A pacing board is a simple yet effective tool to help patients slow down their speech rate and, in many cases, increase their intelligibility.
In this article, you’ll learn how to use a pacing board with your adult speech therapy patients—and you’ll find a FREE Pacing Board download!
For our bestselling patient handouts and worksheets, check out the Adult Speech Therapy Starter Pack!
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How To Use A Pacing Board: General Tips
In preparation for using a pacing board, gather functional reading material (small talk, phrases, coffee order, etc.) Your patient can either read the material or repeat a target that you model.
To introduce the pacing board, have the patient place their finger on the left-most dot. Next, have them touch each dot (left to right) as they say simple targets at a rate of 1 dot per syllable. Examples of simple targets are automatic speech (counting) or small talk (“how are you?” “I am fine.”)
Increase the challenge as appropriate for your patient’s needs and goals. Read how below.
Work within your patient’s motor abilities. If they have fine motor difficulties, for example, they may instead slide their finger across the dots, pausing on a dot while saying each syllable.
Also work with your patient to find the most comfortable placement of the pacing board. This may be closer to their body, farther away, a little to the left or right, etc.
Provide fading cues to help patients learn and internalize this strategy. And offer plenty of encouragement!
Educate caregivers and the care team about how and when to use the pacing board.
For example, one patient may only need the pacing board during communication breakdowns. While a different patient finds it helpful after 3 p.m., when they’re tired. While another patient needs it all of the time.
See The Adult Speech Therapy Starter Pack for reading materials and word lists made for speech therapy patients.
Pacing Board For Dysarthria
For patients who have dysarthria, the goal of a pacing board is to slow down their speech rate in order to improve prosody and intelligibility.
- Place the pacing board in an easily accessible and comfortable position in front of the patient.
- For moderate or severe dysarthria, have the patient practice reading short phrases or sentences, pointing to one dot per syllable on the pacing board.
- As appropriate, increase the challenge to longer sentences, paragraphs, etc.
- As they get used to self-pacing, have the patient point to one dot per syllable during simple conversations.
- For milder dysarthria, start pointing to one dot per syllable at the sentence level and while holding a conversation (small talk, etc.) Increase the length of self-paced reading and conversation, as appropriate.
Pacing Board For Acquired Apraxia of Speech
A pacing board is considered a rate and rhythm control technique for patients with acquired apraxia of speech. Its goal with this population is to improve prosody and articulation.
- Place the pacing board in an easily accessible and comfortable position in front of the patient.
- For moderate or severe acquired apraxia of speech, have the patient practice reading bisyllabic or multisyllabic words, pointing to one dot per syllable on the pacing board.
- As appropriate, increase the challenge to phrases, short sentences, etc.
- As they get used to self-pacing, have the patient point to one dot per syllable during small talk and simple conversation.
- For milder apraxia, start pointing to one dot per syllable at the sentence level and while holding a conversation (small talk, etc.) Increase the length of self-paced reading and conversation, as appropriate.
For more apraxia of speech pacing approaches, see Metronomic Pacing and Metrical Pacing.
Free Pacing Board PDF!
Your Pacing Board download comes with 6 free pacing boards. Choose the board that works best for each of your patient’s needs.
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