Poor auditory processing skill is an often neglected
and undiagnosed problem that around 5% of children face. It has symptoms that
overlap with ADHD, ADD, ASD, LD, which makes it very difficult for a parent to
understand the real issue. Presence of poor auditory processing skill often
leads to over-diagnosis of the other disorders mentioned above.
Typical symptoms that a child with poor auditory
processes faces are:
·
Difficulty in
following instructions
·
Difficulty in
differentiating subtly different words
·
Over/under
sensitivity to sounds around
·
Speech delay/difficulty
·
Difficulty in
sound articulation
·
Difficulty in
following a conversation
Activities for strengthening auditory processes:
·
Auditory
reception (Comprehension: the child listens to an auditory input and responds
to the relevant questions asked).
·
Auditory figure
ground (list of heterogeneous words is given to the child and the child has to
group the words based on some concept. E.g. tree, river, mountain, snakes,
tiger ---> Jungle).
·
Auditory
discrimination ( giving words like pin- pen, sake- sale, time- chime and asking
him whether they are different or not. Lip reading shouldn’t facilitate the process. Recognizing different animal sounds is also very helpful).
·
Auditory
sequential memory (numbers or letters are given to the child and the child
repeats them in the same sequence. E.g. 2,7,4 said by the teacher and the child
repeats).
·
Auditory
closure (a word is spelled with certain letter missing and the child has to give
the missing letter. E.g. For_st, _ne).
·
Auditory
concept (giving similarities and differences between certain words. E.g. Forest
and zoo, mango and banana, cat and rat).
·
List of words
given for immediate recall and delayed recall.
·
Reading short
stories and recalling them.
·
Repetition of
sentences.
·
Word pair recall of both familiar(cow-milk, paper-pencil) and unfamiliar pairs(paper-water, spoon-eraser). Child is told all the words in pair, then one word of each pair is asked and he should say the other word.
·
Word game
(first person says one word, second person says the first word and gives
another word , first person says the first two words and gives another word,
and so on).
This is not an exhaustive list of activities but just an idea of what can be done when you observe any auditory problem happening in your child. In fact, it is a good idea to do these activities anyways in all kids in the foundation years to strengthen their auditory focus and processes.
Disclaimer: this write-up is not a diagnostic and therapeutic tool for Auditory Processing Disorder (APD)
