Features of speech therapy work with autistic children

Features of speech therapy work with autistic children

Elena Safonova

Features of speech therapy work with autistic children

MKDOU Bogucharsky combined kindergarten "Rodnichok"

Report

(using computer presentation)

«Features of speech therapy work with autistic children».

Compiled by:

Teacher speech therapist

Safonova Elena Gennadievna

Boguchar 2017

Target:

• Definition of autism .

• Practical introduction to the features of speech therapy work with autistic children .

• Clarification of difficulties in the work of a speech therapist with a child with Kanner syndrome

• Familiarization with the stages of a speech therapist's work .

Equipment: multimedia installation, computer presentation.

What is autism ?

• Autism is a disorder of brain development characterized by severe and pervasive deficits in social interaction and communication, as well as restricted interests and repetitive behaviors. All of these signs begin to appear before the age of three. Similar conditions with milder signs and symptoms are autism spectrum . Autism is a severe developmental disorder that lasts throughout life.

of psychological and pedagogical support for children with autism continues to be an urgent problem in domestic correctional pedagogy . The fact that in Russia society is gradually beginning to recognize the need for education and social adaptation of children suffering from complex forms of developmental disorders forces specialists to think more and more about how to build a system of work with this population. Autism syndrome is often part of a complex defect, where it plays a role no less important than other disorders, for example, intellectual, speech, and motor impairment. This is due to the fact that communication disorders as such are the main obstacle to the development of all mental functions, even with their potential preservation. We will focus on some aspects of working with children with severe and complicated forms of autism .

Autistic have a wide range of speech disorders, and very often it the speech therapist who is the person who must conduct an initial diagnosis of the development of autistic child and coordinate the family for further action.

Let us recall that the main symptoms of delay and distortion of speech development vary depending on the autism .

Thus, in children of the first group we observe an almost complete absence of external speech. Rare words or short phrases uttered by a child at the height of passion suggest that he understands speech at least partially.

The speech of children in the second group is characterized by echolalia; there is also a small set of stereotypical short phrases, either received by the child in some affective situation. Children of the second group have stereotypical requests and appeals in which the verb is used in the infinitive ( “Drink juice”

,
“Give cookies
,” and the child speaks about himself in the second or third person (
“Sasha will draw”
).
But often such children prefer to address and ask not in the usual way, but by shouting, or simply try to lead an adult to the right place and poke his hand into the object of interest to them.
Children of the third group have extensive literary speech, but are almost incapable of dialogue ; they do not hear their interlocutor, although they quote entire pages of their favorite books or discuss their favorite topic.

In a child of the fourth group, we encounter quiet, unclear speech and echolalia, sometimes delayed in time. Such a child asks and addresses, as a rule, with the help of speech, but retelling is difficult for him.

When working with children diagnosed with ASD , RDA, one cannot talk only about corrective influence, as everyone is accustomed to understanding the work of a speech therapist . Correction means correction; but it is impossible to correct sound pronunciation or begin work on improving lexical and grammatical skills if the communicative features of the child’s speech .

The main tasks of speech therapy work for autism :

• establishing emotional contact with the child;

• finding out the child’s level of contact with a stranger (i.e. speech therapist )

• primary examination of speech (its understanding)

;

• speech understanding training;

• teaching expressive speech.

The speech therapist carries out the first step of primary diagnosis - monitoring the child. This method makes it possible to formulate initial ideas about the object of observation or check the initial assumptions associated with it. Therefore, the observation method plays a decisive role in the search for differential diagnostic criteria.

In order to clarify the picture of the child’s holistic development, a speech therapist can use a diagnostic card developed by K. S. Lebedinskaya and O. S. Nikolskaya. When exploring the sphere of communication, the speech therapist needs to pay attention to visual contact, features of the revitalization complex , recognition of loved ones, the formation of attachment to loved ones, reaction to a new person, contact with children , attitude to physical contact, reaction to verbal addresses, lack of response to a name, selectivity responses to speech, lack of adequate gesture, behavior alone, attitude towards the environment, “lack” of differentiation between animate and inanimate.

Most speech therapy techniques remain unsuited for diagnosing the level of speech development of children with autism , when the main attention should be paid to examining the understanding of speech and its communicative use. can a description of speech therapy examination and correctional work built on the methodological foundations of applied behavioral analysis in S. S. Morozova in the section “TRAINING SPEECH AND COMMUNICATION SKILLS”

.

Directions for speech therapy correction for autism .

1. Examination of speech understanding (impressive speech)

.

First of all, the child’s understanding of speech is examined in a spontaneous situation. They study whether the child understands statements that contain words that are affectively significant for him. What is meant? By observation or in conversation with parents, they find out what the child loves, what is especially significant .

Then they check whether the child follows verbal instructions: a) in the context of what is happening; b) outside the context of what is happening. In the first case, the child is asked to do something in line with what he is doing. For example, if he is playing with a railroad, you can say: “Put the carriage on the rails.”

.

In the second case, the child is given instructions that are not related to what he is doing, for example: “Come here.”

,
“Give me a cube,”
etc. When assessing understanding of instructions, assistance
(for example, gestures)
to obtain more accurate information. Instructions must be presented in different contexts and situations.

If the child's behavior changes in a visible way - for example, he turns his head towards the speaker or approaches him, we can assume that he has at least partially understood the statement.

