Functional dyslalia. What is dyslalia: how to distinguish it? What types of dyslalia require treatment and correction?

Dyslalia is a violation of sound pronunciation with intact hearing and intelligence. Incorrect pronunciation with dyslalia manifests itself in the absence, confusion or substitution of sounds, which leads to speech distortion. This deviation is considered a natural phenomenon for the speech development of children aged from birth to five years due to the physiological immaturity of the articulatory apparatus.

There is a nuance here: if a child is three years old, then he must clearly pronounce the sounds [s], [z], [ts], if four - [w], [zh], [h], [sch], five - [l ]. Problems with pronunciation in a child over 5 years old (absence, incorrect pronunciation, for example, the tongue is between the teeth when pronouncing sounds [s], [z], [ts]; replacing them with others, for example, s-sh, z-zh, ch-t is a reason for an urgent visit to a speech therapist.)

When diagnosing dyslalia, a specialist examines the state of phonemic processes, general and manual motor skills, and the structure and mobility of the speech apparatus. To restore normal sound pronunciation in a child, you may need to consult other specialists - a dentist, otolaryngologist, neurologist.

Without special training, it is difficult to determine the causes of dyslalia and select corrective exercises that correspond to the structure of the defect, so parents of children with this pathology are rarely able to correct their child’s pronunciation on their own. It is best to address this problem to a specialist who knows corrective techniques. For example, there are about 50 ways to produce the sound P, each of which can be either effective or useless for a particular child with such a defect.

Below we will tell you what dyslalia is in children and what methods of eliminating it exist (sometimes the term “treat” is used, but this is not entirely correct).

Types of dyslalia

Depending on the cause of the disorder, the following types of dyslalia are distinguished:

1. The functional form is characterized by age-related immaturity of the articulatory apparatus. The muscles of the tongue, lips, and soft palate are not yet strong enough to perform the precisely coordinated movements necessary to pronounce individual sounds. This form of dyslalia also occurs in children who are in contact with adults or children with speech defects, with “lisping” parents, in families where the child’s speech development is not given due attention.
2. Functional dyslalia, in turn, is divided into acoustic-phonemic, articulatory-phonemic and articulatory-phonetic forms. In the first case, the perception and reproduction of sounds according to acoustic characteristics (hard-soft, dull-voiced) is impaired; in the second, some of them are replaced by phonemes similar in articulation (machine-masina, ryaba-lyaba). In the articulatory-phonetic form of dyslalia, the distortion of correct pronunciation is caused by incorrect positions of the organs of articulation (burring).
3. Mechanical (organic) dyslalia occurs as a result of a violation of the structure of the speech apparatus - a narrow and high “Gothic” palate, a short frenulum of the tongue, which prevents the articulation of sounds of the upper instep and other defects. This form of the defect may be hereditary. Quite often, physiological dyslalia is diagnosed simultaneously with the mechanical type.

There are concepts of simple and complex dyslalia. When making a diagnosis, monomorphic dyslalia is distinguished, which includes a minimum number of simple pronunciation defects and a polymorphic variety. Polymorphic dyslalia is based on impaired articulation and discrimination of a large number of sounds.

Classification of dyslalia depending on articulation distortion:

• Rhotacism is characterized by incorrect pronunciation of hard and soft [r].
• Yotacism is a defect in the pronunciation of yot [j].
• Hitism is the incorrect pronunciation of hard and soft [x].
• Kappacism - impaired pronunciation of hard and soft [k].
• Gammacism - impaired pronunciation of hard and soft [g].
• Sigmatism is a violation of the articulation of whistling and hissing sounds [s, z, c, g, w, h, sch].
• Lambdacism is a defect in the pronunciation of hard and soft [l].

Causes of speech impairment

Organic and mechanical dyslalia develops under the influence of a physical defect in the articulatory apparatus, which prevents the correct pronunciation of sounds.

In most cases, this diagnosis is given to those children who have problems in the structure of the speech apparatus:

• cleft of the hard palate - “cleft palate”;
• cleft of the upper jaw - “cleft lip”;
• malocclusion - progenia or prognathia;
• absence of teeth, their incorrect location, distances between teeth;
• short hypoglossal ligament (“frenulum”);
• tongue that is too large or too small (macro- and microglossia);
• abnormal structure of the maxillofacial bones;
• underdevelopment of the lower jaw.

To eliminate a speech defect in the presence of one of the possible pathological conditions, the patient needs comprehensive assistance from various specialists.

Causes of functional dyslalia:

• weakness of the child caused by somatic and infectious diseases;
• violation of phonetic perception;
• MMD, history of mental development delay;
• delayed speech development;
• unfavorable social environment: pedagogical neglect, close contact with speakers of incorrect speech, limited contacts with society.

