Wednesday, October 05, 2011
WHEREWEBE.COM
http://finance.yahoo.com/focus-retirement/article/113590/tips-from-early-retirees-usnews?mod=fidelity-buildingwealth&cat=fidelity_2010_building_wealth
Monday, May 09, 2011
Friday, April 29, 2011
Today is April 29th, 2011
http://www.txsha.org/_pdf/pdf/Krauss-Lehrman,%20Tricia-Stuttering-SC.pdf
http://www.txsha.org/_pdf/pdf/Krauss-Lehrman,%20Tricia-Stuttering-SC.pdf
http://www.montrealfluency.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Referral-List-2011_03.pdf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25x9JPzo3vI&feature=BFa&list=AVGxdCwVVULXfyhZucVzFT7tLSVre1N2sH&index=56
http://www.txsha.org/_pdf/pdf/Krauss-Lehrman,%20Tricia-Stuttering-SC.pdf
http://www.montrealfluency.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Referral-List-2011_03.pdf
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=25x9JPzo3vI&feature=BFa&list=AVGxdCwVVULXfyhZucVzFT7tLSVre1N2sH&index=56
Monday, April 18, 2011
http://www.stamres.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/Vol1-Issue1.pdf
http://www.stamres.psychol.ucl.ac.uk/Vol1-Issue1.pdf
http://gregorysnyder.com/CV/data/Snyder-FRP-2005.pdf
http://gregorysnyder.com/CV/data/Snyder-FRP-2005.pdf
Sunday, April 17, 2011
INFO IRS 2010 TAX RETURN DEADLINE IS MON. 4-18-2011
Wed: Talked to woman to get W-2 Info. A success, spoke calmly and slower on the telephone and was extremely polite.
Got job done.
Thurs. Spoke to friend was, emotionally. No control, self regulation. Caught a cold.
Friday. Very busy and sore throat. Cold starting
Saturday. RECALL: Focus on how you are saying it. Not on the content. Focus on reduced rate and aim for a slower rate, calm rate. ASKING FOR CLARIFICATION, NOT CONFRONTATION.
Sunday Calmer today. Talked to Jim on the phone, Ok. Jim seemed annoyed..........did not pay attention to rate.
Got job done.
Thurs. Spoke to friend was, emotionally. No control, self regulation. Caught a cold.
Friday. Very busy and sore throat. Cold starting
Saturday. RECALL: Focus on how you are saying it. Not on the content. Focus on reduced rate and aim for a slower rate, calm rate. ASKING FOR CLARIFICATION, NOT CONFRONTATION.
Sunday Calmer today. Talked to Jim on the phone, Ok. Jim seemed annoyed..........did not pay attention to rate.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Stuttering
Carol Seery (left) mentors graduate student Kathryn Perkins, who recently presented her proposal for a research project that would examine how to more effectively alter the way people who stutter are perceived.
Stuttering is more than ‘The King’s Speech’
* Written by Beth Stafford, UWM University Relations and Communications
* February 23, 2011
Carol Seery (left) mentors graduate student Kathryn Perkins, who recently presented her proposal for a research project that would examine how to more effectively alter the way people who stutter are perceived.
Carol Seery (left) mentors graduate student Kathryn Perkins, who recently presented her proposal for a research project that would examine how to more effectively alter the way people who stutter are perceived.
The movie “The King’s Speech” has stirred tremendous interest in stuttering. Already the winner of seven awards from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and the Screen Actors Guild award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture, the film will again be spotlighted at the 83rd Academy Awards show on Feb. 27, with 12 Oscar nominations.
The film tells the story of King George VI and his efforts to deal with his stuttering. His live broadcasts kept the spirits of the British people alive during the dark days of World War II. The film also has created awareness of other famous people who stutter, including Vice President Joe Biden, James Earl Jones, Nicole Kidman, Bruce Willis, B.B. King, Samuel L. Jackson and Jack Welch.
But for University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Associate Professor Carol Hubbard Seery, it was a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who “made the topic so interesting that I was drawn to it.”
Mystifying disorder requires multidimensional approach
Stuttering is probably the most misunderstood of all communication disorders. It is mystifying because of its fluctuating occurrence. At one moment the speaker says “apple” easily and at the next moment cannot, no matter how hard he or she tries. Some people have mild episodes of being blocked, while others struggle with severe speech disruptions.
“Stuttering appears to involve almost all aspects of what we do when we try to communicate,” says Seery, who is with the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in the College of Health Sciences. “Studying stuttering requires a multidimensional approach, since it appears to be impacted by a multitude of factors – a person’s social interactions, psychological processes and physical capacity.”
Seery felt that “The King’s Speech” oversimplified some of the issues involved in stuttering. She recently attended the film with several members of a stuttering support group, the local chapter of the National Stuttering Association (NSA).
The NSA members include people from many different career paths, including an accountant and a biologist. “Everyone liked how the film showed that a person who stutters also can have some really strong competencies,” said Seery. “But we also thought that someone could leave the theater believing that the primary reasons for stuttering are psychological. For example, there is the suggestion that some kind of traumatic event in the king’s childhood coincided with his starting to stutter.
“But research suggests that the reasons and risk factors are complex,” she continues. “It would have been more balanced if the movie also had depicted people who stuttered that had wonderful parents.” Seery adds that an underlying genetic factor is found in a high percentage of cases.
‘Many oars in the water’
Seery was instrumental in a multisite, multiyear research collaboration among several Midwestern universities, evaluating young children as soon as possible after stuttering was first noticed. Comprehensive reassessments continued across several years. The National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders awarded an unprecedented $4 million for the study. Data drawn from the project are now being used to advance understanding of stuttering and guide clinical decisions.
Seery has many “oars in the water” regarding stuttering. At the UWM College of Health Sciences, she conducts research, teaches undergraduate and graduate courses, mentors several research students and serves as graduate program coordinator for the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. For several years, she also supervised the graduate students in the program, who provide services at the UWM Speech Clinic for people who stutter or have other communicative challenges.
“Too often, clinical practice and research are interpreted as mutually exclusive. Throughout Dr. Seery’s work, I see a remarkable combination yielding important contributions to both disciplines,” explains colleague David Shapiro, the Robert Lee Madison Distinguished Professor at Western Carolina University’s Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. “As a clinician and as a researcher, I am grateful and I personally appreciate her focused, balanced and applied approach. Indeed, Dr. Seery’s work has made a significant impact, both in terms of its content and clarity, on our understanding of communication and its disorders.”
Seery sees advocacy and research partnered in the exploration of how listeners respond to a person who stutters. For example, she is collaborating with James Bashford, a researcher in UWM’s Department of Psychology, to examine whether a momentary pause before a stuttered word alters a listener’s perception of how long the stuttering moment is. She explained: “The preceding pause may affect the listener’s sense of how long the elongated sound seems to be.”
In another study, a graduate student wants to test how to more effectively alter the way stutterers are perceived. “Scholarly literature shows that people who stutter are judged with more negative characteristics – such being extremely shy, anxious, or slower intellectually. We need to explore how to educate people that those who stutter are competent individuals who should be given the opportunity to contribute,” says Seery.
The research aim is to find out whether video clips impact viewer attitudes toward people who stutter. Will views be changed by a video of people who stutter talking about their personal experiences, or by a video of a speaker giving information about stuttering?
Seery’s dedication to people who stutter is apparent in her interactions with a children’s support group. At monthly meetings, the group gives children who stutter a safe environment to talk and play with each other, and offers parents the opportunity to meet separately with Seery.
Although she credits previous students from UWM and Marquette with providing the impetus to launch the NSA-Kids group, Seery’s sensitivity and sense of humor guide the sessions.
Stuttering is more than ‘The King’s Speech’
* Written by Beth Stafford, UWM University Relations and Communications
* February 23, 2011
Carol Seery (left) mentors graduate student Kathryn Perkins, who recently presented her proposal for a research project that would examine how to more effectively alter the way people who stutter are perceived.
Carol Seery (left) mentors graduate student Kathryn Perkins, who recently presented her proposal for a research project that would examine how to more effectively alter the way people who stutter are perceived.
The movie “The King’s Speech” has stirred tremendous interest in stuttering. Already the winner of seven awards from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and the Screen Actors Guild award for outstanding performance by a cast in a motion picture, the film will again be spotlighted at the 83rd Academy Awards show on Feb. 27, with 12 Oscar nominations.
The film tells the story of King George VI and his efforts to deal with his stuttering. His live broadcasts kept the spirits of the British people alive during the dark days of World War II. The film also has created awareness of other famous people who stutter, including Vice President Joe Biden, James Earl Jones, Nicole Kidman, Bruce Willis, B.B. King, Samuel L. Jackson and Jack Welch.
But for University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Associate Professor Carol Hubbard Seery, it was a professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign who “made the topic so interesting that I was drawn to it.”
Mystifying disorder requires multidimensional approach
Stuttering is probably the most misunderstood of all communication disorders. It is mystifying because of its fluctuating occurrence. At one moment the speaker says “apple” easily and at the next moment cannot, no matter how hard he or she tries. Some people have mild episodes of being blocked, while others struggle with severe speech disruptions.
“Stuttering appears to involve almost all aspects of what we do when we try to communicate,” says Seery, who is with the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders in the College of Health Sciences. “Studying stuttering requires a multidimensional approach, since it appears to be impacted by a multitude of factors – a person’s social interactions, psychological processes and physical capacity.”
Seery felt that “The King’s Speech” oversimplified some of the issues involved in stuttering. She recently attended the film with several members of a stuttering support group, the local chapter of the National Stuttering Association (NSA).
The NSA members include people from many different career paths, including an accountant and a biologist. “Everyone liked how the film showed that a person who stutters also can have some really strong competencies,” said Seery. “But we also thought that someone could leave the theater believing that the primary reasons for stuttering are psychological. For example, there is the suggestion that some kind of traumatic event in the king’s childhood coincided with his starting to stutter.
“But research suggests that the reasons and risk factors are complex,” she continues. “It would have been more balanced if the movie also had depicted people who stuttered that had wonderful parents.” Seery adds that an underlying genetic factor is found in a high percentage of cases.
‘Many oars in the water’
Seery was instrumental in a multisite, multiyear research collaboration among several Midwestern universities, evaluating young children as soon as possible after stuttering was first noticed. Comprehensive reassessments continued across several years. The National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders awarded an unprecedented $4 million for the study. Data drawn from the project are now being used to advance understanding of stuttering and guide clinical decisions.
Seery has many “oars in the water” regarding stuttering. At the UWM College of Health Sciences, she conducts research, teaches undergraduate and graduate courses, mentors several research students and serves as graduate program coordinator for the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. For several years, she also supervised the graduate students in the program, who provide services at the UWM Speech Clinic for people who stutter or have other communicative challenges.
“Too often, clinical practice and research are interpreted as mutually exclusive. Throughout Dr. Seery’s work, I see a remarkable combination yielding important contributions to both disciplines,” explains colleague David Shapiro, the Robert Lee Madison Distinguished Professor at Western Carolina University’s Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders. “As a clinician and as a researcher, I am grateful and I personally appreciate her focused, balanced and applied approach. Indeed, Dr. Seery’s work has made a significant impact, both in terms of its content and clarity, on our understanding of communication and its disorders.”
Seery sees advocacy and research partnered in the exploration of how listeners respond to a person who stutters. For example, she is collaborating with James Bashford, a researcher in UWM’s Department of Psychology, to examine whether a momentary pause before a stuttered word alters a listener’s perception of how long the stuttering moment is. She explained: “The preceding pause may affect the listener’s sense of how long the elongated sound seems to be.”
In another study, a graduate student wants to test how to more effectively alter the way stutterers are perceived. “Scholarly literature shows that people who stutter are judged with more negative characteristics – such being extremely shy, anxious, or slower intellectually. We need to explore how to educate people that those who stutter are competent individuals who should be given the opportunity to contribute,” says Seery.
The research aim is to find out whether video clips impact viewer attitudes toward people who stutter. Will views be changed by a video of people who stutter talking about their personal experiences, or by a video of a speaker giving information about stuttering?
Seery’s dedication to people who stutter is apparent in her interactions with a children’s support group. At monthly meetings, the group gives children who stutter a safe environment to talk and play with each other, and offers parents the opportunity to meet separately with Seery.
Although she credits previous students from UWM and Marquette with providing the impetus to launch the NSA-Kids group, Seery’s sensitivity and sense of humor guide the sessions.
