Truly Heard is speech pathology practise which specialises in helping children, teenagers and young adult who have learning and communication disabilities.
Truly Heard is speech pathology practise which specialises in helping children, teenagers and young adult who have learning and communication disabilities.
We can help if your child or teenager is experiencing any of these:
1. falling behind at school or working overtime to keep up
2. losing confidence and feeling they are ‘dumb’
3. having trouble with assignments, exams or reading
4. diagnosed learning difficulties such as dyslexia, ADHD/ADD or auditory processing issues
Whilst some of our students come to us with a repertoire of “Yeah”, “Nah” and “I know right?”, it is our skill as speech pathologists to identify whether that is simply teenspeak or whether there is a specific language issue limiting their ability to express their ideas. Before starting therapy, all of our students undergo an assessment to ascertain the student’s strengths in processing and using language and also which areas require support.
As speech pathologists, we are trained to identify and treat the underlying language processing issue that is causing the student difficulties. Speech pathologists understand neuroplasticity and have the therapeutic skills to improve, if not correct, the processing issue. Therapy therefore provides the teenager with lifelong benefits of improved language processing which will help them across all subjects at school as well as in their life now, and beyond school.
“Speech Pathologist” is a challenging lable for our profession as most people do not know the breadth of work we do, especially in the education sector. In the USA, we are under the bracket of Educational Specialists, and in the U.K., we are referred to as Speech and Language Therapists. Most parents of teenagers don’t know to seek the service of speech pathologists for their child’s learning and academic issues as they associate speech pathologists with young children or people with speech impediments. Parents then turn to the teenager’s school for advice. The school then refer the student to an educational psychologist to assess the teenager’s mental health, IQ and attention. The psychologists then refer the teenager to a speech pathologist to treat the underlying language difficulty which is causing the comprehension, expression and literacy issues.
Therapy is delivered by speech pathologists who treat the underlying language or processing issue which is causing the difficulty.
Students who are school aged are encouraged to bring their school assignments or exam preparation to therapy sessions to be used as ‘live’ examples. The speech pathologist then teaches the student language processing techniques which not only help them complete their school work, but which simultaneously assist them in developing new neural pathways in their brain for improved language processing and memory. This means the teenager gains long-term improvements to the way they think, learn, perform at school and express themselves.
Many people wonder the difference between speech pathologists and tutors. Tutors are teachers who instruct a student on a particular school-based topic or task and can be an invaluable part of a student’s overall support network. Speech pathologists are trained to identify and treat the underlying language processing issue that is actually causing the student issues. A large part of the training to become a speech pathologist (a university qualification which takes 4-6 years full-time) involves studying the neuroscience behind learning and language processing and how to utilise brain plasticity to improve, if not correct, the processing issue. Therapy therefore provides the teenager with lifelong benefits of improved language processing which will help them across all subjects at school as well as in their life now, and beyond school.
1. We are devoted solely to working with teenagers and have over a decade of experience.
2. Our service blends the proven benefits of speech pathology with the added element of confidence and resilience building. Through helping teenagers better understand themselves and their world, we provide a more holistic approach to supporting teenagers so they develop both the language skills and coping strategies to perform better and be more confident.
3. Our service is delivered online therefore benefiting teenagers Australia wide.
Therapy is customised to target the individual learning needs of each student and is delivered in a manner which motivates and engages the individual student.
No. Students do not require a referral. However, if you have one from a GP or psychologist, then please let us know as it may mean you’re eligible for a small Medicare rebate.
Reading is the act of decoding letters into sounds and sequencing them together to say them (in our head or aloud). When we are spelling a word, it is the act of encoding, so we need to do the process in reverse; recall the sound of the word in our head, break it into smaller sounds, and then recall the visual of the letters that make each sound and then write them down in the correct order to spell the word. The challenge with the English language is the number of different ways we can spell certain sounds. For example, the ‘a’ sound can be spelled (or spelt) 5 different ways e.g. mate, may, wait, weight, steak. Spelling therefore requires encoding sounds to letters and also recalling the visual memory of the word in order to check the correct spelling. An additional chllange is spelling sight words which do not follow spelling rules, (e.g. yacht) we simply have to learn them visually.