AUT-2B-HOME IN CAROLINA ~ Teaching our twenty-five-year-old daughter with autism and aphasia, who is still learning about God, the world, and its people with a little help from Charlotte Mason
Showing posts with label Association Method. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Association Method. Show all posts
The next sentence I taught was (I see a/an/some _____). Because Pamela had already learned the difference between the three articles (a/an/some), we did not spend any extra time on them. I wrote "see" in green to attract her attention to the new syntax. I also took pictures of Pamela pointing to the object to emphasize that she was the subject (I) and she was in the act of seeing the object. We had not worked on eye gaze at that time, and I remember finding it difficult to get her to look at the object and pose for the camera. Notice that the first two sentences I taught were declarative in nature because the speaker states something about an object. (Click the pictures for a better view.)
As before, I taught the question that goes with the sentence next: "What do you see?" and then alternate randomly between the two sentence/questions to make sure Pamela knew which sentence answered which question. We also practiced this playing games and in real life to make sure Pamela understood the context in which to apply them.
The next sentence we covered was similar to the second: I have a/an/some _____. Again, we color code the verb "have" because it is the new word of interest. I purposely had Pamela hold each object when I took these pictures to emphasize the difference between seeing and having. After we taught the question "What do you have?" we went back to alternating between the three sentence-question pairs and being sure to use all three in games and real life.
The fourth sentence we covered was similar to the second and third: I want a/an/some _____. The verb "want" is green, and I had Pamela reach out to the object of desire to emphasize the meaning of the verb. After we taught the question "What do you want?" we went back to review all four pairs and using them beyond therapy time.
Then, I switched gears and focused on names of people and characters instead of nouns "This is _____" to go with "Who is this?" I remember this "little" change threw a few curve balls, which Pamela overcame after a few weeks (yes, weeks): (1) remember when to use articles and (2) when to ask "who" versus "what" questions. Her difficulty with these minor alterations in syntax confirmed my suspicions that she had syntactic aphasia.
Pamela found the next question much easier because there were no articles to trip her up: "_____ has a/an/some _____" and "What does _____ have?" She was so used to using "I" in sentences and "you" in questions, she had no problem substituting these pronouns with the name of a person. However, she struggled a bit with "has" versus "have." To you, it may seem minor, but children with aphasia are extremely poor guessers and they usually guess wrong! So, a little difference in the last sound of a word was huge and took another week or two for her to nail.
Up until this point, all sentences and questions were in the present tense. We finally reached the first past tense one, and, believe it or not, it threw Pamela for a loop: "I saw a/an/some _____" and "What did you see?" I forget how long Pamela needed to nail the sentence and question down, but it took quite some time to remember which words went with which tense!
Last month, something interesting happened. Pamela's skeeter bites were driving her nuts. We were working on expressive imperative and declarative gestures, but she was so distracted that she stimmed up a storm AND fell back on the six repetitive sentences that she learned five years ago! Here is the clip:
As promised in my first post on the second unit of language, I want to share some ideas about where I think RDI dovetails with the Association Method. If I could boil RDI down into one over-arching principle, I would say the goal is to redo developmental milestones missed originally. Therefore, I believe the key to figuring when to implement the Association Method ought to flow from the development of typical children. Since many readers may be "lone rangers" (without consultants), I plan to refer to readily available documents found on line (such as Zero to Three handouts), rather than RDI stages. As you read through this post, think about your child and try to assess if the language delay is due to the overall delay or something co-occuring, above and beyond what is seen in typical autistic children. If you are dealing with garden variety autism with no extra-special language delays, maybe the answer is to keep doing RDI and reevaluate language in a few months.
Focus on Typical Development
Babies spend the first year of life becoming masters of nonverbal communication (both receptive and expressive). In the early stages of development, nonverbal trumps verbal. So, before going crazy with fifty nouns and six repetitive sentences, it makes sense to follow the path of babies if your child is nonverbal or low-verbal. Should you follow this exactly? No, every child is unique and the key is to fill in gaps. I am just attempting to give a broad outline to help you figure out where the Association Method might fit:
0-3 months - Build trust between you and your child; be a source of comfort when they are melting down; respect their need to take a break when overwhelmed; encourage times when you are both nonverbal and expressing yourself through sound, facial expressions, and body movements.
3-6 months - Continue the foundation previously built; sounds become more structured (babbles, coos, gurgles). In my opinion, this is a great time to introduce simple phonemes in a playful, unstructured manner.
6-9 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame situations in which your child has a chance to learn by copying you; spotlight feelings in your sounds; pair common gestures with your words. In my opinion, this is a great time to continue simple phonemes, going back and forth like conversation.
9-12 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame situations in which your child can (1) follow simple directions and (2) communicate through sounds and body; develop interaction patterns. In my opinion, this is a great time to get serious about phonemes if vocal play seems stalled.
12-15 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame situations in which your child can (1) communicate what they want through actions, (2) point to common things you name, and (3) imitate what you do; join in and elaborate any pretend play your child starts. In my opinion, this is a great time to continue working on phonemes and make plans for the fifty nouns.
15-18 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame situations in which your child can (1) respond to simple questions and directions through their actions, (2) react to the emotions of others, and (3) perform simple roles in household chores. In my opinion, this is a great time to get serious about the fifty nouns, if no nouns have emerged.