Wednesday, April 06, 2011
shit you read...You read this kind of worthless, time consuming shit
http://www.worldjournal.com/view/full_law/12598404/article-%E5%A5%B3%E5%85%92%E7%A7%BB%E6%B0%91%E8%B6%85%E9%BD%A1?instance=law
女兒移民超齡
世界新聞網 北美華文新聞、華商資訊
April 02, 2011 06:00 AM | 2557 觀看次數 | 0 | 2 | |
●新澤西州是800餘萬人的家，也是10餘萬華人追求夢想的棲息地。在構築避風堡壘的過程中，新舊移民都難免遭遇法律等問題，為幫助大家更輕鬆地解決各種疑難雜症，新澤西版開闢法律信箱專欄，邀請專家為讀者解答問題。
來函寄至：World Journal, 41 Bridge St., Building A, Metuchen, NJ 08840，或傳真(732)632-9595 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (732)632-9595
並請註明「法律信箱」。
問：我想諮詢有關移民子女超齡問題，我和女兒於2003年2月18日持K-1、K-2簽證到德州，女兒那時17歲(她生日是1985年2月)。我來美後結婚，並拿到永久綠卡，但我先生在我們來美後要去面試期間，他去台灣探望年邁父母，當他回來時，我和女兒錯過了一些重要面試，之後他又反悔，說不要照顧我和女兒，並且又去了一趟台灣，我和女兒的案件被轉到移民法庭。這時我先生回美，又說想清楚了，要和我好好過日子，就這樣我拿到綠卡，女兒卻超齡了。移民法官當時說要驅逐出境或者自願離境(2005年5月)，我們也不懂法律，請的是公護律師，她說讓我們選擇自願離境。
女兒來美就讀一所公立中學畢業，讀大一(2003至2005年)，現在即將大學畢業，面臨工作、生活、感情等方面的困擾，非常痛苦，請問：
1.像我女兒這樣的案例，應該通過怎樣的途徑，才能取得合法身分？
2.我和女兒來美八年，一直在德州，沒有去過美國其他州 (因女兒沒有駕照，無法乘坐飛機)，請問她沒有SSN和駕照，可否持中國護照搭乘美國國內飛機？
3.請問驅逐出境和自願離境什麼區別？
答:你與女兒於2003年持未婚妻及子女簽證，進入美國，因為當年你的先生心意不決，所以未能在90天內辦理結婚手續。後來，你和你女兒的案件轉入移民法庭，你獲得了綠卡，但你的女兒選擇自動離境。
1.你的女兒1985年2月出生，2005年5月移民法院判決你獲得綠卡，你的女兒當時應該未超過21歲，應可獲得跟隨綠卡。你可嘗試重新開案，請求法官更改判決。
2.中國護照也是身分證明，你女兒應可持中國護照在美乘坐國內飛機。
3.一般被查獲違法入境美國或逾期居留，移民法庭法官通常會給予當事人驅逐出境，或在一定期限內自動離境。
若當事人選擇自動離境，並且符合規定在一定期限內離開，那麼，日後隨時可再申請入境美國。但是，若未能遵守規定，當事人很可能面臨十年內不能再入境的處罰。
4.你女兒的案件，可諮詢律師如何申請豁免。
（本文由林榮傑律師事務所林榮傑律師解答）
Read more: 世界新聞網-北美華文新聞、華商資訊 - 女兒移民超齡
女兒移民超齡
世界新聞網 北美華文新聞、華商資訊
April 02, 2011 06:00 AM | 2557 觀看次數 | 0 | 2 | |
●新澤西州是800餘萬人的家，也是10餘萬華人追求夢想的棲息地。在構築避風堡壘的過程中，新舊移民都難免遭遇法律等問題，為幫助大家更輕鬆地解決各種疑難雜症，新澤西版開闢法律信箱專欄，邀請專家為讀者解答問題。
來函寄至：World Journal, 41 Bridge St., Building A, Metuchen, NJ 08840，或傳真(732)632-9595 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting (732)632-9595
並請註明「法律信箱」。
問：我想諮詢有關移民子女超齡問題，我和女兒於2003年2月18日持K-1、K-2簽證到德州，女兒那時17歲(她生日是1985年2月)。我來美後結婚，並拿到永久綠卡，但我先生在我們來美後要去面試期間，他去台灣探望年邁父母，當他回來時，我和女兒錯過了一些重要面試，之後他又反悔，說不要照顧我和女兒，並且又去了一趟台灣，我和女兒的案件被轉到移民法庭。這時我先生回美，又說想清楚了，要和我好好過日子，就這樣我拿到綠卡，女兒卻超齡了。移民法官當時說要驅逐出境或者自願離境(2005年5月)，我們也不懂法律，請的是公護律師，她說讓我們選擇自願離境。
女兒來美就讀一所公立中學畢業，讀大一(2003至2005年)，現在即將大學畢業，面臨工作、生活、感情等方面的困擾，非常痛苦，請問：
1.像我女兒這樣的案例，應該通過怎樣的途徑，才能取得合法身分？
2.我和女兒來美八年，一直在德州，沒有去過美國其他州 (因女兒沒有駕照，無法乘坐飛機)，請問她沒有SSN和駕照，可否持中國護照搭乘美國國內飛機？
3.請問驅逐出境和自願離境什麼區別？
答:你與女兒於2003年持未婚妻及子女簽證，進入美國，因為當年你的先生心意不決，所以未能在90天內辦理結婚手續。後來，你和你女兒的案件轉入移民法庭，你獲得了綠卡，但你的女兒選擇自動離境。
1.你的女兒1985年2月出生，2005年5月移民法院判決你獲得綠卡，你的女兒當時應該未超過21歲，應可獲得跟隨綠卡。你可嘗試重新開案，請求法官更改判決。
2.中國護照也是身分證明，你女兒應可持中國護照在美乘坐國內飛機。
3.一般被查獲違法入境美國或逾期居留，移民法庭法官通常會給予當事人驅逐出境，或在一定期限內自動離境。
若當事人選擇自動離境，並且符合規定在一定期限內離開，那麼，日後隨時可再申請入境美國。但是，若未能遵守規定，當事人很可能面臨十年內不能再入境的處罰。
4.你女兒的案件，可諮詢律師如何申請豁免。
（本文由林榮傑律師事務所林榮傑律師解答）
Read more: 世界新聞網-北美華文新聞、華商資訊 - 女兒移民超齡
Tuesday, April 05, 2011
Part 4
【協會公告】台灣口吃協會聚會的意義
分類：重要公告
2009/07/25 18:49
台灣口吃協會聚會：
01.關懷口吃者。
02.協助口吃者減輕生活壓力，減緩憂鬱和焦慮。
03.認識口吃，接受口吃。
04.提供口吃資訊，矯正訊息。
05.讓大家有練習說話的機會。
06.交友、聚會、聯誼。
07.擴大生活圈，認識異性，增加結婚機會。
08.互相鼓勵，互相扶持，人生旅途不寂寞。
09.放鬆法練習。
10.呼吸法練習。
11.情境練習。
12.協助矯正，但心態與成功與否看個人。
13.心理建設。
14.協助解決求學、求職、工作所發生的困難。
15.增進就業機會。
16.口吃乃人生喜怒哀樂中之一環，人人皆會發生，人有驚恐也有潛能，都是正常事。
17.體認人非完美的事實。
18.口吃者像我，生活圈較小，像個白痴，藉由協會增加知識和常識。
19.將心比心。
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
【公告】2009年10月22日為國際口吃日
有鑑於當前世界有數千萬成人和兒童患有口吃，每天和口吃鬥爭。
當前全球很多國家和地區，這些口吃患者只能從語言病理專家和口吃自助組織得到很有限的幫助，而在台灣能夠獲得的這樣幫助幾乎是零，台灣口吃協會正在尋求解決與幫助口吃患者的方法。
當前，世界較先進的國家都發展教育性的專題探討以提昇大眾對口吃的認識，和支持口吃者，尤其在一年一度的國際口吃日。
我們配合國際口吃組織，在此宣佈，2009年10月22日為國際口吃日。
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
分類：重要公告
2009/07/25 18:49
台灣口吃協會聚會：
01.關懷口吃者。
02.協助口吃者減輕生活壓力，減緩憂鬱和焦慮。
03.認識口吃，接受口吃。
04.提供口吃資訊，矯正訊息。
05.讓大家有練習說話的機會。
06.交友、聚會、聯誼。
07.擴大生活圈，認識異性，增加結婚機會。
08.互相鼓勵，互相扶持，人生旅途不寂寞。
09.放鬆法練習。
10.呼吸法練習。
11.情境練習。
12.協助矯正，但心態與成功與否看個人。
13.心理建設。
14.協助解決求學、求職、工作所發生的困難。
15.增進就業機會。
16.口吃乃人生喜怒哀樂中之一環，人人皆會發生，人有驚恐也有潛能，都是正常事。
17.體認人非完美的事實。
18.口吃者像我，生活圈較小，像個白痴，藉由協會增加知識和常識。
19.將心比心。
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
【公告】2009年10月22日為國際口吃日
有鑑於當前世界有數千萬成人和兒童患有口吃，每天和口吃鬥爭。
當前全球很多國家和地區，這些口吃患者只能從語言病理專家和口吃自助組織得到很有限的幫助，而在台灣能夠獲得的這樣幫助幾乎是零，台灣口吃協會正在尋求解決與幫助口吃患者的方法。
當前，世界較先進的國家都發展教育性的專題探討以提昇大眾對口吃的認識，和支持口吃者，尤其在一年一度的國際口吃日。
我們配合國際口吃組織，在此宣佈，2009年10月22日為國際口吃日。
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誠實的說出協會困難，撐一天算一天。
台灣口吃協會的成立，非常感謝大家，但是大家真的是想的不夠清楚，事實上我們沒有足夠的能力成立協會，一個協會的成立真的需要經費，沒有經費無法運作，多年來我一直希望有企業贊助，但並沒有企業願意贊助。
本來我可以義務的為大家做，無怨無悔，但我現在失業了，我面臨著非常沈重的家庭壓力，這種壓力大到無法睡覺或是沒地方睡覺，這其中的痛苦，很難說明，而我在沒有收入的沈重壓力下每去辦一件事，多少還是要花到錢，有時間甚至兩天就要加一次油，雖然對別人來說只是小錢，但對我一個失業又有家庭壓力的人，實在不堪負荷，而我們還有那麼多的事要做，要服務那麼多的人，似乎也無能為力。
我的熱誠沒減，甚至我現在對協會的熱衷比四年前剛開始還要積極，但我過了今天，我不知明天我是在那裏？我是否有地方睡覺？我對服務口吃朋友的心，沒有疲累，但我其他方面，生活收入的壓力和煎熬，我無法做下去，如果沒有改善，沒有人做事，協會將會被國稅局或是內政部提出糾正，糾正再沒改善(改善需要有人做)，不但有罰則還要被迫解散，我一次又一次的徵志工和尋求企業贊助，我想盡辦法增加部落格流量‧‧‧都是為了協會能永續經營，可惜認同協會的人太少，願意幫忙的人更少，我如果再沒有工作，勢必要離鄉背井，暫時離開家‧‧‧協會可能就走向解散的命運。
台灣口吃協會的成立，非常感謝大家，但是大家真的是想的不夠清楚，事實上我們沒有足夠的能力成立協會，一個協會的成立真的需要經費，沒有經費無法運作，多年來我一直希望有企業贊助，但並沒有企業願意贊助。
本來我可以義務的為大家做，無怨無悔，但我現在失業了，我面臨著非常沈重的家庭壓力，這種壓力大到無法睡覺或是沒地方睡覺，這其中的痛苦，很難說明，而我在沒有收入的沈重壓力下每去辦一件事，多少還是要花到錢，有時間甚至兩天就要加一次油，雖然對別人來說只是小錢，但對我一個失業又有家庭壓力的人，實在不堪負荷，而我們還有那麼多的事要做，要服務那麼多的人，似乎也無能為力。
我的熱誠沒減，甚至我現在對協會的熱衷比四年前剛開始還要積極，但我過了今天，我不知明天我是在那裏？我是否有地方睡覺？我對服務口吃朋友的心，沒有疲累，但我其他方面，生活收入的壓力和煎熬，我無法做下去，如果沒有改善，沒有人做事，協會將會被國稅局或是內政部提出糾正，糾正再沒改善(改善需要有人做)，不但有罰則還要被迫解散，我一次又一次的徵志工和尋求企業贊助，我想盡辦法增加部落格流量‧‧‧都是為了協會能永續經營，可惜認同協會的人太少，願意幫忙的人更少，我如果再沒有工作，勢必要離鄉背井，暫時離開家‧‧‧協會可能就走向解散的命運。
Part 2
類：協會的困難
2009/11/21 19:55
我們是特殊的一群，我們有社交恐懼，我們不敢參加協會，但是我們辦協會。
我們是特殊的一群，我們有說話障礙，我們不敢參加活動，但是我們辦活動。
我們是特殊的一群，我們沒有聚會場所，但我們還是辦聚會。
我們是特殊的一群，我們有協會地址，我們依然還是有協會。
口吃者必須團結的理由：
口吃者常伴隨著一些問題，焦慮、心悸、憂鬱、社交恐懼，有苦難言。
口吃者給人的感覺，四肢健全、頭腦正常，何必無病呻吟？
即使你說破了嘴，別人聽來也不以為意。
所以口吃者遭遇困難時，別人不認為有困難，只能自救，別人看不到你的焦慮，看不到你的憂鬱。
如果別人看到你的焦慮和憂鬱，也會認為那是你自找的。
所以口吃真正的問題不在口吃，而是它衍生的問題和存在於背後的意義。
能夠救你的，僅有你自己，加上協會的幫忙。
2009/11/21 19:55
我們是特殊的一群，我們有社交恐懼，我們不敢參加協會，但是我們辦協會。
我們是特殊的一群，我們有說話障礙，我們不敢參加活動，但是我們辦活動。
我們是特殊的一群，我們沒有聚會場所，但我們還是辦聚會。
我們是特殊的一群，我們有協會地址，我們依然還是有協會。
口吃者必須團結的理由：
口吃者常伴隨著一些問題，焦慮、心悸、憂鬱、社交恐懼，有苦難言。
口吃者給人的感覺，四肢健全、頭腦正常，何必無病呻吟？
即使你說破了嘴，別人聽來也不以為意。
所以口吃者遭遇困難時，別人不認為有困難，只能自救，別人看不到你的焦慮，看不到你的憂鬱。
如果別人看到你的焦慮和憂鬱，也會認為那是你自找的。
所以口吃真正的問題不在口吃，而是它衍生的問題和存在於背後的意義。
能夠救你的，僅有你自己，加上協會的幫忙。
Part 1
http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/stuttering-help/article?mid=167&prev=184&next=163&l=f&fid=10
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漫步口吃人生路 TW Stuttering Association.
本網站為前「台灣口吃協會」。 「口吃」者到處求救無門，但當發現自助團體的時候，會有一種解救解脫的感覺，可是「口吃」者不敢參加自助團體，根據非正式的統計，他們掙扎、觀察了一年，才鼓起勇氣硬著頭皮去參加。這裏是一個輕鬆的、沒有壓力的地方，讓每一個口吃者都敢來。
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【協會的困難】克難的方式
分類：協會的困難
2009/08/22 12:37
台灣口吃協會籌備期間，我們常常這樣沒地方，沒有固定場所，有時候在門外風吹、雨淋、蚊子咬的，但我們瞭解口吃的痛苦，為了口吃者的前途，我們從來沒有因此而中止，我們用最克難的方式，把口吃協會成立起來。
我們也一直希望有企業可以贊助，給我們一個遮風避雨的練習場所。
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* 大家好！很高興看到在台灣也有口吃(tsao101)
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漫步口吃人生路 TW Stuttering Association.
本網站為前「台灣口吃協會」。 「口吃」者到處求救無門，但當發現自助團體的時候，會有一種解救解脫的感覺，可是「口吃」者不敢參加自助團體，根據非正式的統計，他們掙扎、觀察了一年，才鼓起勇氣硬著頭皮去參加。這裏是一個輕鬆的、沒有壓力的地方，讓每一個口吃者都敢來。
訂閱部落格
關閉
即使人生已走到夕陽，也該創造美麗的夜晚。將心比心，坎坷路上互相扶持。 我要留言
檢舉
【協會的困難】克難的方式
分類：協會的困難
2009/08/22 12:37
台灣口吃協會籌備期間，我們常常這樣沒地方，沒有固定場所，有時候在門外風吹、雨淋、蚊子咬的，但我們瞭解口吃的痛苦，為了口吃者的前途，我們從來沒有因此而中止，我們用最克難的方式，把口吃協會成立起來。
我們也一直希望有企業可以贊助，給我們一個遮風避雨的練習場所。
我要引用
我要回應
Add to My Web 儲存至「書籤」
上一篇 下一篇
刊登贊助網站
一點通學習-最新光碟線上教材
www.edtung.com
全新國中數學理化英語生物基測作文社會等光碟與線上課程，名師親授。
www.edtung.com
聯凱有限公司代理美國張力控制器
www.lynxeye.com.tw
提供排線器、無牙螺桿、電磁式張力控制器、張力量錶、線材整直器、直線軸承等。
www.lynxeye.com.tw
佳業工程 - 組合式隔間
www.goodconn.com
各式隔間、隔音、抗震、防火工程，所有施工材質均通過嚴格檢驗，品質值得信賴。
www.goodconn.com
回應(0)
* 迪士尼很久以前的電影(錄影帶時期)
* itouch4 8G可以升級成32G嗎？？
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◀ 2011 ▶
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* 未分類資料夾 ( 1 )
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* 協會的困難 ( 8 )
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* 活動花絮 ( 8 )
* 鼓勵小語 ( 3 )
* 本協會之口吃論述及文章 ( 18 )
* 台灣口吃協會附加價值 ( 1 )
* 口吃停看聽 ( 7 )
* 溫馨小提醒 ( 1 )
* 協會關心您「口吃以外的事」 ( 4 )
* 口吃療法 ( 2 )
* 口吃小故事 ( 2 )
最新文章
* 【台中口吃聚會第266次例行活動】4/1 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第265次例行活動】3/25 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第265次例行活動】3/25 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第264次例行活動】3/11 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第263次例行活動】3/4 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第262次例行活動】2/25 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第261次例行活動】2/18 星期五 19:00 (不限成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第260次例行活動】2/11 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第259次例行活動】1/28 星期五 19:00 (限舊成員)
* 【台中口吃聚會第258次例行活動】1/21 星期五 19:00 (不限成員)
* 所有文章
最新回應
* 鬆蛋餅： 如果你真的想參加，請你(漫步口吃人生路)
* 您好!!我是個求學中的大學生，多年(鬆餅蛋)
* 已公告改期，結果還是有人到彰化火(漫步口吃人生路)
* 聚會都在台中喔！別的地方目前好像(漫步口吃人生路)
* 曹老師您好，目前我(沙與石)
* 感謝，由於本人很忙，故需安排時間(沙與石)
* 您好, 有幸找到這個網站, 請問小弟(Jim)
* 大家好！很高興看到在台灣也有口吃(tsao101)
* 各位大家好，我是台中縣的口吃朋友(阿信)
* 所謂的將心比心，簡單說就是(portico)
* 更多回應
我的訂閱
目前沒有訂閱部落格
更新日期
2011/03/31 13:18
統計資料
* 今日人數：16
* 累計人數：10127
* 發表文章：162
* 相片數量：53
* 回應數量：26
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Stuttering in Taiwan. Almost zero Help
http://tw.myblog.yahoo.com/stuttering-help/article?mid=344&sc=1#349
Sunday, April 03, 2011
Who is to blame (who is responsible)
"Failure in therapy is never the fault of the therapy or the therapist; It is ALWAYS the fault of the client." (CWS, parent of CWS, or the Adult PWS)
Regards -
The Professional Fluency Nazi, more commonly known as the speech & language therapist.
