| About TALK, Inc.
Teaching
Autistic, Apraxic, and
Language-disordered Kids
What is TALK?
TALK is a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to the development of clinical and educational programs serving individuals with language-based needs.
Who does TALK serve?
At this time our efforts are focused on children with apraxia, autism, and other severe
communication disorders resulting from neurological disease or impairment. These would include children with seizure disorders, aphasia, head trauma, and those who have hearing loss with processing problems, among others. Ultimately, TALK hopes to serve the broad community of all persons with language-based needs.
How large is this population?
Very large. The numbers are frightening and growing at epidemic rates.
Accurate tallies are hard to reach because many of the individuals fit more than one reporting category and would therefore be counted more than once. However, we do know this: If we look at the figures for autism alone, we know that there are over 500,000 autistics in the U.S. (18 thousand in New Jersey alone). Nationwide, the current incidence is one in every 300 births, and the rate jumps to 1:150 in pockets around the country. Moreover, it is getting worse all the time. According to data gathered from the U.S. Department of Education, the number of autistic children has grown over 900 percent since 1992. Therefore, if we add to these figures all those children who are apraxic without autism, or the many thousands who have other neurological problems leading to speech and language deficits, we are clearly talking about staggering figures.
In our region, how many speech schools currently serve this population?
Only the Magnolia Speech School Demonstration Program, that we know of, and believe us, we have looked. We are certain that we are the only intensive speech school for school-age children with severe communication disorders in the states of Delaware or Pennsylvania. Moreover, it is certain that in the Northeast, if they exist, none offers the advantages of the Association Method.
What is apraxia?
Apraxia is an oral-motor disorder, which results in severe impairment of articulation and/or expression. Children who are apraxic have difficulty sequencing the sounds that are necessary for intelligible speech.
Why is autism included in a discussion of speech disorders?
Communication disorders including absent or impaired speech and language are a hallmark of autism. With the tools, resources and delivery systems in general use today, it is expected that no more than half of autistic children will ever acquire speech.
In addition, most language-disordered children, no matter their medical diagnoses, share many features with people who are autistic. These include delayed social development, disturbances of the sensory system and associated behavioral issues.
What are the goals of education in this population?
The goals are the same as in any primary school setting. However, they are expanded to include verbal fluency and normal social interaction.
Is fluency a realistic goal?
Yes, we have seen it. There is no guarantee, no quick fix, and no two children respond exactly the same. But, with appropriate intensive intervention progress is made. If continued at the same level of intensity over years, a percentage of children will achieve fluency. Others will have enough speech to make their needs and wants known, to hold a simple conversation, to tell someone where it hurts and to say I love you. For these children, that alone, makes all the difference.
Federal and state law mandates that all children receive a ?free and appropriate? education. Why aren?t these children getting what they need?
There are many answers to this question and most are complicated. However, TALK believes that the exponential rise in the occurrence of autism and other language disorders in the pre- and school-age population, has overwhelmed local school districts and caught them unprepared. Many have insufficient experience with these types of problems and are just now learning how to address them. Cost is also undeniably an important factor. Because appropriate remediation and education for these kids is both time and labor intensive, the cost is high. In addition, the inefficiency of current delivery systems adds significantly to the expense.
Therefore, in most cases, educational agencies have not been able or willing to mount a speedy and adequate response. As a result, there is often hot debate over the legal and practical definitions of ?appropriate? in each individual child?s case.
Kids are squeezed into existing programs that partially meet needs. Some curricula cap a child?s potential by assuming its limits and then working only toward this lower standard. Most children receive no more than one to two hours of speech therapy each week. And, clearly, this is hardly sufficient for the child with severe impairment. Therefore, those parents who can manage to afford it, pay out-of-pocket for a few costly additional hours of treatment. Moreover, nearly all of these students have associated problems that require other services, occupational therapy being chief among them.
TALK believes, and clinicians overwhelmingly agree, that the only truly appropriate program is one that provides full-time immersion in a language-based, fully integrated therapeutic and educational environment.
Why does TALK promote ?The Association Method??
To date, we have seen no other program that compares for teaching oral and written language.
What is The Association Method?
The Association Method is a phonics-based, multi-sensory and multilevel curriculum designed to teach oral and written communication to people with severe communication disorders. It was developed by the late Mildred McGinnis at the Central Institute for the Deaf in St Louis over fifty years ago.
The curriculum matches the strengths and needs of each individual child and works on the core deficits of speech and language, social interaction and behavior. Instruction progresses from the teaching of individual sounds to syllables, words of
gradually increasing length, basic sentences and questions, more advanced sentence structures and the corresponding questions. Ultimately, when sufficient language
skills have been achieved, a transition is made to traditional textbook formats for instruction.
The teaching procedures are specifically designed to reduce or alleviate the language-disordered child?s difficulties in decoding, organizing, associating, storing and retrieving information pertinent to the production of clear, articulate speech.
The Association Method is available in a number of areas throughout North America and has a long history of bringing speech, reading and writing, to children previously rendered nonverbal and illiterate by severe speech impairments. It has been used successfully to teach children with severe apraxia to speak. It is also effective with all degrees of aphasia (language-disorders), autism, dyslexia, hearing impairment, head trauma and the regular education of elementary students and adult non-readers.
If the Association Method has been around for so long, why isn?t better known?
The method was passed down from Ms. McGinnis to her students, who established their own schools and mentored a few colleagues. Dedicated to their schools and
the children, most were unable to devote much time to promotion.* And because there is nothing to buy or sell, no one has ever had an interest in marketing the method. In fact, in all but the most advanced levels of the Method -- when students are transitioned to traditional texts -- the teachers, themselves, make nearly all of the materials. It is also worth noting that an effective Association Method program is not that easy to replicate. While the basics of the technique are relatively easy to acquire, truly effective application requires significant skill, experience and diligence.
* It must be acknowledged that Maureen Martin, Director of the Dubard School for Language Disorders in Hattiesburg, Mississippi and her predecessor, Etoile Dubard, have made it their mission to provide professional development in the Method. Thanks to their efforts the Method is more readily available in the South.
What is the Magnolia Speech School?
The Magnolia Speech School of Jackson, Mississippi has been using The Association Method to improve the lives of children for nearly half a century. This private non-profit program has a tradition of enrolling students whose parents have relocated from diverse parts of the country in order to give their offspring the benefits of Magnolia?s exceptional curriculum. Thus, TALK was thrilled and honored to be selected by Magnolia to establish the Magnolia Speech School Demonstration program. This is their first attempt at replicating their school. As such, our efforts are being closely supervised and monitored. It is likely, and in fact our hope, that what we are doing here will have far-reaching consequences for children in need throughout our region.
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OUR MISSION:
TALK, Inc. (TALK) is a registered, 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization dedicated to the development of clinical, and educational programs serving individuals with language-based needs.
Currently, our goals are to:
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Promote awareness and adoption of The Association Method (a unique multi-sensory methodology proven effective for the treatment of severe communications disorders) throughout the mid-Atlantic region of the U.S., where despite great need, until now has been unavailable.
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Support the Magnolia Speech School Demonstration Program as a classroom-based center for clinical training, on-going research and documentation -- as well as direct application of The Association Method to a select cohort of children, as a demonstration ?model?.
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Publish a newsletter, "TALK ABOUT TALK", for families, clinicians, and researchers.
TALK, Inc.
395 H Bishop Hollow Rd.
Newtown Square, PA 19073
610-356-5566
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