Usually, interdental sigmatism is spoken of in the framework of such a speech disorder as dyslalia, but it also occurs in some other cases. Such a violation of pronunciation manifests itself as a symptom in more complex diseases (dysarthria, alalia, cerebral palsy, intellectual deficiency).
To help the child correct interdental sigmatism, the reasons for its occurrence should be identified as accurately as possible. Depending on the nature of the violation, corrective work of the speech therapist is carried out and, if necessary, rehabilitation, adaptation or compensation assistance from medical personnel.
How to fix interdental sigmatism in a child, and what is hidden behind such an unusual name?
What is speech impairment?
All the shortcomings of articulation are systematized depending on the violation of the pronunciation of a certain group of speech sounds. There are seven of them:
- rotacism - distortion of sounds [p] and [p '];
- lambdacism - [l] and [l '];
- sigmatism - [g], [w], [h], [u], as well as [s] - [s '] and [h] - [h'];
- yotacism - [th];
- kappacism - distortion of the posterior sounds [k] - [k '], [g] - [g'], [x] - [x '];
- gammacism - [g] and [g '];
- hitism - [x] and [x '].
As can be seen from the list, sigmatism is the most extensive group. This is due to the proximity of the locations of the listed sounds during pronunciation. So, the sound patterns [s] - [h] and [w] - [g] are the same (they differ only in the presence of a voice in a voiced consonant).
Types of Sigmatism
The considered group of violations is divided into five subgroups:
- Interdental sigmatism - the tongue is in the wrong position between the teeth.
- Dental-dental - pronunciation is done with the help of lips and teeth.
- Lateral - the air stream does not exit through the tip of the tongue, but on the sides.
- Salient - the tongue is pressed to the upper teeth.
- Hissing - the tongue moves back from the front position, which causes distortion of the sound.
- Nasal - the tongue tightens and moves back, presses near the larynx, directing a stream of air upward.
The names of the species indicate the location of the disturbed pronunciation. But despite the variety of disorders, the most common is interdental sigmatism. With him, the sound characteristics [s] are distorted (the whistle disappears and an incomprehensible weak noise is heard) due to the position of the tongue between the teeth. If, with the correct articulatory structure, air passes through the tip of the tongue along the groove that forms on the back of the tongue, then in the distorted position it is absent, contributing to the appearance of noise overtones.
The presence of such a speech impairment in a child or in adults is due to a number of organic and sometimes behavioral reasons. Therefore, the correction of interdental sigmatism should begin with the identification of all adverse factors.
The importance of timely and correct diagnosis
In modern speech therapy, the problem of speech impairment is considered comprehensively by logopsychology, pathopsychology, defectology, speech therapy, sociology. This approach is due to the complexity of the manifestation of speech disorders as a symptom or as a syndrome. It is important to identify it and start the correction as soon as possible.
At the rate of development, a child by the age of three pronounces all vowels and consonants (sonorous [r] and [l] can appear by four years of age - this is not critical), does not lose syllables in spoken words, builds complex sentences. There are diaries (often in the form of notebooks for filling) of development, in which the appearance of all the skills in a child is described in stages, monthly. Parents only need to consult with him periodically, and if some skill is not formed in a timely manner, immediately pay close attention to this and find out the reason. Often a child is brought up at home, so there is no one to tell mom the necessary actions in this situation.
If delays in the development or violation of any functions began to appear, you should contact a specialist (pediatrician, speech therapist, psychologist, if necessary, pediatric neurologist). In 90% of cases, timely correction allows you to forget about the existence of a problem by seven years, and sometimes even earlier. But if you miss this period of development, then you will have to spend much more effort, and the result may be unsatisfactory.
Possible concomitant developmental disorders
Interdental sigmatism can be a symptom of developmental disorders such as an open bite and other abnormal forms of development of the speech apparatus, overgrown adenoids, hypotension of the muscles of the speech muscles (this is how dysarthria manifests). In all these cases, the cause of the speech defect should be eliminated together with the corrective work of the speech therapist. If you ignore diseases, the result of speech therapy work may not be seen.
