As a Speech Therapist, I am always looking for new ways to motivate and and encourage Speech and Language development. I use the IPAD during Speech Therapy, and often recommend apps to IPAD owning families.
This blog will share my favorite IPAD application each month and ways you can use it at home.
App of the Month: Story Builder by the Mobile Education Store
Description: Story Builder is designed to help children improve paragraph formation, improve integration of ideas, and improve higher level abstractions by inference.
Why I like Story Builder: Story builder is great for a variety of language levels and ages. One of my favorite feature is the "record" buttong. Students can use the prompts they provide to create stories and record themselves for motivation and auditory feedback. Story builder can help in the exact ways listed in the description above, but can also be used to improve speech intelligibility, improve story sequencing, and narrative development, as well as inferencing, prediction, and reasoning skills.
Cost: Story builder can be purchased for use on IPAD and IPOD on the App Store. It is $5.99 and in my opinion well work the money!
Looking for a social skills group for your child this summer? Check out Social Butterflies Club at the South Charlotte office of Child and Family Development!
Social Butterflies Club™ was founded in 2004 by Rhonda Osisek M.S., CCC-SLP in Virginia. The Club helps children learn how to interact with peers while having fun with sensory and speech activities combined. Thus, this club is led by both an occupational therapist and speech therapist at CFD. The children in the group may have a variety of diagnoses, such as expressive and/or receptive language problems, sensory processing difficulties, and fine motor deficits. The goal of the Social Butterflies Club™ is to teach the kids how to communicate with peers in a positive way that allows them to thrive outside of therapy.
Each child is screened as part of placement. The Clubs are formed based on each child’s communication skills, social ability and age. The Club meets for 1-hour sessions, twice a week on Tuesday and Thursday at 11 over 2 consecutive weeks. Several schedule options are offered this summer.
I am co-leading the Club with a speech therapist. Contact her to register your child: Michelle Pentz, 704-541-9080 x214, mpentz@childandfamilydevelopment.com
Visit www.socialbutterfliesclub.com for more details about the Social Butterflies Club™.
Visit www.childandfamilydevelopment.com for more information about the C&FD Social Butterflies Club™.
The Social Butterflies Club has come to Charlotte at Child and Family Development.
This summer, the Club will help kids gain social skills in a way that can be easily carried over into a classroom and everyday life because they are taught social skills in natural but structured scenarios. The Club is led by Courtney Stanley, an occupational therapist, and Michelle Pentz, a speech-language pathologist.
Both Occupational Therapy and Speech Therapy are involved because so many of the kids who have difficulty with social skills, also have difficulty with sensory processing, and/or fine motor skills. All of the kids interested in the club will be screened to determine which club groups would be the most beneficial for them, based on their social abilities. We will be alternating movement and language tasks to help elicit social interaction in a naturalistic way. The approximate schedule is 5-10 minutes of free play, 10-20 minutes of an opening circle time, 10-20 minutes of a motor activity, 10-20 minutes of a craft/cooking activity and 5 minutes of a closing circle. The Club meets for 1-hour sessions, twice a week on Tuesday and Thursday at 11. Several options are offered this summer. Kids can enroll and benefit from consecutive groups. Each group will contain between 4-8 kids.
Social Butterflies Club™ was founded in 2004 by Rhonda Osisek M.S., CCC-SLP in Virginia. It is widely used across the country. Visit www.socialbutterfliesclub.com for more details.
Contact Michelle Pentz, MS, CCC-SLP at 704-541-9080 ext. 214 or mpentz@childandfamilydevelopment.com
A Carolinas Walk Now for Autism Speaks captain has just become a published author!! For every book she sells, Stephani will be donating a portion back to Autism Speaks.
Chasing the Light Within
by Stephani Bothwell Tucker
This is the story of 2 brothers, one with a lifelong fight, the other with the lifelong fight of watching his brother search for the light. 2 years apart in age but years apart in everything else. Patrick struggles with autism - Grayson has to watch. Patrick struggles to find words - Grayson struggles to find himself. Patrick searches for his light hidden in the darkness of autism - Grayson shows the world that autism has secret miracles that only his brother can share.
Order your copy today at http://eaglecreative.com/chasing.
May 2012: Happy C&FD Anniversary to Ellen Bruce
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This month marks 5 years of tenure at Child and Family Development for Ellen Bruce. She contributes a great deal to our Occupational Therapy team at the Midtown office. Her training and experience in NDT, Sensory Processing and SOS Approach are just a few highlights of her professional focus. Ellen continues to get great satisfaction from her pediatric therapy work, especially when kids and families make changes for the better. Besides that, she is always willing and able to get the job done- just ask her about the special crown she received from the C&FD team a few years ago. We are pleased to announce that she is expecting her second child later this year.
