Speech Buddies: Product Review
As a speech therapist, I had already known of Speech Buddies because they have an amazing blog with recommendations and ideas that I incorporate into my therapy practices. I was so excited when I found out that this company makes placement tools for articulation. I had to try them out! I was very interested in Speech Buddies because “they train the tongue to make the correct shape by providing targets that you can feel.” This made articulation therapy sound so easy for both me and my clients. Who wouldn’t want that? I contacted Speech Buddies and they offered to send me the Speech Buddies Placement Tools to try out! I was so excited to try these bad boys out!
What comes with the Speech Buddies Placement Tools?
This product is very well packaged and it comes with an instruction booklet to help you best use the placement tools. The instruction booklet is user friendly and it has pictures inside to show how to place the tool inside of the mouth to help elicit each sound. There are 5 tools for the following sounds: /r/, /s/, /sh/, /ch/, and /l/.
The placement tools come in a small travel case with a hard exterior. This is great when you are a speech therapist who is constantly on the go!
Using Speech Buddies in Speech-Language Therapy:
I have been using the placement tools with quite a few of the children on my caseload. Everyone (including parents) was really excited to see this product. I used the tools with children varying in ages (3.5, 4.5, and 10) and I worked on the following sounds: /r/, /s/, /sh/, and /l/. I did not use the /ch/ tool because I currently do not have anyone on my caseload with /ch/ errors.
Significant gains were made after using the placement tools (specifically with /l/). I was unable to elicit /l/ prior to using the tools and then… Viola! We began working on sounds in isolation and have now progressed to /l/ clusters. I had similar results with the /sh/ and /s/ tool; however, success with these tools was at a slower rate.
I also utilized the /r/ placement tool. This was the most difficult tool to use. However, it should be noted that /r/ is a very difficult sound to elicit in general. Speech buddies provided me with an email to contact in case I might have questions. This was very helpful. I contacted the speech-language pathologist from Speech Buddies and she was able to give me some advice for my client.
I am very happy with the results that I have seen with the placement tools so far and I love how easy it is to use this product. Learning to produce sounds can be difficult and Speech Buddies makes it as easy as possible. Great job, guys! My only question is: When will you make placement tools for other sounds? I sure hope it’s soon!
**This product was reviewed by Key Therapies, LLC. No other compensation was provided.