If the problems of the development of the dentoalveolar system can be corrected by the orthodontist (using plates and special simulators), then the psychiatrist deals with the treatment of dysarthria, which often scares parents. In practice, the revealed dysarthria at the age of three by the age of seven does not manifest itself in any way, provided that it is properly treated and timely correctional care is provided to the child.
Interdental sigmatism is often a concomitant developmental disorder in diseases such as cerebral palsy, intellectual disability, deafness, blindness. In these cases, it all depends on the degree of complexity of the underlying disease (the more complex the form, the less opportunities for correction) and the safety of intelligence. The correction of speech in such children is delayed for many years and reaches a satisfactory level as much as possible.
Correctional work
If a child is diagnosed with speech impairment, in the presence of all the results of the corresponding examination, it is possible and necessary to proceed with the correction. Along the way, all possible pathogenic factors identified at an appointment with specialists are eliminated. Correction of interdental sigmatism is carried out in three stages:
- Preparatory. It implies the formation of positive motivation, the development of sound analysis skills , the preparation of the muscles of the tongue, jaw and lips for making sounds.
- The formation of the correct articulatory structure. This statement, automation and differentiation of sound in syllables, words of different syllabic composition.
- Introduction of sounds into independent speech. Assumes the correct pronunciation of sound in all communication situations.
This is how the correction of sound pronunciation in dyslalia looks like - impaired sound pronunciation against the background of the preservation of hearing and the innervation of the speech apparatus. With the right approach, the correction of interdental sigmatism of wheezing is corrected within three to five months with the correction of 2-3 sounds. But it can last from one to two years, if correction of 6-10 sounds is required.
In the event that interdental sigmatism is a concomitant ailment, then this work is planned in conjunction with the correction of the underlying disease. For example, correction of sound pronunciation in dysarthria will consist of the following steps:
- Preparatory. It takes place against the background of treatment prescribed by doctors, physiotherapy, massage and includes the preparation of the speech apparatus, the development of hearing, the ability to control voice and breathing, and the formation of a dictionary.
- Formation of pronunciation skills. The stage includes correction of violations of the speech apparatus, sound pronunciation, voice apparatus and breathing, the formation of sound analysis and synthesis skills, communication.
In this case, the formation of communication skills occurs in parallel with the first two stages.
Speech Therapy
Exercises for the development of the speech apparatus include training the jaws, lips and tongue. An example of articulatory gymnastics with interdental sigmatism may look as follows.
- “Elephant Smile”: smile with your mouth closed as far as possible, pulling the corners of your lips, and then “put your lips together in a tube” and show how the elephant drinks water with its trunk. Repeat all over again. All exercises are performed 10 times at the same pace (this is very important). You can use the metronome in the classroom.
- “Knead the dough”: massage the wide, relaxed tongue over the entire length with your lips, saying “pah-pah-pya”, then you can do the same with your teeth - “ta-ta-ta”.
- “Pancake”: lips in a smile, wide tongue lies on the lower lip “cools down on the window”. It is important to monitor the statics, to prevent arbitrary movements during the exercise.
- “Fence”: stretch your lips in a smile, combine upper teeth with lower ones, building an even “fence”. It is important to learn to hold the jaw in this position for at least 10 seconds.
- “The cat is angry”: lips in a smile, rest the tip of the tongue in the lower teeth and alternately raise (“the cat arched his back with an arc”) and lower (“the cat calmed down”) the back of the tongue. In this exercise it is very important to maintain rhythm and correlate the movements of the tongue with the movements of the pendulum of the metronome.
- “Swing”: the initial position of the lips is a smile, “the tongue rolls on a swing” at the expense of the metronome. First, the broad tongue with the tip covers the lower lip, and then the upper lip. The movement is repeated, first at a slow pace, up to ten times.
- “We clean the lower teeth”: with the tip of the tongue go over the teeth from the outside, placing the tongue in a “pocket” between the cheek and teeth. The tongue should “brush” all the teeth of the lower jaw. To strengthen the lateral muscles of the tongue, you can do the exercise “clean the upper teeth” (the movements are the same as with the lower teeth).