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Saturday, 2 April 2011 15:41:00 CEST
Anonymous said...
In my experience failure in therapy is the failure of the therapist and the client. Most of time when you go for stuttering therapy you see someone that knows nothing about stuttering. Their knowledge depends largely on where they go, not necessarily the quality of the overall program. If someone goes to a school that has a doctoral program that specializes in stuttering their knowledge will potentially be good. The downside is the many stuttering experts are like frauds Onslow and Packman, and the PhD students in communication disorders (unfortunately even the stuttering students with stuttering problems) where I'm from are low quality in comparison to other programs. These people are also guaranteed a tenure track position because there is such a shortage of stuttering PhDs. At my university, you sometimes see interdisciplinary professors in human development teaching future early childhood teachers that stuttering is caused by uncertainty resulting from parents not allowing children to become confident in what they're saying.
The fact is the people that want to become speech therapists or to train them are the very lowest quality. They don't even try to stay current on research or they can't understand it. It's not that they're hard working and well meaning, but not very smart. Those are the people I have a lot of respect for. It's the ones that want to put in a minimal amount of work so they can get drunk every night. They're the ones that would want to be put in a position where they don't have to learn about how to treat stuttering and fail miserably treating clients. These are also the most common speech therapists and teachers.
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Regards -
The Professional Fluency Nazi, more commonly known as the speech & language therapist.
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
Saturday, 2 April 2011 15:41:00 CEST
Anonymous said...
In my experience failure in therapy is the failure of the therapist and the client. Most of time when you go for stuttering therapy you see someone that knows nothing about stuttering. Their knowledge depends largely on where they go, not necessarily the quality of the overall program. If someone goes to a school that has a doctoral program that specializes in stuttering their knowledge will potentially be good. The downside is the many stuttering experts are like frauds Onslow and Packman, and the PhD students in communication disorders (unfortunately even the stuttering students with stuttering problems) where I'm from are low quality in comparison to other programs. These people are also guaranteed a tenure track position because there is such a shortage of stuttering PhDs. At my university, you sometimes see interdisciplinary professors in human development teaching future early childhood teachers that stuttering is caused by uncertainty resulting from parents not allowing children to become confident in what they're saying.
The fact is the people that want to become speech therapists or to train them are the very lowest quality. They don't even try to stay current on research or they can't understand it. It's not that they're hard working and well meaning, but not very smart. Those are the people I have a lot of respect for. It's the ones that want to put in a minimal amount of work so they can get drunk every night. They're the ones that would want to be put in a position where they don't have to learn about how to treat stuttering and fail miserably treating clients. These are also the most common speech therapists and teachers.
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Saturday, April 02, 2011
Friday, April 01, 2011
Ellen Marie Silverman and story telling. Stories!!!
About the presenter: Ellen-Marie Silverman, Ph.D., CCC-SLP has been a speech-language pathologist for almost 40 years and is an ASHA Fellow. She is trained in transactional analysis. Ellen-Marie has worked in a private school, inpatient and outpatient centers, skilled nursing facilities, and home health. She has addressed her own stuttering through Eastern psychology theory and methods, including meditation. A member of several university faculties, Ellen-Marie has authored or co-authored more than 40 professional publications. She wrote Jason's Secret, a middle reader novel, to address the alienation, isolation, anger, and hurt that can accompany stuttering problems. She is founder and CEO of TSS-The Speech Source, Inc.
You can post Questions/comments about the following paper to the author before October 22, 2004.
USING STORY TO HELP HEAL
by Ellen-Marie Silverman
from Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin
It seems plain and self-evident, yet it needs to be said: the isolated knowledge obtained by a group of specialists in a narrow field has in itself no value whatsoever, but only in its synthesis with all the rest of knowledge and only inasmuch as it really contributes in this synthesis toward answering the demand, 'Who are we?' -- Erwin Schrodinger, 1933 Nobel Prize Winner for Physics
* * * * * *
A tourist noticed three men working on an urban lot where a synagogue was being erected. Approaching one, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I'm a stone mason,' the man answered. 'I cut stone. That is what I do.' Turning to the second, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I'm a brick layer,' the worker replied. 'I lay bricks. That is what I do.' Addressing the remaining worker, sweeping the area with a broom, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I am building a beautiful temple for God and the people,' he answered smiling.
-- Hasidic Tale
INTRODUCTION
Think about what our world would be like without story. No myths, tales, fables, folklore, dreams, anecdotes, history or even gossip to shape us. How different our family, culture, and society would be. How different we would be. It is almost unimaginable, like contemplating the sound of a song that has no melody. Story comprises the fabric of our lives. Knowing that, we can use story to help ourselves change.
STORY
Story helps fashion who we are and who we think we are, what we are and what we may expect to become. Stories told to form our perception of ourselves, the world around us, and our place in that world exist in earliest recorded history. They abound in the Hebrew Scriptures, referred to by some as the Old Testament. These stories of epic creation and destruction, relationship, partnership, civility, obedience, and passion inform and sharpen our perceptions leading to shared values and behavior, as do their counterparts in many other traditions (Campbell, 1988; Fraser, 1923). They function as a staple of rabbinic teaching (e.g., Polsky and Wozner, 1989) including that of Jesus, who taught primarily through parable. By activating multiple sensory channels while recounting common experience, stories serve as teaching tools that indelibly reach not only the mind but the heart. Story tellers, revered throughout history and across cultures as depositories of prized human experience, use these riches to teach and heal (Estés, 1993). Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Jungian analyst and story teller in the Latina tradition, elaborates (1993, pp 4-5):
. . . many of the most powerful medicines, that is stories, come about as a result of one person's or a group's terrible and compelling suffering. For the truth is that much of story comes from travail; theirs, ours, mine, yours, someone's we know, someone's we do not know far away in time and place. And, yet, paradoxically, these very stories that rise from deep suffering can provide the most potent remedies for past, present, and even future ills.
So, too, fictional stories can heal. Written to expose layers of the human soul and the world political by keen observers of humanity, such as Aesop, Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen, Franz Kafka,Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez, C. S. Lewis, Lois Lowry, J.K. Rowling, and Maurice Sendak, they guide us to our place and contribution in the world.
Children with stuttering problems experience stories as guides to self awareness and sources of inspiration as all children do as they open to their messages. I remember still sitting on my grandfather's lap when I was four asking him to repeat a particular folk tale that only he told me. I did not quite understand the main character, the circumstances of his life, or the essential meaning of the tale, but the story riveted me. Thinking the way a child does, I thought hearing it again would make its meaning clear to me, so I asked my grandfather to repeat it. He did over and over until I no longer asked to hear it, not because I understood it but because I didn't. Many years later facing a critical personal challenge as a middle-aged person, I spontaneously recalled that story and discovered the valuable meaning it held for me. Biographies saved my life. When I was eight, I discovered a series of stories in our school library about famous people when they were children. As I digested one after another, I came to believe that, like the main characters, I, too, could survive and even succeed, if, like them, I was good; lived what I believed no matter what; and worked hard and well as long as necessary.
Stories about others are not the only ones to influence our thinking and behavior. By the time we are three, we are scripting, casting, and acting out our own life stories. Shakespeare penned in As You Like It: "All the world is a stage, and all the people are the actors." Loretta LaRoche (1995), stress management consultant and humor therapist, admonishes us to sharpen our self-perception by acknowledging the scripted nature of our lives. She asks quite seriously: "Do you get it yet? You are the director of your own movie."
Many prominent therapists believe living a scripted life in unawareness leads to cumulative personal dissatisfaction. For example, psychiatrist and founder of Transactional Analysis, Eric Berne (1977), helped people heal themselves by showing how to identify limiting, essentially subconscious, scripted behaviors and replace them with purposeful, skilled actions. Psychologist Daniel Goleman (1985), author of Emotional Intelligence (Goleman, 1995), advises us to examine the stories we tell about ourselves and the world to flush out the lies that foster delusion and court unhappiness. The discipline of journaling, for example the private Intensive Journal Program ® developed by Ira Progoff, www.intensivejournal.org, and the public sharing of thought and experience known as blogging, identifies certainties that limit our perception of reality, especially our own potential.
Spiritual teachers in Buddhist, Native American, and Judaic traditions also believe in the necessity of living a mindful existence to heal. The teachings of the Dalai Lama, e.g., (2001) and zen master Thich Nhat Hanh (2000) detail methods for increasing personal awareness. Caroline Myss (1997), medical intuitive, reports an anecdote identifying one Native American approach to healing. According to Dr. Myss, a Navajo World War II veteran heeded the recommendations of his tribal council to "...reclaim his spirit..." through the recollection and then release of his experience as a POW in Nazi Germany. As a result of his modified perception and relationship to that aspect of his past, he regained the use of his wounded and wasted legs. Kabbalists, i.e., Jewish mystics, believe our individual stories highlight teachings of the Torah (Gafni, 2004 ). They call on us to claim and share our stories as the gifts each of us brings into this world.
Citizens of the United States have been writing personal and family stories at an unprecedented volume during the past decade or so. Ostensibly to give as gifts of labor to dear ones, telling personal stories helps complete our life's journey, for many of us sense a life unshared is a life not fully lived.
USING STORY AS AN ADJUNCT TO TREATMENT
Bibliotherapy and narrative speech pathology can help heal. Because this conference focuses on the needs of children and adolescents, I will comment on the application of each to their needs and imagine you will be able to see possibilities they hold for adults.
Bibliotherapy
Bibliotherapy, first used in the United States with hospitalized World War I veterans, was applied to children for the first time in 1946, but only indirectly. Experts provided parents guides to help them select books to underscore desired societal values (Agnes, 1946). As children's literature changed from pedantic moralizing to presenting the world through a child's eyes and from idealizing painless circumstances to portraying challenging life situations, such as death, Alzheimer's Disease, AIDS, disabilities, divorce, and gay parents, bibliotherapy with children and adolescents shifted to child-centered experiential learning with the revised goal of helping children overcome their problems. Not unexpectedly, given the relatively low incidence of stuttering and presumed low readership demand, few published stories depict a child wrestling with the various dimensions of a real-life stuttering problem. That is precisely why I wrote Jason's Secret (Silverman, 2001), a middle reader novel where a 10 year-old deals with his feelings about stuttering, communicating, and speech therapy, without a saccharine ending, and am preparing an accompanying user's manual (Silverman, in preparation, 2004). Two other books also have bibliotherapeutic application: Ben Has Something to Say (Lears, 2000), a picture story book depicting a boy momentarily overcoming his fear of stuttering through concern for a dog, and Sometimes I Just Stutter (de Geus, 1999) containing several anecdotes from children and teens who stutter and one fairy tale about stuttering. These three are not the only books showcasing children with stuttering problems (www.stutteringhomepage.com), but, in my opinion, they are best suited to bibliotherapy.
What makes bibliotherapy effective is:
1) Reading about other children approximately the same chronological age who have faced problems they face helps readers better manage feelings of isolation and
2) Considering a characters' thoughts, feelings, and emotions helps:
* Identify and express feelings
* Develop awareness that problems can be solved, including their own
* Enhance problem-solving skills
* Amplify social skills
With the current interest in reality programming on television, children and teens may find comparing their lives to that of book characters more compelling than ever.
Bibliotherapy can be conducted with an individual or in a group. While many respond well, some do not. Those unable to: 1) See themselves and their lives reflected through book characters, 2) Face their problems, and/or 3) Readily transfer new insights into daily life require other interventions to help them develop a realistic, helpful perception of the process of change.
Narrative Speech Pathology
In narrative speech pathology, a term I coined after learning of narrative medicine, the fast-growing medical practice where story trumps questionnaire in diagnosis and treatment (Thernstrom, 2004), the process is consumer-centered. The narrative specialist, possessing "... competence to recognize, absorb, interpret and be moved by the stories of illness..."(Thernstrom, 2004, p. 44) encourages clients to share their histories uninterrupted while practicing analytical listening to both the content and form of the narrative, e.g., its temporal course, images, associated subplots, silences, where the tellers first begin telling of themselves, how they sequence symptoms with their other life events. Practioners write their stories of patient care using a process called Parallel Charts. They analyze the structural elements of their writing using narratology, a formalist literary theory applied to story, which focuses on structure, i.e., elements of contingency, intersubjectivity (relationship of writer to subject and reader), genre, and diction. Some practioners encourage patients to write pathographies written as part of a three-part chart where patients and physicians write about themselves and their sense of the treatment process and respond to each other's accounting. Applying the process to children can involve drawing, painting, singing, musical instruments, and dance as well as writing.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
To the extent we live our individual stories and prepare children and teens to do the same, we encourage the orderly growth of ourselves and each other.
REFERENCES
Written Material
Agnes, S. (1946). Bibliotherapy for Socially Maladjusted Children. Catholic Educational Review, 44, pp. 8-16.
Berne, E. (1977). Intuition and Ego States. New York: Harper & Row. Campbell, J. (1988). The Power of Myth. New York: Broadway Books.
Dalai Lama (2001). An Open Heart. New York: Little, Brown and Company.
de Geus, E. (1999). Sometimes I Just Stutter. Memphis: The Stuttering Foundation of America.
Estés, (1993). The Gift of Story. New York: Ballantine Books.
Fraser, J. (1923). Folklore in the Old Testament. New York: Macmillan.
Goleman, D. (1985). Vital Lies, Simple Truths. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Goleman, D. (1995). Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam Books.
Hanh, T. N. (2000). The Wisdom of Thich Nhat Hanh. Pennsylvania: Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc.
Lears, L. (2000). Ben Has Something to Say: A Story About Stuttering. Albert Whitman and Company.
Polsky, H. And Wozner, Y. (1989). Everyday Miracles. The Healing Wisdom of Hasidic Stories. New Jersey: Jason Aronson, Inc.
Silverman, E.-M. (2001). Jason's Secret. Bloomington, Indiana: 1st Books.
Silverman, E.-M. (2004). Jason's Secret: A User's Guide. In preparation.
Thernstrom, M. (2004). The Writing Cure. Can Understanding Narrative
Make You a Better Doctor? New York Times Magazine, April 18.
CD's
Gafni, M. (2004). The Soul Prints Workshop: Wisdom Teachings from the Kabbalah Illuminating Your Unique Life Purpose. Boulder: Sounds True.
VIDEO's
LaRoche, L. (1995). The Joy of STRESS. Boston: WGBH.