During observation of the child's spontaneous behavior, various vocalizations and sounds of extralaryngeal origin are recorded. Attention is drawn to the presence of spontaneous imitation of various sounds and words; expression of demands or refusals; echolalia is recorded; The child’s own spontaneous statements are noted.

After observing the child, which may be repeated, the speech therapist begins to build a work . To do this, he draws up an individual program, where he records his stages of work .

2. Development of understanding of speech (emotional and semantic commentary, plot drawing)

.
A speech therapist involved in the psychological and pedagogical support of a child with autism must learn to provide emotional and semantic commentary as a necessary element of classes.
This is the only adequate way to ensure that the child is included in reality, aware of what is happening around him, and understands speech. Before starting training, it is necessary to analyze the entire range of speech skills that the child has. Training begins with the skills that are easiest for him; the degree of difficulty is determined individually.

Necessary prerequisites for starting training are the partial formation of “learning behavior”

, following simple instructions (including
“Give”
and
“Show”
). These instructions will be needed to help you learn to understand the names of objects.

3. Development of the ability to actively use speech (disinhibition of external speech)

.

• With autism, more than with any other disorder, there is a noticeable difference between what a child understands and what he can say. But the reason here is completely special : this is the absence or decrease in speech initiative, which we must restore and develop. The most difficult, time-consuming and least predictable in terms of pace and results is working with “non-speaking”
children (the first group or a mixed case with signs of both the first and second groups).
4. Disinhibition of speech in such children occurs simultaneously in three directions:

• Provoking involuntary imitation of the action, facial expressions, and intonation of an adult .

• Such involuntary imitation can become a prerequisite for voluntary imitation - auditory, and then verbal.

5. Provoking the child to echolalia and involuntary verbal reactions.

• At the right moment in the game, when you have managed to focus the child’s attention on your face, you can, for example, make a grimace of surprise, of course, with a suitable comment. In general, it is important for us to ensure that a non-speaking child looks at our face and mouth as often as possible at the very moment when we say something. We achieve this with the help of physical rhythms, the rhythms of the child’s movement. This work takes a lot of time. In most cases, this lasts up to six months.

6. Formation of expressive (active)

speeches

• This stage begins with learning the skill of imitating sounds and articulatory movements.

• Sounds and articulatory movements should be selected individually; it is preferable to use those that occur in the child’s spontaneous behavior. Examples of articulatory movements: open the mouth, show the tongue, brush the teeth, puff out the cheeks, blow, etc.

A study of the results obtained from the work of practicing teachers showed that special speech therapy is one of the most important in the correction of autistic behavior , emotional and mental underdevelopment in children with early childhood autism .

List of used literature.

1. Morozova S.S. Autism : correctional work for severe and complicated forms. — M.: Humanitarian. ed. VLADOS center, 2007.

2. Nurieva L. G. Speech development in autistic children . - M.: Terevinf, 2006.

3. Lebedinskaya K. S., Nikolskaya O. S. Diagnostic card. A study of a child in the first two years of life who is suspected of having early childhood autism .

Psychological - pedagogical medical - social support is a system of professional activities of specialists aimed at creating social and psychological conditions for the successful learning and development of each child. The work of a teacher-speech therapist is an integral part of the support service, in which this specialist evaluates the characteristics of communication and speech development and conducts correctional work in these areas. The area of ​​activity of a teacher-speech therapist is speech therapy diagnostics, correction and development of speech, development of recommendations for other specialists on the use of rational speech therapy techniques in working with a child.

Speech therapy work, as an integral part of the entire system of correctional intervention, is carried out in generally accepted areas: work on the formation and development of phonemic processes; work on the formation and development of the pronunciation aspect of speech and the syllabic structure of words; work on the formation of lexical and grammatical categories; work on the formation and development of coherent speech; work on the formation and development of non-speech mental processes, as well as fine and gross motor skills.

The clinical and psychological picture of autistic disorders in children can be very different: from a non-speaking child with a low level of intelligence to a child selectively gifted in any one area of ​​knowledge. Deviations in speech development are one of the main signs of early childhood autism syndrome.

All signs of deviations in speech development can occur in different types of pathology, however, with RDA, most of them have certain characteristic features. Speech disorders, being largely a consequence of communication disorders, aggravate difficulties in contact with others, so speech therapy work should begin as early as possible.

The goal of speech therapy work is to teach an autistic child to actively use speech. Its objectives are: normalization of muscle tone and motor skills of the articulatory apparatus; development of speech breathing and voice; formation of strength, duration, sonority, controllability of the voice in the speech stream; developing synchronicity of voice, breathing and articulation; normalization of the prosodic aspect of speech; formation of articulatory praxis at the stage of production, automation and differentiation of sounds, i.e. individual selection and continuous, constant implementation of articulation exercises during the entire correction period; development of phonemic perception and sound analysis; normalization of lexical and grammatical skills of expressive speech; development of functional capabilities of the hands and fingers, correction of fine motor skills; correction of writing and reading (formation of skills in educational activities.)

Speaking about the speech development of children with ASD, we note that it is variable. Depending on the groups of autistic development formulated by O.S. Nikolskaya, in this category of children it is possible to identify the specifics of speech development.

O. S. Nikolskaya (1985-1987) identified four main groups of RDA. The main criteria for the division are the nature and degree of disturbances in interaction with the external environment and the type of autism itself.

