Therapy Solutions in Dickinson, Killdeer, and Richardton, ND provides play-based therapy specifically tailored to a child’s speech, voice, language, or swallowing needs. Our speech therapists can help decrease issues pediatric patients have with eating, drinking, swallowing, and communicating. Our speech therapists work hard to help patients develop strong speaking skills as well as refine volume and quality of voice.

If you’ve noticed your child is having difficulty with their speech, quality of voice, or problems swallowing, rest assured that Therapy Solutions’s extensive therapeutic services can help provide guidance and relief. Contact our office in Dickinson, Killdeer, and Richardton, ND today to learn more.

What is play-based therapy?

When you think of speech therapy for a child, you might imagine a speech therapist taking a “direct” approach, and asking a child to repetitively practice making sounds, question/answer interactions, or identify pictures/structures out loud. Play-based therapy at Therapy Solutions in Dickinson, Killdeer, and Richardton, ND offers a more relaxed, fun alternative to direct therapy.

Play-based therapy is a kind of treatment specifically for pediatric patients.  According to Good Therapy, with play-based therapy, your child’s Therapy Solutions speech therapist will “encourage them to explore life events that may have an effect on current circumstances, in a manner and pace of the child’s choosing.” This will happen primarily through interactive play time, but also through speech and language activities. 

For a child, playing is more than second-nature. It’s how they communicate in early development! Playing helps a child learn how to express themselves, relieves stress, and helps them connect with others. Play-therapy at Therapy Solutions naturally stimulates the creative thinking process in children, steadies their emotions, builds self-confidence. 

With speech-based play-therapy in Dickinson, Killdeer, and Richardton, ND, your child’s speechtherapist offers learning opportunities vs structured trials. For example, say a speech therapist is trying to teach a patient how to produce single words. They may provide numerous unlabeled toys (doll, car, ball) and allow the patient to pick one to play with. 

When a toy is chosen, the speech therapist might then comment on the toy, label it, and wait for the child to verbally respond. Depending on treatment, a patient may also be expected to verbally label the toy themselves before being allowed to play with it. This is how the child learns and comes to recognize that by saying the name for the toy, they will be rewarded with an opportunity to play with it.

What disorders can play-based therapy can help?

There is no shortage to the benefits play-based therapy has to offer! Play-based therapy can benefit children in many different ways, including but not limited to the following:

• Improved speech and language skills
• Improving and maintaining attention 
• Improved cognitive abilities
• Improve participation through play
• Build positive adult-child interactions
• Improved socialization skills

If you’ve noticed your child is having difficulty with their speech, quality of voice, or problems swallowing, rest assured that our skilled speech therapists can help provide guidance and relief. Our therapists’ ultimate goal is to help your child build skill and confidence, and eliminate their speech, voice, and language issues.

Contact our clinic today

There’s more than one way to go about speech therapy! Contact our office in Dickinson, Killdeer, and Richardton, ND today to learn more about our play-based speech therapy services.