COVID – 19 Response
COVID-19 Summer 2022 Face coverings must be worn at all times by all persons while in indoor, common spaces (e.g., waiting room, hallways, restroom). The following individuals are exempt from…
Guidelines for Home Articulation Practice
Learning a new speech sound is like learning to play an instrument or any new hobby or activity: it takes consistent, daily practice. In order to make the most out…
Welcome to the Neighborhood!
It’s a beautiful place in the [speech sound] neighborhood! Has your tongue found its favorite place to live? If it hasn’t already, the speech sound neighborhood is where you…
Lisps: When is Treatment Warranted?
You are likely familiar with this frustrated statement: Whose idea was it to put an /s/ in the word lisp? For lisp-ers of all types, /s/ is the…
Your child is talking! Now what?
Children develop language in stages, not all at once. Sometimes you’ll hear your child say something that sounds “wrong” or not grammatically correct. Dependent on their age, this can be…
Speech, Language, and the Holiday Season
Happy holiday season! The holidays are an exciting and special time spent with family, friends, and new experiences. For some families, it is also a busy, bustling season that makes…
Nasal Breathing
What does Nasal Breathing Have to do with your Child’s Speech Development? Is your child a chronic snorer? Suffer from frequent congestion from illnesses and or allergies? Have you noticed…
Modeling AAC
Where do we start? Children learn language through models from the people in their lives, including parents, siblings, caregivers, and peers. This is no different for children who use methods…
Reading Opens Worlds!
Early Reading Skills in Everyday Routines
Parents and caregivers can play a big role in setting-up children for reading success. Using a few fun and engaging activities in everyday life will facilitate the development of early…
Picking Your Battles with Picky Eaters
Picky eating is a common cause of concern for parents of young children. Generally speaking, we can think of food selectivity as an avoidance of or aversion to certain foods…
Favorite Place: my apartment (when it's clean) or Ireland (when it's not raining)
Dogs or Cats: Kittens (they are just too cute)
Coffee or Tea: A really good cup of coffee :)
Parent Coaching
At Jennifer Katz Inc’s last summit, JKI team member Claire Dolan M.S., CCC-SLP, presented on the benefits of including parent coaching into early intervention sessions and how fellow therapists could…
Welcome Melissa Wilson-Beer, AuD
Jennifer Katz Inc. welcomed Melissa Wilson-Beer, AuD from Sound Speech and Hearing Clinic to speak to our team at our spring 2019 summit. Melissa gave us tons of helpful information…
Golden Gate Regional Center (GGRC)
JKI was fortunate to have Grace Chau, Supervising Social Worker and Tina Tom, Early Start Service Coordinator speak to us about GGRC and answer our questions about helping our families…
We Love Our Therapists’ Stories
We Shine A Spotlight on Katie Werner JKI: Where are you from? What brought you to the Bay Area? Katie: My roots are in Pennsylvania and Illinois. I…
Spotlight on a Therapist
This month we are highlighting one of our therapists, Casey Ruffin, M.S., CCC-SLP, who has been at Jennifer Katz, Inc. for four years. We have a conversation with Casey to…
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Model Release: Yes
Property Release: Yes
Portrait of a girl shrugging and sitting on a branch
“What Did You Do Today?” How We Can Help Our Children Talk About their Days
As parents, we want to know details about our children’s days but how do we get that information from them? The questions we choose to ask, can impact the information…
UCSF Residency Partnership
Jennifer Katz, Inc. is proud to partner with UCSF's Development and Behavior/ Physicians in the Community residency program. Several residents observed our therapists to see what speech and language pathologists do…
Volunteer Day: Beautification through Greenification
Jennifer Katz, Inc. is committed to giving back to the community. This year, our team joined Friends of the Urban Forest in partnership with Glen Park Association to help beautify…
Welcome Steve Johnson
Steve Johnson, a learning specialist, came for a visit to speak with our speech therapists here at Jennifer Katz, Inc (JKI). He spoke about his overall professional role and his…
Welcome Chad Kordt-Thomas, LCSW
Jennifer Katz, Inc. invited Chad Kordt-Thomas, LCSW, a licensed clinical social worker, in San Francisco to lead our team in a 3-part series discussion on the stressors associated with “relationship-based”…
Using Games to Target Our Children’s Goals
Our speech therapists love the game Ice Cream Scoops of Fun! Who it is geared towards: To play the game by the rules, it was developed for children ages 3+ but…
Welcome Dr. Tina Gabby
The Jennifer Katz, Inc (JKI) team was pleased to welcome Dr. Tina Gabby, a well respected behavioral and developmental pediatrician in the Bay Area. Dr. Gabby focuses on infants, pre-school,…