In children of group I we will talk about detachment from the external environment, II - its rejection, III - its replacement and IV - the child’s overinhibition by the environment around him.

As studies have shown, autistic children of these groups differ in the nature and degree of primary disorders, secondary and tertiary dysontogenetic formations, including hypercompensatory ones.

In the first group of children, speech is represented by individual vocalizations used in affectively rich moments. In children of the second group, you can find echolalic words and individual phrases that are not used for communication. The speech of children in the third group is represented by detailed stereotypical monologues with an abundance of inappropriate quotes from their favorite books or cartoons. Children of the fourth group are characterized by independent statements, with an abundance of agrammatisms and a violation of the prosodic component, but most of the vocabulary is represented by stereotypical statements.

Thus, the speech of children with ASD can have different variations: from individual vocalizations to large, detailed monologues. However, the common thing is that speech means are not used by children with autism for communication, often acting as autostimulation.

In this regard, it becomes relevant to develop and describe directions and tasks of work that would take into account the specifics of children’s speech development and the organizational difficulties that they experience. Thus, 4 stages of work are identified: 1) establishing a stable emotional contact; 2) disinhibition (provocation) of speech; 3) expansion, enrichment and comprehension of statements; 4) classic speech therapy work. Each stage of work is implemented sequentially and has its own specifics, depending on the level of speech development at which the child with ASD is.

The stage of establishing stable emotional contact is a preparatory part of work with all children with ASD, regardless of which group he belongs to and what speech abilities he has. At this stage, the child gets acquainted with the new specialist and the office in which the classes will be held, learns some rules, a lesson stereotype is formed, and the understanding of speech expands. To do this, the speech therapist uses emotional and semantic commentary, which is the voicing of those impressions that attracted the child’s attention at the moment, and combining them into a single plot. For each group of children, the speech therapist varies the following comment: the first group is a detailed emotional comment with many details. Second group: the comment excludes words with a strong negative meaning, which can cause prolonged stuckness on these words and expressions. Third group: the comment is episodic in nature (the speech therapist asks clarifying questions) and is associated with the child’s stereotypical interests. Fourth group: the comment is neutral, detailed, with many details; the speech therapist builds the conversation through the mother or through the speech therapy mirror. The stage is considered mastered when children with ASD calmly enter the office, make contact for a long time, look the specialist in the eye, accept the tasks he offers, and imitate the speech therapist. The stage of disinhibition (provocation) of speech is an important stage of work with all children with ASD and represents the induction of speech through emotional stimulation.

Work with children of the first group is aimed at provoking speech, since their speech is represented by individual vocalizations. The speech therapist solves the following problems: provoking involuntary imitation of the actions, facial expressions, intonation of an adult; provoking the child to echolalia and involuntary verbal reactions; expansion and comprehension of the child’s existing vocalizations. For this purpose, emotional commentary is used, with the inclusion of favorite songs, poems, nursery rhymes in emotional and tactile games. Also, to expand the child’s vocalizations, the speech therapist repeats the sound series after him, copying the intonation and timbre, and includes them in the overall plot of the game. This approach is due to the fact that there are negative experiences in the development of speech in children with ASD, and such emotional stimulation is sometimes the only way to provoke and disinhibit speech. The stage is considered mastered by this category of children when a variety of vocalizations, lightweight, onomatopoeic and common words are observed in speech.

Work with children of the second group is aimed at disinhibiting speech, since their speech is represented by echolalic stereotypical statements and they do not need speech provocation. The speech therapist solves the following problems: disinhibition of verbal reactions; expansion and understanding of stereotypical phrases; development of speech initiative. For this purpose, motor and poetic rhythms are used, with the addition of pauses, repeating a speech pattern after the child and including it in the verbal commentary of the game, providing speech patterns in a contact situation (prompt). The stage is considered mastered by this category of children when independent statements appear in the child’s speech and are used for communication.

Children of the third group do not need speech disinhibition, since their speech consists of voluminous monologue statements and quotes, but they require provocation of dialogic speech. To this end, the speech therapist creates a lively communication situation, supported by the interests of the child, using the techniques of joint drawing, joint examination of pictures from favorite books. The stage is considered mastered when the child enters into dialogue and uses verbal means for communication.

With children of the fourth group, work is being done to disinhibit independent statements, since their vocabulary is represented by stereotypical, meaningless speech. For this, the speech therapist uses techniques similar to the first and second groups: emotional and tactile games, accompanied by dynamic poetic texts; repeating speech patterns after the child and incorporating them into the overall plot of the game; providing a speech sample in a communicative situation. The stage is considered mastered when independent statements with an abundance of agrammatisms are observed in the speech of children of the fourth group.

The stage of enrichment, expansion and comprehension of statements is necessary for children of the second, third and fourth groups, since in these cases it is possible to achieve expanded speech. In the case of children of the first group, if it was not possible to achieve speech by school age, then alternative communication methods are used.

