Why does my Speech Therapist want to see my child eat?

Have you had an evaluation with an SLP or started speech therapy and your therapist has asked you about your child’s eating or asked to have a snack with them? Are these related? YES! There is a reason we like to look at snacks and their skills when eating.  It gives us so much information about their ability to move their tongue and lips.  While the movement patterns are slightly different, we use the same muscles and body parts for feeding and speech!

During a snack, these are a few of the things we are looking at from a feeding/speech perspective:

–Lips

• Do they use their lips to clear a spoon?
• Do they keep their lips closed while chewing?
• Can they round their lips on the straw and use them appropriately on a cup?

–Tongue

• Does their tongue move foods to their molars for chewing?
• Does the tongue move front/back or mash the foods on the roof of their mouth?
• Do we see the tongue with straw drinking or swallowing?
• Can they use their tongue to clear foods from their cheeks or lips after swallowing?

–Cheeks

• Do they take appropriate sized bites or stuff all the foods into their cheeks/mouth?
• Do they clean out the cheeks after a swallow or is there food left in?
• When they drink from a straw or cup, do they use their cheek muscles as expected?

–Teeth/Jaw

• What does their chewing look like?
• Can they bite through a variety of textures easily?
• Does their jaw slide/jut forward when they are eating?
• What teeth do they have/not have?
• How do their teeth line up?

These are just a few things we are looking at in a short “snack” with your child that give us information on their ability to move the same body parts and use the same muscles that we use for speech! We often see kids that come in with difficulties with sounds, but find that they actually could benefit from more oral motor skills for feeding as well.  Also, a lot of our kids are motivated and hungry during our sessions, so we use this as an opportunity to work on a variety of movements and language with this!  So, YES! It is very helpful for us to see your child eat to give us more information about their skills in other areas that relate to their speech to help with therapy and planning! Don’t be surprised when we ask you when we see you next if we haven’t already!

-Amber-