Symptoms of the disorder

An adult can easily notice deviations from the norm in the perception and reproduction of sounds by children, although in the practice of a speech therapist there are more often cases when parents do not notice all the deviations in their child’s pronunciation.

When replacing sounds, children do not distinguish similar phonemes by sound and replace one sound with another. Most often, symptoms manifest as tongue-tiedness. For example, a child confuses deaf and voiced consonants, soft and hard (tree-tree, paw-blooper). If the difference in articulation is insignificant, and the sounds are formed in the same place, for example: instead of [P], [L] or [D] may sound (fish - lyba), instead of C - CH (chicken - chipling), etc. .

Sometimes a child has difficulty choosing a sound, although he can pronounce it correctly in individual words (Shapka speaks, but makes mistakes kaSya in the word porridge), that is, the same sound is pronounced differently depending on the situation. In some cases, children pronounce the sounds of the Russian language in a way atypical for the language system - throat (French) [P], specific [Z], similar to the English the.

Substitutions and confusion of phonemes refer to phonemic defects, distortion of sounds - to phonetic types of pathology.

Diagnosis of speech disorders

To identify defective sounds, the speech therapist asks the child to repeat the words after him or her to name what is shown in the picture. This material is selected in such a way that it covers all groups of sounds. Moreover, the sound must be in different positions: at the beginning, at the end, and in the middle of the word, soft and hard consonants are also taken into account.

Parents should prepare for the fact that the speech therapist may need information about the presence or absence of pathologies of pregnancy and childbirth. The specialist may prescribe additional examinations from other specialists (vision, hearing, mental development tests). When a child is diagnosed with hearing loss, in addition to a speech therapist, he will need the help of an otolaryngologist.

Diagnostics includes a number of phonemic tests that are aimed at testing the ability to distinguish sounds that are close in pronunciation. In the mechanical form of the pathology, it is impossible to get rid of the defect in the pronunciation of certain sounds unless the source of their appearance is eliminated. Therefore, the treatment of dyslalia begins with this.

Methods for correcting dyslalia

No qualified speech therapist corrects all sounds at the same time. First, the sound that is basic for a group of phonemes is subject to correction. If the articulation of several groups is impaired, they start with the group of phonemes that appears in a person earlier according to age norms.

Basic sounds for different groups:

• S - for whistling, then Z, S', Z', Ts;
• Ш – for hissing ones, then Zh, Ch, Shch;
• K – for back-lingual speakers, then G.H. Kj, Gj, Kh.

Stages of sound production:

1. preparatory;
2. staging;
3. automation of phonemes in syllables, words, phrases, sentences, coherent speech;
4. differentiation of mixed or replaced sounds.

The minimum number of classes with a speech therapist for dyslalia is 2 classes per week. Every day, parents should consolidate the material studied with the teacher by completing assignments. The expected result is visible only after 2–3 months of work, this period depends on the age of the child, the structure of the defect, the number of disturbed sounds, the regularity of classes, parents’ homework, and the qualifications of the speech therapist.

Preparatory stage

At this stage, the articulatory apparatus is prepared for the perception and reproduction of the phoneme.

Areas of work:

• practicing speech breathing;
• development of phonemic hearing;
• practicing the correct articulatory structure of the speech apparatus;
• work on fine motor skills;
• practicing reference sounds.

The child, under the guidance of a speech therapist, learns and practices a set of articulation exercises that train the movements of the lips, tongue, cheeks, soft palate, and lower jaw. They are joined by exercises to practice a directed air stream. At the same time, through various exercises, the baby develops perception, memory, attention, thinking, general and fine motor skills.

Staging

At this stage, all achievements in mastering correct articulation, directed air flow, and voice are combined. There is a playful way of producing sound, a conscious way of imitation, and a mechanical way of placing the organs of articulation in the desired position using special tools. The speech therapist avoids naming the sound he is working on with the child, so that an old, incorrect stereotype does not become entrenched in the child’s mind. The result of this stage is the child’s correct pronunciation of the sound without any help.

Automation

To consolidate a given sound in speech, it is first practiced either in open syllables in combination with the vowels A, O, U, Y (la, cha, ly, shi), or in closed syllables (as, ar, ats, esh). Next, the sound is placed in a position between two vowels (asha, ushu, ozo, uzu), in syllables with several consonants nearby (shka, sku, tla, rba).

After automation in syllables, it is the turn of sound automation at the beginning, end, and middle of a word. Each word or picture name is spoken up to 5 times and this lesson is repeated at home. At the beginning of automation, the sound being worked on is slightly emphasized by the strength of the voice and the duration of pronunciation, then this technique is not used.

After practicing the sound in words, speech material is selected for its automation in sentences, poems, prose, and ordinary speech.

