Family, Feelings and Fun: Apraxia

Hey,

The first thing I'm going to cover is apraxia which is not common for kids with Down Syndrome. I'm only covering it because Aaron just got lucky and has it.

There are 2 main types of apraxia there is acquired apraxia and there is developmental. Aaron has developmental. Developmental apraxia of speech, or as I'm going to call it because other wise it is way to long DAS, occurs in children and is present from birth. It appears to affect more boys than girls. This speech disorder goes by several other names, including developmental verbal apraxia, developmental verbal dyspraxia, articulatory apraxia, and childhood apraxia of speech. DAS is different from what is known as a developmental delay of speech, in which a child follows the "typical" path of speech development but does so more slowly than normal. Children with DAS have problems because they can't get all there muscles working at the right time to produce speech. It's very hard for them to get all the muscles in there mouth and breathing to work right. There brain just can't cordinate all that. I can tell when Aaron is really trying to get the words out and sometimes he is succcesful in doing it. His best words are bye, go, Dad and yellow. Since he needs a way to communicate we teach him sign language using.....

Signing Time, a great fun video that teaches kids basics signs. He does quite well in learning signs he probably knows more than me. I often have to look up a sign because he is signing it to me and I have no idea what it means. ( I really need to catch up)

Mom also made little cards. These are to help with language development and beginning reading. So he matches the picture, he will sign whats in the picture and then go and...