Updated
June 21, 2008
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We need to be open minded...
By:
Judith Eckardt |
As some of you know, I'm
a clinical supervisor at the Successful Stuttering
Management Program (SSMP) in WA in the summer for 3.5
weeks. We normally have 10 stutterers and 20
clinicians. Most of the clinicians are second year
SLP graduate level students but each year we invite a few
stutterers who have come through the program to be "clinicians"
to the new stutterers.
This has worked great for us because they are excellent
role models but we have been criticized in the
professional community. We continue doing it
because it is so beneficial for the spirit of the program.
This past summer one of our best clinicians was Barry
Stullberg who in real life is a
successful attorney for Microsoft in Seattle.
We need to be open minded and not just necessarily follow
the wishes/demands of the professional community.
Many times they are behind in knowing what helps people
who stutter. A very good example of this is "reduction
of frequency of dysfluencies". For years and
years, this was considered as the most important
indicator of "success". Finally, they are
beginning to move away from that criteria for success in
the SIDs Fluency Group in ASHA. At SSMP, we
consider our successful stutterer to be the person who
has eliminated avoidance behaviors, has much willingness
to communicate in all situations, advertises that he
stutters, and may still have dysfluencies in his speech.
Handling techniques have the least focus in SSMP therapy
but if stutterers do the first 3, they are good at using
handling techniques to smooth out their speech.
ISA therapy lists need to be comprised of what we have
heard is good from other stutterers and to protect
ourselves, a disclaimer statement needs to be present.
DIFFERENT THERAPIES/APPROACHES WORK FOR DIFFERENT PEOPLE
and we need to respect that.January 2001 |
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