Differentiation

At this stage, the child is taught to distinguish the sounds he mixes and pronounce them correctly. The speech therapist draws his attention to the difference in the position of the organs of articulation when pronouncing sounds that are similar acoustically and in terms of motor characteristics, and to distinguish them by ear.

Differentiation occurs sequentially - sounds are distinguished first in isolation, then in syllables, in words, in phrases and sentences.

Parents need to remember that underdevelopment of phonemic hearing will develop during schooling into complex pathologies such as dyslexia (reading impairment) and dysgraphia (writing impairment). Their correction is much more complex and time-consuming than the correction of dyslalia. Speech disorders negatively affect the development of memory, attention, thinking, and speech hearing, so parents of a child with defective pronunciation should seek professional help as early as possible.

In medical terminology, dyslalia is a disorder of sound pronunciation, which combines many different deviations in the development of the speech apparatus, both organic and functional; a distinctive feature is the absence of any hearing impairments and the presence of mobility of the organs of the speech apparatus, even taking into account the impairments.

Due to defects in the speech apparatus, it becomes difficult for a person to articulatory correctly pronounce various sounds [r], [w], [z], [s], [l], etc. According to statistics, various types of dyslalia occur in every second person who consults a specialist . These deviations are especially common before the age of 6 years. In the absence of timely treatment, dyslalia can lead to impaired written speech and the development of other developmental disorders (the child will not be able to read and write).

The table will help you understand more clearly the types of forms of dyslalia.

Depending on the pathology of sound reproduction, dyslalia is classified into:

• acoustic;
• articulatory;
• phonetic;
• phonemic.

As a result, according to the nature of the sound defect, forming, for example, articulatory-phonemic dyslalia, when the patient has incorrect placement of the speech apparatus when pronouncing a sound and phonemic hearing and perception are impaired. This makes it difficult to correctly distinguish the sounds you hear. There is a mixing and replacement of vowels and consonants in speech.

Phonetic defects are divided according to the letters with which there are problems. The names come from the Greek alphabet:

• Hitism - problems with the sounds [x] and [x’].
• Yotacism - [th].
• Lambdacism - [l] and [l’].
• Kappacism - [k] and [k’].
• Rotacism - [p] and [p’].
• Sigmatism - all hissing and whistling [zh], [h], [sh], [z], etc.
• Gammatism [g] and [g’].
• Defects in voicing, deafening.
• Defects in softening and hardness.

Dyslalia is also divided into simple (monomorphic dyslalia) and complex (polymorphic dyslalia). In the first case, violations are observed only in one sound group, for example, among [з], [с], [ц]. With the polymorphic type, there are problems with the pronunciation of several different groups of letters at once, for example, [ш], [к]. This is observed more often with the organic form of dyslalia. According to statistics, complex dyslalia in preschool children is much more common than simple dyslalia.

In the final conclusion, the patient’s diagnosis may look like this: “sensory acoustic-phonemic dyslalia” or “mechanical articulatory-phonetic rhotacism.” As a rule, doctors say simply: rotacism, lambdacism, and then write down on the card what caused it and what exactly the problem is (with the perception of sounds or their pronunciation).

Reasons for appearance

After we have examined the definition of dyslalia and its varieties, let’s move on to the factors influencing its occurrence. According to its form, the causes of dyslalia are divided into organic (mechanical, anatomical) and functional.

In the first case, pronunciation defects appear due to the anatomically incorrect structure of the speech apparatus. As a rule, such deviations are inherited (the structure of the speech apparatus and its organs). With functional dyslalia, a person experiences disturbances in the functioning of the brain.

In most cases, speech problems arise due to anatomical changes in the lips and tongue.

If a person has bone abnormalities (bad bite, high palate, small teeth, etc.), then he has physiological dyslalia. It is a genetic disorder and is passed from parents to children. In some cases, it occurs after serious injuries to the jaw.

Sensory and motor functional dyslalia occurs only due to social and biological reasons.

Social reasons include:

• surrounding society with incorrect speech;
• “lisping” with a child (deliberately incorrect pronunciation of letters when speaking);
• simultaneous use of two languages ​​in one environment (bulingualism);
• neglect of the child in upbringing.

Among the biological factors noted:

• delayed speech development;
• incorrect formation of phonemic hearing;
• high pain in the child.

The main forms of dyslalia appear precisely because of these reasons. Children under the age of 6 are most susceptible, since they are still learning and all actions are repeated after adults. Because of this, it is so important that the baby is surrounded by people with good speech and correct diction.

Main symptoms

As you know, any deviation is much easier to correct at the initial stage of development. Motor functional dyslalia and its other types are much easier to cure when articularly incorrect placement of the speech apparatus has not become entrenched in the subconscious.

