The Entire World of R
I don’t know how it did it, but today gMail inspected an email conversation between me and my graduate student and decided we needed to see speech threapists about the problem of /r/. So it provided the following link in its ads section.
SayItRight.org > The Entire World of R
What is The Entire World of R™?
The Entire World of R™ is a proven research-based program for evaluating and treating the difficult /r/ phoneme. The program comprises a complete suite of products designed to meet your specific /r/ remediation needs.
If you are reading this, then you already know that /r/ is a difficult, elusive and frustrating sound to treat. According a recent survey of over 100 speech-language pathologists (SLP), /r/ is of the most difficult tasks on their caseloads. The reasons they gave; lack of good training and lack of a comprehensive strategy…until now.
The Entire World of R™ approach is to evaluate and treat /r/ phonologically based on word position and individual sound. Phonetically, /r/ has 8 distinct vocalic variations: /ar/, /air/, /ear/, /ire/, /or/, /er/, /rl/, and prevocalic /r/. Separated further by initial, medial and final word positions, there are 21 different types of /r/. The ability to separate the /r/ into its most basic phonetic components and word positions is the key for successful remediation.
No other remediation program targets the basic components of /r/ like The Entire World of R™.
The truth is, gMail’s guess was actually not too far off. We were indeed discussing phonemes and spelling rules. I didn’t know there is a whole /r/-me of /r/ researchers out there. Looks like I do need to make an appointment with a speech therapist at some point.