Raising a child with Down syndrome

TalkTools uses chewing, sucking and blowing to improve oral motor function. The advocates of this say that if you improve the child's muscular function then their coordination improves too, and that improves speech clarity. I'd put in a caveat, which is that low muscle tone is with a person for life if they have DS, so these programmes work best if you continue them - otherwise the person starts getting sloppy again.   Micah is sloppy sometimes.  And there are professionals who say the whole thing is hogwash, but I don't believe it's hogwash, and good oral motor function is a big health bonus anyway, aside from improving speech clarity. 

The speech and language therapist advised me to get my son away from a bottle and drinking through a straw and from a plain ordinary cup as soon as possible so as to get healthy exercise for his tongue.  That stops tongue thrust and all the consequences described in that essay. She also said: get him chewing hard things by offering them to him in the corners of his mouth so he chews them with his back teeth - whether or not he has any. Especially get him working on the side which is weaker.  Offer food on alternate sides. Examples: start with rice-cakes because they dissolve in the mouth so he doesn't choke. Then: toast; chips; bread-sticks.  I used to make a flour-and-water dough and bake breadsticks really hard.  Of course, there comes a time when your child won't let you stick things in his mouth, but you can make a game of it & get the whole family doing it chewing on the left side and then the right.  After three weeks of that, Micah stopped dribbling.  That was useful. No more thrush infections on his lower jaw.  Less laundry without having to wash all those bibs.  He must have been about three when I did that. Small enough to let me stick a chip in the side of his mouth. 

I tried chew toys from TalkTools but didn't have the patience and was quite happy with breadsticks, although you might want to consider them for your son.  I bought the TalkTools straws and horns and got Micah blowing the horns and whistles each in turn, and drinking progressively thicker and thicker drinks through straws which got progressively longer and thinner, until he could drink a fruit yogurt (no "bits") through a standard cheap supermarket straw (we bought packs of a hundred - some were really thin & ideal to give challenge) because the TalkTools straws were pricey and hard to clean if you let your child drink juice & forgot to rinse then straight away. 

The horns were carefully designed, each one to address a particular muscle weakness, and our kids have them all (the weaknesses, that is), so they might as well learn to blow them all. It also gives confidence and control of breathing.   Some of the Symbol UK speech and language therapists are trained in getting a child to blow properly through those horns.  I started with other blowing games: blowing bits of tissue; blowing bubbles (some mixes and wands make it easier); blowing bubbles in water through a straw.   All those things can be taught as games with My turn, your turn.  We had a wonderful (private) occupational therapist who'd taken herself to get TalkTools training.  She worked with Micah once every three months or so - that was what we could afford - and supervised me and his teaching assistant at school. 

Also, I stopped using teaspoons with Micah. When he fed himself he used a teaspoon (still does) but I used a soup-spoon if I was feeding him. That meant he had to do the work to make the yummy stuff arrive in his mouth. He had to sip and slurp it. Or he had a straw and had to suck it.  Licking out plates and bowls also gives good exercise for the tongue.  Only, it isn't the greatest way to impress the aunties and grandmas.  But it pays off years later when he can tell them what he wants for tea. 

Micah is still doing a lot of stuff on the level of a child half his age. He likes dinosaurs.  And that's ok. Many people in the UK have a reading-age of eight ("The Sun" newspaper) and manage fine.  I think it's best if our kids feel confident and keep making progress at their own speed without feeling they have to do stuff when they aren't ready.  Then when they gain those skills they have them solidly.