02/18/2026
I have been a speech-language pathologist for over 20 years. In the field of speech-language pathology, there are a couple of topics that are currently somewhat controversial. Those topics are gestalt language processing (GLP) and spelling to communicate (S2C). In both cases, the controversy centers on scientific validity. Is GLP a real thing? Is S2C a valid means of communication? These are the questions that people within the field have very different answers to.
If someone in my field has not spent much time working with autistic clients, they might not even know about this divide or have a strong opinion either way on either issue. Many speech language pathologists go their whole careers without ever working with clients who spell to communicate or clients who could be described as GLPs. But the majority of my professional experience has been with clients from these groups, so I do have strong opinions that have developed gradually over two decades, one client at a time.
Without going into specifics on either topic, I will clearly and confidently state that these groups of people - autistic people who don’t speak with their mouths and GLPs - are widely, consistently and dramatically misunderstood by most, and grossly under-represented in research. Over the years, I have found myself innovating treatment methods and materials time and time again because doing what has already been done wasn’t yielding any meaningful progress. Accepting that someone could not communicate was not something I could do so throwing my hands up wasn’t an option. The standardized tests don’t adequately represent these groups so the results don’t really mean much and the commercially produced therapy materials often aren’t relevant or helpful. So when I hear people making grand declarations to deny truths about people that are not based on individual factors, citing the reason to be because science doesn’t prove those truths, I find it laughable. Science hasn’t begun to crack the surface with these groups.
Do I have the answers? No. Can I explain all that I have experienced working with individuals from these groups? Also no. But my intuition has guided me to remember that the person and the way they exist are valid, regardless of whether or not science is up to speed on them. Putting delayed, insufficient or faulty science ahead of personhood is a grave mistake and it has lead, and continues to lead, to disservice done by our profession.
I don’t identify as a GLP therapist but I have incorporated gestalts into my therapy with GLP clients and was doing this before ever hearing the term GLP. I have never worked with a S2C client but have used typing, writing and other orthographic means in treatment when it seemed right for over a decade. My clients have lead me to understandings that weren’t in any of my textbooks.
Gravity was real before we had irrefutable science to explain it. We have to be humble enough to accept that we don’t have everything figured out and humane enough to do no harm in the meantime.
Image description: Background is bright purple that fades into bright pink with white text that says ‘…the person and the way they exist are valid, regardless of whether or not science is up to speed on them.