Among the most obvious symptoms are:

• skipping letters in words (machine - maina);
• replacement of sounds (cow - cola);
• extraneous sounds during pronunciation when they are not required (wheezing, hissing, etc.);
• lack of hardness, softness, sonority, deafness in words;
• periodic incorrect use of letters in words and the use of the correct version every other time;
• mixing two sounds into one.

Sensory and motor functional dyslalia, impairs the pronunciation of 1-4 letters of the alphabet. While with a physiological defect in a person, more than 4 sounds are disrupted.

After the first symptoms appear, you need to contact a speech therapist for a thorough examination. It accurately determines what form of dyslalia a person has, mechanical or functional, articular or acoustic, phonemic or phonetic dyslalia, etc. The quality and speed of treatment depends on the correct diagnosis.

Treatment

After studying the terminology, you can move on to methods for eliminating dyslalia. Initially, you need to establish the cause of the defects in a person. The causes of dyslalia will help in determining the right treatment path.

Mechanical dyslalia is initially corrected by surgery. At this stage, all anatomical defects that interfere with the normal functioning of the speech apparatus are corrected. In most cases, the operation is performed on adults after trauma to the oral organs.

In some cases, organic (mechanical) dyslalia cannot be cured with surgery. In this case, all adjustment comes down to the speech therapist working with the patient using corrective exercises.

Difficulties in overcoming problems with spoken speech are observed if there is complex dyslalia in preschool children with complications of more than 4 sound groups.

In this variant, the child, as a rule, has a disorder of phonemic hearing. Therefore, children are first taught to correctly perceive and distinguish sounds, and only then pronounce them. It is especially important that correct speech surrounds the child not only in classes with a speech therapist, but also at home in the social circle.

Due to the fact that dyslalia is a rather broad concept, we can only recommend general exercises for speech development. After all, the treatment of lambdacism, rotacism, and sigmatism is very different from each other in principles and exercises. Different sounds use their own articulation techniques. And each sound is individual. Dyslalia in children and methods for eliminating it are of great interest to parents. The main exercises are to develop the speech apparatus. For this use:

• articulation gymnastics;
• development of hearing sensitivity;
• speech therapy massage;
• development of micromotor skills;
• techniques for proper breathing when speaking.

After completing these basics, the articulation of a certain sound occurs. To do this, first use additional help in the form of probes, sticks, fingers, etc.

At the final stage, correct constant pronunciation in speech is trained. To do this, they read books, talk, learn rhymes and sing songs.

Classes with a speech therapist to correct dyslalia should be carried out regularly, two to three times a week. It is important that children also complete all tasks assigned by the speech therapist at home. On average, full treatment takes from 1 month to six months. In adults, this period can be significantly reduced, since it is much easier for them to follow the instructions of a speech therapist.

The easiest way to prevent the development of speech defects is to do simple exercises every day:

• Move your tongue: left, right, clockwise and counterclockwise, reach towards your nose and chin.
• Perform the “mushroom” position - suck your tongue to the roof of your mouth and open and close your mouth.
• Move your lips: up, down, smile, be sad, vibrate them, stretch them as far as possible into the tube.
• Maximum opening and closing of the mouth to warm up the jaw ligaments.
• Pronouncing tongue twisters.

Treatment and exercise characteristics vary from case to case, and the same techniques may not be suitable for different patients. Dyslalia is a fairly common sound pronunciation disorder; with timely treatment, you can completely get rid of it and enjoy free communication.

– defects in sound pronunciation caused by impaired functioning of the cortical sections of the speech motor or speech-auditory analyzer or improper speech education. It manifests itself as motor (distortion) or sensory (mixing, substitution) inaccuracy in the pronunciation of phonemes. The form of dyslalia and its type is established during a speech therapy examination. Primary attention is paid to assessing the formation of speech praxis and phonemic processes. Correction of functional speech deficiencies is aimed at the formation of articulatory structures and phonetic-phonemic processes, the creation of a favorable speech environment.

General information

As a separate speech pathology, functional tongue-tie was first identified by phoniatrist professor M. Seaman in 1955. In speech therapy, functional disorders of sound pronunciation are contrasted with mechanical dyslalia, caused by organic disturbances in the structure of the peripheral speech organs, and dysarthria, associated with disorders of their innervation. In the functional form of dyslalia, anatomical defects and innervation insufficiency are absent; inaccuracy in the pronunciation of phonemes is associated with incomplete maturation of the central speech apparatus or with educational gaps. Untimely uncorrected defects in articulation and phonemic hearing subsequently serve as the basis for the formation of writing and reading disorders.

