Helping Children Recover from Brain Injury
A, As. Ases. Dog. dogs. Doges. Is. ises. Iseses.
Joey grins at me as he explores the newly discovered -s button on his device. It’s fun to be able to suddenly add ‘s’ to your words, and he’s enjoyed seeing just how many ‘s’s he can add to a word. At first I felt put out by his distracted activity with the ‘s’ button, but then I remembered that if Joey is going to learn how to make words plural, he is going to have to know how to use the +s button. So explore away. Sillyeseseseses [Read more…]
I was finally able to introduce Joey to my own five year old daughter. She had been begging to meet him for awhile. Joey lit up when he saw that I’d brought him a friend, and quickly found the words “Hi. My name is Joey. I live in Virginia” on his eye gaze device. When she buried her head into my back, not immediately replying in perfect response to his introduction, I whispered that she was shy. His eyes responded with understanding. It didn’t take him long before he repeated, “Shy. Shy” for emphasis. [Read more…]
I’m pausing in our neuroplasticity series to share the new book that Joey and I are enjoying together.
As a child, I loved the picture book, Good Dog, Carl by Alexandra Day. The wordless book depicts a mother leaving the house alone with Carl, the rottweiler dog, as the baby sitter. Once the mother leaves the house, the baby climbs out of the crib onto Carl’s back. Carl carries the baby throughout the house – to jump on the parents’ bed, play dress up with the mom’s jewelry, check out the fish tank, dance in the living room, eat a snack and even takes a bath to hide the evidence of the messy snack. Before the mother returns home, Carl puts the baby back into the crib as though nothing has happened. [Read more…]
Asking for help on his eye gaze AAC device is something we’ve wanted Joey to be able to do for a long time. We model the phrase “I need help” and try to encourage him to use the help icon as much as he can to tell us what he needs. And he will use it, occasionally.
Joey’s never been a fan of being given the specific words to use in any given situation. I learned this awhile ago when I tried to get him to use the word want. He used every possible word but want, and ended up working a lot harder than he needed to. [Read more…]
When I arrived at Joey’s house a few Fridays ago, I was thrilled to find his seven year old cousin there with him. She could only stay for about ten minutes of our session, but it was one of the best, most targeted ten minutes I’ve seen from Joey.
Typically, when I first begin to work with Joey each session, he fills me in on random parts of his week. Sometimes I introduce a topic and he changes the subject to a preferred topic, or if he is really bored with me, he might begin exploring his words. I live with a five year old at my house, so while these behaviors are frustrating, I’m also 100% sure they are age appropriate. I find myself giving Joey reminders to stay on topic like I would with any five year old, or reminders that we can talk more after we do our work first. [Read more…]
