As SLPs, caregivers and providers, we want children to feel comfortable in their environment and be fully able to express themselves across many different communicative functions -- including *bodily awareness and integrity*. This means that they first need to learn how to identify and refer to their own body parts, and this of course includes AAC users!
Many kids who are minimally verbal have a hard time identifying when (or where) they experience pain. By teaching them to find the words for body parts using AAC, it can help them express themselves during crucial moments when they are hurt, sick, uncomfortable, etc. All children deserve to have the ability to advocate for themselves and to express bodily autonomy. by Halle Demchuk, SLPPaediatric SLP | GLP-Trained Clinician | Owner of HAEPI SLP In order to really understand gestalt language processing, we need to understand gestalt cognitive processing. Most kids who process the world this way have episodic memories. Identifying this is key to understanding how their language is formed. Keep reading to see the difference between these in my birthday example. For analytic language processors, who process things by semantic meaning, they will probably associate the words "happy birthday" with the semantic meaning - what you say when it's someone's birthday. But the phrase "happy birthday" could mean a number of different things to a gestalt language processor. In this case, I suggest that maybe a child hears "happy birthday" for the first time or the first *meaningful* time when it's loud and it's dark - and they are scared! So maybe, every time it's dark and they feel scared they say "happy birthday!", because that's how that phrase is stored in their episodic memory. For another GLP, maybe they were excited the first time they heard "happy birthday" and now that's something they say when they feel excited. Some GLPs may never pick up "happy birthday" as a gestalt. Our GLPs require more detective work with their episodic memories, but it is worth it! by Halle Demchuk, SLPPaediatric SLP | GLP-Trained Clinician | Owner of HAEPI SLP |
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