Top Tips For Making the S Sound At Home

Here are 3 ways to support a child (or adult) learning the /s/ sound at home. These are NOT a replacement for speech therapy, but they are a great way to practice at home, or to teach your child more about the /s/ sound as they are acquiring it in typical speech development, or while they are seeing a therapist if the sound is delayed. If you’re a therapist looking for some new ways to practice /s/ in speech sessions, these will work for that too. :)

Visit our YouTube, to see Hailey talk about /s/ and each strategy. One thing we need to note about /s/ is that, just like with /r/, there are two ways to produce it. One is often referred to as the “tipper” method, where your tongue tip is touching your alveolar ridge (the bumpy part behind your front teeth). The other method is referred to as the “dipper” method. In this method, your tongue tip is pointed down and is touching or almost touching your bottom front teeth. Some of these strategies will focus on the “tipper”, or can be applied to both methods.

1. Cheerios

Sometimes it can be challenging to teach kids where their tongues should go for the /s/ sound. Cheerios, or something similar, make it much easier!

First, grab a Cheerio and model on yourself. You can teach that to make our /s/ sound we need to hold the Cheerio on the top of our mouths, right behind our teeth, and blow our air out gently without letting the Cheerio fall. After, explaining, show what it should look like in your own mouth - hold the Cheerio on your alveolar ridge (the bumpy part behind your front teeth), close your mouth (leaving a slight opening, where your teeth are not touching), smile, and blow out your air for the /s/ sound.

Then, have your child practice with the Cheerios to try and get that good /s/ sound with accurate tongue placement!

2. Snake Sound

I love to teach /s/ as the snake sound for two reasons. First, for tongue placement. You can explain that for our “sneaky snake sound” our tongues can be the sneaky snakes, and that means they have to hide behind our teeth. We can’t let the snake sneak out of our mouth for the /s/ sound, it has to be hiding behind our teeth. This way, if their tongue sticks out in front of their teeth you can remind them it has to be hiding behind the teeth when we are making the /s/ sound.

The second reason is for air flow. I will use my pointer finger and draw a squiggly snake on the table to teach kids that for our /s/ sound we blow out our air, we don’t stop it. This motion helps them understand the air flow, and also allows a fun visual and tactile reminder for which sound we are working on and what we should be doing when we make it.

3. Quiet Sound or Gentle Sound

Finally, I teach the /s/ sound as a “quiet” or “gentle” sound, you can pair this teaching with the other two strategies as well. If we are not gentle with blowing our air out for /s/, then our cheerio will fall. If we are not “quiet” with making the /s/ sound, that’s not a sneaky snake. We have to be quiet and gentle, and listen for the subtle sound the /s/ makes in our mouths.