The Beckman Oral Motor Assessment and Intervention was developed by Speech Language Pathologist Debra Beckman. The Beckman Oral Motor Protocol is widely recognized as a highly effective approach to improving important oral motor skills such as swallowing, chewing patterns for feeding, and speech production. Improving oral motor skills can also reduce drooling and teeth grinding. Many children with feeding difficulties (picky eaters) have underlying problems with oral motor skills that make it difficult to bite, chew, move the food around in the mouth and/or swallow. Children with speech disorders who have difficulty producing certain sounds likely also have underlying oral motor issues that need to be addressed for speech to improve. Our trained therapists use the Beckman Oral Motor Assessment to accurately identify the areas of difficulty and then use the Beckman Oral Motor Intervention Protocol to address these areas of concern. Simple intervention exercises are taught to and carried out by a parent or caregiver at home to improve oral motor skills for more successful feeding and speaking. With consistent carryover improvements in oral motor functioning can be seen in as little as 8 weeks. Additional feeding intervention to address textures and add new foods to the diet are continued until all feeding goals are met.