Noah's Speech Language Evaluation

It is funny. Noah is so smart and yet there are many concepts he cannot grasp. Today at the speech language pathologist office:

For example...when asked "how are apples grapes alike?" he would say "cause they both have stems" instead of something like "they are both fruits". While his answer is correct it obviously was not the more obvious answer she was looking for. He thinks of things differently than we do.

When asked "how are red and yellow alike?" he would answer "you mix red and yellow to get orange and they are both paints"...instead of "they are both colors". Again he is correct but she was looking for what makes the items alike.

When asked "what makes 1 and 5 alike?" he would say "if you add 1 and 5 you get 6". Not "they are both numbers".

When asked "how are shoes and socks alike?" he would say "cause you have to put your sock on before you can put on your shoe" instead of saying "they both go on your feet".

When asked "how is a cup and glass alike?" he would not say "because they are both something you drink out of".

When asked to describe what an ocean was he proceeded to name all 5 oceans in the world. She asked him again to describe them and he said "they were like big ponds."

When asked to give answers on some questions he was trying to find the answers in the therapist's book. She told him to go ahead and look as the answer was not there. However....little did she know...in a matter of 2 seconds he DID find the answer and she started laughing and said "wow you are just too smart!" Apparently her book had the letters of the correct answers and in a group of let's say 4 objects Noah would have to find the correct object the woman was giving the word of. Just by glancing in her book over her shoulder and reading what was there he saw the answers quickly.

BUT prior to that he got in his mind since there would only be ONE CORRECT answer that he needed to look for the object that was different from the others would probably be the correct answer! Amazing.....and correct most instances but sometimes not as let's say when she asked him to show her the picture of a "vine" there were several close examples like leaves, flowers, vine and tree branch. This was a bit more confusing to him then as the objects were all too similar. However, he knows what vines are as if she would have asked "what does Tarzan swing by?" he would quickly have answered "VINES!". hahahah.

Anyway.....he found the letter to the correct answer for that one question so the therapist had to hide her book after that. He is pretty sly when it comes to getting correct answers on things and figuring out things.

SO concepts and how things are alike are difficult for Noah to verbalize....but he can show you very quickly how things are the same visually and his sequencing is off the charts as is his memory. AND while he knows an apple and a banana are both fruits he cannot TELL you that is what makes them alike. He does not get that at all!

He still has problems with articulation and with "s", "sh", "f", "th", "ch", "r", "j", "l" and blends. So this places him in the moderate to severe delay range.

His language comprehension is average range. His fluency/voice is normal.

His language expression where he had to "organize his thoughts" and use syntax is in the moderate to severe delay range.

SO many of the things he had issues with 3 years ago when he was evaluated by this same speech language pathologist, he still has not made much improvement on. When asked to slow down and really be more definitive with his talking he does better. He can say his "s" very very well now without prompting but combining it with other letters like SH is hard for him. OR he will use S when he should be using a C.

The speech language pathologist understood 50-75% of what Noah said during conversation but it all depended on his articulation errors and speed he talked and how he will still add jargon in between when he does not know what words to insert to make a complete sentence. So odd as he can read very very well!

SO...he is scheduled to receive at least 20 individual therapy sessions. I have to make arrangements for that next. BUT that is a huge start and improvement when we originally were told he could receive NO speech therapy as he was over 5 years of age! SO we are thankful about this! She really feels he can sit long enough now to benefit from the therapy and we think he could too.