Students who qualify for speech/language therapy have those services provided at their home school during the academic day. All schools are served by licensed Speech/Language Pathologists who hold a master's degree and ASHA certificate of clinical competence (CCC). Services are provided for students ages 3-21 who meet eligibility criteria.

If your child is not yet enrolled in school (preschool age), is homeschooled, or enrolled in a private school in Blount County and you have concerns about their communication skills we offer speech and language screenings 6 times per year. These screenings are conducted at the BCS central office, 831 Grandview Drive. At this screening, we assess the following areas: vision, hearing, speech, and language. If a student doesn't pass the screening, they will be referred to their home school for a full evaluation. To schedule a screening time, call Judy Coppenger at (865) 984-1212.

The screening dates for 2017-2018 are: 8/11/17, 9/22/17, 11/3/17, 1/5/18, 2/23/18, 3/23/18.

Students can be evaluated in the following areas:

• Articulation- a significant deficiency in speech sound development. These delays must be moderate, severe or profound and adversely impact the student's educational performance.
• Language- a significant deficiency in the student’s comprehension, form, content or use of language which adversely impacts the student's educational performance.
• Voice- an excess or significant deficiency in pitch, intensity, resonance, or quality resulting from pathological conditions or inappropriate use of the vocal mechanism which adversely impacts the student's educational performance.
• Fluency- an abnormal interruption in the flow of speech characterized by an atypical rate, or rhythm, and/or repetitions in sounds, syllables, words and phrases that significantly reduces the speaker’s ability to participate within the learning environment and adversely impacts the student's educational performance.

Typical speech sound development has a wide range of what is considered "average". By the age of 4 unfamiliar listeners should be able to understand most of a child's speech. Individual sounds emerge at different ages. The chart below shows the year at which 90% of children are able to produce most sounds. For example during a child's 3rd year they should be able to produce the following consonants; /m,n,h,w,p/. This doesn't mean they will have them by the time they turn 3 (although they might). But these sounds should emerge before their 4th birthday.

Language development falls into 3 primary categories:

• Receptive Language- What a child can understand and show without speaking. This can include areas such as vocabulary, syntax (grammar), and auditory perception.
• Expressive Language- How a child uses language verbally. This can include areas such as vocabulary, syntax (grammar), semantics (meaning of words), and morphology (the structure of words).
• Pragmatics- The use of language in social context.

We welcome (and will consider) all evaluation reports submitted by ASHA certified SLPs. Often times, their information can be merged with ours, and we can avoid duplicate testing. Please be aware that outside agencies (hospitals, rehab centers, private SLPs), use a medical model for diagnosis. As a school system we MUST use the eligibility criteria provided by The Tennessee Department of Education. These criteria differ from what is used in a medical setting, and your school speech/language pathologist will be able to determine if the student meets criteria for having a moderate, severe or profound disability based on state education standards.