Myss, C. (1997). Why People Don't Heal and How They Can. PBS.
You can post Questions/comments about the above paper to Ellen-Marie Silverman before October 22, 2004.
June 28, 2004
Return to the opening page of the conference
You can post Questions/comments about the following paper to the author before October 22, 2004.
USING STORY TO HELP HEAL
by Ellen-Marie Silverman
from Whitefish Bay, Wisconsin
It seems plain and self-evident, yet it needs to be said: the isolated knowledge obtained by a group of specialists in a narrow field has in itself no value whatsoever, but only in its synthesis with all the rest of knowledge and only inasmuch as it really contributes in this synthesis toward answering the demand, 'Who are we?' -- Erwin Schrodinger, 1933 Nobel Prize Winner for Physics
* * * * * *
A tourist noticed three men working on an urban lot where a synagogue was being erected. Approaching one, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I'm a stone mason,' the man answered. 'I cut stone. That is what I do.' Turning to the second, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I'm a brick layer,' the worker replied. 'I lay bricks. That is what I do.' Addressing the remaining worker, sweeping the area with a broom, she asked, 'What are you doing?' 'I am building a beautiful temple for God and the people,' he answered smiling.
-- Hasidic Tale
INTRODUCTION
Think about what our world would be like without story. No myths, tales, fables, folklore, dreams, anecdotes, history or even gossip to shape us. How different our family, culture, and society would be. How different we would be. It is almost unimaginable, like contemplating the sound of a song that has no melody. Story comprises the fabric of our lives. Knowing that, we can use story to help ourselves change.
STORY
Story helps fashion who we are and who we think we are, what we are and what we may expect to become. Stories told to form our perception of ourselves, the world around us, and our place in that world exist in earliest recorded history. They abound in the Hebrew Scriptures, referred to by some as the Old Testament. These stories of epic creation and destruction, relationship, partnership, civility, obedience, and passion inform and sharpen our perceptions leading to shared values and behavior, as do their counterparts in many other traditions (Campbell, 1988; Fraser, 1923). They function as a staple of rabbinic teaching (e.g., Polsky and Wozner, 1989) including that of Jesus, who taught primarily through parable. By activating multiple sensory channels while recounting common experience, stories serve as teaching tools that indelibly reach not only the mind but the heart. Story tellers, revered throughout history and across cultures as depositories of prized human experience, use these riches to teach and heal (Estés, 1993). Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Jungian analyst and story teller in the Latina tradition, elaborates (1993, pp 4-5):
. . . many of the most powerful medicines, that is stories, come about as a result of one person's or a group's terrible and compelling suffering. For the truth is that much of story comes from travail; theirs, ours, mine, yours, someone's we know, someone's we do not know far away in time and place. And, yet, paradoxically, these very stories that rise from deep suffering can provide the most potent remedies for past, present, and even future ills.
So, too, fictional stories can heal. Written to expose layers of the human soul and the world political by keen observers of humanity, such as Aesop, Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen, Franz Kafka,Toni Morrison, Gabriel García Márquez, C. S. Lewis, Lois Lowry, J.K. Rowling, and Maurice Sendak, they guide us to our place and contribution in the world.
Children with stuttering problems experience stories as guides to self awareness and sources of inspiration as all children do as they open to their messages. I remember still sitting on my grandfather's lap when I was four asking him to repeat a particular folk tale that only he told me. I did not quite understand the main character, the circumstances of his life, or the essential meaning of the tale, but the story riveted me. Thinking the way a child does, I thought hearing it again would make its meaning clear to me, so I asked my grandfather to repeat it. He did over and over until I no longer asked to hear it, not because I understood it but because I didn't. Many years later facing a critical personal challenge as a middle-aged person, I spontaneously recalled that story and discovered the valuable meaning it held for me. Biographies saved my life. When I was eight, I discovered a series of stories in our school library about famous people when they were children. As I digested one after another, I came to believe that, like the main characters, I, too, could survive and even succeed, if, like them, I was good; lived what I believed no matter what; and worked hard and well as long as necessary.
Stories about others are not the only ones to influence our thinking and behavior. By the time we are three, we are scripting, casting, and acting out our own life stories. Shakespeare penned in As You Like It: "All the world is a stage, and all the people are the actors." Loretta LaRoche (1995), stress management consultant and humor therapist, admonishes us to sharpen our self-perception by acknowledging the scripted nature of our lives. She asks quite seriously: "Do you get it yet? You are the director of your own movie."
Many prominent therapists believe living a scripted life in unawareness leads to cumulative personal dissatisfaction. For example, psychiatrist and founder of Transactional Analysis, Eric Berne (1977), helped people heal themselves by showing how to identify limiting, essentially subconscious, scripted behaviors and replace them with purposeful, skilled actions. Psychologist Daniel Goleman (1985), author of Emotional Intelligence (Goleman, 1995), advises us to examine the stories we tell about ourselves and the world to flush out the lies that foster delusion and court unhappiness. The discipline of journaling, for example the private Intensive Journal Program ® developed by Ira Progoff, www.intensivejournal.org, and the public sharing of thought and experience known as blogging, identifies certainties that limit our perception of reality, especially our own potential.
Spiritual teachers in Buddhist, Native American, and Judaic traditions also believe in the necessity of living a mindful existence to heal. The teachings of the Dalai Lama, e.g., (2001) and zen master Thich Nhat Hanh (2000) detail methods for increasing personal awareness. Caroline Myss (1997), medical intuitive, reports an anecdote identifying one Native American approach to healing. According to Dr. Myss, a Navajo World War II veteran heeded the recommendations of his tribal council to "...reclaim his spirit..." through the recollection and then release of his experience as a POW in Nazi Germany. As a result of his modified perception and relationship to that aspect of his past, he regained the use of his wounded and wasted legs. Kabbalists, i.e., Jewish mystics, believe our individual stories highlight teachings of the Torah (Gafni, 2004 ). They call on us to claim and share our stories as the gifts each of us brings into this world.
Citizens of the United States have been writing personal and family stories at an unprecedented volume during the past decade or so. Ostensibly to give as gifts of labor to dear ones, telling personal stories helps complete our life's journey, for many of us sense a life unshared is a life not fully lived.
USING STORY AS AN ADJUNCT TO TREATMENT
Bibliotherapy and narrative speech pathology can help heal. Because this conference focuses on the needs of children and adolescents, I will comment on the application of each to their needs and imagine you will be able to see possibilities they hold for adults.
Bibliotherapy
Bibliotherapy, first used in the United States with hospitalized World War I veterans, was applied to children for the first time in 1946, but only indirectly. Experts provided parents guides to help them select books to underscore desired societal values (Agnes, 1946). As children's literature changed from pedantic moralizing to presenting the world through a child's eyes and from idealizing painless circumstances to portraying challenging life situations, such as death, Alzheimer's Disease, AIDS, disabilities, divorce, and gay parents, bibliotherapy with children and adolescents shifted to child-centered experiential learning with the revised goal of helping children overcome their problems. Not unexpectedly, given the relatively low incidence of stuttering and presumed low readership demand, few published stories depict a child wrestling with the various dimensions of a real-life stuttering problem. That is precisely why I wrote Jason's Secret (Silverman, 2001), a middle reader novel where a 10 year-old deals with his feelings about stuttering, communicating, and speech therapy, without a saccharine ending, and am preparing an accompanying user's manual (Silverman, in preparation, 2004). Two other books also have bibliotherapeutic application: Ben Has Something to Say (Lears, 2000), a picture story book depicting a boy momentarily overcoming his fear of stuttering through concern for a dog, and Sometimes I Just Stutter (de Geus, 1999) containing several anecdotes from children and teens who stutter and one fairy tale about stuttering. These three are not the only books showcasing children with stuttering problems (www.stutteringhomepage.com), but, in my opinion, they are best suited to bibliotherapy.
What makes bibliotherapy effective is:
1) Reading about other children approximately the same chronological age who have faced problems they face helps readers better manage feelings of isolation and
2) Considering a characters' thoughts, feelings, and emotions helps:
* Identify and express feelings
* Develop awareness that problems can be solved, including their own
* Enhance problem-solving skills
* Amplify social skills
With the current interest in reality programming on television, children and teens may find comparing their lives to that of book characters more compelling than ever.
Bibliotherapy can be conducted with an individual or in a group. While many respond well, some do not. Those unable to: 1) See themselves and their lives reflected through book characters, 2) Face their problems, and/or 3) Readily transfer new insights into daily life require other interventions to help them develop a realistic, helpful perception of the process of change.
Narrative Speech Pathology
In narrative speech pathology, a term I coined after learning of narrative medicine, the fast-growing medical practice where story trumps questionnaire in diagnosis and treatment (Thernstrom, 2004), the process is consumer-centered. The narrative specialist, possessing "... competence to recognize, absorb, interpret and be moved by the stories of illness..."(Thernstrom, 2004, p. 44) encourages clients to share their histories uninterrupted while practicing analytical listening to both the content and form of the narrative, e.g., its temporal course, images, associated subplots, silences, where the tellers first begin telling of themselves, how they sequence symptoms with their other life events. Practioners write their stories of patient care using a process called Parallel Charts. They analyze the structural elements of their writing using narratology, a formalist literary theory applied to story, which focuses on structure, i.e., elements of contingency, intersubjectivity (relationship of writer to subject and reader), genre, and diction. Some practioners encourage patients to write pathographies written as part of a three-part chart where patients and physicians write about themselves and their sense of the treatment process and respond to each other's accounting. Applying the process to children can involve drawing, painting, singing, musical instruments, and dance as well as writing.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
To the extent we live our individual stories and prepare children and teens to do the same, we encourage the orderly growth of ourselves and each other.
REFERENCES
Written Material
Agnes, S. (1946). Bibliotherapy for Socially Maladjusted Children. Catholic Educational Review, 44, pp. 8-16.
Berne, E. (1977). Intuition and Ego States. New York: Harper & Row. Campbell, J. (1988). The Power of Myth. New York: Broadway Books.
Dalai Lama (2001). An Open Heart. New York: Little, Brown and Company.
de Geus, E. (1999). Sometimes I Just Stutter. Memphis: The Stuttering Foundation of America.
Estés, (1993). The Gift of Story. New York: Ballantine Books.
Fraser, J. (1923). Folklore in the Old Testament. New York: Macmillan.
Goleman, D. (1985). Vital Lies, Simple Truths. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Goleman, D. (1995). Emotional Intelligence. New York: Bantam Books.
Hanh, T. N. (2000). The Wisdom of Thich Nhat Hanh. Pennsylvania: Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc.
Lears, L. (2000). Ben Has Something to Say: A Story About Stuttering. Albert Whitman and Company.
Polsky, H. And Wozner, Y. (1989). Everyday Miracles. The Healing Wisdom of Hasidic Stories. New Jersey: Jason Aronson, Inc.
Silverman, E.-M. (2001). Jason's Secret. Bloomington, Indiana: 1st Books.
Silverman, E.-M. (2004). Jason's Secret: A User's Guide. In preparation.
Thernstrom, M. (2004). The Writing Cure. Can Understanding Narrative
Make You a Better Doctor? New York Times Magazine, April 18.
CD's
Gafni, M. (2004). The Soul Prints Workshop: Wisdom Teachings from the Kabbalah Illuminating Your Unique Life Purpose. Boulder: Sounds True.
VIDEO's
LaRoche, L. (1995). The Joy of STRESS. Boston: WGBH.
Myss, C. (1997). Why People Don't Heal and How They Can. PBS.
You can post Questions/comments about the above paper to Ellen-Marie Silverman before October 22, 2004.
June 28, 2004
Return to the opening page of the conference
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Richard Shine. (I thought it was very good)
How Parents and Professionals Can Help the Stuttering Child
by Richard Shine
The following article first appeared in North Carolina Medical Journal for Doctors and Their Patients, The Official Journal of the North Carolina Medical Society, December 1983, Volume 44, No. 12
What Is Stuttering?
The best way to understand stuttering is to first know what it is not. Stuttering is not a learned behavior, a nervous condition, a psychological problem, an emotional problem, nor is it a problem caused by parental pressures and environmental stress. Stuttering is not caused by the reaction of parents to a child's nonstuttering dysfluencies such as pauses or hesitations within a sentence or before beginning to talk; interjections such as "uh," "um," "like uh," "you know," etc.; revisions of words like, "I rode the hor- pony"; phrase repetitions, "we had a . pause . - . We had a good time"; or incomplete phrases, "Yesterday we took the - pause . . . Yesterday we went to the fair."
There has never been any research or clinical evidence to support the historical belief that stuttering is a problem caused by psychoses, neuroses, or nervousness, but there are children who exhibit these problems and who also stutter. These other problems do not cause the stuttering but they can complicate the steps to alleviate the stuttering.
There has never been one shred of evidence to support the assumption and long-accepted theory that parents cause stuttering by pressuring the child to talk correctly, by labeling stuttering (erroneously referred to by experts as "normal nonfluency"), or by reacting to a child's way of speaking before he becomes fluent in the language. In fact, the literature reveals that directing the child to change the way he talks (slow down, take it easy, stop and try again) helps him overcame the stuttering.
Stuttering is the whole-word repetition (I-I-I, he-he-he), part-word repetition (pu-pu-part, wu-wu-went), prolongation (SSSSSSunday, wwwwwwwe), and struggle behavior (any, stuttering that is. primarily characterized by tension, i.e., increased loudness and/or pitch of the voice, facial grimaces, head jerking, associated body gestures, etc.) exhibited by an individual when talking. The order in which the four types of stuttering are listed above represents a general hierarchy of severity from mild to severe and the frequency of each type helps determine the need for direct professional fluency training. For instance, if the primary type of stuttering is whole-word repetitions, generally the problem will be rated as mild and may be overcome by parental intervention. If the primary types include part-word repetitions and prolongations, the general severity rating will be moderate and the need for direct fluency training will depend to a great degree on the frequency of stuttering and the concerns of the parents and the child about the problem. If struggle behaviors are predominant, the problem will be rated as severe and immediate direct fluency training will almost always be recommended.
Stuttering is a coordinative disorder involving the child's lack of ability to coordinate the muscles used in speaking; that is, the muscles of respiration (the speech breathing system), phonation (the larynx/voice box), and articulation (the tongue, lips, jaw. palate). The stuttering child's lack of coordination can be likened to that of the child who is clumsy in running, throwing or other motor activities except that the child who stutters is clumsy in controlling the muscles of the speaking mechanism.
It's not surprising that the child with coordination problems of the speaking mechanism cannot maintain conversational rates of speaking without a breakdown (stuttering) if we realize that during conversation we produce approximately 170 words per minute, with each word containing an average of about 3 or 4 sounds, or 10 sounds per second. To help understand rate-of-speaking, time yourself for 30 seconds while saying out loud "one thousand one," a phrase containing 11 sounds that is typically used to count seconds. If a child becomes excited and attempts to speak more rapidly as well as use the muscular system more vigorously, it is highly probable that the breakdowns (stuttering) will become more frequent.
Stuttering is a universal problem; that is, it exists in all cultures and all languages of the world, and no matter what language the child (age 2 to about 9 years) speaks -- English, Spanish, German, or Dutch -- the following identical "types" of stuttering behaviors will be exhibited: whole-word repetitions, part-word repetitions, prolongations, and struggle behaviors. Of course the frequency of each type and the nature of the struggle behaviors will differ from child to child and from time to time
Stuttering is a problem of childhood which is significantly greater in males than females (the ratio is approximately 3 to 1 with findings as high as 8 to 1) Almost all stuttering begins between the ages of 2 and 9 years with the majority beginning between 3 and 5 years of age. Some children do overcome their stuttering as a result of maturation, but most of the 40 to 50% reported to recover from childhood stuttering do so as a result of parents' and others' suggestions for the child to change the way he talks (Slow down take it easy, stop and try again. . . .)
