Teaching · Speech & Language

Too nasal, too little, or air through the nose: describe it, then refer.

Mark what you hear and how often, try two quick checks with a mirror and a gentle nose pinch, and gather the history. The summary puts the pattern in plain words and tells you when a medical look at the palate is usually the next step.

Start a resonance recordWhat you get
$12one-time · every device you sign in on
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Included with Caveat Classroom and Whole-school licenses. Or get it in the Speech & Language toolkit, $79 for 72 items.

The resonance record

One record per student and date. Use initials or a code, never a name. The example is made up.

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What you get

Teaching · Speech & Language$12 · included with Classroom and Whole-school licenses

What you finish with
For each student, the resonance features heard, the quick checks, relevant history, the referral and its steps, with a plain-words summary for the family and provider.
Who it is for
School speech-language pathologists and clinical fellows who hear a resonance concern and need to describe it and refer.
Format
Browser form. Several saved records per student; printed with the summary to attach to a referral letter, or as a blank form; CSV with one row per record; export and import a file.
Access
$12 one-time, yours on every device you sign in on; the tool opens once you are signed in with it. Included with Caveat Classroom and Whole-school licenses. Also in the Speech & Language toolkit ($79) and the Teaching Suite pass ($199), and 1 more bundle. Everything you type stays in this browser; nothing is sent to Caveat.
Where it lives
The Speech & Language space in Caveat Teaching.
Support
Questions about an order, access or a correction: team@caveatacademic.com.
closed: air to the mouthopen: air to the nose
Drawn for this page. For most speech sounds the soft palate closes the nose off; when it does not close fully, voice and air escape through the nose.

How to use it

  1. Start a record with the student’s initials or a code and the date.
  2. Listen in words, pressure-sound sentences and conversation, and mark how often each feature appears.
  3. Try the mirror and nose-pinch checks on an oral sentence and, if needed, a nasal one.
  4. Ask the family about history and when the concern began.
  5. Choose where to refer, work the steps and send the summary with the letter.

Start a resonance record

What the record is for

Why refer

Hypernasality and nasal air emission often come from the soft palate not closing the nose off fully, which can be structural, as with a cleft or a short palate. A structural cause is evaluated with instruments such as nasendoscopy or video imaging and treated medically or surgically; speech therapy alone does not fix it. Compensatory errors that children learn around the problem are treated in speech therapy.

The quick checks

On a sentence with no nasal sounds, a mirror under the nose should stay clear and pinching the nostrils should change nothing. Fogging, or a change when pinched, suggests sound or air escaping through the nose. On a sentence full of m and n, pinching should change the voice; if it does not, there may be too little nasal sound.

What this record is not

It does not diagnose velopharyngeal dysfunction or any condition and gives no ratings against norms. It describes what was heard to support a referral.

Sources

  1. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, Practice Portal: Resonance Disorders.
  2. Kummer, A. W. Cleft Palate and Craniofacial Conditions: A Comprehensive Guide to Clinical Management, 4th edition (2020).
  3. American Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Association (2018). Parameters for Evaluation and Treatment of Patients with Cleft Lip/Palate or Other Craniofacial Differences. Cleft Palate-Craniofacial Journal, 55(1), 137 to 156.
  4. Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, 34 CFR 99.30 (written consent before sharing records with an outside provider).

The example student is made up. The record describes and screens; diagnosis comes from medical and instrumental evaluation. Support: team@caveatacademic.com.