With other children with ASD, speech therapy work to enrich, expand and comprehend statements is based on the following principles. Firstly, speech therapy work should be based on the principle from the general to the specific: from a speech situation to a word when expanding the vocabulary, from a word to a letter when teaching literacy, etc. Secondly, work on speech involves presenting the correct speech sample in a playful way and inclusion of the child’s statements in the overall plot. Thirdly, the development of the ability to sequentially present events is carried out in the process of discussing past (future) events in the child’s life. Taking into account these principles is due to the fact that children with ASD do not have access to a meaningful transfer of acquired knowledge and skills into practice. Thus, learning new words outside of a communicative situation is learned mechanically and is not used in a real situation. To expand and comprehend statements, the speech therapist uses the following techniques: playing together, drawing together, reading together. The stage is considered mastered when children with ASD use independent, detailed, meaningful statements as a means of communication.

Having paid attention to work on speech, taking into account the specifics of speech development in children with ASD, you can move on to the stage of classical speech therapy work, which also needs to be built taking into account a number of rules.

Work on speech is always preceded by the stage of establishing contact and forming a lesson stereotype, regardless of what speech abilities a child with ASD has. The speech therapist needs to take into account behavioral characteristics: not to provoke aggression or concentration on affectively rich statements, not to use direct questions, not to use expressions with a figurative meaning. Isolated practice of individual speech skills (correct pronunciation of sounds, work on grammatical structure, etc.) leads to mechanical assimilation. Therefore, all speech material must be related to the child’s personal experience, his interests, and included in a specially created communicative situation. The structure of a speech therapy session should be flexible and should take into account the interests of the child.

Speech therapy work with children with autistic symptoms has a number of the following features:

- diagnosis is difficult during the initial examination: it is difficult to establish emotional contact, the likelihood of revealing all the child’s capabilities is low, and at the same time, their overestimation is possible;

— all stages of work take longer, its effectiveness is usually low, children may lose acquired skills, the material is absorbed unevenly, all this directly depends on the children’s capabilities;

- there is a lack of motivation for learning or its low level, as well as the difficulty or impossibility of the child voluntarily concentrating on the proposed tasks. Speech skills acquired in classes are acquired in a ready-made, unchangeable form and are used only in a certain situation without transferring what has been learned.

Speech therapy work with autistic children in preschool age is carried out only individually, and in school the option of subgroup classes of 2–3 children can be used.

Visualization is very important in speech therapy work. For children, cards can be used that have drawings that are understandable to the child, allowing him to express desires and create an algorithm of actions.

Work on the formation and development of phonemic processes is carried out necessarily based on symbols, cards and requires repeated repetition of the same types of work.

A feature of speech therapy work on the sound side of speech - the formation of articulatory patterns, production of sounds, their automation and differentiation - is its longer stage, where the need arises to get used to working with a mirror. When producing sounds, a mechanical method is often used due to the impossibility of creating an articulatory pattern due to the child’s misunderstanding of the instructions, or there may be a categorical refusal of such help due to hypersensitivity. When forming articulatory structures, a minimum of explanations is used, only showing photos or pictures of the position of the organs of the articulatory apparatus with the necessary pose. There is a non-compliance with the principle of a certain sequence of work on sounds, so it is advisable to call out that group of sounds whose articulatory structure has “ripened” first of all. Automation and differentiation of the delivered sound also comes with its own peculiarities: the acquired skill is not used outside the speech therapy room for a long time.

The work on the formation of a dictionary and lexical and grammatical categories has a number of features. The child’s vocabulary and its topics depend on the child’s preferences; there is a large gap between the active and passive vocabulary, and the rare use of the words being studied in everyday speech. At preschool age, work on the formation of lexical and grammatical categories begins with inflection; at school, this work continues. Its peculiarity lies in the fact that you have to work on the same form of a word on different materials many times; work on word formation also requires constant exercises in each type of word formation.

Coherent speech, if any, is intermittent, undeveloped, with long pauses; the sentences are short, often consisting of one word; the sentences may be practically unrelated to each other.

When learning to compose sentences, distribute them, and write a story, diagrams, tables, pictograms, reference pictures, and mnemonic tables are necessarily used.

Normally, dialogue precedes monologue, and it is dialogue that has social significance for the child. In autistic children, this sequence is perverted, so teaching even basic dialogue becomes a pressing topic in the formation and development of coherent speech.

Literature:

1. Children and adolescents with autism / O.S. Nikolskaya, E.R. Baenskaya, M.M. Liebling, R.K. Ulyanova, T.I. Morozova. - M.: Terevinf, - 2005. - 224 p.
2. Dodzina, O.B. Reflection of the features of interaction with the objective and social world in the lexical development of children with autism: abstract of thesis. ...cand. psychol. Sciences: 00.19.10: protected 01.18.07 / Oksana Borisovna Dodzina. – M., 2007. – 24 p. – Bibliography: p. 24.
3. Dodzina, O.B. Psychological characteristics of speech development in children with autism / O.B. Dodzina // Defectology. – 2004. – No. 6. – P. 44-52. – Bibliography: p. 52.
4. Nikolskaya, O.S. Problems of teaching autistic children / O.S. Nikolskaya // Defectology. - 1995. - No. 2.
5. Education of children with severe and multiple developmental disorders. Collection of materials of the 1st international scientific and practical conference November 27 – 29, 2013, St. Petersburg, ed.: Yakovleva N.N.

Conducts classes and receptions at CNIR:

Development of speech understanding in children with ASD of preschool and primary school age

Children with autism spectrum disorder often have speech problems. The causes of violations of children's understanding of speech are listed. The experience of correctional work of teachers on the understanding of spoken speech and reading in children of primary, senior preschool and primary school age, tested in a school of the Federal Resource Center for organizing comprehensive support for children with autism spectrum disorders, is described. The stages of work are proposed, and methodological recommendations for classes are given.