Causes of functional dyslalia

In children with the speech problem under consideration, the structure of the peripheral speech apparatus is normal, the innervation of the articulatory muscles is not impaired, and physical hearing is preserved. The detected pronunciation defects are caused by disruption of neurodynamic processes in the cerebral cortex. Functional dyslalia can be caused by both biological and social (pedagogical) factors:

• Biological background. Includes delayed psycho-speech development, somatic weakness of the child due to frequent infectious diseases, chronic pathologies, hypovitaminosis, nutritional disorders (dystrophies). Violation of general physical development predetermines a neurodynamic deficit, which is expressed in the weakening of subtle differentiations in the speech-auditory or speech-motor analyzer. Articulatory movements are inaccurate, speech kinesthesia is unclear, phonemic hearing is underdeveloped.
• Social prerequisites. These include cases of improper education of children’s speech: parents’ imitation of the babbling pronunciation of a preschooler, the child’s assimilation of defective patterns of adult speech (burr, blurred sound, dialect features). The development of children's speech is negatively affected by being in a bilingual environment - in this case, the features of sound pronunciation that are normative for one language can be transferred to another, where they are not the norm. Finally, the cause of dyslalia may be a late visit to a speech therapist or pedagogical neglect, when adults do not pay attention to defective pronunciation and do not participate in the development of the child’s speech.

Pathogenesis

The mechanism of occurrence of functional dyslalia is associated with an imbalance and weakness in the dynamics of nervous processes in the brain. The cortical sections of the speech-auditory and speech-motor systems are without pathology, but the balance of excitation and inhibition in them is disturbed and uncoordinated. The nature of the leading defect is determined by the localization of disturbances in cortical neurodynamics. If this phenomenon affects the center of motor realization of speech (Broca's area), predominantly motor failure occurs: the reproduction of phonemes is primarily affected, and speech hearing is secondary. When neurodynamic disorders are localized in the sensory speech area (Wernicke's center), the primary defect is deficiencies in sound perception and sound discrimination; Against this background, confusions and substitutions of phonemes occur in expressive speech.

Classification

Based on the pathogenetic approach, which takes into account the predominance of speech-auditory or speech-motor insufficiency, three forms of functional dyslalia are distinguished: motor, sensory and mixed. This classification considers the psychophysiological mechanisms of speech that are disturbed in the child and require speech therapy correction in the first place:

• Motor dyslalia. It is caused by the insufficient readiness of the articulation organs to perform complex speech-motor acts: holding the tongue and lips in the desired position, switching from one articulation to another. As a result of motor awkwardness and undifferentiated movements of the speech organs, instead of correct sound pronunciation, a defective one is fixed.
• Sensory dyslalia. Caused by underdevelopment of speech hearing, leading to difficulty recognizing and distinguishing oppositional sounds. With this form of tongue-tiedness, the phonemic system of the language is not formed.
• Sensorimotor (mixed) dyslalia. Motor and sensory acts are closely interconnected, so combined disorders may be the basis of defective pronunciation. Thus, with sensory insufficiency, the formation of sound kinesthesia suffers, and inaccurate pronunciation, in turn, negatively affects the development of auditory differentiation.

In addition to the nature of functional shifts in the central link of speech formation, the classification takes into account the leading defect - phonetic or phonemic. In accordance with this criterion, dyslalia is divided into several types:

• Acoustic-phonemic. It is based on the child’s inability to distinguish acoustically similar phonemes by ear. Defects in sound pronunciation are represented either by the absence of sounds, or by their mixing or replacement. All sounds are pronounced normally and are not distorted.
• Articulatory-phonemic. The normative articulatory base has not been formed, so instead of the correct ones, the child uses articulatory sounds that are simpler or closer. Based on the similarity of phonemes in place or method of formation, their replacements or confusions arise.
• Articulatory-phonetic. The disorders affect the phonetic level of speech with complete preservation of phonemic processes. It manifests itself as sound distortions - the use of incorrect versions of a particular sound in speech. Complete absence of sound is rare.

Symptoms of functional dyslalia

Various forms of tongue-tiedness have common manifestations, however, each of them is characterized by its own special set of symptoms. The lack of development of speech skills is expressed in the replacement of sounds with similar articulation or acoustic properties, confusion (unstable use), distortion (abnormal pronunciation) or absence. Only consonants are affected; pronunciation and distinction of vowels remains correct. The disorder may affect individual sounds within one phonetic group or different groups of sounds (sonorant, whistling and hissing). Soft and hard sounds are equally affected.

In the acoustic-phonemic variant, sounds are identified incorrectly, which is accompanied by incorrect perception of the word (instead of “barrel” - “kidney”, instead of “mountain” - “bark”). The child mixes and replaces phonemes that are similar in acoustic characteristics (voiced and unvoiced, hard and soft, sonorants (r-l), hissing and whistling). Rarely is there a complete absence of a particular phoneme due to the fact that the child does not distinguish it audibly either in the speech of others or in his own speech.

