Expressive Language Disorder and oral narration

[Matt'sMom]

Good Morning Ladies,

My name is Durea and although I actually joined this forum about three years ago and read several times a week I very rarely post. So by way of intro I'll give you a little back ground. I have three children but only have one still at home, a ds who is 10 years old. We have just finished Preparing and plan to start CTC in the fall. Matthew is a sweet boy who wants to learn but is hindered by several things. He has Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and has just recently been diagnosed with Expressive Language Disorder (ELD). I certanly do not want to be someone who puts a label on her child and identifies him by that. He is so much more that any label, a precious gift from God who is wonderfully made in his image. I will say that the "Labels" have helped us to identify problem areas we can address with pray and more patiece because we better understand that there really is a problem and not just obstinance or direct disobedience.

Having said all that I guess what I'm looking for is a little help. I saw on another thread that some one was looking at a question with her "Occupational Therapist Hat" on and I was wondering if anyone else who was an expert in this area had any ideas about who to help a child with ELD. Right now we are not able to get the therapy that would help him be better able to express himself because our insurace will not cover the speech theropy that is required. Matthew really struggles with finding the right words. He has a very large vocabulary and can usually carry on a great conversation but when asked to tell what happened or to narrate he can't seem to put it together. He leaves out major details or usually says the very first thing or the very last thing that happened. This happens in everyday situation like trying to tell Dad about his day as well as narrating in school. Another part of the ELD is that he has a very hard time with emotions. He can't really "read" his or other peoples and he missunderstands peoples facial expressions. He gets frustrated easily because he can't always express himself how he wants and we can't understand what he is upset about. Then he gets angry and thinks we are angry even though we try to reassure him we are not. So you can see that this can really impact how our school day goes. Any way I was just wondering if any one had any suggestions with how to help him improve with the narrations. I know there are several threads on the board about narration but I was wondering if any one could address it from a point of view that might included some training with OCD or ELD. I really think that continuing with them will help him in many areas. I'm just not sure how to help him move forward. I don't want to excluded anyone either. I love all the help that is offered on this board by the sweet careing women who take time to answer questions daily. Carrie, if you are Julie have ideas I'd love to hear them .

thanks,
Durea

[lmercon]

Hi,
I wanted to welcome you to the board. I hope you find it helpful and encouraging. Unfortunately, I don't have any experience with your particular situation. I can imagine that it must get very frustrating for you and your little guy! A couple of thoughts did pop into my mind as I was reading your post. They may or may not help or maybe you will come up with a variation that will work better. Maybe trying to get all the details AND in the right order is mentally stressful to him. What if you cut strips of paper and asked him to dictate to you any bit of the story he can remember. He doesn't need to worry about when it came in the story. When he thinks of something, you write it down on a strip of paper. After he has thought of all that he can, he now needs to read each bit of narration and move the strips into the order that the events happened in the story. After he is satisfied with the order of events, he can read the narration back to you to see how it feels to tell a narration of a story using details in their proper order. During this activity, you may wish to add your thoughts too. It can be a work-together narration. Another idea I had was to draw a number of square boxes in a row. When you are ready for his narration, he quickly sketches, using simple stick figures and symbols, each major event that he remembers. Then he retells the story using his sketches as guidance. He may also wish to act out parts of the story in the order that they happened. There are lots of ways to narrate. He probably would enjoy variety. It just seems to me that he needs some "tools" to assist his verbal narrations, since that is a "deficit" for him right now. Also, make sure that he isn't narrating passages that are too long. Start out only narrating a paragraph or two and move up to a page or two for a while. Later, he can narrate a whole passage or story. Additionally, make sure that there are times when he can just enjoy a story without the "stress" of narrating. You could inform him that today, he can just sit back and enjoy the reading. On another day, you may tell him that today he has to be really thinking because he "gets" to retell the story to you! Narration is a high-level thinking skill and takes lots of practice. He will get better as time goes on.
hth a bit,
Laura

[spidermansmum]

Hi.I have a 7 yr old with ASD[autistic spectrum disorder ]And as part of that package he has a few 'quirks' too.My son has very good expressive language -but very poor verbal processing skills.Except with emotional/pain communication where he struggles.So some of the things I do-may or may not help.

Have you heard of comic strip conversations?.Here is alink to a brief explanation of how it works
http://www.behaviour4learning.ac.uk/Vie ... ntId=10324
You can buy the book detailing how it works from Amazon.
Some kids like my Nathan- do really well with something to fiddle with if they are being asked to listen.Blue tack is good or
maybe he could draw some basic notes-in boxes to help him sequence .
Because Nathan has a verbal processing disorder,we read slower- allowing for pauses.Its a bit like when you go to aforeign country,say France.You can speak some french,you know some keys words-but it takes you longer to translate the conversation-and think of response.If the foreign conversation goes too fast.It just overwhelmes you.
Hth

[Matt'sMom]

Ladies,

Thanks so much for your suggestions. I do think Matthew would love to act out his narrations and he really likes to draw so these are great ways to offer a varity of narration options. Maybe if we shake it up and don't do it the same way each time it will not be such a chore. He does well with prompts or when given questions to answer, it's just when he has to pull it all out of his mind kind of in an open ended "tell me all you know about this" that he struggles.

I really found the idea behind the comic strip conversations interesting. I will check into it more because it sounds like something that might work for us.

thank you,

Durea