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Writer's pictureSCCSHA Account

SCCSHA Spring 2023 Newsletter

Updated: Mar 31, 2023


Table of Contents





President's Corner


Andrea Goddard MA, CCC-SLP

SCCSHA President 2022-2023



Dear SCCSHA Community,


Thank you so much for supporting our transition back to in person workshops! It has been so wonderful spending a few days learning among other professionals. I even closed my laptop and just soaked in the information.


We are so excited to be hosting our first Spring Luncheon in 3 years. This luncheon has traditionally been a celebration of our members, where we get to come together, learn a little, share a meal, and celebrate both new and longstanding members of our community.


This year, we are welcoming Sandy Kaul to speak about ways to incorporate multi-sensory learning into so many different conditions that we work with as SLPs and audiologists. We will also be celebrating a longstanding SLP who has served our community by awarding them the Honor’s of the Association and bolstering a new graduate student with out annual scholarship award.


Prior to COVID, this was also a time when our members could invite special education directors and other members of our school, private practice, or medical team to join us to celebrate our field as well as the end of the academic year.


Don’t forget to renew your membership over the summer so you’ll have member pricing for the upcoming speakers lined up next year. In October, 2023, we will be learning from Marcella McCollum about all the ways we can make our bilingual assessments more effective and defensible. In January, 2024, we can’t wait to hear from Rachel Dorsey about ways to incorporate neurodiversity affirming practices into our intervention. We cannot wait to see more wonderful faces in person as we continue to grow our strong SLP & Audiology community.


Legislative Corner


Ann England

Legislative Liaison



NEW! Required Professional Experience Direct Supervision Requirements and Tele-Supervision Regulations


Effective Date of Regulation: April 1, 2023


The Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology and Hearing Aid Dispensers Board announced a regulatory change to the Required Professional Experience (RPE) direct supervision requirements. This regulatory change modifies Title 16 of the California Code of Regulations (CCR) sections 1399.153 and 1399.153.3 to allow for the tele-supervision of RPE temporary for up to half of the required monthly supervision hours under specified circumstances.


To Learn More About this New Regulation:

Student Corner


Alyson Jimenez

Student Representative



The last workshop we had was incredibly informative and I have implemented some of the strategies mentioned during my graduate clinic this semester. It was great to meet some of the members as well!


Some updates regarding my work as a Student Representative, I have reached out to the local university NSSLHA programs and have sent out flyers of what SCCSHA offers to students. I have been posting on our Instagram and Facebook pages as well with updates.

These next few months I will be promoting the Jan Wilkerson Memorial Scholarship for graduate students that is due soon.


This semester, I have been working with children with articulation disorders from ages 5-14 years old. It has been fun creating new ideas each week and getting to build relationships with my clients. I also have been working on rate of speech using fluency strategies and apraxia by using treatment strategies I have learned in previous courses. I look forward to the other opportunities I have coming up this year as I start my internships.


Please feel free to contact me via email, Instagram, or Facebook if you have any suggestions for potential SCCSHA-student collaborations and any contributions to our social media pages.


I look forward to seeing you all at our Spring Banquet!!


Spring 2023 Luncheon Workshop

Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, ADHD: WTF - Where's the Focus?


Details


May 19, 2023

8:45 - 2:00 PM


3055 Olin Ave Suite 1000

San Jose, CA 95128





Seminar Description

This presentation examines the interrelationship of students with Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, ADHD in regard to their shared underlying symptoms: the inability to focus on auditory stimulus and monochromatic symbols in relation to phonemic awareness. An examination of the research suggests that incorporating multimodal approaches facilitates focus toward the learning of speech, language and literacy skills. We will demonstrate the best practices for teaching, various multimodal tools and how these approaches assist with focus for speech sound production and literacy skill development.

This presentation involves videos, demonstrations, participation of attendees & a raffle.


Detailed Summary - Purpose, Procedures, and Results

Without a doubt, Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, ADHD are distinctly different conditions. There are, however, specific symptoms that relate to them all: the underlying inability to process auditory and visual stimulus related to speech and language, otherwise described as, incapability to focus. This presentation will look at the results of research that relates to three of these populations, Down syndrome, Apraxia, and Dyslexia, to support the necessity of multimodal approaches to therapy. The subsequent focus of this presentation will be to explore how multimodal tools can improve focus for speech sound production and literacy for all populations.


Individuals with Down syndrome show a specific pattern of strengths and weaknesses in cross-sectional studies of various areas of development. Some aspects of this phenotypic profile, such as strengths in visual processing and deficits in verbal/auditory processing have a direct influence on academic performance and all areas of communication (Fidler, 2005). Because of the poor auditory abilities and the complex relationship between the areas of information processing and reading development (Most, 2010), these populations are at a disadvantage.


Apraxia is a phonological processing disorder that is compounded by an inability to pair the auditory signal with the perceived modeling of the sound (Stoeckel, 2016). Many researchers believe that childhood apraxia of speech (CAS) might indeed have an auditory perceptual basis. Selective auditory attention or deficiencies may interfere with focus on aspects of speech and language development (Kent, 2016). According to the Neurocomputational Model (Guenther, 2012, et.al)) students with apraxia process indistinctly because of distractions, confusion, and insufficient focus. Subsequently, the original signal may be transformed into a distortion. This will be demonstrated and examined to provide clarification.


