Course 4: Program Planning

In terms of verbal speech in general, the student sometimes uses approximations of several words that are useful for basic engagement with people who do not use ASL: “hi/hey/hello, bye, yeah, no, mom, and dad.” We have been working on closed syllables (CVC—e.g., "mom") and two syllable words (with the shape CVCV—e.g., "mama"). The student has been able to use these skills to produce some of the above words: “mom, dad, and hello.” The student is still most successful with CV syllable types (“ma, ba, pa”). The student has also developed the ability to produce the following sounds they did not use at the beginning of therapy: d, l, t n, ch, j, k (most successful with the first four.). They can also produce m, p, b, f, and h.

The student enjoys communicating both verbally and with sign. They can be quite enthusiastic and have recently become more verbally “chatty,” attempting longer sentences and phrases. This may draw people in. However, the student's verbal speech continues to be very difficult to understand, and as a result, it is not currently very efficient and effective when they want to communicate more than greetings and yes/no.

It has been great to see the student's hard work in this challenging area, and I know they will continue developing communication using multiple strategies!

The student uses a wide variety of signed words and verbal approximations of words, meeting the goal for 6/10 opportunities per session. They still require prompting about 40% of the time. The student can make requests, answer yes/no questions, make comments about events and objects, and refer to things that are not immediately present. See the following notes from a recent session for examples: talked about the beach, sand, and a little house in the first picture with prompting.

For a picture of a bench signed "seat," the student answered the question, "Where do you find it?" by signing “yes” to the suggestion of "the park," from dad. In the next picture, the student identified a tree and used the sign for the letter J to mention how it was like the trees at Julie's house. They answered the question, "What colour are the leaves?" by signing "green." For a picture of basketball players, they signed, "playing with me." For a picture of a couch, signed "baby house" which referred to the couch at his aunt's place. For a picture of a lunchbox with wraps in it, signed "sandwich" with prompting. Answered the question, "What are you going to eat?" by signing "chicken." At the end of a game of Crocodile Dentist, signed "angry" when referring to the crocodile.

In the future, a communication board or other AAC system will likely be the most useful option for the student when communicating with people who do not use ASL. This was difficult to implement during our time together for a variety of reasons, but the student points to pictures and objects reliably and would very likely be able to use such a system when it's appropriate to address this goal.