18-24 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame, elaborate on, and speak declaratively about pretend play, problem solving, and testing things out; whenever your child uses nouns, add another word in response ("apple" "Want apple?") In my opinion, this is a great time to continue working on the fifty nouns.
24-30 months - Continue the foundation previously built; frame, elaborate on, and speak declaratively about pretend play, problem solving, testing things out, and interactions with another child; whenever your child puts words together, add another word in response ("want apple" "You want apple?") In my opinion, this is a great time to continue working on the fifty nouns and make plans for the six repetitive sentences and questions.
30-36 months - Continue the foundation previously built; spotlight sentences with two ideas. In my opinion, this is a great time to get serious about six repetitive sentences and questions . In time, stories in the second unit will cover developmental milestones listed in the link: personal stories (own name and characteristics of people), past tense stories (what happened yesterday), present progressive stories (acting out own stories), etc.
Focus on Cognition
Another principle to consider is that cognition (thoughts and ideas) precede communication. When Pamela was eighteen months old, she had no clue that crying was a cause producing the effect of getting what you want more quickly. Therefore, she saw so no point in learning the names of things because she saw no connection between using the name to get the object of desire faster. We started suspecting autism at two years of age (Steve's sister helped us zero in that quickly), so I took sign lessons to learn the names of nouns of things I believed Pamela wanted most: grapes, cookies, yogurt, milk, etc. Although my strategy was sound, it still took Pamela a long time to make connection between signing a word and getting what she wanted! We never had a "Helen Keller at the water pump" miracle. Once Pamela did make the connection (around age three), she quickly dropped the signs and started learning nouns at a rate of about one noun a month! We called it the word of the month! I stopped keeping a spreadsheet tracking every noun when she turned four. At that point, nouns and animal sounds came more quickly.
Applying cognition to the developmental profile above, it helps to understand the function of phonemes, nouns, and the six repetitive sentences and questions. Early in development, infants figure out how to make sounds with their mouths. After months and months of play and experimentation, the babbling, cooing, and gooing become predictable phonemes, the building blocks of words. When you are doing interactive patterns with a nonverbal child in the early stages of RDI (tossing a ball back and forth), you might want to try vocal games in which sounds are the object in the pattern. I do not think it needs to be formal and structured at first, but playful, fun, and joyful.
Once vocal play becomes easy, it makes sense to start playing around with putting two or more phonemes together in a playful manner, well before nouns enter the picture if your child is still low-verbal. At this point, you should have more opportunity for lots of variation, sound effects made from phonemes in their pretend play, imitation games with multiple phonemes, even little words when you do things together (uh-oh, oh-no, y-ay, uh-p, w-ee, ow-ch), etc. I still remember Pamela's first two spoken words when she was three years old: coo-coo (cookie) and so-see (music). If your child comes up with her own phonemes for a word, why not repeat it with joyful nonverbals to celebrate their accomplishment? From there, you might even be able to guide coo-coo into coo-kee with more back and forth sound games.
Again, cognition is the key. A child who starts coming up with their own words understands the concept of labeling nouns. A child who points to things she wants or sees is grasping the idea of a noun. A child who follows the simple direction to get her Beanie Baby understands a set of words identifying a particular noun. These are all signs of readiness to begin work with the fifty nouns. I think picking nouns with simple phonemes that are part of every day life or of special interest to the child are great ones to target at first. Meaning and context fuel the need for nouns.
Well before you consider starting the six repetitive sentences and questions, you might need to make sure cognition leads the way. If you have a new object in a group of familiar ones, does your child look curiously at the new one? Does she point with a questioning look? If so, the first question, "What is this?" will help her ask for names. When you are driving to the store, does your child observe the new restaurant that just opened up or point out a truck that made a wrong turn near a ditch. If so, "I see a/an/some _____" will serve that function. If your child requests things, then "I want a/an/some _____" will suffice. Without the desire to ask questions, share observations, or make requests, the new and improved syntax has no meaning or benefit to a child.
Focus on the Unique Child
The hardest thing about autistic children is that they are so scattered in development. Even though our RDI stage reflects the dynamic intelligence of a toddler, Pamela is working on decimals in math, reading sixth grade level books, writing at about a third grade level, and speaking like a preschooler. That is a wide range of ability! The key is to focus on those strengths and scaffold through their weaknesses.
Suppose a child's fine motor delays prevents her from doing all of the writing. Try using magnetic letters for the kinesthetic channel and figure out the reason for the delay. Pamela was very delayed in writing until we did patterning exercises to improve her bilateral coordination, worked on strengthening her fingers and pincer grasp, and figured out that she was left-handed and treated her as such! If a child has dyslexic tendencies, the Association Method may be a solution for that, too, because it falls under the same umbrella as Orton-Gillingham and the Spalding Method. So, even though reading or writing are well above the developmental level you are targetting in RDI, if the child can do these things, by all means, incorporate it into your work with the Association Method!
At first glance, the association method seems very static and drill-like. To be honest, a child with a severe language disorder that goes beyond the scope of autism may very well need some focused, drill-like work on language. It would be no different from a child with autism and cerebral palsy needing some focused, drill-like work on motor skills. However, I have embedded some RDI principles into what we do with the association method. When reading stories, I try to make sure I react in nonverbal ways. We reflect on any emotional highs or problem solving abilities of the characters. We talk about what the story reminds us of (perhaps, something that happened to us). I give Pamela much more time to think and process before she speaks, showing a warm, encouraging smile. Rather than correct syntax errors directly during oral work, I wrinkle my forehead and frown, say "What?" or "Huh?" or repeat the question, using my voice to emphasize the word giving the best syntax clue. Our Association Method work is much more fun since we started RDI as you can see in this video clip I made for the Charlotte Mason Conference in 2007.