Impaired speech understanding in children with ASD

A common problem encountered in children with ASD is the child’s impaired understanding of speech. This is one of the important markers of autistic disorders. Difficulties in understanding spoken speech appear already in the early period of children’s speech development. The child does not understand the names of objects, their qualities, or actions. Does not follow simple verbal instructions. In the future, he does not understand spoken language or what is read, and cannot answer questions or retell the text. Why is this happening?

Sufficient understanding of speech is ensured by:

- a good level of voluntariness in children (voluntary organization of their attention and behavior in accordance with what they hear; voluntary organization of their own speech reaction; interest in the speech situation);

— a sufficient level of vocabulary (the dictionary must be updated - this is a prerequisite);

- skills of correct grammatical formatting of statements.

In children with ASD, the listed skills are, as a rule, in acute deficit, which inevitably leads to difficulties in understanding speech.

Work to overcome speech understanding disorders begins as soon as a parent notices difficulties of this nature in their child or on the recommendation of a specialist. This work should be carried out comprehensively and include classes with a psychologist, speech therapist, and parent-child activities at home. At the same time, the parent becomes a full participant in correctional work, applying their experience and knowledge and skills received from specialists in the child’s daily life.

Stages of working on speech understanding

At the preparatory stage, it is important to establish emotional contact with the child and determine the scope of his interests, needs and zone of proximal development. Based on this, speech material for classes is selected. Throughout the day, a teacher or parent needs to use emotional and semantic comments. This will allow the child to focus on the situation or speech of the adult. The comment should be based on the child’s experience and interest. For example, you can draw his favorite toy with your child, talk about it, and express your emotional attitude towards it.

It is imperative to bring meaning to any child’s activity. For example, a child starts knocking on the table. Then the adult says that it is “the master knocking with a hammer: knock-knock, he’s building a house...”.

It is imperative that throughout all stages of correctional work the method of speaking out situations, establishing cause-and-effect relationships is used, and feelings and emotions are described. For example: “We will put away the toys and then we can go for a walk.” Or: “You will complete this task and you can play.”

It should be emphasized that teachers and parents always talk through what is happening in the child’s life.

It is also useful to use games and tasks to develop visual and auditory attention, activate tactile and motor sensations, analyze and dramatize simple fairy tales.

The main stages of work to overcome difficulties in understanding speech

Stage 1 - working on a dictionary of nouns by topic (it is important to make sure that the child correctly understands the meaning of each word and can relate it to a specific object and picture).

The child is taught to follow simple verbal instructions: “Give me...”, “Show me...”. This work is carried out on the basis of processed lexical material. First, use the help of an adult (the adult acts with the child’s hand). The baby must be praised and encouraged. After the child has learned to give an object according to instructions, it is necessary to teach him to distinguish this object from others. For these purposes, an alternative object (or picture, word) is introduced that is not similar to the original. Also, the adult must get the child (so that he memorizes) answers to the questions: “What did you give?”, “What did you bring?” If the child is speechless, it is permissible to use PECS cards or pictograms as alternative communication, because This will make the child’s communication with others accessible.

Stage 2 - working on a dictionary of verbs. Specially selected speech material will help you master the deep semantic structure of a phrase of 2-3 words and will make it possible to form simple forms of dialogue (answering questions). First, simple instructions are introduced: “Come here,” “Sit down,” “Put it down,” that is, at first the child is taught to imitate the movements of adults, and later they move on to picture material. It is important to select several pictures for each item - actions, for example, where the mother reads, cooks, hugs, washes, irons. This way the child will learn to understand the action, and not just remember the template “mom is cooking.” Also, after practicing the action word, alternative words and pictures are used.

Stage 3 - working on a vocabulary of adjectives;

Stage 4 - work is carried out on the grammatical structure of speech;

Stage 5 - work on reading comprehension. This work is based on the analysis of each word in a sentence. The child (or adult) reads the sentence, the adult asks a question for each word in the sentence. After this, the text is read in full and questions are asked. The text is adapted for the child, the teacher leaves the words that carry the main semantic load. A retelling plan is drawn up, and the child learns the adapted text. Here it is also necessary to use alternative words and sentences, alternative pictures or objects. In this case, dramatizing the text helps the child well.

Work on understanding speech is a necessary and important part of the correction program, the basis for the formation of all aspects of speech and successful communication. Arranged in this sequence, it facilitates the teacher’s task of teaching understanding of oral speech and texts to children with ASD of preschool and primary school age, and helps children master the school educational program in basic subjects.

Notes of speech therapy classes.

MAGAZINE Preschooler.RF

Authors:

• Teacher-speech therapist Syrovatko S.M.,
• educational psychologist Florova Yu.A.

Currently, there is an urgent problem in domestic correctional pedagogy - the creation of a comprehensive system of psychological and pedagogical support for children with autism. At the State Budgetary Educational Institution GPPC DogM, many specialists are involved in the development, correction and adaptation of children with ASD: psychologists, defectologists, speech therapists, and additional education teachers.

Great success has been achieved in the development and implementation of programs that allow children with this feature of mental development to adapt to society, attend kindergartens or schools, participate in joint (collective) activities, receive an education and ultimately be maximally adapted to life in society.