Dyslexia has been defined as a neurological deficit creating impairment in a person's fluency or conceptual accuracy in the reading process. (APA, 2000; Nicolson, 2010, et.al). It is postulated that spatiotemporal attention to the visual input can lead to poor reading ability and is compounded by poorer phonological skills (Visyasagar, 2005). Studies also have shown that these neuroanatomical deficits are related to the left hemisphere. These results also suggest the part of the brain that contains the cortical deficits affecting people with dyslexia are not the parts of the brain that recognize visual stimuli (color, shape, etc.). It logically follows that utilizing a multimodal approach that involves other areas of cerebral function, will improve auditory focus and support phonological awareness necessary for the reading process.


This research reveals that, auditory and visual focus affects the development of phonemic awareness in persons with Down Syndrome, apraxia and dyslexia in similar ways. Since these deficiencies are left brain functions it follows that the use of right brain functions with multisensory focuses augment auditory perception by improving focus. We will give examples of numerous evidence-based multimodal tools and of how to effectively use them to improve focus for these populations.


Audience participation will be implemented to demonstrate the basic methods for multimodal instruction and methods to improve auditory and visual focus utilizing evidence-based multimodal programs and tools. These are multisensory programs that incorporate visual, tactile, kinesthetic, and proprioceptive techniques that augment the auditory modality and reinforce the correct movements for speech. By implementing these approaches we improve functional neurological pathways for motor planning and speech sound sequencing. We will examine how using these tools can improve phonological awareness and hierarchically create a bridge to spelling and reading. These will include, PROMPT (Hayden, 2005), Visual Phonics (Wang, 2013), and FONEMZ: Speak and Read (Pieretti, 2015). The importance of vowels as the primary elements in speech correction will be included in a discussion of Vowel Tracks (Marsalla, 2007).


Whether we are working in person or virtually, there are basic factors in how humans learn that remain the same. Multimodal practices are essential in improving focus by opening up new pathways in the brain, we must address the importance of the best teaching practices that engage students and stimulate learning (CSTP, 2009). We will experience how hierarchical, direct, engaging and success oriented activities promote achievement for all students. "Explicit instruction" is a critical part of effective teaching (Archer, 2011) and will be incorporated in the presentation, which will necessitate audience participation.


There is no better focus than to see yourself on video. Student video-recording, using iPads, incorporates self-direction and self-reflection, and is mesmerizing in face-to-face and online learning. By explicitly teaching students to utilize apps, video recording, play back, and self-rating their performance, we inspire in them ownership of their behavior.

As a summation, participants will reflect on the strongest modalities of our focus populations and how to use these strengths, with multimodal tools, to facilitate focus on the skills needed for speech and literacy advancement.


Learners Outcomes

At the completion of the presentation, attendees will be able to:

  1. Analyze how poor auditory focus affects the production of speech sounds and literacy skills of students with Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, & ADHD.

  2. Identify five of the best practices of teaching which improve focus.

  3. Appraise and apply the use of multimodal tools in various activities for teaching speech sound production and reading to individuals with Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, & ADHD.

Workshop Agenda

8:15 - 8:45

Registration

8:45 - 8:50

Welcome & Overview

8:50 - 9:20

Discussion: Down syndrome, Apraxia, Dyslexia, CAP, ASD, DHH, ADHD in relation to some of their underlying symptoms: the inability to focus auditorily

9:20 - 9:40

Effective Teaching Strategies

9:40 - 9:50

Brain Gym

9:50 - 10:00

Neurocomputational Model

10:00 - 10:15

Description and discussion of the benefits of multimodal/multisensory approaches and hierarchical methods in improving focus.

10:15 - 10:30

Break

10:30 - 11:30

Examination of evidence-based speech, literacy and other multimodal tools

11:30 - 11:45

Self-direction and self-reflection with use of iPad/Video technology

11:45 - 12:00

Reflection /Summary of best practices and multimodal tools, Questions

12:00 - 2:00

Luncheon, Honors of the Association, Student Scholarship, Raffle, and Closing Remarks

About Our Presenter: Sandy Kaul


Sandy Kaul, reading a book to two children.

Sandy Kaul, has been an SLP with over 40 years of teaching experience. She was previously an interpreter for Deaf and Hard-of-hearing individuals for 10 years at CSUN and in the community. She has worked with all ages and disabilities in the field of communication sciences and disorders. Her titles include SDC teacher in CH, DHH and LD classrooms. She has been a mentor teacher for the state of California, a master clinician and a clinical instructor at CSU, Sacramento. She has done extensive research and numerous presentations on phonemic awareness, speech sound production, literacy and multimodal learning. She has given over sixty presentations to ASHA, CSHA, TxSHA, NSHA, IRA, NSSLHA, CalED, colleges and school districts. Sandy is the developer of FONEMZ




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