Last month, I gave an overview of the association method and a description of the first unit of language. Today, I will follow up with introducing the six repetitive sentences and questions taught at the beginning of the second unit of language. If you find you have no clue about what I am explaining, you might want to read the overview and first unit posts first! If you are dying to know more NOW, this long pdf summarizes and condenses the method. The manual itself is only $52, and, when I reflect back on all of the speech therapy materials and manuals I have bought in the past seventeen years, this book was the best investment I ever made. Without a doubt!
The minimum required vocabulary at the beginning of the second unit is fifty nouns (you will understand why soon). Children do not need to have verbs or adjectives because you cover these parts of speech later in the unit. They need to be able to read and write these nouns, but, for children delayed in fine motor, I would certainly try this method with magnetic letters!
The manual recommends doing "I see a/an/some _____" ("What do you see?") first, but I chose "This is a/an/some _____" ("What is this?") because it seemed simpler. Here is an example of teaching the latter from the manual:
Here are the official seven steps listed in the manual in my words (there are only six because one of the original seven gets dropped when you move to the second unit). I modified these steps with Pamela, but this summarizes what the manual recommends:
Activity 1: Reading the Child's Book - The educator observes the child read the stories in her individualized book (all pictures in this blog are examples of said stories) and monitors her pace and articulation and ability to read from top to bottom and left to right.
Activity 2: Syntax Review - The educator writes an appropriate number of sentences with the new syntax on the board (four to six or more). The child reads the sentences in three passes broken down into the reading step, the lip-reading step, and the acoustic step.
a. Reading - The educator points to each word in a sentence and the child reads it aloud. Then, the child turns around and repeats the entire sentence from memory. The child performs this step for each sentence on the board.
b. Lip-Reading - The educator reads a random sentence from the board. The child points to the sentence, reads it aloud, turns around, and repeats it from memory. The child performs this step for each sentence on the board in random order.
c. Acoustic - This is actually done in three phases. In the first phase, the child faces the board, and the educator stands behind the child (preventing any lip-reading hints). The educator points to the first sentence and reads it aloud. The child repeats the sentence. They continue reading all of the sentences in this manner in order. In the second phase, the teacher reads the first sentence without pointing and the child repeats the sentence. They continue reading the story in order. In the final phase, they continue working in a similar manner, except the teacher does not point and reads the sentences in random order.
Activity 3: Oral Recall - The educator shows a picture of a noun, and the child says a sentence using that noun with the syntax of the week. They work through several pictures in this manner.
Activity 4: Writing - The educator writes a story in cursive and the child copies it onto lined paper. (The manual has adaptations for children whoare still learning to write.)
Activity 5: Written Recall - The educator gives the child a picture (or series of pictures), and the child writes her own story, using the syntax already mastered.
Activity 6: Dictation - The educator slowly says a story, sentence by sentence, as the child writes it on paper.
Other Activities Games - While playing games, like Go Fish and Concentration, the child and educator can practice new and old syntax. This can even work well with commercially available games, too.
Pretending to Be Teacher - The child and educator switch roles!
Daily Activities - Educators can looks for opportunities throughout the day to apply the new syntax and reinforce the syntax already learned.
I made the following modifications to suit Pamela. Because she already knew phonics, I did not teach the Northampton symbols. Because she could read chapter books, I wrote the nouns as words in the sentences and put the pictures on the question page and began sentences and questions with a capital letter. Here is the very first story we read and seeing it brings back memories for me! I applied the "seven steps" from a Charlotte Mason perspective, so I modified it from the book a bit. We focused on the sentence only at first. I believe I used to spend about a week on this sentence (some new syntax took two weeks, or longer). Notice that the first sentence taught is "This is a" which limited me to singular countable nouns that begin with a consonant. Pay attention to the color coding because you will soon see a pattern that green signals the syntax du jour. (Click the picture for a larger view.)
If you haven't already guessed, I am a principles-oriented thinker which I believe is the common element present in all three ways of thinking. I have tried to coalesce them into one (RDI, Charlotte Mason, and the Association Method). When I was processing the Association Method, I tried linking it with a Charlotte Mason point of view and, after careful reflection, realized that all I needed was a minor translation. Every day, we cycled through these steps, focused on the new syntax. The very first week we focused on "This is a" stories:
Read aloud (Activity 1) – Pamela reads aloud a typed story (cursive, color-coded) in her therapy book with the new syntax for the week.
Recitation (Activity 2) – I read a sentence from the story. Pamela repeats it while seeing the page and without seeing the page. We did do all three steps (including the three phases of the last step), but I reduced it to pure recitation after doing the Association Method for a year.
Oral Narration (Activity 3) – Pamela practices the new syntax during her daily conversations.
Copywork (Activity 4) – Pamela copies a story I type in cursive.
Written Narration (Activity 5) – Pamela writes her own story applying the new syntax in print.
Dictation (Activity 6) – I say a sentence, and Pamela writes it on paper in print.