Of great importance for inclusion in the adaptation of such a child is the development of the ability to communicate and the formation of speech at the highest possible level.

Autistic children have a wide range of speech disorders, and very often it is the speech therapist who is the person who must conduct an initial diagnosis of the development of an autistic child and coordinate the family for further action.

For children with autism spectrum disorders, the main symptoms of delays and distortions in speech development vary depending on the autism group. There are 4 groups of speech development:

Thus, in children of the first group we observe an almost complete absence of external speech. Rare words or short phrases uttered by a child at the height of passion suggest that he understands speech at least partially.

The speech of children in the second group is characterized by echolalia; there is also a small set of stereotypical short phrases, either received by the child in some affective situation. Children of the second group have stereotypical requests and appeals in which the verb is used in the infinitive ( “Drink juice” , “Give cookies” ), and the child speaks about himself in the second or third person ( “Sasha will draw” ). But often such children prefer to address and ask in an unusual way, shouting or simply trying to lead an adult to the right place and poke his hand into the object of interest to them.

Children of the third group have extensive literary speech, but are almost incapable of dialogue; they do not hear their interlocutor, although they quote entire pages of their favorite books or discuss their favorite topic.

In a child of the fourth group, we encounter quiet, unclear speech and echolalia, sometimes delayed in time. Such a child asks and addresses, as a rule, with the help of speech, but retelling is difficult for him.

First of all, in a spontaneous situation, the state of impressive speech is examined. The child's understanding of statements that contain words that are affectively significant to him is studied. By observation or from a conversation with parents, they find out what the child loves, what is most significant for him. Then, in the absence of a significant object or action, a statement containing a significant word is uttered in the child’s field of vision (for example, “Let’s go ride a horse?” , “Do you want a Kinder surprise?” , etc.)

If the child's behavior changes in a visible way - for example, he turns his head towards the speaker or approaches him, we can assume that he has at least partially understood the statement. A directed examination of speech understanding includes tasks for understanding the names of objects, actions, qualities of objects, concepts expressing spatial relationships.

Your own speech is examined simultaneously with your understanding. Attention is drawn to the presence of spontaneous imitation of various sounds and words; expression of demands or refusals; echolalia is recorded; The child’s own spontaneous statements are noted. The child’s involuntary reactions indicate that he is able to understand speech and what is happening around him if it comes into the zone of his involuntary attention. (Nikolskaya O. S. Autistic child. Ways of help / Nikolskaya O. S., Baenskaya E. R., Liebling

MM.).

On the basis of the canistherapy department of the State Budgetary Educational Institution GPPC DogM, for the second year, research has been carried out on the development of integrative speech therapy classes using the canistherapy method based on applied behavioral analysis for children with autism. Such classes are conducted by two specialists: a speech therapist and a canitherapist psychologist with a specially trained, certified dog.

Considering the characteristics of children with autism spectrum disorders, the child’s initial contact with a speech therapist, as well as other children, can be traumatic due to hypersensitivity to the information conveyed by the human face and speech. Even the use of toys representing people is often not accepted by such children.

By introducing such a means of work as a specially trained dog, we create the possibility of indirect contact between a specialist and an autistic child, where the animal acts as an intermediary. The image of a dog, while not being a super-stimulant for a child, contact with a dog does not include affective reactions, but, on the contrary, causes increased interest and expressed motivation for interaction. Communication with the inclusion of an animal allows you to form a subject-subject relationship, establish communication, inform learning activities, and keep the child’s attention due to the bright non-frequency stimulus which is the dog. All interactions between a child and a dog are carried out in accordance with the main program of a specialist (speech therapist), where the speech therapist is the leading specialist who declares the working topic of the lesson, and the canine therapist engages the dog in order to achieve the results stated in the lesson plan.

Selecting exercises and tasks, adjusting the complexity, dynamics, and pace of mastering the program, even in small groups, must be based on a pre-built individually oriented route for each child. It is necessary to combine children into small groups after carefully studying the recommendations of the PMPC. In our experience, we rely on the ability to provide speech therapy assistance individually for the required time for each child, and only after establishing stable contact with the child and boosting his high motivation to attend classes, we transfer children to small groups consisting of two or three children with similar nosology. Because the group of autism spectrum disorders includes very different children, with different levels of development, different perspectives and different causes of existing disorders.

Based on the above, we can state: speech therapy work with autistic children using the canistherapy method should be carried out in a certain way.