Parents Are Valid Judges of Stuttering
In my 16 years of experience in working with young children who stutter, I have found that parents rarely if ever misdiagnose stuttering and they validly estimate its rate and severity. If parents report that their child is stuttering and that it is severe enough to cause communication problems, we can be assured that they are correct and that careful consideration and appropriate advice needs to be provided. The professional is guessing when he dismisses the parents' concern by explaining that it is merely a stage the child is going through (data indicate he will be correct by chance about 40 to 50% of the time).
What To Do When Your Child Begins Stuttering
Do not read the sections on stuttering in current baby books or child development texts and do be extremeiy critical of articles in popular magazines, newspapers, and particularly tabloids. Critically evaluate anything written by speech clinicians prior to the 1980's and much of what is still being written.
Do have confidence in your own evaluation of whether your child has a stuttering problem and do not hesitate to seek assistance, but be aware that inappropriate or incorrect advice may be given by speech clinicians, psychologists, physicians, and other professionals who have not kept up with recent developments.
What You Should Know about Professional Advice
Traditionally, advice to parents has been both inappropriate and incorrect. Inappropriate advice includes suggestions that would be beneficial in raising any child (i.e., providing opportunities for enjoyable and rewarding speaking experiences; developing and maintaining the health of the child including diet, exercise, rest, and sleep; developing other interests, hobbies, and abilities; etc.) but are not specific to the needs of the stuttering child. Advice may involve an attempt to deceive the child by telling him, "It's all right because everybody has troubie talking and it'll be okay." If the child had a cut finger we wouldn't say, "It's all right, everybody cuts his finger and it'll be okay"; rather, we would help by bandaging the finger or seeking medical attention and giving advice to the child an how to avoid future cut fingers.
A source of incorrect advice has been the assumption that stuttering is to be expected or is common in young children and that it is merely a stage of normal development that most children go through. This is not true! It is estimated that less than 20% of all children ever stutter, but most children, including those who do stutter, do exhibit nonstuttering disfluencies. Stuttering disfluencies, being different from nonsluttering disfluencies, are easily identified by parents and other lay persons but, because of bias, are often misdiagnosed as normal developmental disfluencies by professionals. If it were merely a stage of normal development that children go through, there would not be an estimated 2 million Americans who never overcome the "normal" stage and thus continue to stutter.
Other incorrect advice includes suggestions to refrain from doing anything that might cause the child to become aware of the problem and thus begin to fear or avoid talking. Again, my experience has been that children, even the 3-year old, know when they talk different from their peers. Unfortunately when the problem is not handled directly by the parents, the child may begin to think that the problem is so bad even the parents won't talk about it. The parents are mistakenly advised to listen quietly to what their child has to say and to wait patiently even if the child is struggling severely to say a word. The parents are told never to help the child by filling in words he is struggling to say even though experience reveals that saying the word for the child enables him to simply repeat the word and to continue with what was being said without repeating the word. We now know that we should not let the child continue to struggle but should eliminate the struggling by providing the word. Finally, it is incorrect to imply or to blatantly state that parents cause stuttering or that the environment causes the problem.
Examples of inappropriate/incorrect advice, regardless of the professional who offers the advice, include: "Don't worry about it, Mom, it's just a stage that most kids go through"; "It's just normal nonfluency and you really need to be careful not to call attention to it or to cause your child concern by reacting or by trying to help him correct the problem"; "Just ignore the stuttering and try to find out what things in the child's environment cause it, particularly what things you (Mom and/or Dad) are doing"; "It's an emotional or psychological problem because he has a lot of trouble only when he's excited."
Why Does My Child Stutter?
In the past (the early t960s) we used to think that children stuttered primarily because someone, usually a mother, was putting pressure on the child to talk correctly or she was correcting or calling attention to the child's normal developmental non stuttering disfluencies. Since then we have discovered that parents do not cause stuttering (parents cause children).
A child stutters because he/she is different: different like the child who has a reading problem or a math problem or the child who has to wear glasses. If your child had a reading or math problem or needed glasses, would you feel that you did something to cause the problem? No, the reason for the problem is that the child is different; that is, the child has a weakness which, however, could be a hereditary problem.
The reason your child stutters is because he has a coordination problem. In a way it is like the kid who is clumsy and cannnot control or coordinate his muscles to run well or throw well - except that your child is clumsy in controlling the muscles used for talking. Our task is to teach the child to talk in a different way to compensate for the discoordination and to speak in a normally fluent manner. Once the child establishes fluency his speech will not be identifiably different from that of his peers and in later life he will probably not remember his stuttering.
What You Can Do to Help
The best advice is to do what works as long as it is reasonable. The child should never.be punished for stuttering. Parents, particularly mothers, have an intuitive sense about how to help their child overcome problems including stuttering, and thus it can be beneficial to know what things you have done that help your child and continue those that improve fluency. If the suggestions upset your child or do not seem to help, explore other possibilities of parental intervention.
Specific advice includes having the parents talk more slowly and quietly to their child. We suggest that they talk openly about the problem and/or about the way the child talks; they can "talk about talking," about easy talking, quiet talking, slow talking, or whatever they feel might be beneficial. If the child is having a particularly bad day, they can engage him in activities requiring little talking or short, simple responses. The parent should not be afraid to experiment and should try all kinds of things, using those which are most effective and informing the speech clinician about all successes and failures.
The parents are not given a list of do's and don'ts but are trained to identify their child's stuttered words and develop procedures that are effective do's and don'ts unique to their child's environment. Determining appropriate management procedures for stuttering is much like determining disciplinary procedures for your child; if one thing doesn't work we try something else. Generally it is apparent or quickly becomes apparent that what works for one child in a family does not work with the other child or children. And, of course, with some children nothing really seems to be effective and we may need to seek assistance. We should realize that our effectiveness may depend an awful lot on the general makeup or personality of the child.
One Word of Caution
As with anything we do, we shouldn't overdo it. If something is said to the child every time he opens his mouth, it may become upsetting and not be beneficial - even though it won't be harmful or cause the stuttering to worsen. It will do no good to stop the child, particularly while he is speaking fluently, and ask him to repeat a word on which he stuttered. Primarily we should follow the rule of giving suggestions only when the child is having obvious difficulty communicating because of the frequency and particularly the severity of the stuttering. Same parents have developed effective hand signals or gestures to remind the child when he begins talking too fast, too loud, too hard, or in a way that results in discoordination and stuttering.
When to Refer: Guidelines for Parents and Professionals
The best guideline for the professional to follow is to listen to the concerns of the mother. If the mother states that the child is stuttering and it's a problem for either the child or the parent, do not hesitate to refer them to a speech clinician. It's rare that parents cannot easily distinguish between normal developmental non stuttering disfluencies and stuttering disfluencies or determine whether the rate and severity of stuttering is causing communication problems.
An important point to remember is that young children tend to be cautious about what they say and how they say it, using short telegraphic phrases or even a different manner of speaking and thus can often speak fluently during an interview or while answering questions in the office of any professional. Always ask the parent if the stuttering or manner of speaking heard during the interview is characteristic of what the child typically does. Remember that children tend to stutter most when they are happily excited or when they are relaxed and engaging in a meaningful conversation with someone they enjoy being with and talking to, usually a mother. The need for referral can also be determined by answering and evaluating the results of the following five questions:
1. How old is the child? Many children begin stuttering with the onset of speaking, while others begin around 2 1/2 to 3 years or at about the time they begin using two-and three word phrases, with the majority beginning by 5 years of age. The preschool and young schoolage child up to about 9 or 10 years of age finds it generally easier to change speaking patterns and overcome stuttering than do older children and adults. Fluency training is most successful when initiated near the time when stuttering first begins and thus early referral is necessary.
2. How long has the child been stuttering? If the child has been stuttering for six months or longer, immediate referral to a speech clinician is advised. Many children (somewhere between 40 and 50%) do overcome their stuttering due to parental intervention, development of language skills and/or maturation (neurologic development leading to improved motor skills), but the majority do not and thus early intervention and fluency training are necessary.
3. Is the severity of stuttering increasing? The severity of stuttering may be expected to increase gradually as the child's language develops and the demands of increased length and complexity of expression require greater coordination of the speaking mechanism, but we frequently get reports that the stuttering began overnight or developed to its greatest severity within a week or two and then remained rather stable except for episodic periods of fluency (which are to be expected even with the most severe child). In general, the more frequently the periods of fluency occur, and the greater their length, the better is the prognosis that the child will overcome the stuttering; however, if an extanded period (6 months or so) of increasing severity is reported, professional help is necessary.
4. What type of stuttering is the child exhibiting? If the child exhibits primarily prolongations and/or struggle behaviors, immediate referral is necessary. If the types of stuttering are whole-word and part-word repetitions the mother should observe the stuttering for 3 to 6 months to see if the problem remains stable or decreases in severity. If stuttering persists, even though mild to moderate, it is advisable to refer the child before he/she enters school. As a result of Public Law 94-142, public school speech clinicians can provide services for preschool children and definitely should not delay fluency training with kindergarten children.
5. Is there a history of stuttering the family? If the father or mother or close relative stutters and the child has a moderate to severe stuttering problem, the need for referral and fluency training is seldom questioned. Contemporory literature indicates that there is a genetic basis for stuttering; however, a family history of stuttering is not conclusive evidence that it was inherited.
What Can I Expect from Professional Fluency Training?
At the East Carolina University Speech and Hearing Clinic we have been engaged in direct fluency training with the beginning stutterer (ages 2 to 10 years) since 1974. A followup study of the first 18 children enroIled in the program (1974 through 1979) revealed that all 18 established normally fluent speaking patterns and all but one maintained fluency. The one child who regressed was severe when enrolled and was found to have a mild to moderate problem when re-evaluated four years later. His current prognosis for re-establishing fluency is good. During the past four years we have worked with approximately 30 more young stuttering children, four of whom had difficulty establishing or maintaining fluency. Prognosis for only one of the four is poor because of the severity of his involvement and his resultant inabilitv to change his speaking patterns. The average time it takes a child to establish fluency has been sixty 40-to 50-minute sessions spread over a 9-month period. Two children established fluency in less than 20 sessions and it took almost 135 for two others and almost 200 sessions for one child.
Summer Residential Program for the Beginning Stutterer and Parents (note - this summer program ceased operation in 1989 due to cuts in funding - JAK)
A 3-week (June 25 through July 13) intensive fluency training program for 15 stuttering children (ages 3 to 10 years) and their parents is being planned at East Carolina University for the summer of 1984. The program will include 3 hours of fluency training per day, one hour of music therapy, and one hour of adaptive motor training. Parents will participate in a parent training/counseling program designed to help them understand stuttering and help them work directly with their own child. For additional information, write to the author at Speech and Language Department, East Carolina University, Greenville 27834.
Referral Sources and Where to Seek Assistance
An excellent book available for parents and for professionals advising parents is written by Dr. Eugene B. Cooper and is entitled Understanding Stuttering. It may be purchased from The National Easter Seal Society for Crippled Children and Adults, 2023 West Ogden Avenue, Chicago 60612.
The Board of Examiners for Speech and Language Pathologists and Audiologists publishes a directory of licensed personnel practicing in North Carolina. The address is Post Office Box 5545, Greensboro 27435-0545.
The North Carolina Speech, Hearing, and Language Association publishes a directory listing institutions and professionals practicing in North Carolina. The address is NCSHLA Publications, 530 N. Pearson St., P.O. Box 28350, Raleigh, NC, 27611-8350, 919-833-3984
added March 7, 1997, with permission
by Richard Shine
The following article first appeared in North Carolina Medical Journal for Doctors and Their Patients, The Official Journal of the North Carolina Medical Society, December 1983, Volume 44, No. 12
What Is Stuttering?
The best way to understand stuttering is to first know what it is not. Stuttering is not a learned behavior, a nervous condition, a psychological problem, an emotional problem, nor is it a problem caused by parental pressures and environmental stress. Stuttering is not caused by the reaction of parents to a child's nonstuttering dysfluencies such as pauses or hesitations within a sentence or before beginning to talk; interjections such as "uh," "um," "like uh," "you know," etc.; revisions of words like, "I rode the hor- pony"; phrase repetitions, "we had a . pause . - . We had a good time"; or incomplete phrases, "Yesterday we took the - pause . . . Yesterday we went to the fair."
There has never been any research or clinical evidence to support the historical belief that stuttering is a problem caused by psychoses, neuroses, or nervousness, but there are children who exhibit these problems and who also stutter. These other problems do not cause the stuttering but they can complicate the steps to alleviate the stuttering.
There has never been one shred of evidence to support the assumption and long-accepted theory that parents cause stuttering by pressuring the child to talk correctly, by labeling stuttering (erroneously referred to by experts as "normal nonfluency"), or by reacting to a child's way of speaking before he becomes fluent in the language. In fact, the literature reveals that directing the child to change the way he talks (slow down, take it easy, stop and try again) helps him overcame the stuttering.
Stuttering is the whole-word repetition (I-I-I, he-he-he), part-word repetition (pu-pu-part, wu-wu-went), prolongation (SSSSSSunday, wwwwwwwe), and struggle behavior (any, stuttering that is. primarily characterized by tension, i.e., increased loudness and/or pitch of the voice, facial grimaces, head jerking, associated body gestures, etc.) exhibited by an individual when talking. The order in which the four types of stuttering are listed above represents a general hierarchy of severity from mild to severe and the frequency of each type helps determine the need for direct professional fluency training. For instance, if the primary type of stuttering is whole-word repetitions, generally the problem will be rated as mild and may be overcome by parental intervention. If the primary types include part-word repetitions and prolongations, the general severity rating will be moderate and the need for direct fluency training will depend to a great degree on the frequency of stuttering and the concerns of the parents and the child about the problem. If struggle behaviors are predominant, the problem will be rated as severe and immediate direct fluency training will almost always be recommended.
Stuttering is a coordinative disorder involving the child's lack of ability to coordinate the muscles used in speaking; that is, the muscles of respiration (the speech breathing system), phonation (the larynx/voice box), and articulation (the tongue, lips, jaw. palate). The stuttering child's lack of coordination can be likened to that of the child who is clumsy in running, throwing or other motor activities except that the child who stutters is clumsy in controlling the muscles of the speaking mechanism.
It's not surprising that the child with coordination problems of the speaking mechanism cannot maintain conversational rates of speaking without a breakdown (stuttering) if we realize that during conversation we produce approximately 170 words per minute, with each word containing an average of about 3 or 4 sounds, or 10 sounds per second. To help understand rate-of-speaking, time yourself for 30 seconds while saying out loud "one thousand one," a phrase containing 11 sounds that is typically used to count seconds. If a child becomes excited and attempts to speak more rapidly as well as use the muscular system more vigorously, it is highly probable that the breakdowns (stuttering) will become more frequent.
Stuttering is a universal problem; that is, it exists in all cultures and all languages of the world, and no matter what language the child (age 2 to about 9 years) speaks -- English, Spanish, German, or Dutch -- the following identical "types" of stuttering behaviors will be exhibited: whole-word repetitions, part-word repetitions, prolongations, and struggle behaviors. Of course the frequency of each type and the nature of the struggle behaviors will differ from child to child and from time to time
Stuttering is a problem of childhood which is significantly greater in males than females (the ratio is approximately 3 to 1 with findings as high as 8 to 1) Almost all stuttering begins between the ages of 2 and 9 years with the majority beginning between 3 and 5 years of age. Some children do overcome their stuttering as a result of maturation, but most of the 40 to 50% reported to recover from childhood stuttering do so as a result of parents' and others' suggestions for the child to change the way he talks (Slow down take it easy, stop and try again. . . .)
