The Importance of Lip Closure and How to Encourage It In Your Child

As a Chicago parent have you been noticing that your child is drooling past toddlerhood, losing food from their mouth or is struggling to drink from a straw? What you’re seeing could be caused by a developmental delay in a critical skill called lip closure.

It’s very easy for this skill to go unnoticed at an early age, but as children get older acquiring it is critical for the foundation of oral motor development. It affects feeding, speech, saliva management, sensory regulation, and overall coordination of the mouth.

For neurodiverse children and those with developmental delays, difficulties in this area becomes more noticeable over time because they overflow into their daily routines and a pattern emerges.

At Blue Bird Day, our multidisciplinary team in Chicago has spent over a decade helping families develop this essential skill through individualized care.

This guide walks you through what lip closure is, why it matters, how it develops, the signs to watch for, and the practical strategies to help your child build a strong oral motor foundation.

If you’d like more personalized insights, please contact us today. We’re here to help support you every step of the way!

What Is Lip Closure?

Lip closure is your child’s ability to bring their lips together with enough strength, coordination, and endurance to complete everyday tasks. It’s a key part of oral motor development and plays a role in:

• Feeding and swallowing
• Speech sound production
• Managing saliva
• Drinking from straws or open cups
• Oral sensory awareness
• Breath control
• Facial muscle development

Here’s the important part: lip closure isn’t just about the lips. It relies on coordinated teamwork between the cheeks, jaw, tongue, and facial muscles.

When these systems work together, children can eat safely, speak clearly, and take part in daily routines with more confidence.

Why Lip Closure Matters

Lip closure supports several areas of growth at once. For neurodiverse children and those with developmental delays, strengthening this skill can create meaningful improvements across the board.

Feeding Skills

Strong lip closure helps children:

• Seal their lips around a spoon
• Clear food from utensils
• Drink from straws
• Manage liquids without spilling
• Move food efficiently inside the mouth
• Swallow safely

When lip closure is weak, mealtimes can become frustrating. You might notice your child losing food or liquid from the front of their mouth, having trouble moving to textured foods, struggling with straw drinking, eating messily, or tiring quickly during meals. These aren’t signs of a picky eater being difficult, they’re signs that the muscles need support.

Speech Development

Lip closure is essential for producing bilabial sounds, the sounds made when both lips come together:

• /m/ as in “mama”
• /b/ as in “ball”
• /p/ as in “puppy”

When these muscles are weak, children may produce distorted speech sounds, become harder to understand, develop compensatory movements to get by, or reach articulation milestones later than expected. Building lip closure through speech therapy helps your child’s words come through more clearly, so their voice can be heard and understood.

Oral Sensory Regulation

Lip closure also supports how children experience their mouths. It helps with:

• Awareness of the mouth
• Tolerance of different textures
• Reduced drooling
• Improved oral motor control

Children with sensory processing differences, meaning the nervous system takes in and interprets input differently, may find lip closure especially tricky. This can show up as hypersensitivity (too much reaction to input), hyposensitivity (too little), oral aversion, or reduced awareness of the facial muscles.

Social and Emotional Development

Eating and talking are deeply social activities. When lip closure is hard, children may feel frustrated at meals, struggle to communicate their needs, lose confidence, or start avoiding social eating situations altogether. Supporting this skill helps your child participate more fully in family dinners, playdates, and classroom activities, building both connection and confidence along the way.

Why Children Often Struggle With Lip Closure

Children with autism, ADHD, Down syndrome, sensory processing differences, or global developmental delays may find lip closure challenging for a few common reasons.

Low muscle tone. Weak facial muscles can make it hard to hold the lips together during feeding or speech. It takes more effort, and children may tire quickly.

Oral motor coordination challenges. Coordinating the lips, tongue, and jaw at the same time is complex. When these movements don’t sync smoothly, both feeding and articulation can be affected.

Sensory processing differences. Some children avoid certain textures, resist input around the mouth, or simply have less awareness of where their lips are and what they’re doing.

None of these reflect anything a parent did or didn’t do. They’re simply areas where your child benefits from targeted, compassionate support.

How Lip Closure Develops

Lip closure usually emerges in infancy and grows stronger through the toddler years. Typical milestones include:

• Sucking from a bottle or breast
• Bringing hands and toys to the mouth
• Exploring textures orally
• Transitioning to purees and soft solids
• Drinking from open cups or straws
• Producing early speech sounds like /m/, /b/, and /p/

For neurodiverse children, these milestones may arrive later or need therapeutic support to develop fully. That’s completely okay. Every child’s journey unfolds at its own pace, and early intervention can make a real difference in how these skills grow.

Signs Your Child May Need Support

You know your child best. If something feels off, trust that instinct. Here are signs that may point to a need for oral motor support:

• Drooling beyond the toddler years
• Difficulty clearing food from a spoon
• Food falling out of the mouth
• Trouble drinking from a straw
• Messy eating patterns
• Weak or distorted bilabial sounds
• Avoidance of certain textures
• Open-mouth posture at rest
• Fatigue during meals
• Difficulty blowing bubbles or whistles

If you’re seeing several of these, reaching out for an evaluation is a positive, proactive step. Early intervention gives children the tools to build strong foundations before challenges become more established.

