I am looking for some type of curriculum or good website that will help me teach my daughter proper pronounciation/speech techniques. I've seen some online, but none that explain to me how to explain to her how to make the sounds with her mouth. Mostly looking for v, r, and th's. Thanks!!

Not really any help, but maybe some encouragement?? I see your daughter is 5 years old. My daughter had trouble with th, and once she learned to read, a lot of that problem disappeared, because she could see how the word was spelled and then her pronunciation improved. We also used a mirror, and I showed her that her tongue needed to be between her top and bottom teeth so that she could see it in the mirror when she wanted to make the th sound.

As to the r, this is one of the latest developing sounds. I had two of my older kids in speech therapy, and the therapist told me that r may need until age 7 to develop. Speech therapists don't consider it a "problem" until age 7.

Sorry I don't remember anything about v!

HTH,
Michelle

I used a program called Straight Talk with my daughter to help her learn to say some sounds that she couldn't master. She was 6 or 7 and had trouble with sh/ch/j/r/s. Using this manual (combined with my understanding of phonetics - I studied it in college) we fixed the sh/ch/j problem. Even with the manual and my background, though, I didn't feel comfortable teaching her about s and r - in both cases, I couldn't figure out when to say "good enough" and when to expect further improvement. So I hired a professional.

The good thing about th and v is that they're very easy to explain, since they're formed at the front of the mouth. I don't know what you need to know and what you've figured out already, but V is formed with the top teeth against the bottom lip, and uses the vocal cords. (Can she say f? It's formed the same way with the mouth, but v uses the vocal cords and f doesn't.) Th is made with the tongue against the top teeth.

One thing Straight Talk didn't address is the emotional aspect of speech difficulties. I feel like I could have saved my daughter some distress if the book had pointed out some pitfalls to me. For example, I thoughtlessly let her see the long list of sounds that she wasn't pronouncing properly.

My guess is that you should be able to help her with v and th by using Straight Talk, but you may have troubles with r.

http://www.nathhan.com/straight.htm

I googled speech therapy for children and got a really good website that showed how to teach certain sounds, written for the parent. It had tips like gently touching the check/jaw for certain sounds, have the child look in the mirror as they say it, etc. I found this website sometime last year... I have a cat sleeping on my lap or I'd go get the print out now.

It helped, but ultimately we still have an appt set for a professional evaluation to make sure there is nothing physically wrong that we are missing. That was after his regular doctor screened and referred him. Good luck, and share if you find anything.

Oh, I also remember that making the sounds in play is good practice - rrrr, is the sound lion makes, or a car vroom. But that doesn't really fly if they aren't even close to making the sound. I've found out anyway.

Thanks so much for leading me to Straight Talk. I think her problems are mostly minor, so hopefully that will work....and if not, we'll go from there. My husband pointed out that one session with a therapist would probably cost more than this program, so it is most likely worth it.

Your husband has a very good point I will discuss it with mine tonight. We've waited several months for the evaluation, so we will probably still do that...but we may consider Straight Talk in lieu of Speech Therapist at his age (4).

I have a dd that is 6 with a severe speech delay. But thank God, she is making progress. She has Apraxia, and sees a private speech therapist. They recommended that I go to www.linguisystems.com to order some supplemental material to work on at home. They have some games and computer programs that are fun and don't feel like work. Also, many of their workbooks are very fun cut and paste type stuff. Hope this helps.
Ann