Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 21, 1995 TAG: 9506210072
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: ADRIANNE BEE STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RADFORD LENGTH: Long
The adults are graduate students in Radford's Speech and Pathology program. Siobhan Campbell, Shelly Buck, Kristen Crawford and Lauren McIntosh are getting their 300-plus hands-on hours working with children who have language disorders in a pilot program launched this summer.
They're helping children who have various problems with language: kids who can't hear well and foreign-born kids who are struggling to learn English, for example.
A handful of children clutching stuffed bears gathers on a mattress covered with "101 Dalmations" sheets. Campbell begins to read as the children follow along: "'Goodnight kittens, goodnight mittens.' Do you see the kittens, where are they?"
Blue-eyed Kristen squeals as she points to the kittens. She also points to the mittens, the house and mouse, the bowl of mush and woman whispering "Hush."
"She's sharp as a tack," said Ann Harrell, director of the program. "She's here because she has apraxia."
Apraxia is a language disorder that causes a person to have difficulty in verbally expressing thoughts. Kristen knows what these things are, it is just hard for her to name them. Campbell continues to ask the children questions as she reads.
"There is a way to read to children," said John Pettit, head of the department of communication sciences and disorders. "We teach parents to use open-ended questions as they read, such as 'What do you think will happen next?'"
A main component of the clinic is getting parents involved. They watch from behind a two-way mirror as the children read with the clinicians. Attentive and excited as they turn the pages and point to the pictures, these children are definitely children. Blond-haired Drake, not realizing his mother is watching from the other side, makes the famous McCauley Caulkin after-shave scream face in the mirror.
"Before, with his one-on-one speech class, he never wanted to come," said Angie Layman, Drake's mother. "Now he can't wait to come."
The children fidget as they line up to go on a hunt for stars through the hallways of the speech and hearing clinic. "We stole some stars last night," Campbell says as she invites the children to pull off any of the large gold stars affixed to the walls
"I see one!" someone screams and the children begin pulling off stars to plunk into a wishing-well box at the end of the hallway.
Roy signs that he wishes for a dog as he drops his star into the well. Macintosh, skilled in sign language, translates for the other hearing children.
"Another dog, a cat, more stars." These are the children's wishes.
The program focuses on literacy, printed words and stories to be acted out and read aloud. "Imagination and pretending are a big part of it," Pettit said.
After the group reading session, the children each go to a designated room with their parents to read. Kristen will invite you into her room with a smile as she points to her interior decor of choice, pictures of bears. She and mom, Donna Suarratt, crouch over a book. "They do exciting things here," Suarratt says. "Kristen wants to read a lot more."
Around the corner Roy's mother, Connie Lunsford, is learning sign language while Roy is in the clinic. She has recently learned 200 words and Roy has been making quite a bit of progress himself.
"He is the one who is reading to the clinician now," Harrell said. "His voice goes up and down at the appropriate parts."
Though he is not speaking discernible words, Roy has begun to learn inflection in story-telling.
As the children stretch out on the bed with the lights dimmed to look at the glow-in-the-dark stars stuck on the ceiling, Harrell remarks how glad she is "that we can be as creative as we can be.
"I mean, what do kids really want to do?" she asked. "They want to jump on beds and have fun."
The Scottish Rite funding allows for props such as the makeshift headboard the clinicians have created behind the mattress to provide a bed, essential for a song that goes "No more monkeys jumping on the bed!"
Other props are the monster costumes and jungle decorations for the next day's program when the children will read Maurice Sendak's "Where The Wild Things Are."
"We tried to get books that the parents would remember from their own childhoods," Harrell said, pointing to a rack of new books, absent of peanut butter fingerprints and scribbles.
"At first they could hardly sit through one book," Campbell said of the children in the program. "Now they want to hear a story two or three times."
As the day ends, Kristen skips into the nighttime room and flops onto the bed with a smile. She playfully pushes her mom out of the room as Suarratt attempts to take her home. Drake runs in past his mother, ducking under her extended arm.
They wish the program would last longer. The clinicians do, too - the program is funded only for this summer.
Still Pettit hopes it will answer research questions, lead to improvement and point out just what works for children with language disorders. "I think the kids really like it," Pettit said.
by CNB