Signing Progress

Katie's comprehension of sign language and how it fits in her environment is really starting to blossom! Here are a few things she did just today:

• This morning Katie was playing with a little plastic Tigger figure that she loves to play with, and I pointed to his nose and asked her, "What's this?" She immediately signed "nose" to me! So I pointed to his ears, eyes, and mouth and asked her all of those too, and she signed them all to me and got them all right! I was amazed!! Not only did she understand what I was asking her, but she also generalized all those body parts to an inanimate object!

• This evening, we were at Wal-Mart, and she saw a package with Mickey Mouse in a car on it. She went up and looked at it, and I signed "Mickey Mouse" to her, and she pointed to his car and signed "car" to me!!! I about fell over!
  

• Then we walked past a display of socks, and I held up a pair of them and signed "socks" to her, and she pulled up her pants leg and showed me her socks!

• Also at home this evening, I fingerspelled "d-o-g" and then signed "dog" to her, and she got up and walked across the room and kicked our dog!! (She doesn't like him!) Arlin and I totally cracked up! Of course, we had to put a stop to that one...but we were still pretty impressed! :-)

Developmental Pediatrician Observation

Katie's developmental pediatrician came to Katie's school one morning last week to observe Katie and her educational team. She specializes in deaf communication, so it was really good to get her input on some things.

She really likes Katie's interpreter (as do we!) and feels she has a really good handle on Katie and her communication needs.

She did have some concerns about the effectiveness of Katie's expressive communication. She thinks Katie's signs seem apraxic in nature. Apraxia is a problem with motor planning and sequencing. I know of at least one or two other children with CHARGE who have apraxia, so I'm in contact with them to learn more about this and what we might do to help Katie with this. Dr. Wiley also has some resources that she plans to share with Katie's team about fine-motor development as it relates to sign formation.

Katie is going to be trying out a Dynavox--an augmentative communication device that has pictures and will "speak" for you--to help with her expressive language. Dr. Wiley thought this was a great idea. The school has one on loan from Ohio State for two months and started working with Katie on it as of last week. We hope that she'll pick it up quickly and it will give her another avenue for expressing herself. Dr. Wiley thought we might also want to start some private speech therapy, in addition to what Katie gets at school, to focus more on learning how to use the device.

Dr. Wiley had several other observations and suggestions that were right on target for Katie. Arlin and I will be meeting with Katie's educational team on January 5th to discuss her findings. We are so lucky to have such good professional and educational resources for Katie--we feel very blessed!

Signing Progress

Katie has been making great progress with her signing skills this school year! Her receptive skills continue to flourish, and she is also now starting to use expressive sign more and more every day. It seems like language is starting to click for her, and she's beginning to understand that the signs actually mean something.

Last week, I got this encouraging email from Katie's interpreter:

I think I failed to mention in Katie's communication book today something that I feel was a very big step with her communication. Besides the fact that she made several unprompted requests today regarding her wants, she did something else I want to share with you. Ashley (Katie's support educator) was working on numbers with Katie today. She had lots of numbers in front of Katie as we were working on her receptive skills. Ashley would say a number and I would sign it, and Katie would find the number and pick it up. We have done this activity many, many times. Katie will watch for the sign and often will need it signed again as she is having to watch for both digits. However, today I signed the number (64) and she looked at me and signed back to me "6" with that expression that was saying, "Did you sign 6 (60)?" Of course, she really signed 7, but that is her 6, 7, 8, and 9. I got so excited! I said to Ashley, "She just asked for clarification!!!!" She has many times looked at me for clarification (needing the number signed again), but this was the first time she tried to sign back to me asking for clarification. I think this is great! She really is getting it! This was the first time she has used turn-taking appropriately without being prompted. I hope this makes sense. It is hard to explain in writing, but I think this shows wonderful progress!

We were thrilled at this note! It's so wonderful to see Katie's language starting to develop! We are proud of you, Katie!