SAN ANTONIO – Taking a few minutes to role play and talk to children can help them boost their vocabulary, a San Antonio speech pathologist said.
Madeleine Paul, clinical director at Speech and Language Center Stone Oak, said referrals for attention difficulties, language disorders and communication skills have doubled since the pandemic. Many of those referrals are for children under the age 12.
“In the middle school range, we’re seeing more of an increase of fear to interact with others, fear of going out and seeing other people and and being in social situations,” Paul said.
The pandemic boosted a trend that was already on the rise, said Casey Taliancich-Klinger, speech language pathologist associate professor at Our Lady of the Lake University.
“With a generation of kids who are spending a lot of time on screens and tablets. Those were coming into popularity already before the pandemic,” she said. “And then during the pandemic, we saw a lot more screen time. A lot of things had to be digitized and virtual because of safety.”
But it also took away the ability for children to be social and practice new words and their social skills, Taliancich-Klinger said.
The problem families are facing is that there’s a demand for speech pathologists.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have enough clinicians to go around,” she said. “So, many places in San Antonio are on a wait list for services and dependent on several issues. It’s dependent on geographic area and location. Sometimes, it’s a lot more difficult to get a speech pathologist out to a more rural area or location.”
Costs and insurance coverage is also a factor, Taliancich-Klinger said. But she really hopes that families are persistent in advocating for their children and helping them at home to get enough practice.
“We want interaction that’s meaningful, quality, interactive. We want the kids to practice. ‘What did I say? What did I just do?’ So, not only do I want to tell them what I’m doing and narrate, but I want to see if they can actually tell it back to me,” Taliancich-Klinger said.