Dawn Weatherly Speech Therapy Services LLC

08/29/2024

At the very least, set limits.

12/13/2022

This graphic is so helpful for explaining why children might appear to "hear" you, but not be "listening" -- or, to put it in other words, why they might look at you when you speak, or might even be able to repeat back the sounds that you made, but might not have comprehended a direction that you gave them, or might not have even looked up from their play.

A child might detect that a new sound (like you calling their name) is happening in the room, but not discriminate that the sound is important or directed at them.

They might detect the sound, and discriminate it from other noises in the environment such that they recognize it as their name and try to tune in...but then not be able to identify the specific things that you're saying.

They might identify what you're saying, but not comprehend what the individual words mean, or be able to successfully turn it into a statement or question that they understand and process and can act on.

And an adult might watch this happen and then turn away and say, frustrated, "They heard me, they just chose not to listen!" or "They heard everything I said and then they broke the rule anyway!", not realizing that the child's hearing, processing, auditory systems are still learning and practicing and doing their best.

[Image description: A graphic from the Instagram handle Deafinitely Communicating (). It has a picture of a dark-skinned ear, with four different-colored "wave" shaped semicircles going into the ear. The text next to it reads, "I know you hear me! ...Yes, but there's levels to hearing. I may hear you, but not understand you." Below the ear and the text are numbers 1-4, colored the same as the different-colored "waves" going into the ear, indicating that these are 4 facets of the process of hearing/understanding:
1. Detection
2. Discrimination
3. Identification
4. Comprehension

End description.]

02/18/2021

https://www.facebook.com/1164013180364844/posts/3290675957698545/

Yesssss 👏🏼 👏🏼

Wee Talkers

12/07/2019

This is MY FAVORITE kids book explaining autism. Even look at the subtitle- ”A story about autism and its gifts”. The words we chose to describe children who are wired differently matter so much.

This is a MUST BUY for all parents, teachers and therapists. Commissioned link: https://amzn.to/2DDk0TG

06/19/2019

This is such a great list!! Social skills and pragmatic language cover such a wide variety of skills!

06/13/2019

04/12/2019

An executive function skills cheat sheet:

http://www.nclexquiz.com/mnemonics/executive-function-skills-cheat-sheet/

04/01/2019

True!

03/28/2019

A few weeks ago, I shared a visual stating that talking is like a house- first you need to have a solid foundation. This foundation is built from what are known as pre-language skills. Some of these come naturally to parents, while others do not- so check this out and see where you can add more purposeful play and communication into your day!

03/25/2019

This graphic takes you through a typical day in the life of a child with slow processing speed.

03/22/2019

❤❤❤