Oral Motor Exercise

How can our speech therapists help with oral motor exercises?

Here at MPPT, we believe that each one of our clients benefits most from a customizable treatment plan based on their current abilities and future goals. We pull from several treatment protocols to create a personal plan of care to best treat your child. Oral motor therapy is one technique used in a several disciplines, for a variety of reasons.  

Our Speech-Language Pathologists utilize oral motor therapy to increase awareness of the oral structures necessary to produce the precise movements needed for articulation and feeding. Establishing awareness is the foundation, before one can quickly and precisely coordinate the movements of several structures to produce one sound or even drink from a straw. Most of us are able to coordinate these movements without having to think about it. However, many kiddos demonstrate the difficulty coordinating their tongue (i.e. elevating the tip), puckering their lips or stabilizing their jaw. This is where your speech pathologist comes in!  

One shoe, does not fit all! Our clinicians thrive in pulling aspects from known protocols to suit each client’s specific oral motor- planning needs. The two most common oral motor therapy protocols used at MPPT are TalkTools and Beckman Oral Motor. MPPT has trained clinicians in both protocols which allows our clinic to use learned oral motor stretches and exercises from Beckman and manipulatives from TalkTools (i.e. chewy tubes, honey bear, bite blocks, etc.) to provide tactile, visual and direct assistance to your child. Both of these protocols interactive, parent friendly and easy to carryover at home.