Taking a break from an inappropriate Superbowl half time show. Oh my goodness!
NFL games are no longer family shows, lol.
And is it just me or could those outfits have been a little more "pg" than "r". grrr.
So I'm sharing some of Tommy's progress as a multilayered communicator. He is 6 years old now and communicates thru his ipad (proloque2go), vocalizations, gestures and ASL sign language.
This hasn't been an easy road to language acquisition and eventually speech. We have been surrounded by some of the most talented people in the State though!
Our SLP with our elementary school has been with Tommy for three years and does a comprehensive
job teaching him. Our Western Wa Univ Speech disorder team has been teaching him for over a year now and we have worked with folks at WWU audiology for alot longer than that.
Tommy's one-on-one aide at school has only been teaching him for four months but has probably had the most profound effect on his language acquisition as she is also teaching him ASL and contexts to choose the ipad or gestures within. ASL is proven as a help to motor planning thru a very interesting longitudinal study (I can send it to you if you want). His one-on-one aide is the Tommy whisperer. And her in combination with the school SLP is some amazing support for Tommy!
And then there is us as a family, Tommy's best educators if you ask us are his parents and family! We pick up his cues and are doing all things to support his communication. He has over 100 signs, can sign about half of the alphabet, count, can use proloque2go fairly well and use his vocalizations.
Last but not least is the support Tommy gets from his school teacher and administration. We have a plan and support and although it is a fairly innovative blending that has involved thoughts and work on their side, support for Tommy will give him access to an education. We know they have the entire room of students in life skills, but we are happy to know they listen to Tommy's needs and meet him where he is.
We are grateful for the hard work and hours and thoughts from everyone.
So with all that.... here are two short videos at WWU speech therapy showing first a four or five word request in proloque2go and the second video is some really nice turn taking which is an important piece in language development. I'm on one side of the one-way mirror so my reflection kinda distorts the picture.
The usual session is 45 mins, don't worry I'm not going to bore you with the whole thing! This one was amazing, by far the best session EVER with signing, gestures, proloque2go, scheduling, and lots of language development like requests, eye contact and lots of thinking by Tommy!
Tommy is getting his voice!