Parents Are Valid Judges of Stuttering
In my 16 years of experience in working with young children who stutter, I have found that parents rarely if ever misdiagnose stuttering and they validly estimate its rate and severity. If parents report that their child is stuttering and that it is severe enough to cause communication problems, we can be assured that they are correct and that careful consideration and appropriate advice needs to be provided. The professional is guessing when he dismisses the parents' concern by explaining that it is merely a stage the child is going through (data indicate he will be correct by chance about 40 to 50% of the time).
What To Do When Your Child Begins Stuttering
Do not read the sections on stuttering in current baby books or child development texts and do be extremeiy critical of articles in popular magazines, newspapers, and particularly tabloids. Critically evaluate anything written by speech clinicians prior to the 1980's and much of what is still being written.
Do have confidence in your own evaluation of whether your child has a stuttering problem and do not hesitate to seek assistance, but be aware that inappropriate or incorrect advice may be given by speech clinicians, psychologists, physicians, and other professionals who have not kept up with recent developments.
What You Should Know about Professional Advice
Traditionally, advice to parents has been both inappropriate and incorrect. Inappropriate advice includes suggestions that would be beneficial in raising any child (i.e., providing opportunities for enjoyable and rewarding speaking experiences; developing and maintaining the health of the child including diet, exercise, rest, and sleep; developing other interests, hobbies, and abilities; etc.) but are not specific to the needs of the stuttering child. Advice may involve an attempt to deceive the child by telling him, "It's all right because everybody has troubie talking and it'll be okay." If the child had a cut finger we wouldn't say, "It's all right, everybody cuts his finger and it'll be okay"; rather, we would help by bandaging the finger or seeking medical attention and giving advice to the child an how to avoid future cut fingers.
A source of incorrect advice has been the assumption that stuttering is to be expected or is common in young children and that it is merely a stage of normal development that most children go through. This is not true! It is estimated that less than 20% of all children ever stutter, but most children, including those who do stutter, do exhibit nonstuttering disfluencies. Stuttering disfluencies, being different from nonsluttering disfluencies, are easily identified by parents and other lay persons but, because of bias, are often misdiagnosed as normal developmental disfluencies by professionals. If it were merely a stage of normal development that children go through, there would not be an estimated 2 million Americans who never overcome the "normal" stage and thus continue to stutter.
Other incorrect advice includes suggestions to refrain from doing anything that might cause the child to become aware of the problem and thus begin to fear or avoid talking. Again, my experience has been that children, even the 3-year old, know when they talk different from their peers. Unfortunately when the problem is not handled directly by the parents, the child may begin to think that the problem is so bad even the parents won't talk about it. The parents are mistakenly advised to listen quietly to what their child has to say and to wait patiently even if the child is struggling severely to say a word. The parents are told never to help the child by filling in words he is struggling to say even though experience reveals that saying the word for the child enables him to simply repeat the word and to continue with what was being said without repeating the word. We now know that we should not let the child continue to struggle but should eliminate the struggling by providing the word. Finally, it is incorrect to imply or to blatantly state that parents cause stuttering or that the environment causes the problem.
Examples of inappropriate/incorrect advice, regardless of the professional who offers the advice, include: "Don't worry about it, Mom, it's just a stage that most kids go through"; "It's just normal nonfluency and you really need to be careful not to call attention to it or to cause your child concern by reacting or by trying to help him correct the problem"; "Just ignore the stuttering and try to find out what things in the child's environment cause it, particularly what things you (Mom and/or Dad) are doing"; "It's an emotional or psychological problem because he has a lot of trouble only when he's excited."
Why Does My Child Stutter?
In the past (the early t960s) we used to think that children stuttered primarily because someone, usually a mother, was putting pressure on the child to talk correctly or she was correcting or calling attention to the child's normal developmental non stuttering disfluencies. Since then we have discovered that parents do not cause stuttering (parents cause children).
A child stutters because he/she is different: different like the child who has a reading problem or a math problem or the child who has to wear glasses. If your child had a reading or math problem or needed glasses, would you feel that you did something to cause the problem? No, the reason for the problem is that the child is different; that is, the child has a weakness which, however, could be a hereditary problem.
The reason your child stutters is because he has a coordination problem. In a way it is like the kid who is clumsy and cannnot control or coordinate his muscles to run well or throw well - except that your child is clumsy in controlling the muscles used for talking. Our task is to teach the child to talk in a different way to compensate for the discoordination and to speak in a normally fluent manner. Once the child establishes fluency his speech will not be identifiably different from that of his peers and in later life he will probably not remember his stuttering.
What You Can Do to Help
The best advice is to do what works as long as it is reasonable. The child should never.be punished for stuttering. Parents, particularly mothers, have an intuitive sense about how to help their child overcome problems including stuttering, and thus it can be beneficial to know what things you have done that help your child and continue those that improve fluency. If the suggestions upset your child or do not seem to help, explore other possibilities of parental intervention.
Specific advice includes having the parents talk more slowly and quietly to their child. We suggest that they talk openly about the problem and/or about the way the child talks; they can "talk about talking," about easy talking, quiet talking, slow talking, or whatever they feel might be beneficial. If the child is having a particularly bad day, they can engage him in activities requiring little talking or short, simple responses. The parent should not be afraid to experiment and should try all kinds of things, using those which are most effective and informing the speech clinician about all successes and failures.
The parents are not given a list of do's and don'ts but are trained to identify their child's stuttered words and develop procedures that are effective do's and don'ts unique to their child's environment. Determining appropriate management procedures for stuttering is much like determining disciplinary procedures for your child; if one thing doesn't work we try something else. Generally it is apparent or quickly becomes apparent that what works for one child in a family does not work with the other child or children. And, of course, with some children nothing really seems to be effective and we may need to seek assistance. We should realize that our effectiveness may depend an awful lot on the general makeup or personality of the child.
One Word of Caution
As with anything we do, we shouldn't overdo it. If something is said to the child every time he opens his mouth, it may become upsetting and not be beneficial - even though it won't be harmful or cause the stuttering to worsen. It will do no good to stop the child, particularly while he is speaking fluently, and ask him to repeat a word on which he stuttered. Primarily we should follow the rule of giving suggestions only when the child is having obvious difficulty communicating because of the frequency and particularly the severity of the stuttering. Same parents have developed effective hand signals or gestures to remind the child when he begins talking too fast, too loud, too hard, or in a way that results in discoordination and stuttering.
When to Refer: Guidelines for Parents and Professionals
The best guideline for the professional to follow is to listen to the concerns of the mother. If the mother states that the child is stuttering and it's a problem for either the child or the parent, do not hesitate to refer them to a speech clinician. It's rare that parents cannot easily distinguish between normal developmental non stuttering disfluencies and stuttering disfluencies or determine whether the rate and severity of stuttering is causing communication problems.
An important point to remember is that young children tend to be cautious about what they say and how they say it, using short telegraphic phrases or even a different manner of speaking and thus can often speak fluently during an interview or while answering questions in the office of any professional. Always ask the parent if the stuttering or manner of speaking heard during the interview is characteristic of what the child typically does. Remember that children tend to stutter most when they are happily excited or when they are relaxed and engaging in a meaningful conversation with someone they enjoy being with and talking to, usually a mother. The need for referral can also be determined by answering and evaluating the results of the following five questions:
1. How old is the child? Many children begin stuttering with the onset of speaking, while others begin around 2 1/2 to 3 years or at about the time they begin using two-and three word phrases, with the majority beginning by 5 years of age. The preschool and young schoolage child up to about 9 or 10 years of age finds it generally easier to change speaking patterns and overcome stuttering than do older children and adults. Fluency training is most successful when initiated near the time when stuttering first begins and thus early referral is necessary.
2. How long has the child been stuttering? If the child has been stuttering for six months or longer, immediate referral to a speech clinician is advised. Many children (somewhere between 40 and 50%) do overcome their stuttering due to parental intervention, development of language skills and/or maturation (neurologic development leading to improved motor skills), but the majority do not and thus early intervention and fluency training are necessary.
3. Is the severity of stuttering increasing? The severity of stuttering may be expected to increase gradually as the child's language develops and the demands of increased length and complexity of expression require greater coordination of the speaking mechanism, but we frequently get reports that the stuttering began overnight or developed to its greatest severity within a week or two and then remained rather stable except for episodic periods of fluency (which are to be expected even with the most severe child). In general, the more frequently the periods of fluency occur, and the greater their length, the better is the prognosis that the child will overcome the stuttering; however, if an extanded period (6 months or so) of increasing severity is reported, professional help is necessary.
4. What type of stuttering is the child exhibiting? If the child exhibits primarily prolongations and/or struggle behaviors, immediate referral is necessary. If the types of stuttering are whole-word and part-word repetitions the mother should observe the stuttering for 3 to 6 months to see if the problem remains stable or decreases in severity. If stuttering persists, even though mild to moderate, it is advisable to refer the child before he/she enters school. As a result of Public Law 94-142, public school speech clinicians can provide services for preschool children and definitely should not delay fluency training with kindergarten children.
5. Is there a history of stuttering the family? If the father or mother or close relative stutters and the child has a moderate to severe stuttering problem, the need for referral and fluency training is seldom questioned. Contemporory literature indicates that there is a genetic basis for stuttering; however, a family history of stuttering is not conclusive evidence that it was inherited.
What Can I Expect from Professional Fluency Training?
At the East Carolina University Speech and Hearing Clinic we have been engaged in direct fluency training with the beginning stutterer (ages 2 to 10 years) since 1974. A followup study of the first 18 children enroIled in the program (1974 through 1979) revealed that all 18 established normally fluent speaking patterns and all but one maintained fluency. The one child who regressed was severe when enrolled and was found to have a mild to moderate problem when re-evaluated four years later. His current prognosis for re-establishing fluency is good. During the past four years we have worked with approximately 30 more young stuttering children, four of whom had difficulty establishing or maintaining fluency. Prognosis for only one of the four is poor because of the severity of his involvement and his resultant inabilitv to change his speaking patterns. The average time it takes a child to establish fluency has been sixty 40-to 50-minute sessions spread over a 9-month period. Two children established fluency in less than 20 sessions and it took almost 135 for two others and almost 200 sessions for one child.
Summer Residential Program for the Beginning Stutterer and Parents (note - this summer program ceased operation in 1989 due to cuts in funding - JAK)
A 3-week (June 25 through July 13) intensive fluency training program for 15 stuttering children (ages 3 to 10 years) and their parents is being planned at East Carolina University for the summer of 1984. The program will include 3 hours of fluency training per day, one hour of music therapy, and one hour of adaptive motor training. Parents will participate in a parent training/counseling program designed to help them understand stuttering and help them work directly with their own child. For additional information, write to the author at Speech and Language Department, East Carolina University, Greenville 27834.
Referral Sources and Where to Seek Assistance
An excellent book available for parents and for professionals advising parents is written by Dr. Eugene B. Cooper and is entitled Understanding Stuttering. It may be purchased from The National Easter Seal Society for Crippled Children and Adults, 2023 West Ogden Avenue, Chicago 60612.
The Board of Examiners for Speech and Language Pathologists and Audiologists publishes a directory of licensed personnel practicing in North Carolina. The address is Post Office Box 5545, Greensboro 27435-0545.
The North Carolina Speech, Hearing, and Language Association publishes a directory listing institutions and professionals practicing in North Carolina. The address is NCSHLA Publications, 530 N. Pearson St., P.O. Box 28350, Raleigh, NC, 27611-8350, 919-833-3984
added March 7, 1997, with permission
http://www.aarp.org/health/conditions-treatments/info-03-2011/conquering-stuttering.html
JM (she) B something Berkeley, CA
Example of Goodbye Letter to Resign
Eric Says Goodbye
StutterTalk would like to thank co-founder and former co-host Eric Jackson for all that he has done and will continue to do for the stuttering community. Eric is saying goodbye to StutterTalk to pursue other interests. We wish Eric the very best. Read Eric's goodbye letter below:
Dear StutterTalk listeners,
It is with great sadness and excitement that I am writing this letter to inform you all that I am resigning from StutterTalk.
It has been a privilege and pleasure to be a part of StutterTalk for the past four years. During that time, I’ve been touched by the many heart-warming emails and voicemails from our listeners; I will especially miss those emails revealing that you voluntarily stuttered or “advertised” for the first time after listening to a show! StutterTalk has been an incredible learning experience for me and I thank you all for listening and allowing me to provide this service for the stuttering community for as long as I have.
But, as all things come to an end, so do my days with StutterTalk. I have decided to pursue other interests in the stuttering world—and will most definitely be keeping the conversation going!
I hope to see you via Skype, at a conference, or at a local (or not so local) watering hole soon.
Love,
Eric
ejaxon@gmail.com
StutterTalk would like to thank co-founder and former co-host Eric Jackson for all that he has done and will continue to do for the stuttering community. Eric is saying goodbye to StutterTalk to pursue other interests. We wish Eric the very best. Read Eric's goodbye letter below:
Dear StutterTalk listeners,
It is with great sadness and excitement that I am writing this letter to inform you all that I am resigning from StutterTalk.
It has been a privilege and pleasure to be a part of StutterTalk for the past four years. During that time, I’ve been touched by the many heart-warming emails and voicemails from our listeners; I will especially miss those emails revealing that you voluntarily stuttered or “advertised” for the first time after listening to a show! StutterTalk has been an incredible learning experience for me and I thank you all for listening and allowing me to provide this service for the stuttering community for as long as I have.
But, as all things come to an end, so do my days with StutterTalk. I have decided to pursue other interests in the stuttering world—and will most definitely be keeping the conversation going!
I hope to see you via Skype, at a conference, or at a local (or not so local) watering hole soon.
Love,
Eric
ejaxon@gmail.com
Friday, March 18, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rDaajW-pKlw
Love is More Important to Me. A member of GrassHopper (HK)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ntFD8fBKt0&feature=BF&list=PLE0704E2E1BC04ED1&index=76
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ntFD8fBKt0&feature=BF&list=PLE0704E2E1BC04ED1&index=76
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
AS and Stuttering
TITLE: stuttering........autism symptom gene identified
stuttering/autism symptom gene identified?
Very interesting!
This is very interesting. There is a human genetics researchers at NIH Dr.
Dennis Drayna. He found 3 stuttering genes....and talking about stuttering mice.
It would be interesting to look at his stuttering sample size (people who
stutter in Pakistan), and see how many of those stutterers also have ASD.......
We don't know what causes Stuttering/ASD and big mysteries of what causes
stuttering and/or ASD?
There are probably hundreds of stuttering genes and hundreds of genes for ASD.
As we know, there are many stuttering subtypes and hundreds of ASD subtypes.
>
> A couple of abstracts that seem to reference the same gene for stuttering and
> autism spectrum disorder:
>
>
>
>
> Am J Med Genet A. 2010 Dec;152A(12):3164-3172.
> Identification of a microdeletion at the 7q33-q35 disrupting the CNTNAP2 gene
in
> a Brazilian stuttering case.
> Petrin AL, Giacheti CM, Maximino LP, Abramides DV, Zanchetta S, Rossi
> NF, Richieri-Costa A, Murray JC.
> Department of Pediatrics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa.
> Abstract
> Speech and language disorders are some of the most common referral reasons to
> child development centers accounting for approximately 40% of cases.