Once Pamela mastered "This is a _____" we moved onto the question it answers: "What is this?" I believe we spent a week on the question before moving onto the next piece of syntax, the article an. While we stuck to singular countable nouns, this time we focused on nouns beginning with a vowel. Again, the color green spotlights the most important syntax is an. Because the question for this second sentence structure is the same ("What is this?"), we practiced the sentence and question side by side, both Pamela asking and answering the question.
In the next step, we combined both kinds of sentences, "This is a _____" and "This is an _____" to make sure she had mastered the difference. Because Pamela had an eye for pattern and already knew the difference between consonants and vowels, we only spent a week on this kind of story. I imagine younger or less experienced children might take longer. You have to be absolutely sure the child is able to say the syntax correctly very consistently before moving onto the next level. This looks startling easy to us native speakers, but, for kids like Pamela, still learning English as a first language, it is surprisingly difficult. I found when I pushed Pamela too fast, her syntax fell apart! Seeing that happen several times convinced me that she really did have aphasia.
I believe we spent another week on the question before moving onto the next piece of syntax, the article some which went with mass nouns. Again, the color green spotlights the most important syntax is some. Because the question for this third sentence structure is the same ("What is this?"), we practiced the sentence and question side by side, both Pamela asking and answering the question.
In the final step of teaching the first sentence and question while spotlighting the articles, a, an, and some, we combined all three kinds of sentences, "This is a _____" and "This is an _____" and "This is some _____" to make sure she had mastered the difference.
For her, the cliff notes looked like this (new in green and review in black) but remember some kids may progress more quickly or more slowly than this timeline:
Week One: This is a _____.
Week Two: What is this? This is a _____.
Week Three: This is an _____. What is this?
Week Four:
What is this? This is a ______. This is an _____.
Week Five: This is some _____. What is this? This is a ______. This is an _____.
If you are impatiently chomping at the bit, wondering if a child could ever get far progressing through syntax at such a slow rate, one structure at a time, take a peek at Pamela's latest unedited nature notebook entry she composed with no input from me and you will see how far a child with severe language issues can go when you find the right method of her!
Because this post is very meaty, I will pause here and let you digest this introduction to the second unit of language. While I have only covered one sentence and one question, the next five will flow much more quickly, now that we have gotten through the methodology of actually teaching one structure. Some of you RDI families may be thinking this is dull and deadly and down-right static. These are very valid points to consider. In Part II of the second unit, I plan to reflect on how one can view this from an RDI perspective!
The first unit of language is for children who cannot read and have very little language, if any. The goal is for them to learn to say, read, lip-read, listen, and write at least fifty nouns. In the first phase of the program, children learn the Northampton symbols shown to the left. As you can see (click the picture for a better view), the manual provides detailed information about each symbol and its associated sound. If you are familiar with The Writing Road to Reading or Orton-Gillingham-like methods, these symbols are based on the concept of phonemes. (Warning Label: We tried WRTR and, well, in our house, it was "The Writing Road to Crying"--Pamela and David fared much better with At Last! A Reading Method for Every Child for reading and Handwriting without Tears for writing.)
Phonemes Children first focus on Northampton symbols, mastering one symbol-sound at a time. To do this, they undergo multi-sensory steps, which I have explained in a much earlier post. Going through all multi-sensory steps and incrementally progressing from phonemes to syllables to words are vital. Children with severe language disorders really do need this much focus and repetition in all sensory channels. What distinguishes the Association Method from how ABA therapists typically approach language is the incremental progression and emphasis on multi-sensory. Again, I do not believe all autistic children need to do this, but kids like Pamela need a more structured, multi-channel approach.
Once children have learned several symbols, they can play simple card games like Go Fish and Concentration with cards made from the symbols. Pro-Ed does offer materials that make preparing to teach this unit less time consuming, such as 282 4 x 6 phoneme manuscript cards. I know you might be thinking playing Concentration with phoneme cards is no big deal. If so, I dare you to watch Connor's Story and NOT CRY!
Two-Sound Syllables The second phase, a transitional one, uses drop drills combining two phonemes into one syllable. They are started once children learn three Northampton vowels and three Northampton consonants and are taught in the seven steps described in another blog post. This exercise got its name for two reasons: the syllable drops down the page and the activity is dropped in the next phase. Notice how color-coding distinguishes between two sounds in these drills. Children learn to read simply consonant-vowel words after mastering only a few symbols! Pro-ed offers noun cards for the first unit of language: 193 4 x 6 small picture noun cards (also available as 8.5 x 11 cards).
Nouns
Once they can read, repeat from lip-reading or hearing, and write ten syllables from cross drills, children transition to cross drills in the final phase of the first unit, which trains the eye in left to right, top to bottom reading. I Can Talk'spage on the Association Method shows a boy doing a cross drill at the dry erase board and another boy reading from his personal story book, where all drills and stories are stored. Simple nouns are drawn from each set of cross drills, formed into seven groups of sound patterns. Each group increases the complexity of the word with V representing by phonemes having a vowel sound and C representing those with a consonant sound:
Group 1 - CV or VC
Groups 2 and 3 - CVC
Group 4 - CVC or CVV
Group 5 - CVC or VCC or CCV or CVV
Group 6 - CVCC or CCVC
Group 7 - CVCV or CVCVCV and beyond
Appendices
The appendices of the manual are quite extensive and necessary to implement the pogram. Appendix A covers phonetics and the Northampton symbols. Appendix B has over 140 pages of sample content from a typical child's book for all three units of language. Appendix C provides a standard vocabulary list of nouns taught in the first unit of language, while Appendix D provides more detail on sample stories used in the second and third units. Appendix E outlines a typical program showing the progression from first phonemes to first syllables to words for a chlid with dyslexia. That's not bad for $52 plus shipping!
