What is Carryover in Apraxia Therapy and Why Does it Matter?

Carryover – practicing words outside of therapy – is an important element in building and generalizing the motor plan.  

Children with apraxia of speech need a lot of repetition of their target words to learn the movements. They also need to practice their words in other settings and with more communication partners.  

Speaking is a real-life skill! Practice in the therapy room is great for learning, but we need to bring it outside of the therapy room for generalization.

This post will help you understand how to successfully collaborate with parents and other professionals to engage with carryover and why it matters. 

Who is in charge of carryover?

A child’s SLP is responsible for communicating and collaborating with parents and any other professionals who help the child practice their target words. 

Outside professionals may need training and guidance from the apraxia SLP to ensure that carryover is done correctly. We don’t want negative practice. Words always need to be practiced accurately in order to make progress.  

Successful carryover is a team effort. SLPs and parents need to talk about the child’s goals and what can reasonably be expected outside of therapy sessions. 

Sometimes SLPs hesitate to ask parents to do carryover out of concern for their time and responsibilities. SLPs don’t ever want to burden parents, and we know that speech therapy may not be the only therapy a child is participating in.  

Collaboration is necessary. It also takes time.  Some SLPs, especially those who work in schools, are not given adequate time to make and maintain connections with parents. It can be difficult to find time for everything. But the benefits of carryover are worth the time and effort it can take to implement and get parents on board. 

The benefits of carryover in apraxia therapy 

When there is no carryover, progress is slower. And slow progress can be frustrating for parents, children, and the SLP, especially when it comes to apraxia therapy.  

Apraxia therapy requires a lot of repetition to acquire the motor plan. If this practice only happens during a 1:1 speech therapy sessions, it will take the child a long time to learn.  

The bottom line? More practice leads to more progress.  

Here are a couple of important things that happen as a child progresses in their motor planning skills:

• They will be able to use the motor plans they have to independently learn new words. The faster a child learns a variety of motor plans, the more movements they can apply to new words.  
• When a child feels more confident about their verbal communication skills, they are more willing to try imitating and producing new motor plans on their own. The better a child feels about their skills, the more they will practice on their own. 
• As the child progresses, family members, teachers, and other support professionals realize the child has potential. Seeing what’s possible encourages more engagement with the child to practice more words. 

Building a consistent carryover practice is one of the best ways to support your child’s progress in apraxia therapy. 

How can I improve carryover with my clients? 

Carryover is a collaborative effort. You can’t expect parents and other professionals who are not trained in apraxia therapy to immediately understand how to help a child practice at home or school. 

But SLPs who learn how to make carryover an easy, manageable part of the apraxia therapy experience help their clients make faster, more effective progress. 

One of my young clients has three older siblings who are 6, 8, and 10. The parent assigned each child one word to practice with my client to help him generalize words to his home environment. 

This carryover led to his siblings realizing how much their little brother is capable of, and they increased their engagement with him.  Of course, this led to even more progress!  

With his siblings helping him outside of therapy, this client felt more confident and excited to practice. His siblings became his biggest cheering squad, and he made steady progress in adding words to his repertoire.  

Parents as partners 

If you’re ready to get parents more engaged with carryover and at-home support, I created a mini-course just for you.

Parents as Partners takes all the guessing and frustration out of trying to collaborate with parents and gives you clear strategies that work! 

You will also be eligible to receive 1 PDH and .1 ASHA CEU when you complete the course. 

This mini-course is specifically for SLPs who:

• Work with children for apraxia and other speech sound disorders 
• Struggle to know what to send home
• Don't know how to teach parents to practice
• Don't want to overwhelm parents who don't have any therapy skills 
• Want to see your clients succeed faster 
• Care about helping parents feel connected to the process

Learn how to successfully engage parents with carryover and help your clients make more progress with Parents as Partners.