Summer's Journey

Last week, I was sharing with YS' Mummy on how to facilitate language learning in everyday routine. I shared with her the S.P.A.R.K. approach by Hanen TM . She looked at me straight in the eyes and told me flatly that she had undergone the entire Hanen TM  'It Takes Two to Talk' programme and it was not effective at all! ( Prior to this, Daddy had shared with me how YS was talking before she started using Picture Communication System, and how she just lost her speech totally the moment her school placed her on the Picture Communication System a few years back. He also mentioned that YS has been doing oromotor exercises for a long time with little results. ) When Mummy told me outright that what I shared is nothing new and it is totally ineffective, I did not take it to heart at all. In fact, I felt really sad. It added on to the sadness which I was feeling after hearing what Daddy had shared. I asked myself what had gone wrong. YS' parents had tried almost every r...

Happy Teachers' Day to all Educators out there, regardless of whether you are a teacher or a therapist! Being an educator is not a easy journey... but definitely a rewarding one. Like how parents would celebrate every little achievement their child with special needs makes, I celebrate every little achievement that the children I work with make. Two weeks ago, one of my new client's mum told me, "You know, it took me THREE weeks to teach LD to tap my hand to get my attention when requesting for an item!" I thought to myself, "Three weeks is not too bad at all! I have had worked with children who took three months or even longer!" Today, as many educators celebrate Teachers' Day in school, I wish all of you a Happy Teacher's Day. You deserve all the recognition for the hard work which you have put into our children. Of course, not forgetting the LOVE which you have showered on each of them, bringing them to greater heights every day. Happy Tea...

It has been 12 days since my last post on DJ. I had another two sessions with him.  I am excited to share about those two sessions! Because DJ is no longer trying to get off-seat or trying to rush through the tasks.  I changed my approach completely... First, I removed the schedule board. Second, I moved the table aside. It was funny how DJ stretched towards the table to check out the schedule board, to find out what he had to do, but could not even find the board. I simply told him, "Come play with Teacher." He looked at me straight in my eyes and gave a cheeky smile. We played tickle... we played throwing/catching ball... we played blowing a windmill...  we laughed and had fun together... I obtained the rapport again!  Then... I told him, "Let's do work for 5 counts and we can play again!" He looked at me with moderate reluctance and I repeated calmly, "Just 5 counts." He trusted me and know that when teacher said '5 counts', i...

Today I had my session with DJ, a 5 year-old boy with Autism. He communicates mainly with single words and gestures. He also has articulation difficulties, resulting in an intelligibility of about 60%. For the past month, I have been losing sleep over him. When we started therapy five months ago, I used a play-based approach. This decision was based on my experience working with children like DJ. Through his speech productions in fun activities, I used the Hanen approach to increase his language and PROMPT technique to work on his articulation. DJ was highly motivated to 'work' with me and Mum reported that improvement has been noted - he is talking more and with increased clarity. This approach boosts his motivation and confidence to talk. However, three months into therapy, Mum requested for structured oromotor exercises and speech drills. Maybe play-based approach looked like too much fun. Maybe she felt that I was not doing enough 'explicit' work about DJ'...

Last Sunday at JEM, I sat in a forum "How can we create a better world?", under a project by Care Positioning System ' From Singapore, With Love '. It included Ms Sylvia Lee, Founder of EmancipAsia, Ms Hannan Leong, Founder of Engineers Without Borders Asia, and Mr. Thomas Wee, Founder of Willing Hearts Orphanage. Several questions were discussed and the one question which I found most difficult was "How do we encourage Singaporeans to do more volunteer work and be less apathetic?" Ms. Sylvia Lee made a good point. She mentioned that volunteerism has been oversold in Singapore. Since primary school days, or even preschool days, children have been 'made' to do volunteer work. To many of them, as they grew up, 'volunteer work' became a bad word. As for me, I would encourage everyone to pause in their business in life and think about what is life-giving to them. I am sure everyone has an innate passion which drives them on in life. Don...

Yesterday afternoon, I had a session with one of my oldest client, WN. She is a 11 year old girl with Autism. When I first started working with her 1.5 years ago, she had little speech. Her only phrase at that time was ' I want.. mama.. '. The desired item was always called 'mama'. And she always used that soft weak voice. Three months into speech therapy, WN spontaneously told her mum ' I want swimming .' Awesome! Her mum brought her swimming immediately. This motivated WN to keep saying ' I want swimming .' even at the most inappropriate timings. Six months into speech therapy, WN was able to say ' I want go toilet.' and ' I want water. ' All these spontaneously. Critical communication skills achieved! A year and a half into speech therapy, WN spontaneously told me ' I want biscuit. ' It was halfway through a session. I replied ' later ', thinking that I may have heard wrongly. Five minutes later, she repeated aga...

Yesterday and today evening, I was invited to speak at a public exhibition of Singaporeans who have participated in community work overseas. It is really my honour to be one of the 50 Singaporeans to be featured in this project, From Singapore, With Love . It is an initiative by Care Positioning System (CPS), in celebration of SG50. I really like what they are doing because CPS aims to gather all the like-minded people who are doing community work overseas, so that resources can be maximised and projects will have continuity. Find out more at www.inspiration.volunteerbetter.com In my sharing this evening, I highlighted the lack of Speech Therapy services in neighbouring countries. For countries such as Nepal and Myanmar, the profession does not exist at all. In my last community work trip to Myanmar in March 2015, it breaks my heart to see that the children do not get any support for their needs, especially those with severe communication difficulties and s...