Ming explains why kids stutter and how parents can help. Many childhood disfluencies are normal, but stuttering disorder shows up as part-word repetitions, prolongations, and blocks. Parents should avoid finishing sentences, use play-based language activities, and praise smooth speech.
Children who start stuttering at about 3.5 years (three and a half) or later were more likely to continue stuttering.
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Hey, this is ming here from agentsofspeech.com today we want to talk about why does your child stutter? So your child, when he or she stutters, that's actually developmentally acceptable. That's quite a mouthful. But anyways, so when stuttering happens, it may most of the time be normal, okay? You and I stutter all the time, okay? And especially when we're nervous, when we don't know what we're doing, don't know what we're talking about, you know, if we are way out of our head and we're trying to explain something that we're, that's out of our pay grade, you know what I'm saying? Then we will stutter for a bit and we, we get scared and stuff, right? So it is acceptable. And we'll talk about this later. I'll show you article, I'll link it down below as well. And the reason for stuttering is there's a lot of theories. But the theory that I like to refer to and I personally think is rather great because I happen to have a lot of these problems when I was growing up, is that there's a discrepancy between language capabilities and environmental demands. All right? So when you are in a new place and you're learning how to speak a different language or like just people are around, you are speaking so much faster than you, so much better than you, you will study, okay? And this is where a lot of, for instance, I just went, right? Or when I say like a lot, it's a way of thinking and buying time and all that. And it happens a lot that, you know, when language capability isn't as high and you're not as clear minded and the environmental demands are too damn high, you know what I'm saying? Like, so if you're speaking on stage, you're talking to a bunch of people, you're talking to people who you look up to, you are going to sweat and you're going to stutter, okay? So imagine a child who is just learning how to talk and they want to speak and like they want to tell a story to you. They're super excited. They want to talk about what happened at school, whatever. Of course they're going to stutter because the language capabilities aren't high enough to be able to get there. Okay, let's see a bunch of some things from the, from the ASHA website. So ASHA is American Speech Language Hearing association. Okay? So here it says, and I'm just quoting them right here, causes of stutter, right? So There aren't really no known causes for this stuttering. There's a family history of such. Okay. There are brain differences, but we. We don't have enough research to talk about this. Right. Gender. Boys are more likely. It's just a risk factor, not the cause. Age when stuttering began. Right? So children who start studying at age three and a half or later were more likely to continue stuttering. And that's just a fact. That's just a risk. And these are all just risks. Right? So obviously, the best way is to see a professional. Some SLPs, some STs, are specialized in stuttering disfluency disorders, right? I am not one of them. I just know the bare basics to treat and to diagnose. My focus is not in stuttering. And I want to tell you this as well, because your focus shouldn't be in stuttering as well. All right? Why is that? Well, because. Let's see up here. Okay, so the signs and definition. So a lot of the fluencies or stuttering that we happen to us are not stuttering. So stuttering here is used very, very strictly as the disorder term. All right? So when we add a word or sound, like interjection, like I always do, like, like whatever, that's not stuttering. Repeating the words that I do as well. Like when you say cookie, cookies and milk, or repeating phrase, like he is. He is four years old. Those are not stuttering. All right? And also changing the words in the sentence and like, just revising is also not stuttering. These are very typical and normal. Okay? And not finishing a thought is also not stuttering. So there are some stuttering patterns that are what we call pathological meaning. This is what happens when stuttering happens, right? This is what is the symptoms. Okay, so we have part word repetitions. So for instance, if you say, I want a drink, that is more of a stuttering disorder symptom. Okay. Second of all, it might be one word repetitions, like, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go away. Like that. So you might have heard that before. Okay. The third one is like prolonged sounds. Like, Sam is nice. I'm just reading the examples here, right? And the thing that I think is the most prominent in stutterers, if that's the word, is a pause, it's what we call blocks, right? And what happens is that I want to. And they're like, cannot. It's like there's something blocking him from talking. Then the word finally comes out. So these ones are. Let me just change back to. Okay, so these are the symptoms for like stuttering disorder. Okay. And I think that there's one more that happens a lot, and that is facial grimaces. So when they try, like, with they. I mean, like, people who have a disfluency disorder when they stutter is that they will have facial grimaces. They're trying to talk like that. Right? So we see this actually happened a lot with children who have speech disorders, and that is not stuttering. So you need someone professional to see which one is which. Okay. The last thing I want to talk about is the best practices for stuttering. Okay, Best practices. If you see your child is starting to stutter, what should you do? All right, first of all, remember, hey, Ed Sheeran used to stutter like crazy, you know, like, and then he. You know, a lot of people would think. And I also think stuttering is more of a psychological thing. Okay. And what we need to do for children who are, like, developing the language is not to finish their sentences. Let them stutter it out. That's part of the practice as well. Right. So if you help them finish it or correct them or just like that, they won't go through that developmental stage of getting rid of the stuttering. Okay? So just let them. Just let them be because they're already trying. Let them get it out of the system. Okay. Second of all is to have to give them as much language rich as possible and to praise them when they're smooth. Okay? So there's. There's a. There's a protocol that we use in treating younger children. And I'm not gonna say the name here. I'll link it down below. And what we usually do is just that we play with them. We do a lot of language facilitation. And then when they speak in a stuttering manner, then we say, oh, that's a little bumpy. And then when they do do it, like, correctly, then we say, ah. Okay, that's pretty smooth. Okay, that's good job. Okay. So it can be as simple as that. And I think this is something that you can, as a parent, you can do that is good. No matter if your child has stuttering or not, it's good for language as a whole. Okay. Don't overcorrect your child. Don't help them finish sentences. Let them speak it out. Let them stutter it out, if that's the correct term for it. Just let them be this one. Right? And then when they do say it correctly, just tell them and the feedback and praise them. Okay? So that's the last thing I wanted to talk about to you today. Okay. And before we go, you can go to agentsofspeech.com checklist to grab a list of tools and toys that we recommend you to get when you start home therapy. All right? So thank you for tuning in. I'll see you in the next video next week. Bye. Bye.