The articulatory-phonemic form of dyslalia can occur in two ways. In the first case, due to the immaturity of articulatory structures, the child uses sounds that are simpler in articulation. In another option, despite mastering all articulatory positions, the child confuses the position of the tongue and lips, pronouncing words either correctly or incorrectly. Substitutions and mixtures concern sounds that are close in the method or place of formation: hissing and whistling (roof - “rat”), plosive anterior and posterior lingual (“Tolya” - “Kolya”), hard and soft pairs of sounds (“mal” " - "crumpled"), sonorants ("hand" - "luka"), affricate ("heron" - "chaplya").

Pronunciation defects in the articulatory-phonetic form are represented by various types of rhotacism, sigmatism, lambdacism, inaccuracy in the pronunciation of palatal sounds (kappacism, gammacism, chitism, iotacism). The incorrect version of the sound (allophone) is close in sound to the normalized one, therefore it is easily recognized by others (for example, a burry “r”). Distorted articulation is firmly fixed in the child’s phonetic memory and does not disappear on its own, but does not in any way affect writing.

Complications

Defective pronunciation, first of all, affects the communicative function: peers have difficulty understanding the speech of a child with disabilities, ridicule and imitate him. This can have a very negative impact on mental health, causing isolation, neurotic disorders, and deviant behavior in children. Functional dyslalia, namely its acoustic-phonemic and articulatory-phonemic forms, causes difficulties in sound analysis and synthesis, which in school years is manifested by errors in writing (dysgraphia) and reading (dyslexia). The child makes mistakes both when writing from dictation and when writing creative works - essays, presentations. The consequence of this is poor performance in humanities subjects, which further aggravates social rejection and withdrawal into oneself.

Diagnostics

Determination of the form of dyslalia (mechanical, functional) and the type of the latter is carried out as part of a consultation with a speech therapist. The data obtained during speech therapy diagnostics are of key importance for planning tactics of correctional and pedagogical intervention. During diagnostics, material and tasks appropriate to the age of the subject are used.

• History taking. It is carried out during a conversation with adults - parents or other representatives of the child. The main questions of interest concern the course of the antenatal period, pre-linguistic and speech development of the child, diseases suffered in early childhood, the presence of pronunciation defects and bilingualism in the family. The speech therapist may ask you to provide opinions from a neurologist, otolaryngologist, or pediatrician about the child’s health condition.
• Speech motor assessment. To examine articulatory praxis, the child is asked to perform a number of special exercises: open and close his mouth, stretch his lips into a tube and stretch them into a smile, stick out a wide and narrow tongue, etc. At the same time, volume, accuracy, activity, pace of movements, and muscle tone are assessed.
• Sound pronunciation survey. The child is asked to name the objects shown in the pictures. Didactic material is selected in such a way that the sound presented is in different positions: at the beginning, middle and end of words. This reveals the nature of the defective sound pronunciation: replacement, omission, mixing, distortion of sounds.
• Phonemic hearing test. At this stage, special attention is paid to checking the differentiation of phonemes that are similar in sound or articulation. The child is asked to repeat the syllables (sa-sha, da-ta) after the speech therapist, and is presented with pictures depicting objects denoted by words with oppositional consonants.

The differential diagnosis of functional dyslalia and erased dysarthria can be a practical difficulty - with the latter, there is also blurred and unclear articulation, but pareticism or dystonia of the muscles, disturbances in speech breathing and prosody will also be noted. Within functional tongue-tiedness, the greatest difficulty is the distinction between the articulatory-phonemic and acoustic-phonemic forms of dyslalia.

Correction of functional dyslalia

When choosing a priority direction, they are guided by the structure of the speech defect. Thus, with acoustic-phonemic dyslalia, the main vector will be the development of phonetics, with articulatory-phonetic dyslalia - speech motor skills, with articulatory-phonemic dyslalia - both processes equally:

• Development of articulatory praxis. It is achieved by training the muscles involved in the pronunciation of “difficult sounds” and clarifying articulatory postures. For this purpose, it is recommended to perform a special set of articulatory gymnastics, exercises to develop a directed air stream, and speech therapy massage. Only after this do they move on to sound production, consolidation and differentiation of evoked sounds.
• Development of phonemic processes. Conducted in parallel with work on articulation. Includes the formation of auditory attention, memory, and phoneme discrimination. The differences in the articulatory structure and characteristics of the mixed phonemes are explained to the child. Games for onomatopoeia, recognition of non-speech sounds, exercises for sound analysis and synthesis are used.