Welcome, Dave Hammer, vice-president of the Childhood Apraxia of Speech Association of North America (CASANA)
Extend your arms forward. Twist your palms down, then out. Cross one wrist over the other, clasp your hands, then pull them in. Now – lift your left index finger. Quick! (more…)
I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream For Ice-Cream
Our amazing team decided it was time to put the articulation cards and story grammar books aside while we went on a field trip to the Museum of Ice Cream…
Welcoming Dr. Neal Rojas, MD
Dr. Neal Rojas, a developmental and behavioral pediatrician from Developmental Medicine Clinic at UCSF graciously came Jennifer Katz, Inc. and spoke to our team of speech language pathologists. He presented…
Fitness Challenge Celebration
This is what happens when a team of San Francisco speech language pathologists decide to have some fun-spirited competition to get our bodies moving some more. We divided into two…
Holiday Party
Every year we make time around the holidays to spend some time together - drink a few drinks, eat good food and laugh with each other. This year we had…
Reflective Practices and Halloween
Today, Halloween, our speech language pathologists completed an eight-week series on Reflective Practices, presented by Chad Kordt-Thomas, LCSW. Chad is a San Francisco based child and family psychotherapist. Working closely with…
Stinson Beach Day
Every year in August, while the rest of the country is enjoying the hot summer sun, we are shivering in San Francisco. It's cold, grey and just plain yuck. To…
Client Appreciation Party
We had such a fun day celebrating our clients! Our amazing team of speech therapists joined forces Gateway Learning Group, San Francisco's incredible team of ABA specialists. What an amazing…
Pediatric Voice Disorders
As kids develop, they learn to use appropriate behaviors at school and at home. Teachers and parents focus on shaping behaviors that encourage children to make healthy and safe choices…
Concussions
I recently watched the movie, Concussion, starring Will Smith was an enlightening and influential film. Based on the true story of Dr. Bennet Omalu who studied repeated sports head injuries in…
Magic in Numbers
We are all familiar with the face children (and some adults) make when trying new foods. One can get lost in the hours of YouTube footage on “baby’s first tastes,”…
Classroom accommodations for children with APD
Last month, we discussed Auditory Processing Disorder (APD) and defined some deficits that kids with APD often share. Now that it’s fall and the school year is back in gear,…
Auditory Processing Disorders (APD)
Auditory Processing Disorder: What is it and what is it NOT? Many children who attend speech therapy have difficulties with processing sounds. Some children we see at our San Francisco…
Receptive Language
The two categories of language skills are receptive language and expressive language. Receptive language refers to how children interpret any type of linguistic information they receive (comprehension). Children who experience…
Speech Therapy Insurance – Glossary
Insurance is tricky and insurance for speech language coverage is even trickier. Not only is every insurance different but every plan within each insurance varies. The only consistent thing about…
Speech Therapy – To Recommend Services or Not?
Our speech therapy practice has the pleasure of collaborating with many preschools and schools in San Francisco and, at several of these schools our speech therapy practice provides on-site speech…
Language – all day, every day!
As children learn, everything and every person in their environment is continuously influencing them. One way to think about language learning is to picture kids as little scientists, constantly experimenting…
Articulation On The Go!
Many children that attend speech therapy at our San Francisco practice have trouble making speech sounds and receive therapy services for articulation delays or disorders. Articulation refers to using the…
Autism and Emotions-Movie “Inside Out” helps teach us both
I am so excited about the upcoming movie from Pixar, ‘Inside Out’. The film will be set in the head of a young girl, Riley Anderson, where five emotions—Joy, Anger,…
Frontal lisp and tongue thrust, there is a difference!
At our San Francisco speech therapy practice we get referrals for children, adolescents and young adults with a vague questioning of a tongue thrust or lisp. A tongue thrust (previously…
Feeding Difficulties in a Food Lover’s Paradise
San Francisco is a foodie haven. Even children of San Francisco love food and eating all the exciting dishes this city has to offer. Of course not all children are…
Stuttering: Signs, Causes and How to Help Children
Stuttering is a communication disorder in which the flow of speech is broken by repetitions (li-li-like this), prolongations (lllllike this), or abnormal stoppages (no sound) of sounds and syllables. There may…