You can read about the second unit of language here.
I haven't blogged about our work with the Association Method in a long time and I would like to give a quick overview today. About five years ago, my in-laws told us about a segment on Good Morning America about this method of teaching nonverbal, autistic children to speak. At fourteen years old, Pamela could speak: she had a HUGE vocabulary of nouns and stock phrases. But, she had no idea of how to put words together so as to make sense. We could understand her, but her confusing syntax made it hard for others to understand her. We were living in the Shumagin Islands at the time. Their library offered a great interlibrary loan program so I ordered a copy of the manual for the association method from a library in Oregon. After reading it about fifty times (LOL), I concluded that Pamela had had full-blown aphasia as a child and still had syntactic aphasia as a teen. I purchased a copy because it seemed like it might be the miracle we needed to get Pamela over the language hurdle.
Not all autistic children need the association method! If your child is developing language, late but in a similar pattern as other verbal autistic children, you can probably adopt a wait-and-see attitude. However, children who seem to struggle with learning language at the same rate as their autistic peers might benefit from this slowed-down, exaggerated, highly spotlighted way of learning language.
Here's a brief history lesson! Mildred McGinnis, a speech therapist for the deaf, in the early 19th century worked with aphasic soldiers after World War I. In time, she began to notice similarities between these men and a subgroup of deaf children who struggled to pick up language at the same rate as their deaf peers. She spent the rest of her career devising a method to teach children who showed signs of aphasia, whether they were deaf or hearing, how to understand and use language.
The association method is based on a model outlined in the manual, Teaching Language Deficient Children by Etoile DuBard and Maureen K. Martin. The model assumes that children with severe language disorders are extremely poor guessers at language and require the learning of language to fall into tiny, systematic chunks. Mildred McGinnis designed her approach on information theory to reduce a language-disordered child's chances of making errors in decoding, organizing, associating, storing and retrieving sounds, then words, and eventually sentences. She broke down down the learning of language into three units.
First Unit of Language - This unit concentrates on learning phonemes expressed as Northampton symbols through drop drills and learning nouns through cross drills with the goal of the child being able to say, read, lip-read, listen, and write at least fifty nouns. If your child has major fine motor delays, you might consider typing or using magnetic letters or flashcards to scaffold the writing step until writing is not a problem. If your child has a working vocabulary of at least fifty nouns (both receptive and expressive) and can read, then you can skip the learning of Northampton symbols and move right into the second unit, which is what we did!
Second Unit of Language - This unit concentrates on learning six highly versatile, but limited sentences and corresponding with syntax that can be gradually expanded one element at time, through stories. These stories serve very specific purposes: animal (yes/no questions, numbers, plurals, "can", adjectives), inanimate object ("it" and color), personal (personal pronouns, "am"/"are", preposition round-up (prepositions), descriptive (being able to describe a place), and present progressive round-up (present progressive tense) stories.
Third Unit of Language - This unit expands tense and ability to narration through stories: experience stories (past and future tenses) and imagination stories (sequence language).
Using multi-sensory methods (the seven steps of learning syntax), they learn to read and articulate sounds, sounds combined into words, and words combined into sentence. The highlights of this method include:
Teaches both receptive and expressive language.
Provides structure, repetition, and sameness in language.
Children say, read, lip-read, listen, and write new elements.
Waits for complete recall without prompting.
Associates auditory with visual symbols.
Emphasizes precise articulation.
Uses Northampton symbols for learning sounds.
Teaches one small element at a time.
Slows down the rate of speech to spotlight new elements.
Uses cursive to distinguish words.
Color-codes new elements for emphasis.
Focuses attention on written material (eventually stories).
Associates auditory with visual symbols.
Builds gradually on previously mastered language.
Before closing, I would like to let you know how far Pamela has come with the association method. When we first started, she could not say a complete sentence with correct syntax and words in the right order. In her reading, writing, and speaking, she often dropped articles and prepositions. She had no idea about irregular verbs and would write or say "goed" and "wented". No matter what I did, she confused progressive and present tense, saying "it was run" or "it running" but never "it was running"! In 2004, we started off with the very first sentence in the second unit of language: "This is a ___________." It was a long, slow, but worthwhile process to get to where we are today.
Where are we in 2008?
Pamela reads and writes with very consistent syntax. Less of it shows up when she is speaking, but when I think about the pragmatics of speech, how many of us answer every question in complete sentences? "Are you hungry?" "Yep!" It sounds stilted to say, "Yes, I am hungry." Pamela has more time to retrieve words and reflect on syntax when she writes and you can see that she retains it. When we are having a conversation, I loosen up because we are also focusing on broadband communication (gestures, facial expressions, vocal intonation, and pacing as well as words). When we take our time in orally narrating a story, Pamela can use proper syntax as you will see when I blog the third unit of language.
