We have sent all 3 of our children here and have participated in grades 3-7 as well as summer…read morecourses. Mrs Olga is an excellent principal and the teacher and admin staff are fantastic as well. The curriculum and teaching style are effective at helping kids get to the next level of numerical thinking and problem solving. Cannot recommend it enough.

My kid is not happy there and she comes home at 9:00 PM tired after the 2 hours she spent…read morelistening to math in a boiling hot classroom. I do not recommend sending your child here because they also don't teach the math that is reviewed in regular schools so it will get really confusing for you and your child to focus on two different things. Strongly do not recommend!

We brought our 2.5 year old to see Mandy and were with her for approximately 1.5 years. Mandy…read moreprovided just the right advice as well as engagement for our child (and as new parents, her experienced guidance and suggestions throughout also gave us peace of mind). Our toddler at the time was very shy, so her approach of play-based speech therapy was the ideal fit for a shy kiddo. He looked forward to sessions and didn't realize it was "work", but instead saw it as a fun activity where he was able to play with a variety of toys with an energetic playmate. I don't see how Mandy has the energy to play with the little ones all day, but she does--and really seems to enjoy it. The play/session environment is comfortable, welcoming, clean, and has a toy store's worth of different toys (and Mandy is always trying out new ones for the repertoire). Mandy immediately identified a structural issue that a previous formal evaluation from another speech therapist missed. Our child progressed wonderfully and is now outgoing, able to express himself clearly and with a range of vocabulary and sentence structures, and is doing advanced language and verbal work at school. We are very satisfied and highly recommend Bethesda Speech for Kids and Mandy.

Mandy has made an enormous difference in the life of my 9yo. My son has been in and out of various…read morespeech pathologist's offices since he was 4, and I could never hear or see a measurable difference in his speech until we found Mandy. The difference in a year with her is greater by far than the difference in 5 years with everyone else combined. I cannot say enough good things about our experience with her. She is incredibly effective as a speech pathologist, and the results are really clear. Even more than that, she is flexible, patient, adaptive and works with my son rather than at him. Her humor shines through steadily, and she is very kind, and my son can sense that and relaxes with her. She has specific, targeted exercises and games she goes through with him - he has only begun to figure out that the games are work - and gives us home practice in such a way that he knows what he needs to be doing and how to do it. My son can be a handful - so she works in movement breaks and tunes the games to his interests and approaches it with humor that makes him feel welcome. She gives prizes after so many stickers earned - set at a reasonable, attainable pace - and I noticed that, having figured out my son liked puzzles and stuffed animals, that the prizes being offered have quietly become things he enjoys. He vibrates for the opportunity to win them. Even the games have become quietly tuned to his needs and preferences; I've never seen so many games of Memory played. My son invented his own version of Go Fish with the articulation cards, and she went so far as to write down the rules so they could play it again. Seriously, she is *amazing*. As a note: my son went from throwing tantrums at the very idea of speech to cheerfully practicing at home and happily showing up to his speech therapy. Because she praises him for his effort and his progress and specifically what he is doing right, he can aim for that specific thing again and *believes her* when she tells him he's working and she can tell. I cannot tell you what a difference that has made. Most importantly, my son went, in less than a year, from being unintelligible unless someone had known him for years, to being a confident, talkative, outgoing kid with a lot to say. A few months in with Mandy, I stopped having to 'translate' for him. Months ago, he suddenly started talking non stop, because he could be understood and heard and participate. Before that, he only spoke that much with me, and he chose the most efficient script to short hand what he wanted to communicate, as speaking was tedious and hard work and he might have to repeat himself five times. Now, he is speaking happily and with assurance with his friends and with his teachers, and does not hesitate to step up and speak when called upon to do so. Mandy has made SUCH a difference in his life, and I am forever grateful. She is worth every penny and moment of time. I highly recommend her; you won't find a better speech pathologist.

As a writer, I should be able to testify to Raz Mason's gifts easily. And yet I find myself…read moresearching for ways to describe her supportive, insightful, gentle ability to lead me out of myself into full consciousness of who I am and what I want to be. Sometimes I wonder if she is somehow tuned in to parts of my subconscious mind that I have tuned out. She often makes a quiet suggestion or rephrases something I've said about myself in terms so positive I have to think, "Yes, she's right. That's really me. I don't have to apologize for me!" I love it when she gives me a homework assignment because it always involves doing something good and positive for myself. You would think that having lived two-thirds of my life already, I would be in the habit of doing this all the time. But I'm not. Thanks to Raz, I'm getting in the habit of it. Often she comments on how animated my eyes and face have become when I start talking about something I love more than I knew I loved, and I think, "That's right! I love that! Why am I not allowing myself to pursue it?" In just the few months I have been working with Raz, I have experienced great inner change. Good things are flowing my way--people, opportunities, challenges, achievements--that I never would have imagined. I wake up eager to consume the goodness of my day. Thank you, Raz.

Even though Raz and I come from two different cultural backgrounds (I am both Arab and Muslim), I…read morehave never once felt that she was judging me or my values. Raz is extremely comfortable to speak with and is very mindful as she directs our conversations and has something to bring to my attention. When I first spoke to Raz, there was a sense of calm about her where I knew immediately that I wanted to take a chance and do these sessions with her (knowing very well that I am a very private person and I do not trust easily). There was something about her; her tone and her sensitivity made me take to her very quickly and allowed me to let my guard down faster than I imagined. When deciding how these sessions work, Raz gave me her offers regarding the number of sessions, and she said that it is probably around the tenth session that one starts to sense a change in themselves. I am so glad that I trusted her judgement and took a leap of faith, because it was probably around my eleventh session with her that I started to have certain epiphanies about myself that still had not occurred to me around our fifth or sixth session. I began to feel positive and happy after every one of our talks, and it was then that I realized that she and I were meant to meet, and she was meant to be part of my empowered journey in this thing called life. Not only is Raz sensitive to her client's situations, she is intuitive and seems to have a lot of experience in her line of work. Even though she is mindful, it does not stop her from speaking up and suggesting what she believes will be helpful to me. She is passionate about her work, and most importantly, I feel that Raz genuinely wants me to be the best version of myself and to succeed. When I throw a curve ball her way she is always present. She offers me extra readings where she knows I will benefit, and I cannot thank her enough. Raz has given me very practical tools to help me in my day to day struggles, and some of the things we have spoken about have been so enlightening that that they have changed aspects in my life I assumed were set in stone. Without these sessions with Raz, there are certain things I would not have thought of and probably still would have viewed as being one-dimensional. This testimonial is my thank you to her for the support she has given me as well as an invitation to anyone who is looking to better themselves or parts of themselves they thought were resistant to change. If you are looking to transform the course of your life even in the smallest ways, Raz is the person to take this journey with. Her positive attitude and energy is infectious, but you have to be an honest, willing, and dedicated participant. RA, Middle East