Stuttering
> is a disorder in which involuntary repetition, prolongation, or cessation of
the
> sound precludes the flow of speech. About 5% of individuals in the general
> population have a stuttering problem, and about 80% of the affected children
> recover naturally. The causal factors of stuttering remain uncertain in most
> cases; studies suggest that genetic factors are responsible for 70% of the
> variance in liability for stuttering, whereas the remaining 30% is due to
> environmental effects supporting a complex cause of the disorder. The use of
> high-resolution genome wide array comparative genomic hybridization has proven
> to be a powerful strategy to narrow down candidate regions for complex
> disorders. We report on a case with a complex set of speech and language
> difficulties including stuttering who presented with a 10 Mb deletion of
> chromosome region 7q33-35 causing the deletion of several genes and the
> disruption of CNTNAP2 by deleting the first three exons of the gene. CNTNAP2
is
> known to be involved in the cause of language and speech disorders and autism
> spectrum disorder and is in the same pathway as FOXP2, another important
> language gene, which makes it a candidate gene for causal studies speech and
> language disorders such as stuttering. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
> PMID: 21108403 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher)
>
>
> Neurogenetics. 2010 Feb;11(1):81-9. Epub 2009 Jul 7.
> Disruption of CNTNAP2 and additional structural genome changes in a boy with
> speech delay and autism spectrum disorder.
> Poot M, Beyer V, Schwaab I, Damatova N, Van't Slot R, Prothero J, Holder
> SE, Haaf T.
> Department of Medical Genetics, University Medical Centre Utrecht, Mail stop:
> KC.04.084.2, P. O. Box 85090, 3508, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
> M.Poot@...
> Abstract
> Patients with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) frequently harbour chromosome
> rearrangements and segmental aneuploidies, which allow us to identify
candidate
> genes. In a boy with mild facial dysmorphisms, speech delay and ASD, we
> reconstructed by karyotyping, FISH and SNP array-based segmental aneuploidy
> profiling a highly complex chromosomal rearrangement involving at least three
> breaks in chromosome 1 and seven breaks in chromosome 7. Chromosome banding
> revealed an inversion of region 7q32.1-7q35 on the derivative chromosome 7.
FISH
> with region-specific BACs mapped both inversion breakpoints and revealed
> additional breaks and structural changes in the CNTNAP2 gene. Two gene
segments
> were transposed and inserted into the 1q31.2 region, while the CNTNAP2 segment
> between the two transposed parts as well as intron 13 to the 5-UTR were
retained
> on the der(7). SNP array analysis revealed an additional de novo deletion
> encompassing the distal part of intron1 and exon 2 of CNTNAP2, which contains
> FOXP2 binding sites. Second, we found another de novo deletion on chromosome
> 1q41, containing 15 annotated genes, including KCTD3 and USH2A. Disruptions of
> the CNTNAP2 gene have been associated with ASD and with Gilles de la Tourette
> syndrome (GTS). Comparison of disruptions of CNTNAP2 in patients with GTS and
> ASD suggests that large proximal disruptions result in either GTS or ASD,
while
> relatively small distal disruptions may be phenotypically neutral. For
> full-blown ASD to develop, a proximal disruption of CNTNAP2 may have to occur
> concomitantly with additional genome mutations such as hemizygous deletions of
> the KCTD3 and USH2A genes.
> PMID: 19582487 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
>
stuttering/autism symptom gene identified?
Very interesting!
This is very interesting. There is a human genetics researchers at NIH Dr.
Dennis Drayna. He found 3 stuttering genes....and talking about stuttering mice.
It would be interesting to look at his stuttering sample size (people who
stutter in Pakistan), and see how many of those stutterers also have ASD.......
We don't know what causes Stuttering/ASD and big mysteries of what causes
stuttering and/or ASD?
There are probably hundreds of stuttering genes and hundreds of genes for ASD.
As we know, there are many stuttering subtypes and hundreds of ASD subtypes.
>
> A couple of abstracts that seem to reference the same gene for stuttering and
> autism spectrum disorder:
>
>
>
>
> Am J Med Genet A. 2010 Dec;152A(12):3164-3172.
> Identification of a microdeletion at the 7q33-q35 disrupting the CNTNAP2 gene
in
> a Brazilian stuttering case.
> Petrin AL, Giacheti CM, Maximino LP, Abramides DV, Zanchetta S, Rossi
> NF, Richieri-Costa A, Murray JC.
> Department of Pediatrics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa.
> Abstract
> Speech and language disorders are some of the most common referral reasons to
> child development centers accounting for approximately 40% of cases.
Stuttering
> is a disorder in which involuntary repetition, prolongation, or cessation of
the
> sound precludes the flow of speech. About 5% of individuals in the general
> population have a stuttering problem, and about 80% of the affected children
> recover naturally. The causal factors of stuttering remain uncertain in most
> cases; studies suggest that genetic factors are responsible for 70% of the
> variance in liability for stuttering, whereas the remaining 30% is due to
> environmental effects supporting a complex cause of the disorder. The use of
> high-resolution genome wide array comparative genomic hybridization has proven
> to be a powerful strategy to narrow down candidate regions for complex
> disorders. We report on a case with a complex set of speech and language
> difficulties including stuttering who presented with a 10 Mb deletion of
> chromosome region 7q33-35 causing the deletion of several genes and the
> disruption of CNTNAP2 by deleting the first three exons of the gene. CNTNAP2
is
> known to be involved in the cause of language and speech disorders and autism
> spectrum disorder and is in the same pathway as FOXP2, another important
> language gene, which makes it a candidate gene for causal studies speech and
> language disorders such as stuttering. © 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc.
> PMID: 21108403 [PubMed - as supplied by publisher)
>
>
> Neurogenetics. 2010 Feb;11(1):81-9. Epub 2009 Jul 7.
> Disruption of CNTNAP2 and additional structural genome changes in a boy with
> speech delay and autism spectrum disorder.
> Poot M, Beyer V, Schwaab I, Damatova N, Van't Slot R, Prothero J, Holder
> SE, Haaf T.
> Department of Medical Genetics, University Medical Centre Utrecht, Mail stop:
> KC.04.084.2, P. O. Box 85090, 3508, Utrecht, The Netherlands.
> M.Poot@...
> Abstract
> Patients with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) frequently harbour chromosome
> rearrangements and segmental aneuploidies, which allow us to identify
candidate
> genes. In a boy with mild facial dysmorphisms, speech delay and ASD, we
> reconstructed by karyotyping, FISH and SNP array-based segmental aneuploidy
> profiling a highly complex chromosomal rearrangement involving at least three
> breaks in chromosome 1 and seven breaks in chromosome 7. Chromosome banding
> revealed an inversion of region 7q32.1-7q35 on the derivative chromosome 7.
FISH
> with region-specific BACs mapped both inversion breakpoints and revealed
> additional breaks and structural changes in the CNTNAP2 gene. Two gene
segments
> were transposed and inserted into the 1q31.2 region, while the CNTNAP2 segment
> between the two transposed parts as well as intron 13 to the 5-UTR were
retained
> on the der(7). SNP array analysis revealed an additional de novo deletion
> encompassing the distal part of intron1 and exon 2 of CNTNAP2, which contains
> FOXP2 binding sites. Second, we found another de novo deletion on chromosome
> 1q41, containing 15 annotated genes, including KCTD3 and USH2A. Disruptions of
> the CNTNAP2 gene have been associated with ASD and with Gilles de la Tourette
> syndrome (GTS). Comparison of disruptions of CNTNAP2 in patients with GTS and
> ASD suggests that large proximal disruptions result in either GTS or ASD,
while
> relatively small distal disruptions may be phenotypically neutral. For
> full-blown ASD to develop, a proximal disruption of CNTNAP2 may have to occur
> concomitantly with additional genome mutations such as hemizygous deletions of
> the KCTD3 and USH2A genes.
> PMID: 19582487 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
>
http://www.wisconsinmedicalsociety.org/savant_syndrome/savant_articles/aspergers
http://www.wisconsinmedicalsociety.org/savant_syndrome/savant_articles/aspergers
Asperger's Disorder and Savant Syndrome
By Darold A. Treffert, MD
April 29, 2004 Asperger's article in The New York Times
Amy Harmon: Answer, but No Cure, for a Social Disorder That Isolates Many
Click to go to the March 19, 2004 Update
In 1944 an Austrian pediatrician, Hans Asperger, wrote a doctoral thesis in which he described four patients with rather severe but characteristic psychiatric and social impairments who showed exceptional skill or talent disproportionate to very uneven intellectual ability. Usually the skill included extraordinary memory. He applied the term "autistic psychopathy" to these four patients.
Dr. Asperger, in Austria, had never heard of Dr. Leo Kanner, in the United States. But surprisingly, only one year earlier, a continent away, Dr. Kanner independently applied the term Early Infantile Autism to a group of 11 patients he had seen with also very unique, but nearly uniform symptoms. It is interesting that both Dr. Asperger and Dr. Kanner independently latched onto and included the word autism to describe the syndromes they separately witnessed. But both were apparently drawn to the word "Autism" as a clinical term originally coined by the Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler in 1919; Bleuler had also coined the word "Schizophrenia". Asperger used the term "autism" by itself frequently in his paper, and his use of the word "psychopathy" could have as easily been "personality", as he himself pointed out. Thus the term "autistic personality" might have better characterized the condition he so carefully described, and would have captured better the overall tone of his patients, and would be better understood and better accepted than "psychopathy". Actually Asperger did not name the condition after himself. The condition we now know as Asperger's Syndrome was given that name by Dr. Lorna Wing in 1981, in a paper entitled "Asperger's Syndrome: A clinical account", 37 years after Asperger's original paper, and one year after his death.
Traits and symptoms that Dr. Kanner described in his group of autistic patients included withdrawal and aloneness; mutism or language that fails to convey meaning; delayed developmental milestones; phenomenal rote memory; echolalia; concrete thinking; reference to self in the third person; obsessive desire for sameness; good relation to objects but not to people; fascination with spinning objects and rhythm; staring through people rather than at them; handsome faces that give an impression of serious-mindedness; anxiousness in the presence of others, with a placid smile of beatitude, often accompanied by happy though monotonous humming and singing. In that original group the male:female ratio was 4:1.
Traits and symptoms that Dr. Asperger described in his group of Asperger's patients were similar in many respects to Autistic Disorder, but included some unique characteristics as well. In one of his patients, Fritz V, he noted, for example, very early speech, with learning to talk before learning to walk; the ability to express himself in complete sentences, soon "talking like an adult"; the absence of normal speech "melody" or tone such that the natural flow of speech was impaired producing instead a very monotone conversation; stereotypical movements and habits; highly intellectual family history, in this case on the mother's side; little eye contact with a "gaze directed into the void" rather than directly at people; social relations that were very limited; clumsiness; intellectual abilities which were very scattered and "highly contradictory"; exceptional memory; and a remarkable calculating ability, mastery of negative numbers and fractions as a "special interest".
While Asperger described only four patients in detail in this original paper, by the time he wrote his thesis he had observed over 200 such patients over a ten year period of time. In the aggregate he listed, in part, these findings and characteristics: a lack of eye contact, not being sure whether the child is looking into the far distance, or inward; paucity of facial and gestural expression; flat, emotionally toneless language not directed to the addressee but often as if spoken into empty space; special abilities interwoven with disabilities; unusual interest in natural sciences, complex calculations or calendar calculating; exceptional rote memory; limitations in social relationships; intellect generally above average, but very scattered in distribution and lacking harmony between intellect and affect; pronounced likes and dislikes with respect to taste; hypersensitivity to tactile sensation and/or to sound, although hyposensitivity to sound can be seen as well; intense interest in collecting things with strong attachment to those objects, compared to attachment to persons; absence of a sense of humor; marked predominance of boys to girls with this disorder; predilection for only children; a marked genetic component with related family traits in every single case where it was possible to trace such; many fathers who occupied high positions and ancestors of intellectuals for several generations; a high proportion of such autistic persons in whom work performance can be excellent and which can provide some social integration. Dr. Asperger describes one case he observed over three decades, from boyhood to manhood, who in college discovered an error in Newton's work, made that the subject of his doctoral dissertation and went on to become a faculty member in a University Department of Astronomy.
As Autistic Disorder and Asperger's Disorder have been compared and contrasted through the years, some similarities, as well as differences, have emerged. As in autism, males outnumber females approximately 6:1 in Asperger's Disorder. Unlike Autistic Disorder however, in Asperger's Disorder onset of speech is usually not delayed; but like autism, speech in Asperger's is repetitive, with monotone intonation and absence of first person pronouns. In both Autistic Disorder and Asperger's non-verbal communication is flat with staring through, rather than, at persons and repetitive activities are preferred with resistance to change and intense attachments to particular possessions. Often commented upon as a special trait of Asperger's is poor motor coordination with clumsy, peculiar gaits. Memory is often prodigious in Asperger patients with extraordinary preoccupation and mastery of one or two subjects such as bus schedules, sports statistics, or history trivia, sometimes to the exclusion of learning in all other areas. Language overall is rather limited in Asperger's Disorder, but in the area of special expertise, conversation can be expansive, pedantic and seemingly scholarly but shows little grasp of the meaning of words put forth so liberally. Even those dissertations tend to be carried out by rote memory.
Kanner's work received wide distribution, but Asperger's work was largely ignored until 1981 when Asperger's work was translated into English for the first time, and his name was attached to the disorder. Since then there has been continuous debate as to whether Asperger's Disorder and Autistic Disorder are simply different points on a spectrum of the same disorder, or whether they are in fact two different conditions that happen to share a number of symptoms in common. While not everyone agrees, there is a general consensus emerging these days that Autistic Disorder and Asperger's Disorder are similar if not the same conditions, differing only as to where they sit on a spectrum of disability encompassed in the overall term of Pervasive Developmental Disability (PDD). Asperger's Disorder is at the higher end of that spectrum, in fact sometimes being referred to as High Functioning Autism. In a 1966 review of this question, Trevarthen and his co-authors, (Children with autism: diagnosis and interventions to meet their needs), after examining the data on this topic, concluded that autistic disorder and Asperger's disorder are better viewed as differing in level of impairment on a continuing spectrum of severity rather than being viewed as two separate conditions.
In a 1991 book edited by Uta Frith entitled Autism and Asperger's Syndrome, the links between autism and Asperger's syndrome are explored. Several distinctive features of Asperger's are generally described: (1) clumsiness and poor motor coordination, not regularly seen in autism; (2) a higher level of social functioning than seen in autistic persons but containing unusual, peculiar and naïve social interactions; (3) the use of facile, expansive language in several favorite subject areas but with no grasp of the meaning of words used, in contrast to mutism or globally impaired speech so often characteristic of autism; and (4) an average or above average measured IQ. Asperger believed his patients to be of high intelligence but provided no IQ scores to confirm that impression. Later studies have shown average or above average intelligence in 80% of cases.
While Asperger's Disorder is generally, and probably correctly, viewed as belonging on the high-functioning end of the Autistic Disorder spectrum, it may well be that it exists there as a distinct sub-group. Autistic Disorder, in my view, should more properly be called the "group of Autistic Disorders" rather than be viewed as if Autistic Disorder is a single entity with a single cause, course and outcome. Just as "mental retardation" is not a single entity—there are many sub-groups with differing causes—Autistic Disorder, or autism, likewise is not a single disorder with a single cause in all cases. Autistic Disorder is not a form of mental retardation. But just as the broad term "mental retardation" encompasses a whole number of sub-groups such as Down's Syndrome or phenylketonuria, for example, with widely differing causes, so the term "autism" or "Autistic Disorder", likewise encompasses a number of sub-groups which share similar symptoms as a final common path, but those sub-groups have widely differing causes—some genetic, some environmental, some developmental, and some acquired. In my view Asperger's Disorder exists as a separate sub-group on the Autistic Disorder or PDD spectrum, with some unique and fairly characteristic traits and symptoms, and perhaps a separate, distinct cause or etiology.