In addition to training skills during speech therapy classes, it is necessary to practice them repeatedly in a kindergarten group and at home (repeating articulation and breathing exercises, doing homework in a workbook, memorizing sayings and poems). Only after consolidating the formed speech skills in situations of free communication can speech therapy work be considered complete.

Prognosis and prevention

Despite possible difficulties, functional dyslalia can be completely and permanently corrected. The time frame for overcoming a speech defect is individually variable and largely depends on the number of impaired sounds, regularity of attending classes, and the interest of the child and parents in overcoming tongue-tiedness. We must strive to ensure that all phonemic and pronunciation defects are eliminated in the preschool period. In the case of a later application, an optional attitude to classes, shortcomings in sound perception and sound pronunciation can become persistent and affect written speech. Prevention involves protecting the child’s health, starting from his intrauterine development, parents’ attention to the development of children’s speech (encouraging speech activity, learning nursery rhymes and poems, developing manual motor skills), surrounding the child with the right models for speech imitation.

Among all known speech problems, the most common is dyslalia. Most often it occurs in childhood and consists of various defects in the pronunciation of sounds in the native language - distortions, substitutions, confusions, up to their complete absence in speech. At the same time, there is a fairly broad opinion that dyslalia in children is a transient phenomenon that goes away with age. However, such speech impairment is also typical for adults. In most cases, the main “roots” of the problem should be sought in childhood. Subsequently, defective sound pronunciation often has an extremely adverse effect on the rest of life.

Causes of dyslalia

All potential causes of dyslalia can be divided into two groups:

• Organic. Impaired pronunciation occurs as a result of any anomalies in the structure of the articulatory apparatus - teeth, jaws, tongue, palate. These can be both congenital and acquired defects: lack of teeth, malocclusion, shortened hyoid ligament, high arch of the palate. Any of the listed anomalies can lead to speech defects characteristic of dyslalia;
• Socio-biological. A child's speech develops by imitation. Many parents do not communicate enough with their baby and do not pay attention to the development of his pronunciation skills. This often becomes the cause of dyslalia, because in such a situation it is difficult to expect the child to spontaneously develop correct speech. A delay in the formation of pronunciation skills characteristic of the native language often leads to the development and consolidation of defective sound pronunciation.

Separately, age-related causes of dyslalia in preschool children are distinguished. In this case, the speech defect is a physiological norm and does not require correction. However, to avoid the formation of pathological pronunciation skills, it is necessary to pay close attention to the speech development of young children. It is in preschool age that the foundations of communication capabilities are laid, which play a vital role throughout subsequent life.

Forms of dyslalia

Depending on the reasons that contribute to the appearance of a speech defect, there may be two main forms of dyslalia: mechanical and functional. The first of them can occur at any age in the presence of organic changes in the speech apparatus. At the same time, in children, pronunciation disorders are often associated with a tongue pathology such as a shortened frenulum, or with an abnormal bite, that is, an abnormal position of the jaws in relation to each other. Poor speech in adults can be caused by age-related changes, primarily by lack of teeth.

The functional form of dyslalia has several varieties. This division is due to the identification of the most significant signs of a speech disorder, which makes speech therapy intervention more targeted. There are three forms of functional dyslalia:

• Acoustic-phonemic. This disorder is based on insufficient development of speech hearing, as a result of which there is a mixture of sounds that are similar in acoustic characteristics, for example, in voicedness and deafness. In some cases, the inferiority of auditory perception of sounds leads to their omission in speech;
• Articulatory-phonemic. This form of dyslalia occurs in the case of insufficient assimilation of the correct positions of the organs of the speech apparatus when pronouncing certain sounds, as a result of which their confusion occurs;
• Articulatory-phonetic. This type of dyslalia is characterized by distorted pronunciation of sounds, caused by incorrectly learned articulatory positions.

Complex dyslalia

With dyslalia, the pronunciation of a different number of sounds may be impaired. If one of them or several belonging to the same group is defectively reproduced, for example, only whistling sounds, the defect is considered simple. If the pronunciation of sounds from different groups is impaired, they speak of the presence of complex dyslalia. Most often, it is a consequence of underdevelopment of phonemic perception, that is, speech hearing.

At the same time, the difficulties of correction are associated not so much with the number of defectively pronounced sounds, but with the need for rather painstaking work to develop their auditory perception. As a rule, it is phonemic problems that cause the elimination of complex dyslalia to take quite a long time. The age factor is also important.

In adults, pronunciation defects are often associated with the formation of incorrect articulatory positions, while speech hearing is usually quite well developed. Dyslalia in children in the overwhelming majority of cases is caused by insufficiently developed phonemic perception, as a result of which defective pronunciation of many sounds is fixed.

