I just learned another way to blend literacy
with speech/language therapy. I just completed a 30-hour training course to
become Certified in Orton Gillingham (O-G) (1). I was looking forward to
learning this popular alternative to teaching reading and writing. What I didn’t expect, was to come away from
this O-G course with the realization that private speech therapy has become an
alternative rather than a supplement to public education.
The O-G course was a week long,
thoroughly pragmatic description of how to teach reading. Ten of the 12
participants were classroom teachers. One was a parent home-schooling her child
and the other was me. The instructor was enthusiastic, patient and knew the
material inside and out. There were frequent conversations about how lessons
could be adapted for specific children and settings. I was completely satisfied
with the class.
It seems to me that O-G has a step-by-step
linguistic hierarchy that could be applied to learning fluency tools. Easy
onset, reduced speaking rate, resisting time pressure, voluntary stuttering,
and stuttering modifications could be taught in conjunction with a review of
the rules of English reading and writing. Speaking, reading, writing, listening, and
literature would become a part of every speech therapy session right from the
get-go at appropriate skill levels. Literacy concepts could also be taught in
combination with sessions on acceptance of stuttering, non-avoidance,
desensitization, and self-expression. Multisensory experiences and practice
drills could find a place in every lesson plan.
The practice drill has become
more common in public education because of a teaching protocol called Response
to Intervention (RTI). I attended a day-long workshop on RTI in 2008 (2). RTI
protocol emphasizes drill and data collection.
The emergence of RTI foreshadowed the demise of special education. It
permits children to qualify for extra help without undergoing lengthy and expensive
team evaluations. Using an RTI intervention model, school districts can economize
by assigning volunteers and assistants to complete practice drills with students
who need help in small groups within the classroom. My O-G course instructor
said the “beauty of O-G is that anyone can do it.” Highly structured programs
such as O-G fit well into an RTI model.
I have concerns about RTI. I
don’t understand how a child with an undiagnosed language or hearing impairment
benefits from the RTI more-of-the-same approach. Does such a child need to fail
at all three RTI levels before someone suggests an alternative? At the same
time, I do wonder if my own speech therapy practice should place greater
emphasis on simple speech practice drills. I provide guidelines for speech
carryover practice and I grew up in a house where homework was top priority. But
O-G class discussions made it clear that some students have limited opportunity
for and assistance doing homework. “Race to Nowhere” (3) even suggests that
homework can be harmful. Maybe simple speech drills that “anyone can do”
deserve more respect.
How does O-G, reading, and writing fit with speech language
pathology? The term “orthography” refers to the writing system of a language. A
recent article published in an American Speech Language Hearing Association (ASHA) journal
says that "Orthographic knowledge
represents the information that is stored in memory that tells us how to
represent spoken language in written form..." (4) Two important concepts in this article seem
especially relevant for any reading/writing program:
1.
Mental
Graphemic Representations (MGR): This is "the stored mental
representations of specific written words or word parts...when one has a clear
mental image of a word, then ‘correct writing’(and reading) of that word should
occur." (5)
2.
Orthographic
Patterns: This refers to the letters representing speech sounds, how
letters can be combined, and where letters may appear (positional and
contextual constraints).
"MGR knowledge reflects
memories of specific words, whereas orthographic pattern knowledge connotes an
understanding of the patterns governing the symbol system. It is not word
specific. "(6) O-G teaches non-phonetic “red words” in a different way than
words which can be decoded phonetically.
Red words must be memorized, become mental representations. On the other
hand, “green words” can be sounded out using rules of phonetics. Eventually,
both “red” and “green” words must be memorized for fluent reading. More fluent
reading enhances comprehension. Similarly, it has been speculated that fluent
speech may also have a mental representation in the brain. (7)
Some researchers feel
that developmental stuttering is tangled up in language. "For more than
half a century, language has been defined in part by Its components: phonology,
morphology, syntax, semantics, and pragmatics ... This thinking however ignores
a now well established principle that reading and writing are language
skills...orthography must be included as one of the six, rather than five,
components of language.” (8) Orthography and literacy are within the scope of
practice of the SLP. I will be blending the acquisition of fluency enhancing
techniques with the linguistic hierarchy provided by Orton-Gillingham for some
students. I’ll be blending literacy into all of my lessons. My hope is that new
fluency skills will become associated with literacy skills for the child and
that better carryover will be one result.
A recent comprehensive text on dyslexia is Overcoming Dyslexia
by Sally Shaywitz, M.D. broken link
(2)
Implementing a Response to Interventions Model, Dedham,
MA, March 2008
(4)
Kenn Apel
(2011) What is Orthographic Knowledge? Language,
Speech, and Hearing Services in Schools, 42, p. 592.
(5)
Ibid, p. 593
(6)
Ibid., p. 594
(8)
Kenn Apel, p. 599-600