Last year, we worked hard on simple and progressive, past and present tenses. This week, I formally introduced future tense with the word "will" in her first official experience story. In an experience story, you address what will happen, then you experience it, and you end with what happened. I wrote it about the flat tire we had last week. It just so happened I had a camera with me and I figured I could use my time wisely by snapping pictures.
You can enlarge the picture in this experience story by clicking it. Notice how I spotlight the words will and did with red. They both have similar syntax in comparison to is and was which I spotlighted with blue. When we first started the association method, I had to introduce sentence syntax separately from question syntax. Pamela is advanced enough to learn both at the same time.
Pamela also reads one story from her syntax-controlled readers (which I will blog in another post). Here is the question and answer sheet to review the new syntax:
This is a typical sheet Pamela does to practice the new syntax through copywork, written narration, and dictation.
We also practice the new syntax orally. Pamela filled out the practice sheets while we were waiting to get the car serviced on Wednesday. She picked up the new syntax right away. We decided to head to the health food store while we were in town. I thought it would make a great experience story, so, before we left, I asked her these questions and she told me the answers. I wrote them all down to reinforce our conversation visually.
When we arrived home, we did a follow up story to spotlight the difference between future tense and past tense. We also covered picking up lunch from Hardee's on the way home.
If this post has captured your attention and you are breathlessly waiting for my next post with more details and film footage of us working together, chew on this lengthy pdf file and this monograph. In the next couple of posts, I plan to cover each unit in greater detail and show you how we apply the association method in our homeschooling day. I will not give you enough to fly without the manual, but I think you will walk away with a better idea of whether or not to purchase it.
I love interacting with other people online because they give me wonderful insights. A few months ago, some parents and professionals interested in RDI, whether are not they have or are consultants. For one reason or another, RDI is out of reach for some families, and this list, called Autism Remediation for Our Children, is a place where people can connect and learn relational ways of remediating autism from each other.
This week, we were talking about verbal behavior (VB), a form of speech therapy that is based on the principles of ABA, and I know very little about VB. I did share what is working very well with Pamela, the association method, which can dovetail nicely with RDI, depending upon how you implement it. One person pointed out that verbal behavior focuses on imperative language (right or wrong questions, commands, prompts). RDI, which focuses on declarative language (sharing what you experience), does not mesh well with VB because of the kind of language taught. That comment inspired me to think about the association method in a new light!
Of the he first six sentences and questions taught, five are declarative and only one is imperative.
This is a/an _______. What is this?
I see a/an ______. What do you see?
I have a/an ______. What do you have?
I want a/an _______. What do you want?
______ has a/an _______. What does _______ have?
This is ________. Who is this?
I never thought of this, but much of what the association method teaches is for children to describe what they see in the form of stories, stories about animals, inanimate objects, people, rooms, etc. Slowly, you add on to the basic structure with adjectives, prepositions, other articles, etc. Then, you introduce past tense and future tense to work on experience stories. EXPERIENCE STORIES! That sure sounds like opportunities for experience sharing to me!
We did get back to the Yellow Books (syntax-controlled readers) which we are using to supplement what we do with the association method. I will share more later about our first day of school (I have to edit and process the footage first). Pamela was fabulous as always and enjoyed eating a sandwich (made with gf/cf cheese and bread), soy pudding, and fresh berries from her lunch box. She is so sweet and hard-working!
I have some BIG NEWS to share about speech therapy ala the association method. But, first, I will share a quick recap!
A few weeks ago, we reviewed 131 irregular verbs for simple past tense and mastered simple past tense questions containing the word did. She knows 79 irregular verbs for simple past tense. Of the ones she missed, she knows seven by sound but spelled them incorrectly. That means we can slowly work through the 52 remaining verbs at our leisure because she knows enough to move onto present progressive tense. My idea is to start with the seven misspelled verbs and lump them in with ones she can spell. For example, she wrote layd but wrote said and paid. That will be an easy fix. When I write up the next batch of studied dictation, I plan to find quotations using irregular verbs she misspelled.
As outlined in my plan for speech therapy, we did present progressive tense sentences last week and are doing the questions that go with them this week. The focus for these two weeks was to contrast present progressive tense with simple past tense for the same situation, describing it during and after the action. For example, "The boy is fixing the skateboard with his tools" goes with a picture of a boy fixing a skateboard, while "The boy fixed the skateboard with his tools" goes with a picture of him skateboarding.
Guess what! After years and years of failure, Pamela has caught onto present progressive tense with ease! Back in 1994, I bought Laureate's all seven Micro-LADS and Early Emerging Rules. In 1996, I started drilling her with a hand-me-down program from Pamela's last teacher (Vocabulary, Articulation, and Syntax Training Program cards), a visual way to practice sentences with varying syntax, including verb endings. In 1998, I made color-coded charts for the different verb endings that go with tense and started drilling sentence patterns ala Teach Me Language.
We did a combination of all of these things off and on with very little measurable improvement for about eight years until we came across the answer to our prayers. Yes, I can safely say that the association method is THE ANSWER TO OUR PRAYERS when it comes to syntax. Why? I can remember working with Pamela's present progressive tense during her elementary homeschool years. All of the drilling and diligent practice never amounted to much and no matter how hard we worked she would still say things like "dog is run" or "dog running" as a complete sentence. She continued to do this until we started focusing upon simple present tense back in May.