Contrary to popular belief, both simple and complex dyslalia can be eliminated without consequences at almost any age. In its mechanical form, it is necessary, first of all, to get rid of defects in the articulatory apparatus. If this is quite difficult to achieve, for example, with a malocclusion, correction of speech defects is nevertheless quite accessible. The normalized acoustic effect of sound can be obtained in different ways.

Incorrect pronunciation occurs in people of all ages. In the vast majority of cases, the origins of this problem are in early childhood. Children, due to completely understandable objective reasons, cannot independently decide how to speak throughout their entire subsequent lives. In this regard, it is the parents who most often bear the blame for the occurrence and consolidation of such a speech disorder as dyslalia in children. But it is quite possible to cope with defects in sound pronunciation; for this, it is enough to contact a speech therapist in time.

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How often have we seen children with speech disorders lately?

In modern science, there are two types of dyslalia:

• functional;
• mechanical (organic).

Functional dyslalia

The first type of dyslalia often develops in children at an early age and is caused by an incorrect process of learning the pronunciation of sounds. In other words, with this type of dyslalia there are no disturbances in the physiology of the articulatory apparatus. The main reason that influences the occurrence of functional dyslalia is the untimely correction of distorted pronunciation of phonemes in children.

Quite often, children imitate incorrect speech, and adults do not pay attention or do not record this fact in time, so the initial correction of the pronunciation error does not occur and a speech disorder develops.

Also, factors that influence the occurrence of functional dyslalia include general malaise of the body due to various somatic diseases.

Delayed mental development and the presence of the slightest dysfunction in brain activity also affect the occurrence of dyslalia. In addition, this speech disorder is associated with selective inferiority of the speech motor or auditory analyzer and their low level of analytical-synthetic activity. An unfavorable speech environment and a child’s imitation of it gives rise to dyslalia from the very first days of his life.

Types of functional dyslalia

Within functional dyslalia, motor and sensory dyslalia are distinguished separately. This division is based on the location of the disorder in the analyzers: speech-motor and speech-auditory.

With motor dyslalia, undifferentiated movements of the lips are observed, subsequently resulting in phonetic defects.

With sensory dyslalia, children have problems with the acoustic distinction of sounds and this disorder is phonemic in nature.

Mechanical dyslalia

Mechanical or organic dyslalia occurs due to abnormalities of the speech apparatus, which are anatomical in nature. Depending on their location, a certain type of tongue-tied development develops.

Incorrect placement of the jaws, as well as pathologies of their development, abnormal placement of teeth, malocclusion, defects of the tongue and palate are the main reasons that provoke incorrect pronunciation of sounds. Mechanical dyslalia can occur not only in children, but also in individuals of any age who, for various reasons, have suffered injuries or damage to the respiratory, vocal or articulatory parts of the speech apparatus.

In long-term studies, scientists have established the fact that with functional dyslalia, disturbances of one or two sounds occur, while with mechanical dyslalia, a group of sounds occurs.

In addition, there are combined types of disorders that relate to both functional and mechanical dyslalia.

The speech defect may have a phonetic or phonemic basis

In connection with this division, it is customary to classify dyslalia into:

• acoustic-phonemic;
• articulatory-phonemic;
• articulatory-phonetic.

The immaturity of phonemic hearing is the cause of the first type of dyslalia. A child suffering from this disorder also has difficulty recognizing phonemes. In the form of acoustic-phonemic dyslalia, there are no auditory anomalies, but only a selective auditory inability to differentiate certain phonemes appears.

In articulatory-phonemic cases, the main cause of occurrence is identified: a violation of the process of phonemic selection in the flow of speech. Due to the immaturity of this function, the child can imitate and replace phonemes with sounds similar in articulatory characteristics. Most often these are affricates and sonorants.

Forms of articulatory-phonetic dyslalia include those types of disorders, the factors of which are articulatory positions that have not been formed correctly. Therefore, all sounds have a distorted pronunciation and are realized in incorrect versions.

Of course, such speech defects are recognized in the phonetic system of the child’s native language. Front-lingual non-plosive consonants make up the largest group of sounds in the pronunciation of which disturbances are observed.

System of terms

There is a system of terms that was created to mark functional changes in the pronunciation of sounds. All nominations have a Greek letter and suffix at their root -ism, and in case of replacing a sound with another, a prefix is ​​added to the word pair-: lambdacism, rhotocism, kappacism, gammacism, hitism, rhotacism, sigmatism (accordingly, these terms denote violations of the pronunciation of sounds [l], [lꞌ], [r], [рꞌ], [k], [kꞌ], [g] , [gꞌ], [x], [xꞌ], [th], as well as whistling and hissing).

In any case, only a specialist can determine why your baby has a speech impediment and eliminate it at an early stage, so do not delay and seek help at the first sign of impairment.

18.02.2014