Diary Of An SLP: Gestalt Language Processing
As a 2nd year Speech-Language Pathologist, I am struggling with how to treat my Gestalt Language Processors. I have several in my preschool setting that I work in.
I think my biggest question, is how do I find meaningful enough gestalts for them to imitate and how do I do so when I feel like I don’t have enough time in the day, or enough sessions a week, to feel like I have time to do that.
Today, during a session with a student I suspect is a GLP, I paused my modeling of phrases that I thought were applicable (because he wasn’t imitating any of them), and just kind of watched him play with the Bluey jeep with caravan, Bluey figurines, as well as his “emotional support” alligator figure. As I stopped and watched, he started to use rich intonation, gibberish, Spanish phrases (his first language) and English phrases and created a whole play scene. Phrases I could make out that he said were “oh no!”, “watch out”, “aqui esta” (right here), and “ow”, all in what seemed to be appropriate for the context. Maybe that’s my answer right there. He enjoys more “action” play with danger and crashing around, as evidenced by the phrases he used. Maybe I need to use more phrases like that with him. I do a lot of that already. But maybe I need to do more.
I just think with him, it’s going to take a lot of time modeling phrases. The only phrase that he has imitated with me has been “oh no” when we are playing with a cause and effect ring stacker and all the rings come off and then we put them back on again and do it all over.
This student does seem to enjoy using AAC. Today with the Bluey toys, I made a button for “sit down” to use when we have the Bluey characters sit in their dining room chair or in their car. And when I would say “sit down” and model on AAC, he started pressing it, too on his own.
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Another student who I suspect is a Gestalt Language Processor, uses a lot more words than the first student I mentioned. He labels nouns, knows all the names of all the animals, even obscure ones like “walrus” and “beluga whale”. He loves labeling colors. I was shocked yesterday when he lined up some colored toys in rainbow order and then did it backwards. He has an affinity for letters and loves when they sing the ABC’s in class (I don’t think he sings along, but he likes to watch his teacher point to all the letters as they sing them). I think he can even read because he has read some words of books that I never said out loud and it caught me by surprise.
This student has a script that he has used quite often with me in speech. Last year, I would put little animal figures in eggs and have him open them. He used a script that I’m assuming he got from YouTube or a TV show. He would take the egg, shake it and say “what’s inside” and when he opened it he would say “surprise!” in a sing-song voice. I would then add the phrase “it’s a ____” and label what animal was inside. He loved this activity and he would say that script the exact same way everytime. It has been hard for me to find other activities that are meaningful enough to him where he will use a script or imitate my attempts at creating phrases that are interesting enough for him.
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These are only two of my students who I suspect are GLPs. I have quite a few more just like this. It sometimes feel like the progress we are making is very slow-going. But I will keep trying and experimenting to find what works best for each of them.