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Visit the US Department of Health and Human Services Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration’s website, www.samhsa.gov/children, to learn more about National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day on May 9 and the Caring For Every Child’s Mental Health initiative.
2012 marks the seventh year of this special day and the effort to reinforce the belief that positive mental health is essential to a child's healthy development
SAMHSA's "Caring for Every Child's Mental Health" public awareness effort was created in 1994 with the mission to increase awareness around children's mental health. The "Caring for Every Child's Mental Health" team works to support SAMHSA-funded sites through the strategic use of social marketing and communications strategies. The overarching purpose of the team is to stimulate support for a comprehensive system of care approach to children's mental health services.
Ann Guild is the most experienced Speech Therapist on the Child and Family Development team in Charlotte, North Carolina.
She has the unique and perfect timing of celebrating her 23-year tenure here and Better Speech and Hearing Month at the same time- May!
We're always learning from her and recently posed these questions to this admirable professional:
Team: How have you stayed motivated to be a great SLP for so many years?
Ann: The key for me has been to be a life-long learner and to keep refining skill sets for working with the population that I have chosen. If you keep seeking other clinicians who know more than you do or who have different skills than you do and you keep learning from them, you stay an active in the pediatric rehab community. Teaching also provided an opportunity to learn and organize my knowledge and to share it with others.
Team: What keeps you going as a professional at C&FD?
Ann: C&FD has provided the opportunity to build the caseload of kids that I want to treat. It also provides the environment to treat with other dedicated and skilled clinicians. When I first graduated from school, I had a job that was not particularly fun. I left after 1 year. Since then, I have had only 2 jobs. In each of them, there was ample opportunity to grow, change roles, teach, watch kids grow and learn, and learn from colleagues. Those are the things that make a job rewarding and fun.
Ann, thank you for your most notable contribution to this practice and so many kids and families.
What is it?
The Hangin’ with Heroes group is designed for children who have difficulties interacting with others. Role-playing, modeling and games are used to foster social and pragmatic communication skills.
The curriculum is loosely based on Superflex®, created by Stephanie Madrigal and Michelle Garcia Winner. It teaches kids to increase social thinking and awareness, regulate social difficulties and engage in rewarding interactions with others.
Groups are formed based on each child’s communication skills and social ability. There is a limit of 4 participants.
The Group is led by a speech therapist at the South Charlotte office.
When does it happen?
The Group meets for a 1-hour session on Wednesday morning over a 3-week period. This summer, we plan to offer the Group each month as follows:
JUNE 13, 20 and 27
JULY 11, 18 and 25
AUGUST 1, 8 and 15
What is the cost?
A family may pay privately or use Insurance. Private pay cost is $50.00/ group session. Regular deductibles and co-pays apply. Authorization, medical necessity approval and evaluations or screens may be required. All payments are due at the time of service.
Want to learn more?
∙ Schedule the first appointment by calling our front office at 704-541-9080
∙ Contact the therapist:
Jayne Walton, M.A., CCC-SLP
704-541-9080 ext. 213
jwalton@childandfamilydevelopment.com
∙ Read more online:
www.childandfamilydevelopment.com
blog.childandfamilydevelopment.com
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Child and Family Development is pleased to announce a new offering at our South Charlotte office: Social Butterflies Club™
Social Butterflies Club™ was founded in 2004 by a speech therapist in Virginia. It is widely used across the country. Visit www.socialbutterfliesclub.com for more details.
The Club helps kids learn how to interact with peers while having fun with sensory and speech activities combined. It may be beneficial to children with expressive and/or receptive language difficulties, sensory processing disorder, social stressors and fine motor deficits.
Here, groups are co-led by an occupational therapist and a speech therapist.
Contact Michelle Pentz, M.S., CCC-SLP to learn more about it.
This is Stella.
Stella is a 2-year-old chocolate Labrador Retriever that belongs to a very special guy. She comes to Child and Family Development for Occupational Therapy and Speech Therapy every week, along with her 11-year-old master.
We asked him what he liked the most about his dog and the answer was, "loving on me". What else is there!?! Well, she also provides sensory input, fosters social interactions, and keeps him safe. He loves to go for walks and play fetch too.
Stella was trained by Highland Canine in Harmony, NC via a program called Assistance Dogs for Autism. Learn more about it at www.autismassistancedog.com.
