The best thing you can do in the moment is listen patiently and wait for them to say what they want to say. Keep your facial expression neutral. No pity no frustration, nothing different from you. Just look at them like you are in the middle of a conversation, which you are. If they do stutter at school or when talking to someone else, they aren’t going to be so kind, so keep things at home kind and neutral. In the moment, there is no relaxing or softening. He wants to say something and is going to get agitated that he can’t get it out fluently. Last thing he’s going to want to hear is take a breath and relax. I’d approach it like Occam’s Razor. Assume the easy things first. My stutter was very clearly a result of anxiety and a feeling of rushing and strain. I couldn’t soften. That’s most certainly not the culprit for everyone though. It’s pretty deep and can be very severe. Start with relaxation techniques. He’s 7 so getting him to mediate is kinda laughable but what you can do is start working on a bedtime breathing technique with him. Tell him this is something he just must do every night, without fail. Tell him it might help him speak better. Both of you get cozy in his bed and start simply breathing. 5 in 5 out. Eyes closed. Again, you’ll need to be patient here because the kid is 7! They’re going to get impatient with it so just try to be persistent. 5 in and 5 out for 5 minutes or more. Tell him to think about something he likes while he’s doing it. For me when i was a kid it was dolphins diving and rising in the water. that always calmed me. Do it every night, even if it’s just 5 minutes. It may take months to develop a habit. If you can get him into this habit, you can tell him that if he starts feeling himself losing control of his fluency, he can stop and do the breathing like he does at bed time. If he doesn’t have time to do that, then tell him he can think about that image in his head that he thinks about while he is doing his breathing(his dolphins). The mind draws the association to the relaxation technique and may help him soften. Again, it’s the simplest solution and it may not work but it is a thing you can do at home and it’s free. It won’t hurt. You can also look up National Association for Stuttering. They have lots of good resources! Thank you for advocating for your child!