1. An individual form of speech therapy work, as a necessary adaptation period, with the development of a stable positive reaction to attending classes. Creating motivation for contact with animals. These classes are conducted with the participation of parents, which makes it possible to obtain anamnestic information; in the process of developing play behavior, communication capabilities are diagnosed, a speech map is drawn up, and the child’s free behavior is observed.
2. A dog under the guidance of a dog handler helps to create an atmosphere that allows an emotional connection to be established with the child, while carrying out indirect interaction with specialists based on the child’s keen interest in the learning process, initiating an incentive to complete tasks due to the desire to be in contact with all members of the educational alliance. The main rule at this stage is to reduce pressure and eliminate the directive position of interaction as much as possible, which allows you to provoke the child’s independent initiative.
3. It is very important that in the room in which speech therapy work is carried out there are no objects that radically distract the child from the topics being studied. To do this, specialists need to think through the equipment of the classroom in advance before each lesson, in accordance with the calendar and thematic planning of the program used. In addition, it is necessary to remember about safety, since some autistic children are impulsive, restless and may have strong affective reactions, episodes of aggression and self-aggression.
4. A program for the correction of speech disorders is developed jointly with all specialists working with the child. The inclusion and roles of the therapy dog ​​are discussed in advance and correspond to the goals and objectives of the program used, and also take into account the individual characteristics and capabilities of the autistic child.
5. Speech therapy work to correct speech development must be consistent, patient, and sometimes very long. You should not try to teach your child everything at once; it is better to first focus on one skill that is most accessible to him, gradually connecting him to the simplest operations in other, frequently repeated everyday situations. In each specific case the results will be different. Periods of progress can be followed by regression, just like in healthy children. In order to track the dynamics, you should record (write down) the slightest achievements. Firmness, persistence and exactingness are very important when working with autistic children. Of course, this is very troublesome, both for parents and for specialists, but it is important to remember: by getting the child to behave correctly and purposefully, we form an appropriate stereotype and it will be easier for him to interact, explore the world, and learn.

The directions of speech therapy correction for autism are structured as follows:

1. Development of understanding of speech (emotional and semantic commentary, plot drawing). A speech therapist participating in the psychological and pedagogical support of a child with autism provides emotional and semantic commentary through the inclusion of a dog as an intermediary. Addressing the animal with a request and initiating active play interaction in order to interest the child in the process and include him in joint activities. This path allows you to environmentally ensure that the child is included in reality, aware of what is happening around him, understands speech and follows basic instructions. In this case, there is a persistent positive reaction to the classes, an expansion of the range of positive emotions, and motivation to engage in activities with specialists through interaction with the dog arises. At the same time, when forming activities, it is necessary to take into account that the emotional and semantic commentary must be tied to the child’s experience, bring meaning even to the child’s seemingly meaningless activity, to his autostimulation; focus on pleasant sensations for the child and smooth out unpleasant ones; clarify cause-and-effect relationships, give the child an idea of ​​the structure of objects and the essence of phenomena. Such commentary helps convey the meaning of daily events, their dependence on each other and on human relationships, on social rules; gives an autistic child an idea of ​​human emotions, feelings, relationships that he usually cannot understand or perceive directly. At the same time, taking into account the immediate, direct emotional messages of a dog, it is much easier to form ideas about human emotions in children with autism. Playing with an animal, using a dog as a character in role-playing games is very important for developing in an autistic child the ability to understand speech from commenting on details, sensations, situations to a plot story. In the process of reacting to the received emotions, the child “together with the dog” sketches or indicates in color his impressions of the activities. This allows you to firmly consolidate the information received using psychological anchoring. By reviewing and supplementing, completing the plots, you can return and consolidate the material covered, expanding it by adding new information. Develop the ability to maintain attention, encourage voluntary activity, and emotional regulation of one’s own state. Relaxation exercises next to the dog have a good effect in reducing aggressive and auto-aggressive states. Sensory, tactile stimulation, a calm background of support allows the child to cope with his feelings, feel the safety and comfort of the environment, which makes it possible to continue classes and achieve good results, significantly reducing the manifestations of both aggressive and auto-aggressive impulses in a child with autism.

With autism, more than with any other disorder, there is a noticeable difference between what a child understands and what he can say. The most difficult, time-consuming and least predictable in terms of pace and results is working with “non-speaking” children (the first group or a mixed case with signs of both the first and second groups). The main difficulty for a speech therapist lies in including such a child in interaction. When a dog is included in play interaction, the child is actively involved in communication; the play process itself and the need to communicate with the animal initiates and develops the ability to actively use speech (external speech is disinhibited).

Speech disinhibition in such children occurs simultaneously in three directions:

1) Provoking involuntary imitation of an action,

facial expressions, intonation of an adult, working with the commands Give the ball, Apport, go, leave, come, as well as sit, stand, lie down and other commands.

2) Provoking the child to echolalia and involuntary verbal reactions. In active play interaction with a dog during play interaction with elements of role-playing games. With the help of poetic rhythms, with the help of rhyme and melody, we also stimulate the vocalizations and verbal reactions of an autistic child. When we read poems that are well known to him or sing songs, we leave a pause at the end of the line, provoking him to finish the desired word (at the same time, we use the characteristic desire for such a child to complete an unfinished phrase). If the child does not do this, then we finish the word ourselves (sometimes you can do this in a whisper, or you can do it silently - just articulate it when the child is focused on your face). The rhythm of poems and songs is best reproduced by rhythmic movements (swinging, tossing, it is better for the child to sit in his arms). When a child wants something from you, you should give him a short wording of the request. For example: if you really want to feed the dog, initiate the request “Give me food . Or the game “I want to walk the dog!” After the phrase, the child receives a leash and the opportunity to independently walk around the office with the animal on a leash. In the absence of verbal contact, you should only accompany his silent request with the right word.

