My first week of clinic

This past week was my first week of clinic. I’m one of six graduate students in the phonological disorders group. A person with a phonological disorder (usually a young child) has created his own rule system for how to say words. For example, my client uses the “d” sound for all words that start with a consonant, deletes the last consonant, and whenever a word is two or three syllables, uses the voiced or voiceless “th” sound for each consonant. My job is to re-teach the rule system so that he talks correctly and can be understood.

The six of us were divided into pairs. The Lord blessed me with a wonderful partner named Jen. My disadvantage (or advantage depending on how you look at it) is that this is my first semester in clinic and everyone else’s third. Jen is very creative and has lots of great ideas. She also is well-prepared. She has been so great to teach me how to do everything. I feel spoiled at times because none of my classmates had knowledgeable people working so closely with them when they began clinic.

I’m in clinic for two hours twice a week. For the first hour I work with my client on his sounds. During the second hour Jen and her client join me and together we work on literacy awareness by reading books, learning letters, looking for letters in words, etc. Jen and I take turns being in charge of the group activity.

I can’t say a whole lot about my client, but he’s almost four and is very obedient. Oh yeah, he hardly talks. In the four hours we were together I think he said four utterances on his own. Whenever I ask him to say the words we are talking about he says them. If I ask him to go somewhere in the room for an activity he obeys immediately. I think the poor kid is just terrified. How would you feel if your mom left you with a stranger in a strange place in a strange room where the person said, “Say ‘dough, mow’” and other things like that.

Our group session is interesting. Jen’s client is about the same age. He talks a little bit more, but he’s quite different from my client. He attends a Montessori school, and his mother seems to have taken the “learning” environment a little too far. If he doesn’t want to do something (no matter what) he doesn’t have to. He shouldn’t be rewarded because doing something correctly should be reward enough. When the two clients are together not much happens. They don’t talk to each other. They don’t want to sit very close to each other. At the end of the session Jen says, “Say goodbye to [my client].” He shakes his head and says no while mine shyly waves goodbye. Hopefully as time goes on my client will warm up to me and both clients will get along better.

The other groups have 4 clients at a time ranging from 4-7 years old. Apparently after the first five minutes they were talking to each other like they were best friends that had known each other all their lives. Also, the clinicians said that the 4 can understand each other perfectly even though they all make different mistakes. Apparently the clinicians’ have no clue what the kids are saying and the kids are trying to help explain each other.

So, two sessions down, ten more to go for the summer. I’m enjoying it so far. Hopefully it will continue to go well.