About three years ago, we started doing the association method. One thing I knew is that, if Pamela could finally get present progressive tense straight, then I would know without a doubt that it was working! It has taken three years of working through the varies levels of syntax and stories (see page 9) to reach this goal. But, in two weeks of teaching, she has finally nailed it!
Each of ten reading primers from the syntax-controlled Reading Milestones program has six stories. I always have Pamela narrate in writing her favorite story. We just finished Level 02 Reader 05. This time she chose a story about Dee and Boo, two-costumed characters that appear in some of the stories. She wrote this story without any help or correction from me. Look at her beautiful use of present progressive tense! In days long gone, she would not have been this accurate even with an example in front of her because she just could not process language in this way!
The true test is for syntax to generalize into every day conversation. Present progressive tense is already emerging with accuracy!!!!!!
Yesterday, for both RDI and generalization of speech therapy, I got out twelve pictures card for the three little bears story that I found at Hearing Journey. (It was a weekly activity that is no longer available.) She put them in order, and then we took turns retelling the story. The video clip is six minutes long and, in those six minutes, I only needed to remind her to use full sentences four times. The following is a transcript of all of the sentences she used!
She had NO slip-ups the two times when she used present progressive tense. I know she jumps around from one tense to another but look how well she puts words together! This was NOT possible before the association method and would have only happened in one sentence by sheer luck, much less nineteen sentences. I also love how she added little touches when I asked her questions, adding "I said" for emphasis or responding with "That's right." And, at the very end of her retelling, Pamela gives my hope for the future by saying "The goldilocks will run" for I have not formally taught future tense!
Some bears are eating some breakfast.
The family goes to the woods.
The girl goes to a house.
The girls go inside, see some breakfast.
It’s cold porridge; eat cold porridge.
She sat on the hard chair.
She sat on the soft chair.
She sat on the old chair.
She said, "Too hard! Too little! The bed is great!"
Goldilocks slept in the bed.
The porridge is gone.
Baby Bear feels sad because the porridge is gone.
I saw a broken chair.
A baby bear cries because the chair is broken.
Goldilocks is sleeping.
Baby bear is angry, "Get out of here!"
The girl felt scared.
She is frightened.
The goldilocks will run away.
In case you are really bored and are not in the midst of baking turkey, pie, mashed potatoes, etc., this video clip is one reason why I am so very thankful this year:
If you filled in the blank, you have watched Galaxy Quest one too many times. When this movie was still somewhat recognizable, the kids, Steve, and I attended an astronomy talk at Florissant Fossil National Monument, which was about a mile from our home. The astronomer began talking about galaxies and Pamela got everyone laughing by saying loudly, "Never give up! Never surrender!"
That is how I feel about Pamela's acquisition of language. When she was two, she had no language, no signs, and no attempts at communication. We started teaching her sign language and she mastered a few signs, but did not get the idea of using a signed word to get something for it. Unlike Helen Keller's moment at the water pump, Pamela could only manage to learn one verbal word a month once she figured out that everything had a name. She was four she had a vocabulary of nouns and echolalic phrases. Through some Mommy ABA ala The ME Book, we added some adjectives, shapes, and colors. When she taught herself to sight-read by connecting video tapes to video boxes, she learned that her echolalic phrases were made up of individual words. By the time she turned seven, we were excited about her growing lexicon of language, and then she stalled.
We tried a variety of ways to teach Pamela how to put words together in order to make sense. Nothing worked. Pamela's kindergarten teacher gave me a discarded copy of the Vocabulary, Articulation, Syntax Training (VAST) Program. The program had cards color-coded by parts of speech (146 composite cards, 157 component cards, and a sentence tray). I tried teaching her to put together words with this system for about two years before I transitioned to something new. I figured out later that the VAST program lacked the written component and the very slow introduction of new syntax Pamela needed. Then, I tried Teach Me Language because it was ABA, and ABA was the scientific way to teach anything. I spent another two years on that and realized this was not the ticket for Pamela, either. I figured out later that it also did not have the element of writing and slow pace of syntax.
At that point, I transitioned to a Charlotte Mason approach to language: reading aloud, copywork, oral narration, studied dictation, and recitation. I had all the elements I needed except the slow teaching of syntax. Someone had to connect those dots for me, and that was Mildred McGinnis in her program, the association method. Pamela is near the end of the second unit of language and can finally write simple narrations. She can finally answer questions and use sentences like the ones I tried to teach with the VAST program and Teach Me Language.
Yesterday, I published an updated version of Pamela's web page. In years past, I took her ideas and filled in the correct syntax. With this update, I realized that I could make a list of questions and have her answer them for her web page. For the first time ever, Pamela wrote all the material describing herself with her own syntax. The page pictured above may not seem like much to you, but it has taken over a decade of never giving up and never surrendering to produce it!
This week is monumental for Pamela! Last week, we wrapped up our Round-Up preposition stories (page 15) ala the Association Method last week and, on Monday, began present tense verbs! She has struggled with present tense for years (is eat instead of eat and eats), confusing it with present progressive tense (pages 15-16) (is eating). When Pamela was younger, I drilled this syntax ala ABA-style, but ended up frustrated because she needed the methodical, multi-sensory methods applied in the Association Method.