3) Repeating after the child and acting out his sound reactions, including vocal autostimulation and the active involvement of the dog in response to each sound reaction, attracting and maintaining the child’s attention is another important area of ​​​​work to disinhibit the speech of a non-speaking autistic child. Professionals working with the child pick up his vocalizations, repeat them with his intonation, and then act out and turn them into real words, connecting them to the situation of playing with the animal and maintaining motivation for any positive interaction between the child and the animal. Particular difficulties in working to disinhibit speech arise with children who initially have a lot of vocal autostimulation. If a child constantly “babbles” or sings “in his own language” , or hums, grinds his teeth, clicks his tongue, then it is difficult to carry out speech work, since the child’s mouth is constantly “busy” . Work on provoking imitation with such children is most often impossible. The only way out is the intensive work we described to play up their vocal autostimulation with intensive inclusion in short game interventions. In this type of work, the dog, under the guidance of a canister therapist, is an indispensable assistant to the speech therapist. Since, being a bright, low-frequency stimulus, it does not carry the negative charge that people cause, while the dog can imitate any necessary role, initiate communication and play interaction, occupying any interaction position that is necessary. The activity of the animal also depends on specific tasks and can be regulated by the canister therapist, increasing or decreasing activity in contact. Work with non-speaking children who have passed the age of 5 should begin with very intensive training in disinhibiting “external” speech. When a child reaches school age, we begin to teach him to read and write. At the same time, the technique of turning on the animal remains the same and changes depending on the goals set.

Work on developing dialogue capabilities in children of the third group is structured in a special way. The speech of such children is quite developed, they can talk for a very long time about what they have a special passion for (most often about something scary, unpleasant), they can quote their favorite books for entire pages. But at the same time, their speech is a monologue; they need not an interlocutor, but a listener. A dog is ideal for the role of a listener, helping to survive a complex affective reaction: fear or surprise and developing a certain algorithm of stereotypical actions - as a way to overcome affect and gain access to comfortable experiences.

Features of the approach to teaching reading and writing skills. There are a number of techniques that help teachers develop basic learning skills in an autistic child.

So, when learning to read, you can first focus on the child’s good involuntary memory, on the fact that, when playing with a magnetic alphabet or with cubes with letters written on the sides, he can quickly mechanically memorize the entire alphabet. It is enough for an adult to name letters from time to time, without requiring constant repetition from the child, without checking him, since everything that requires voluntary concentration slows down the child and can cause negativism in him.

Further, authors such as O.S. Nikolskaya suggest that teachers and parents do not teach their children letter-by-letter or syllable-by-syllable reading, but immediately turn to the method of “global reading ,” i.e., reading whole words. This technique seems more adequate for teaching autistic children than letter-by-letter or syllable-by-syllable reading. The fact is that, having learned to add letters or syllables, an autistic child can read “mechanically” , without delving into the meaning of what he read. With “global reading” we can avoid this danger, since we label pictures or objects with whole words, and the word is always combined in the child’s visual field with the object that it denotes. In addition, teaching an autistic child to read whole words is easier and faster than letters and syllables, since, on the one hand, he has great difficulty perceiving fragmented information (coming in the form of letters, syllables, etc.), and, on the other hand, he is able to instantly remember and “photograph” what is in his visual field. We include this technique in a role-playing game in which the dog plays the role of a fellow child, a partner. And she must perform the same tasks, while the specialist deliberately confuses the answers, encouraging the child to help his dog friend answer correctly. These activities are interesting for the child, allow them to maintain attention for a long time, and also cultivate such qualities as mutual assistance, the ability to come to the aid of others, and a careful, caring attitude. These qualities are obviously deficient in autistic children, since it is almost impossible for such children to understand other people’s emotions without additional teaching.

Correction methods used in speech therapy work with autistic children:

• Applied behavior analysis. ( “Speech development in autistic children within the framework of behavioral therapy” - article by S.S. Morozova, a psychologist from Moscow State University, who completed an internship in the USA in behavioral therapy (behavior modification, ABA).
• Methodology L.G. Nureyeva
• Method of global reading B.D. Korsunskaya
• Using elements of the methodology M. Montessori, S. Lupan

The study of the results obtained from the work of practicing teachers showed that special speech therapy, combined with the use of the canistherapy method, takes the correctional and educational process to a qualitatively different level, significantly increases the motivation of children to study, which in turn facilitates the assimilation of the necessary information, and has a positive effect on the quality specialist work.

Diagnostics carried out based on the results of the work show a significant improvement in the assimilation of the program, as well as the development in children of the desire and ability to interact in both verbal and non-verbal ways. I would like to note that this significantly reduces affective reactions, aggression and auto-aggression, increases the opportunity to improve the quality of contact and social interaction, which is also a significant component in any correction of autistic behavior, emotional and mental underdevelopment in children with early childhood autism.

List of used literature.

• Morozova S.S. Autism: correctional work for severe and complicated forms. — M.: Humanitarian. ed. VLADOS center, 2007.
• Morozova T.I. Characteristics and basic principles of correction of speech disorders in early childhood autism // Defectology. – 1990. – No. 5.
• Defectology. Dictionary-reference book: Textbook. / Ed. Puzanova B.P. - M.: Sfera, 2005.
• Lebedinskaya K.S., Nikolskaya O.S. Diagnostic card. A study of a child in the first two years of life who is suspected of having early childhood autism.
• Lebedinskaya K.S., Nikolskaya O.S. Defectological problems of early childhood autism. Message I // Defectology. – 1987. – No. 2. – P. 10-16.
• Lebedinskaya K.S., Nikolskaya O.S. Defectological problems of early childhood autism. Message II // Defectology. – 1988. – No. 2. – P. 10-15