The SPD Foundation recently shared the conclusions of a 2011 study by Schaaf, Nielsen & Schoen titled Phenotypes within sensory modulation dysfunction and published in Comprehensive Psychiatry.
This study partially supports the new taxonomy proposed by Miller and colleagues (2007) and two Sensory Processing Disorder subtypes were identified in a sample of 94 children, including Sensory Seeking/Craving (SC) and Sensory Under-Responsivity (SUR). The third subtype, Sensory Over-Responsivity (SOR) did not cluster as a separate subtype but was present in both Sensory Craving and Sensory Under-Responsivity.
The article states that “the results of this study are different from previous hypotheses about the relationship between Sensory Under-Responsivity and Sensory Craving as well as the relationship between Sensory Under-Responsivity and Sensory Over-Responsivity. Unlike Winnie Dunn’s model, the individuals in this study with Sensory Craving did not have Under-Responsivity in the proprioceptive and vestibular domains. In addition, this study did not find that Sensory Under-Responsivity and Sensory Over-Responsivity were on a continuum as suggested in other writings. Rather, Sensory Under-Responsivity and Movement Over-Responsivity co-occurred in this sample. Additionally, a high percentage of our sample displayed behaviors characteristic of ADHD and similarly a high percentage of children who met criteria for ADHD were reported to have SMD. Specifically, 75% of the children with SMD had significant sensory craving and hyperactivity while 82% or the children with ADHD had sensory modulation difficulties. Therefore, therapists and parents are advised to evaluate children for both SMD and ADHD in order to obtain the appropriate and effective interventions. For example, children with SMD tend to become calmer with sensory activities, while children with ADHD may become more hyperactive and disorganized with the same activities. This research supports the finding that children with ADHD are a heterogeneous group and may present with multiple characteristics of SMD. For example, children with ADHD often have features of sensory craving as well as sensory over-responsivity.”
Visit these websites for full information about this article and study:
May is Better Speech and Hearing Month!
The Speech Therapy team at Child and Family Development participates in this fun annual event to raise awareness about communication disorders and to promote treatment that can improve the quality of life for those who experience problems with speaking, understanding, or hearing.
May 2012: Happy C&FD Anniversary to Ann Guild
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Ann Guild has been a speech therapist at Child and Family Development since May 1, 1989—that’s 23 years!
We are proud to work with her and admire her expertise so very much. Ann has a true commitment to sharing knowledge with others- staff and clients alike.
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April has been full of celebrating the AOTA’s Occupational Therapy Month.
At Child and Family Development, an Occupational Therapist provides a skilled service that is all about the ‘job of living’. We help children with behavioral, developmental, neurological and physical deficits gain skills and learn to function with as much independence as possible. Therapy sessions might focus on helping kids learn to eat, hold a pencil, write letters and words, cut a straight line, get into a car, brush teeth, stay organized and focused in the classroom or on the playground, manage sensory input and their own behaviors, as well as stretch and strengthen their muscles. In other words, we help children with everyday activities.
Founded in 1917, the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) represents the interests and concerns of more than 140,000 occupational therapists, assistants and students nationwide. The Association educates the public and advances the profession of occupational therapy by providing resources, setting standards including accreditations and serving as an advocate to improve health care. Based in Bethesda, Md., AOTA’s major programs and activities are directed toward promoting the professional development of its members and assuring consumer access to quality services so patients can maximize their individual potential. For more information, go to www.aota.org.
The Autism Society has been celebrating National Autism Awareness Month since the 1970s. The United States recognizes April as a special opportunity for everyone to educate the public about autism and issues within the autism community. Join them and get involved this month.
One suggestion they have is for supporters to go to a movie. AMC Theatres offer monthly events called Sensory Friendly Films.
Learn even more by contacting local chapter in Charlotte, Autism Society of Mecklenburg County: www.autismsociety.org
It was wonderful to host Glen Stephens of Gabriel's Sanctuary, Inc. at both of the Child and Family Development offices this week.
Glen updated us on his family life since his son's passing in February, as well as the mission and services of the organization.
Gabriel's Sanctuary works alongside families and businesses in the Charlotte community with a focus on:
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Tutoring services for children of all ages and abilities
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Informational speaking engagements and consultations about people with disabilities for small and large group in community groups and businesses
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Consultation services for students and families seeking special needs services from schools or systems, including IEP development and advocacy training
Visit the website or the Facebook page to learn more: www.gabrielssanctuary.com
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