One of the staff members at DuBard recommended the Reading Milestones program as a nice supplement to the Association Method. I won an eBay auction for all ten Level 1primers and workbooks for half the price of a brand new set ($83 versus $209--quotes include shipping and handling). The problem is that all the sentences are in present tense, not present progressive tense, so I decided to stray from Teaching Language Deficient Children for a spell and introduce present tense first. After all, she has already mastered present tense for sees, has, and wants for singular and plural subjects as well as first, second, and third person subjects. I might as well use the material at hand. Each primer has six stories, so, with ten primers, that equals sixty school days or twelve weeks of material. That will afford plenty of time to work through singular and plural; first, second, and third person; pronouns; etc.
The workbooks are too basic for Pamela because they work on printing and spelling, skills Pamela has had for many years. I decided to snap photographs of the all the pages for a story. I use the images from the workbook to develop my own worksheets in Excel that are more Charlotte Mason friendly and with greater focus on syntax mastered by Pamela. Even better, since I am not consuming the workbooks or primers, I will be able to retrench some of the money invested into these workbooks (thank you, eBay). If I time the sale during the summer when educators are searching for materials, I might do well.
In all, she does four pages a day, tailored to her needs and abilities. This looks like a lot of work, but once I got my format and figured out a consistent way to manipulate images, I spend about as much time preparing as I did before. The first page warms up her brain in practicing the syntax du jour. The next page works on order in storytelling (first, second, and last), another weak spot for her. After that, another page allows her to practice answering questions with syntax she already knows for maintenance. My focus is not purely comprehension, but rather syntax. The last page is pure Charlotte Mason style: copywork (top), written narration (middle), and dictation (bottom).
Because Pamela's syntax is very basic due to her aphasia, we keep her grammar lessons very simple. Whenever she makes a mistake in her studied dictation, I write a lesson on the spot to address the issue. Yesterday, Pamela confused there with they're in the poem A Pirate Story. She recently finished stories with they and their in speech therapy, so I tossed their into the hopper with there and they're. Since it can be confusing talking about they're (or is it there or their?), I color-coded the three homophones, and we referred to them as yellow, pink, and green for clarity. Pamela, like many autistic children, tend to be highly visual and cue into visual patterns. Here is her introduction to homophones that confuse even adults from time to time, especially in emails in which the fingers fly fast. This is only an introduction because, for Pamela to master new syntax, she has to practice it through all three channels (visual, auditory, and kinesthetic) both randomly and sequentially. One reason why the association method is so effective for Pamela is that they encourage color-coding new syntax. This week, I am emphasizing three unrelated things: the possessive its, combining not with is/are, and subject-verb agreement for is/are. I code each concept with its own unique color. She has already had experience with possessive pronouns, negation, and subject-verb agreement, so three at one time is not confusing. When I introduce a completely new syntax, such as present progressive verb tense, it will be on its own. This is Pamela's copywork for today, which I write first on a dry-erase board, color-coded and in cursive.
The next sentence I taught was (I see a/an/some _____). Because Pamela had already learned the difference between the three articles (a/an/some), we did not spend any extra time on them. I wrote "see" in green to attract her attention to the new syntax. I also took pictures of Pamela pointing to the object to emphasize that she was the subject (I) and she was in the act of seeing the object. We had not worked on eye gaze at that time, and I remember finding it difficult to get her to look at the object and pose for the camera. Notice that the first two sentences I taught were declarative in nature because the speaker states something about an object. (Click the pictures for a better view.)
As before, I taught the question that goes with the sentence next: "What do you see?" and then alternate randomly between the two sentence/questions to make sure Pamela knew which sentence answered which question. We also practiced this playing games and in real life to make sure Pamela understood the context in which to apply them.
The next sentence we covered was similar to the second: I have a/an/some _____. Again, we color code the verb "have" because it is the new word of interest. I purposely had Pamela hold each object when I took these pictures to emphasize the difference between seeing and having. After we taught the question "What do you have?" we went back to alternating between the three sentence-question pairs and being sure to use all three in games and real life.
The fourth sentence we covered was similar to the second and third: I want a/an/some _____. The verb "want" is green, and I had Pamela reach out to the object of desire to emphasize the meaning of the verb. After we taught the question "What do you want?" we went back to review all four pairs and using them beyond therapy time.
Then, I switched gears and focused on names of people and characters instead of nouns "This is _____" to go with "Who is this?" I remember this "little" change threw a few curve balls, which Pamela overcame after a few weeks (yes, weeks): (1) remember when to use articles and (2) when to ask "who" versus "what" questions. Her difficulty with these minor alterations in syntax confirmed my suspicions that she had syntactic aphasia.
Pamela found the next question much easier because there were no articles to trip her up: "_____ has a/an/some _____" and "What does _____ have?" She was so used to using "I" in sentences and "you" in questions, she had no problem substituting these pronouns with the name of a person. However, she struggled a bit with "has" versus "have." To you, it may seem minor, but children with aphasia are extremely poor guessers and they usually guess wrong! So, a little difference in the last sound of a word was huge and took another week or two for her to nail.
Up until this point, all sentences and questions were in the present tense. We finally reached the first past tense one, and, believe it or not, it threw Pamela for a loop: "I saw a/an/some _____" and "What did you see?" I forget how long Pamela needed to nail the sentence and question down, but it took quite some time to remember which words went with which tense!
one too many times. When this movie was still somewhat recognizable, the kids, Steve, and I attended an astronomy talk at 
