Pronounce Words Clearly With a Lisp

A lisp is a Functional Speech Disorder (FSD), or difficulty in learning to make a specific speech sound or sounds. The term “lisp” itself is a lay term, and is not something that most speech pathologists use. A lisp is characterized by difficulty in saying the sounds /s/ and /z/. For example, the words “soup” and “zebra” may sound like “thoup” and “thebra.” The most common types of lisp are the interdental and dental types, also referred to as frontal lisps. The /s/ and /z/ sounds are made either with the tongue protruding between the teeth (interdental) resulting in a /th/ sound, or the tongue touching the teeth (dental), resulting in a muffled /th/ sound. Both of these common types of lisps are considered normal parts of speech development for children, and should not be seen as unusual for children under the age of 4 ½. If you have a lisp, here are some tips for correcting your pronunciation.[1]

Steps

Saying the Sounds Using a Mirror

  1. Smile. Looking in the mirror, open your lips like you’re smiling. When you begin saying the sounds, you’ll want to keep your lips open like this to be able to see your teeth the whole time.[2]
  2. Close your teeth and line them up. Line up your teeth so that the bottom row rests just below the top row, touching them lightly. Hold them together like this. If you have a natural slight over-bite when you smile (many people do) you’ll need to shift your bottom jaw forward a little bit to get your teeth in the right position. It may no longer look like a genuine smile in the mirror, but that’s okay.[3]
  3. Get your tongue in the right position. Keep your tongue back away from your teeth. It should be sort of in the center of your mouth, slightly pulled back and just behind the upper teeth. You don’t want it to be locked to the roof of your mouth, otherwise the air won’t be able to come through to make the sounds.[3]
  4. Practice the sounds. Practice saying /sssss/, as though you’re hissing like a snake. To do this, blow air through your teeth while they are lined up as explained above, being sure to keep your tongue back away from the teeth. Do this several times, until it sounds like a clear /s/ sound.
    • To practice /z/, you keep your teeth and tongue in the same position, but you “turn your motor on” as a speech therapist would say. This means you vocalize a sound in your throat instead of just blowing silent air.[3]
  5. Ask a trusted friend or relative for their feedback. After you’ve tried this method, a good way to check and make sure you’re making the right sound is to ask someone. Ask someone who doesn’t speak with a lisp, who will genuinely want to help and won’t make fun. They should be able to tell you if the sounds you’re making sound like clear /s/ and /z/ sounds.
    • Ask them to make the sounds too, and try to copy what they do. Watch their mouths and teeth, and try doing the same thing in the mirror.[3]

Practicing Vocalization Exercises

  1. Start with just the sounds. You’ll need to work up to saying the sounds correctly while speaking naturally. Practice saying just the /ssss/ and /zzzz/ sounds to yourself, and continue using the mirror and someone else for feedback. The more you practice, the faster you’ll be able to say the sounds clearly while speaking sentences.[1]
  2. Increase your speed gradually. For each step in this section, you’ll want to begin slowly and once you’re comfortable saying the sounds correctly, you can start doing each step faster. Soon you’ll be saying the sounds clearly at a natural pace![1]
  3. Try syllables and words. Practice saying the sounds with syllables first. Try saa, see, soo, sie, and sor. Then, try zaa, zee, zoo, zie, and zor. Repeat these gradually and then quickly, trying to maintain the correct sounds for /s/ and /z/.
    • Next practice words: sun, soup, Sue, sigh, saw, see, sip, soap, silly, seven, seals, zoo, bizarre, zippers[1]
  4. Practice sentences. Try repeating sentences containing the sounds /s/ and /z/. For instance, “I see a sock,” and “We saw the store.” Here are some more you can try:
    • The striped zebra made me sneeze.
    • I eat spaghetti with a spoon.
    • He laughs when using scissors.[4]
  5. Repeat tongue twisters. Once you’re able to say sentences using clear /s/ and /z/ sounds pretty easily and quickly, try some tongue twisters:
    • Sister Suzie sat on the sea shore sewing shirts for sailors.
    • The shrewd shrew sold Sarah seven silver fish slices.
  6. Keep practicing. Changing how you’ve been speaking can take quite a bit of work. Don’t give up if you don’t see results right away. Practice the techniques for at least 20 minutes every day. Ask your friends and family for feedback on whether or not they think you are improving your pronunciation during conversations.
    • Children in school often participate in speech therapy for months or even years to improve their lisps. If you’re not finding any improvement in a couple of months, try contacting a speech therapist for more help.

Strengthening the Mouth and Tongue

  1. Use a straw when drinking. Using a straw can help promote oral strength by strengthening your tongue because you have to keep it pushed back while drinking. So, get some straws and pop them into your cups, cans, or bottles when you’re getting a drink.
  2. Blow into a round mouthpiece. Blowing of any kind, whether through an instrument mouthpiece, whistle, horn, kazoo, etc. helps to strengthen the mouth area muscles.
    • You can also blow bubbles. Sure, it’s for kids, but it can be fun for adults too. And if you have kids of your own or nieces/nephews, they’ll love doing it with you.[5]
  3. Practice tongue-tip sounds. Say “lalalalalalalala” without moving your jaw up and down. Just move the tip of the tongue. Rest and repeat.
    • Do this with other tip of the tongue sounds such as “tatatatatata” and “nanananana” and “dadadadada.” Any sounds getting your tongue moving quickly will help to strengthen it. [5]
  4. Do tongue pops. Suck the tongue up onto the roof of your mouth for a 1-2 seconds and then pop it. Try working up to 25 repetitions of this. Doing these types of exercises should cause you to gradually feel more control over the use of your tongue, which will help when you’re speaking to avoid making unclear sounds. [5]

Tips

  • Seek help from a speech therapist if you are still having a hard time forming the sounds clearly, or if after practicing you still speak with a lisp despite your efforts.
  • Relax. Many times speech disorders become more obvious when someone is anxious or nervous. If you lisp by accident while speaking, try not to become embarrassed. It’s a part of who you are, and quite a few celebrities have had lisps. It’s understandable to want to change it, but changing it can be a slow process and most people aren’t able to do it overnight. So be patient and kind to yourself!

Related Articles

Sources and Citations

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 http://speech-language-therapy.com/~speech/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=86:lisp&catid=11:admin&Itemid=120
  2. ↑ http://www.howtogetridofalispfast.com/learn-how-to-get-rid-of-a-lisp-today.html
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 http://heatherspeechtherapy.com/2011/05/correcting-a-frontal-lisp/
  4. ↑ http://www.speechandlanguagekids.com/speech-therapy-frontal-lisp/
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 http://www.arktherapeutic.com/blog/post/403

You may like

Retrieved from "https://kipkis.com/index.php?title=Pronounce_Words_Clearly_With_a_Lisp&oldid=282615"