- “Tube”: raise the lateral parts of the tongue up, and the back - lower it down. You will get a groove through which air is blown for a long time.
Exercises can vary and depending on the structural features of the child’s speech apparatus , add others. It must be remembered that the elimination of interdental sigmatism always begins with speech therapy gymnastics - this is an axiom.
The preparatory phase continues as long as it takes to bring the vocal apparatus into working condition. It implies controllability of the movements of the tongue, jaws, lips, the ability to hold the tongue in a given position for at least five seconds. Only after reaching such a minimum is the transition to the next stage possible.
Sound setting
There are not so many ways to evoke the desired articulation pattern in a child. Only three:
- imitation - performed by showing a speech therapist;
- mechanical - the way is formed using speech therapy probes or items replacing them (usually cotton buds);
- mixed - a combination of the first two methods.
During the production of sound [s] with interdental sigmatism, you can hide the tip of the tongue behind the lower teeth, put a spatula or cotton bud in the middle of the tongue (make a groove) and ask the child to close his teeth with a “fence”. In this position, the child feeds a stream of air forward and controls by ear what sound is pronounced, remembers the correct sound.
This technique is used if the simpler ones did not bring success. Repeat exhalation should be 5-6 times to avoid overwork of the child. After a short break (changing the type of activity), you can return to the statement and consolidate the result. In the future, the reception is carried out with and without a spatula under the tireless control of hearing.
If the pronunciation of all whistling and hissing sounds is violated, then the correction begins with staging [s] with interdental sigmatism. It is very important to “fill with images” the staging process and conduct the lesson, if possible in a playful way. As practice shows, the more visual comparisons a child has in class, the faster the correction takes place.
An effective method is to record the process of the lesson in MP3 format, if possible, you can make a video clip of the lesson, and then discuss with the child what happened and why.
The performance ends only when the child pronounces the sound correctly in any state and any number of times. After that, the correction of the interdental sigmatism of whistlers proceeds to a new stage - automation.
Stages of introducing sound into speech
Automation of any sounds goes along approximately one plan, adhering to the principle “from simple to complex”. The introduction of sounds into speech with interdental whistling sigmatism occurs as follows.
Sound Automation:
- in direct syllables (for example - sa, -so );
- in the opposite syllables (- as, -os );
- in syllables of the intervocal position ( –as, –oso );
- in syllables with a concordance of consonants ( –stra, -arst );
- at the beginning of the word ( son, catfish );
- at the end of the word ( bite, ramp );
- in the middle of the word ( wasp, mustache );
- in words with a concourse of consonants ( construction, mouth );
- in words and sentences ( sauce; the plum garden has become blue );
- in proverbs and tongue twisters;
- in words of complex syllabic construction ( plaques, accomplice ).
It should be noted that the role of parents at this stage is only growing. For the speedy automation of sound, it is very important not to weaken the auditory control for a minute, but this can only be done with the support of significant adults.
Sound correction is carried out at a pace convenient for the child. Some items can take up to ten lessons, and some sound positions can be automated in a couple of sessions.
With interdental sigmatism of hissing sounds, all stages of work with whistling sounds are repeated, with the only difference being that the sound will be set based on the anatomical structure of the child’s speech apparatus and the complexity of the violation.
Speech material
Modern speech therapy has extensive speech material for every age and taste. In addition to collections of tongue twisters, tongue twisters, proverbs, there are various "speech notebooks" designed to help the child in the development of native speech. Selecting material for a specific child will not be difficult.
Parents should take note that if a speech therapist advises you to study for a certain allowance, you should not contrary to a specialist buy notebooks in “walking distance” stores. Mom and dad’s mood for a child to achieve certain results is half the success, and joint activities with a speech therapist, as a rule, are success.
Conclusion
No matter how "scary" and unusual the speech therapy terms may sound, you should not be afraid of them. Most of them are of Latin or Greek origin, so their melody is not very pleasantly perceived.
As for the emergence of progress in logopathic children of different ages, then without the support of parents, their control and stimulation, the child will not be able to achieve success.