Stuttering
07-13-2004, 07:58 AM
Children who stutter often are 'actively engaged'
Sunday, July 11, 2004
The Grand Rapids Press
John "Mick" Hanley remembers what it was like being a shy kid.
He also has a pretty good idea of what it's like to be a child who stutters.
Hanley, chairperson of the speech pathology and audiology department at Western Michigan University, has researched stuttering for more than 30 years and written for a national Stuttering Foundation publication.
Most children today who stutter are "very socially, actively engaged" with school and classmates, Hanley says. Most stuttering children will answer things in class, and about 20 percent of children, even those who don't stutter, are shy, as Hanley says he was.
Shy is not the same thing as withdrawn. If parents see their children withdrawing from communication or social activities, they should seek help.
"Are they willing to talk in spite of the stutter?" is one of the first things Hanley notes when evaluating a new client.
He also encourages parents and school counselors to remind teenagers of what's going on besides their stuttering.
"At that age they're hormonal, they're developing self-image, and they're facing peer pressure. Often they're just lost for a couple years," he says. Some tend to blame the stuttering for everything when other factors also are at work.
Hanley teaches courses in stuttering and supervises speech pathologists in training at WMU's Charles Van Riper Speech, Language and Hearing Clinic in Kalamazoo, which offers hearing evaluation, speech and language evaluations, and therapy/rehabilitation services.
The clinic, which usually has a waiting list for stuttering therapy, bears the name of Charles Van Riper, a longtime scholar in the area of stuttering. Van Riper, who died in 1995, had a severe stutter, though he achieved "fluency."
Clinic staff use characters such as Excited Eddie and Calm Cal to model new speech patterns for stuttering children.
Hanley says most young children are excited and hurried when they're learning to express themselves.
"We often teach them to initiate their sentences without becoming excited or hurried."
Most parents, Hanley notes, use a very rapid rate of speech and sentences with many words. Children are very imitative, but physically, they aren't ready to duplicate that speed or length.
When parents slow their speech and use shorter, more concise sentences, the "outcome is often very measurable," Hanley says.
Tamara Lubic
http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/grpress/index.ssf?/base/features-0/108954146495260.xml
Sunday, July 11, 2004
The Grand Rapids Press
John "Mick" Hanley remembers what it was like being a shy kid.
He also has a pretty good idea of what it's like to be a child who stutters.
Hanley, chairperson of the speech pathology and audiology department at Western Michigan University, has researched stuttering for more than 30 years and written for a national Stuttering Foundation publication.
Most children today who stutter are "very socially, actively engaged" with school and classmates, Hanley says. Most stuttering children will answer things in class, and about 20 percent of children, even those who don't stutter, are shy, as Hanley says he was.
Shy is not the same thing as withdrawn. If parents see their children withdrawing from communication or social activities, they should seek help.
"Are they willing to talk in spite of the stutter?" is one of the first things Hanley notes when evaluating a new client.
He also encourages parents and school counselors to remind teenagers of what's going on besides their stuttering.
"At that age they're hormonal, they're developing self-image, and they're facing peer pressure. Often they're just lost for a couple years," he says. Some tend to blame the stuttering for everything when other factors also are at work.
Hanley teaches courses in stuttering and supervises speech pathologists in training at WMU's Charles Van Riper Speech, Language and Hearing Clinic in Kalamazoo, which offers hearing evaluation, speech and language evaluations, and therapy/rehabilitation services.
The clinic, which usually has a waiting list for stuttering therapy, bears the name of Charles Van Riper, a longtime scholar in the area of stuttering. Van Riper, who died in 1995, had a severe stutter, though he achieved "fluency."
Clinic staff use characters such as Excited Eddie and Calm Cal to model new speech patterns for stuttering children.
Hanley says most young children are excited and hurried when they're learning to express themselves.
"We often teach them to initiate their sentences without becoming excited or hurried."
Most parents, Hanley notes, use a very rapid rate of speech and sentences with many words. Children are very imitative, but physically, they aren't ready to duplicate that speed or length.
When parents slow their speech and use shorter, more concise sentences, the "outcome is often very measurable," Hanley says.
Tamara Lubic
http://www.mlive.com/entertainment/grpress/index.ssf?/base/features-0/108954146495260.xml