THE BUY IN.....What is the buy in? What makes the child tick? I've always said it boils down to 'kids want to get things'. Meaning, they acquire language because when they do something they get something. Cry, get milk. Sign 'more' they get another cookie. Do their work, get to play with a toy. This reward system is all language-based. So when you break it down in simple turns, what's the buy in? What is it that they want, that is going to make them work - whether it be, say 1 word or a sentence, or complete a task. We need a buy-in too. If I go to the gym, I can have dessert. So it is our tough job as clinicians and also as parents to figure out the buy in that makes sense to our child. I was working with a child today whose buy in is bubbles. He will do anything for bubbles. I open the bubbles and give him the wand, but I want him to ask me for the soap. My goal is to get more specific language, and to build his intent to communicate. In other words he needs to ask for what he wants specifically. The buy in was so great that after the second session he looked at me and said, "I want the soap" without any cueing because he remembered the 'pay out' on the buy in. Excellent he got it. apply this to your own kids. This is a simple concept, but one that can continue to be reexamined and built upon. Let us re-examine what we are doing with our own children and our clients to make sure we are maximizing the experience. So, does our child need therapy? Are they saying enough words? Look at how often we give them things without them ever even needing to communicate verbally. Change how we interact to see if they are still having difficulty. Speech therapy, along with parenting cannot be supplemented or made easier with a magic pill. Unfortunately there is no magic pull, because if there was I would have invented it, patented it, sold it and be living in Costa Rica with my beautiful family ;). It's a journey that we need to examine and reexamine on a daily basis.