Therapeutic Strategies to Improve Lip Closure

At Blue Bird Day, our therapists use evidence-based strategies, meaning approaches backed by research and clinical experience, to support lip closure in neurodiverse children and those with developmental delays. Every plan is built around your child’s unique strengths and needs.

Oral Motor Exercises

These targeted exercises strengthen the lips, cheeks, and jaw:

• Lip presses
• Lip rounding exercises
• Straw drinking progression
• Blowing bubbles or whistles
• Using resistive chewing tools
• Lip tapping or vibration for sensory awareness

Our therapists tailor each exercise to your child’s sensory and motor profile, so the work feels achievable and motivating rather than overwhelming.

Feeding Therapy Techniques

Feeding therapy uses structured, gentle approaches to improve lip closure during meals:

• Spoon placement strategies
• Gradual texture progression
• Straw hierarchy training
• Controlled bite sizes
• Oral sensory warm-ups
• Modeling lip closure during feeding

These techniques help children build confidence at the table and reduce the frustration that mealtimes can bring.

Sensory Integration Approaches

For children with sensory processing differences, therapists may use tools that increase oral awareness and support coordinated lip movements:

• Oral sensory tools
• Vibration devices
• Chewy tubes
• Temperature variation
• Taste exploration
• Deep pressure input

Think of this as helping your child’s mouth “wake up” to what it’s doing, so movements become more purposeful.

Postural Support

Believe it or not, lip closure improves when the whole body is stable. A wobbly seat makes precise mouth movements much harder. Our therapists may recommend:

• Adaptive seating
• Foot support
• Core strengthening
• Proper alignment during meals

A stable base gives your child the foundation they need for better oral motor control, which is a great example of how occupational therapy and feeding support work hand in hand.

Speech Therapy Techniques

Speech-language pathologists target lip closure to strengthen clear communication through:

• Bilabial sound practice
• Breath control exercises
• Phonemic awareness activities
• Visual and tactile cues
• Mirror work for self-monitoring

Strengthening lip closure directly improves articulation and how easily others understand your child.

Play-Based Activities

Children learn best when they’re having fun. Our therapists weave oral motor practice into play through:

• Blowing cotton balls across a table
• Bubble games
• Whistle activities
• Straw painting
• Pretend play with food
• Puppet activities

These joyful moments make practice feel like play, which keeps children engaged and building skills without even realizing they’re “working.”

How Parents Can Support Lip Closure at Home

You are your child’s most important partner, and small moments at home reinforce everything happening in therapy. Here are simple, practical ways to help.

Encourage Straw Drinking

Work through a straw hierarchy at your child’s pace:

• Start with short straws
• Move to narrow straws
• Try resistive straws
• Begin with thick liquids like smoothies
• Progress to thin liquids

Model Lip Closure During Meals

Exaggerate your own lip movements when you eat or drink. Children learn by watching the people they love.

Use Oral Motor Play

Turn practice into fun with:

• Blowing bubbles
• Whistles
• Cotton ball races
• Straw painting

Offer a Variety of Textures

Introduce foods that naturally encourage lip closure, such as:

• Applesauce
• Yogurt
• Peanut Butter
• Meltable snacks

Support Posture

Set your child up for success by making sure they:

• Sit upright
• Have their feet supported
• Have stable trunk alignment

Use Visual Cues

A mirror lets your child see their own lip movements, which builds awareness and self-monitoring.

Celebrate Small Wins

Progress may come slowly, and that’s perfectly normal. Every improvement matters. Cheering on the small steps keeps both you and your child motivated for the journey.

Why Early Treatment Matters

The earlier children receive support, the stronger their foundations become. Early treatment helps children:

• Build strong oral motor foundations
• Improve feeding safety
• Reduce frustration
• Strengthen speech development
• Increase independence
• Participate more fully in school and home routines

At Blue Bird Day, our multidisciplinary team, including occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists, physical therapists, feeding therapists, and developmental therapists, works together to support your child’s unique needs.

With more than a decade of experience serving Chicago families, we’re committed to walking alongside you every step of the way. Our collaborative model means your child’s care is coordinated under one roof, not scattered across separate providers, so progress builds naturally from one session to the next.

Frequently Asked Questions

At what age should lip closure develop?
Lip closure begins in infancy and strengthens through toddlerhood. If challenges continue beyond age two, the right support can help your child build these skills.

Is weak lip closure always related to feeding issues?
Not always, though feeding challenges are common. Weak lip closure can also affect speech clarity, saliva management, and overall oral motor coordination.

How long does it take to improve lip closure?
Every child is different. Some make quick progress with consistent practice, while others benefit from ongoing therapy over a longer period. What we know for certain is that early, individualized intervention leads to stronger outcomes.

How is therapy at Blue Bird Day different from school-based services?
Our integrated, multidisciplinary approach means your child’s therapists collaborate closely, embedding oral motor work into natural, everyday activities. This coordinated care often helps children make meaningful progress more efficiently than fragmented services can.

This post was originally published in April 2021 and was rewritten in August 2026 to include updated strategies.