Reading comprehension improves greatly with the ability to visualize. Visualization is the ability to create pictures from words. In the example, “Sam the dog ran out the door” Can you picture Sam? The door? The yard? Maybe Sam is a medium-sized black and white spotted dog with short hair running out of a white screen …
Verbs
Writing is a challenge for many with language-based learning disabilities. Who knew writing was so complicated. Subjects, verbs, objects, how often do any of us think of them when we write. Yet, they are the building blocks of writing and the ability to identify them is part of reading as well. Writing remediation can take …
More on social skills
For people with social skills challenges it is not enough just to teach how to recognize different facial expression or how to greet someone, it is equally important to teach when and where to apply non-verbal language skills. Social skills make it possible to form relationships in order to feed our need for social interactions …
You don’t like my ponytails!
One day my daughter was on a play date, and she came running in crying that someone had made fun of her ponytails. My daughter’s ponytails are more like cotton puffs, but we both knew that her ponytails were a special hairdo. I asked her if she liked them. She tearfully said “yes” I told …
How do we learn to make friends
Today at lunch, my friend told me about a problem her son was having on the bus. She went on to describe how one little boy on the bus who was unpopular, teased and not befriended, had decided to bring his Nintendo with a “Star Wars” game on the bus. He let other kids play …
Head injuries and strokes: lessons to learn
Working at Boston Specialty Rehabilitation Hospital, my first job, helped me to define my role as a “Speech Pathologist.” One of my greatest success's while working in rehabilitation, was working with a woman who had suffered a stroke by providing cognitive and reading remediation. While chasing one of my early clients down the halls of …
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Executive functioning: What’s that have to do with a language disorder?
After working with students for over 13 years the one thing that continues to amaze me is the fact that so often language remediation of a language disorder has as much to do with language as it does with executive functioning including self-regulation. Here's a site that defines and looks at executive functioning in children. …
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