A Swedish study in 1989 suggested that Asperger's Disorder may occur in as many as 26 of 10,000 children. There appears to be an increased incidence of Asperger's Disorder among relatives of those who have the disorder, suggesting a genetic component to the condition; a case of Asperger's in triplets fortifies the evidence for some genetic factors. While clumsiness is sometimes noted as a differentiating feature between Asperger's and Autism, some studies have shown no support for that observation. Asperger himself, as well as other clinicians, have commented on face blindness (prosopagnosia) as being present, perhaps denoting a sub-group of the disorder.
Savant skills, while not universally present in Asperger's persons, are very common, and generally include prodigious memory. When they do occur, in my experience, those special abilities in Asperger's tend to involve numbers, mathematics, mechanical and spatial skills. Many are drawn to science, inventions, complex machines and particularly, now, computers. Some such skills lead to PhD's in mathematics or other sciences and a goodly number of Asperger persons are gainfully, and highly successfully, employed in computer or related industries because of the natural affinity of Asperger persons to organization, numbers and codes. Steven Silverman examines the concentration and increasing numbers of Asperger's and Autistic persons in the Silicon Valley in an in-depth article on this phenomenon in the magazine Wired, in the December 2001 issue. That article points up the natural affinity of high functioning autistic persons for computer and related occupations, and examines genetic and environmental reasons why there might be such a startling increase of Autism and Asperger's disorders as has been reported in California generally, and in the Silicon Valley specifically.
Beyond merely describing the disorder that bears his name, Dr. Asperger was passionately involved in the teaching and training of his "autistic" patients and overall he was very optimistic about outcome using proper methods and techniques. While there are other "how to" books, his hints, tips and pearls for dealing with these special people cannot be improved upon. I refer specifically in his original paper to a very detailed "how to" section for teachers involved with these autistic persons with many specific, hands on illustrations for approaching these special people. He points out forcefully that "exceptional human beings must be given exceptional educational treatment, treatment which takes into account their special difficulties. Further, we can show that despite abnormality, human beings can fulfill their social role within the community, especially if they find understanding, love and guidance". He goes on to state that even though in many cases social problems can be so profound that they overshadow everything else, "in some cases the problems are compensated by a high level of original thought and experience that can often lead to exceptional achievements in later life".
From a research point of view, in attempting to tie specific causes to specific disorders, the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names. In that quest classifications, groups and subgroups matter. But from an everyday, living-with-the-family, sitting-in-the-classroom, or going-to-work point of view, whether Asperger's Syndrome is the same as, or different from, or a sub-group of, Autistic Disorder really doesn't matter a great deal. In those daily settings classifications, labels and diagnostic categories can often be too stereotyping, too un-individualized, and too confining. Hans Asperger, when you read his original paper, is as staunch an advocate for the persons who have the disorder that bear his name as any I have seen along the way. Liberally laced in that lengthy paper, alongside some scientific and medical terms and astute observations are the words and actions that Dr. Asperger felt make a difference in the lives of these extraordinary people, whatever the cause of the condition: "true understanding; acceptance; love; guidance; exceptional human beings; special difficulties; genuine care; kindness; sensitivity; humour; outstanding achievements; dedicated and loving educators; determination; absolutely dedicated; and a right and a duty to speak out for these children with the whole force of our personality".
The May 6, 2002 issue of TIME magazine, on-line at http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020506/scautism.hmtl has an in-depth section entitled "The Secrets of Autism." One portion of that article examines Asperger's disorder — "a.k.a. the 'little professor' or 'geek' syndrome". It examines the apparent "explosion" in Autism and Asperger's cases, especially in the Silicon Valley in California, raising the question of whether the reported increase in cases represents an actual rise in the number of new cases or rather simply a broadening of diagnosis. The article also presents a fairly comprehensive review of some of the newer research findings, particularly in the area of genetics, regarding the causes of Autism, Asperger's and related disorders.
Much more additional, useful information about Asperger's Syndrome can be found on the O.A.S.I.S (Online Asperger's Syndrome Information and Support) Web site at http://www.udel.edu/bkirby/asperger/. Another very useful resource on Asperger's Disorder is a 1998 book by psychologist Tony Atwood, entitled Asperger's Syndrome:A Guide for Parents and Professionals. The Frequently Asked Questions section of that book is particularly helpful for parents and other caretakers or teachers with respect to specific interventions and techniques for helping Asperger persons deal with specific behaviors, and reach full potential. An additional web site which provides perspectives by persons with Autistic and Asperger's disorders, rather than just information about them, can be found at http://www.ani.ac. That site is provided by "Autism Network International, an autistic-run, self-help and advocacy organization for autistic people".
__________________________________________________________________
Asperger's and High Functioning Autism: The same or different disorders?
Often Autistic Spectrum Disorders are divided into three categories: Low Functioning Autism (IQ less than 70); High Functioning Autism (IQ greater than 70); and Asperger's syndrome. Using structural MRI imaging, Lotspeich and co-workers at Stanford and other facilities, attempted to see if there were differences in total brain volume, and particularly grey matter volume, between the low functioning autism, high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome groups. From prior studies a consensus generally seems to be developing that abnormalities in gray matter development, as opposed to total brain volume, seem to be the defining feature of autism compared to control groups.
This study is the first neuroimaging work to investigate differences in brain volume specifically between autism and Asperger's patients. There were no differences between high functioning autism and Asperger's Syndrome on measurements of total cerebral volume (total, gray and white tissue), nor were there any differences between the Asperger's patients and the matched control group of non-disabled individuals in this regard. But mean cerebral gray matter volume for the Asperger's group was intermediate between the high functioning autistic group and the control group suggesting "a continuum in which cerebral gray matter volume increases with the severity of the PDD condition." However when specific neuropsychological testing, including verbal IQ and performance IQ discrepancies were analyzed, there was a suggestion that high functioning autism and Asperger's Syndrome were different disorders. The author's of the study summarize it in this way: "Our attempt to determine whether high functioning autism and Asperger's disorder are conditions on a continuum or are distinct biological entities was only partially successful. On the single measure of cerebral gray tissue volume, these conditions appear to represent a continuum of severity, with autism exhibiting the greatest aberrant neurodevelopment. However on multiple measures (ie, brain-behavior correlations of IQ with specific cerebral volumes) there is preliminary evidence of fundamentally different patterns of neurodevelopment between high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome subjects." The authors point out that other behavioral and cognitive studies have suggested autism and Asperger's may be clinically and neurobiologically different from each other, and family studies have suggested that Asperger's syndrome may be genetically different from autism as well. Their work suggests "that when high functioning autism and Asperper's syndrome are differentiated by history of language development, as they are herein, qualitative differences may surface when patterns of multiple measurements are examined.
So this study does not settle the question, but it does point in the direction that there are some basic qualitative neurodevelopmental and neurobiological differences between high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome, and that they are not merely the same condition on spectrum that separates them only quantitatively. The study appears in Archives of General Psychiatry, March, 2004 issue (Volume 61:291-297, 2004).
For more information, please contact:
Darold A. Treffert, MD
St. Agnes Hospital, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin
Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry
University of Wisconsin Medical School, Madison
Personal Web site: http://www.daroldtreffert.com
e-mail: savants@charter.net
Asperger's Disorder and Savant Syndrome
By Darold A. Treffert, MD
April 29, 2004 Asperger's article in The New York Times
Amy Harmon: Answer, but No Cure, for a Social Disorder That Isolates Many
Click to go to the March 19, 2004 Update
In 1944 an Austrian pediatrician, Hans Asperger, wrote a doctoral thesis in which he described four patients with rather severe but characteristic psychiatric and social impairments who showed exceptional skill or talent disproportionate to very uneven intellectual ability. Usually the skill included extraordinary memory. He applied the term "autistic psychopathy" to these four patients.
Dr. Asperger, in Austria, had never heard of Dr. Leo Kanner, in the United States. But surprisingly, only one year earlier, a continent away, Dr. Kanner independently applied the term Early Infantile Autism to a group of 11 patients he had seen with also very unique, but nearly uniform symptoms. It is interesting that both Dr. Asperger and Dr. Kanner independently latched onto and included the word autism to describe the syndromes they separately witnessed. But both were apparently drawn to the word "Autism" as a clinical term originally coined by the Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler in 1919; Bleuler had also coined the word "Schizophrenia". Asperger used the term "autism" by itself frequently in his paper, and his use of the word "psychopathy" could have as easily been "personality", as he himself pointed out. Thus the term "autistic personality" might have better characterized the condition he so carefully described, and would have captured better the overall tone of his patients, and would be better understood and better accepted than "psychopathy". Actually Asperger did not name the condition after himself. The condition we now know as Asperger's Syndrome was given that name by Dr. Lorna Wing in 1981, in a paper entitled "Asperger's Syndrome: A clinical account", 37 years after Asperger's original paper, and one year after his death.
Traits and symptoms that Dr. Kanner described in his group of autistic patients included withdrawal and aloneness; mutism or language that fails to convey meaning; delayed developmental milestones; phenomenal rote memory; echolalia; concrete thinking; reference to self in the third person; obsessive desire for sameness; good relation to objects but not to people; fascination with spinning objects and rhythm; staring through people rather than at them; handsome faces that give an impression of serious-mindedness; anxiousness in the presence of others, with a placid smile of beatitude, often accompanied by happy though monotonous humming and singing. In that original group the male:female ratio was 4:1.
Traits and symptoms that Dr. Asperger described in his group of Asperger's patients were similar in many respects to Autistic Disorder, but included some unique characteristics as well. In one of his patients, Fritz V, he noted, for example, very early speech, with learning to talk before learning to walk; the ability to express himself in complete sentences, soon "talking like an adult"; the absence of normal speech "melody" or tone such that the natural flow of speech was impaired producing instead a very monotone conversation; stereotypical movements and habits; highly intellectual family history, in this case on the mother's side; little eye contact with a "gaze directed into the void" rather than directly at people; social relations that were very limited; clumsiness; intellectual abilities which were very scattered and "highly contradictory"; exceptional memory; and a remarkable calculating ability, mastery of negative numbers and fractions as a "special interest".
While Asperger described only four patients in detail in this original paper, by the time he wrote his thesis he had observed over 200 such patients over a ten year period of time. In the aggregate he listed, in part, these findings and characteristics: a lack of eye contact, not being sure whether the child is looking into the far distance, or inward; paucity of facial and gestural expression; flat, emotionally toneless language not directed to the addressee but often as if spoken into empty space; special abilities interwoven with disabilities; unusual interest in natural sciences, complex calculations or calendar calculating; exceptional rote memory; limitations in social relationships; intellect generally above average, but very scattered in distribution and lacking harmony between intellect and affect; pronounced likes and dislikes with respect to taste; hypersensitivity to tactile sensation and/or to sound, although hyposensitivity to sound can be seen as well; intense interest in collecting things with strong attachment to those objects, compared to attachment to persons; absence of a sense of humor; marked predominance of boys to girls with this disorder; predilection for only children; a marked genetic component with related family traits in every single case where it was possible to trace such; many fathers who occupied high positions and ancestors of intellectuals for several generations; a high proportion of such autistic persons in whom work performance can be excellent and which can provide some social integration. Dr. Asperger describes one case he observed over three decades, from boyhood to manhood, who in college discovered an error in Newton's work, made that the subject of his doctoral dissertation and went on to become a faculty member in a University Department of Astronomy.
As Autistic Disorder and Asperger's Disorder have been compared and contrasted through the years, some similarities, as well as differences, have emerged. As in autism, males outnumber females approximately 6:1 in Asperger's Disorder. Unlike Autistic Disorder however, in Asperger's Disorder onset of speech is usually not delayed; but like autism, speech in Asperger's is repetitive, with monotone intonation and absence of first person pronouns. In both Autistic Disorder and Asperger's non-verbal communication is flat with staring through, rather than, at persons and repetitive activities are preferred with resistance to change and intense attachments to particular possessions. Often commented upon as a special trait of Asperger's is poor motor coordination with clumsy, peculiar gaits. Memory is often prodigious in Asperger patients with extraordinary preoccupation and mastery of one or two subjects such as bus schedules, sports statistics, or history trivia, sometimes to the exclusion of learning in all other areas. Language overall is rather limited in Asperger's Disorder, but in the area of special expertise, conversation can be expansive, pedantic and seemingly scholarly but shows little grasp of the meaning of words put forth so liberally. Even those dissertations tend to be carried out by rote memory.
Kanner's work received wide distribution, but Asperger's work was largely ignored until 1981 when Asperger's work was translated into English for the first time, and his name was attached to the disorder. Since then there has been continuous debate as to whether Asperger's Disorder and Autistic Disorder are simply different points on a spectrum of the same disorder, or whether they are in fact two different conditions that happen to share a number of symptoms in common. While not everyone agrees, there is a general consensus emerging these days that Autistic Disorder and Asperger's Disorder are similar if not the same conditions, differing only as to where they sit on a spectrum of disability encompassed in the overall term of Pervasive Developmental Disability (PDD). Asperger's Disorder is at the higher end of that spectrum, in fact sometimes being referred to as High Functioning Autism. In a 1966 review of this question, Trevarthen and his co-authors, (Children with autism: diagnosis and interventions to meet their needs), after examining the data on this topic, concluded that autistic disorder and Asperger's disorder are better viewed as differing in level of impairment on a continuing spectrum of severity rather than being viewed as two separate conditions.
In a 1991 book edited by Uta Frith entitled Autism and Asperger's Syndrome, the links between autism and Asperger's syndrome are explored. Several distinctive features of Asperger's are generally described: (1) clumsiness and poor motor coordination, not regularly seen in autism; (2) a higher level of social functioning than seen in autistic persons but containing unusual, peculiar and naïve social interactions; (3) the use of facile, expansive language in several favorite subject areas but with no grasp of the meaning of words used, in contrast to mutism or globally impaired speech so often characteristic of autism; and (4) an average or above average measured IQ. Asperger believed his patients to be of high intelligence but provided no IQ scores to confirm that impression. Later studies have shown average or above average intelligence in 80% of cases.
While Asperger's Disorder is generally, and probably correctly, viewed as belonging on the high-functioning end of the Autistic Disorder spectrum, it may well be that it exists there as a distinct sub-group. Autistic Disorder, in my view, should more properly be called the "group of Autistic Disorders" rather than be viewed as if Autistic Disorder is a single entity with a single cause, course and outcome. Just as "mental retardation" is not a single entity—there are many sub-groups with differing causes—Autistic Disorder, or autism, likewise is not a single disorder with a single cause in all cases. Autistic Disorder is not a form of mental retardation. But just as the broad term "mental retardation" encompasses a whole number of sub-groups such as Down's Syndrome or phenylketonuria, for example, with widely differing causes, so the term "autism" or "Autistic Disorder", likewise encompasses a number of sub-groups which share similar symptoms as a final common path, but those sub-groups have widely differing causes—some genetic, some environmental, some developmental, and some acquired. In my view Asperger's Disorder exists as a separate sub-group on the Autistic Disorder or PDD spectrum, with some unique and fairly characteristic traits and symptoms, and perhaps a separate, distinct cause or etiology.
A Swedish study in 1989 suggested that Asperger's Disorder may occur in as many as 26 of 10,000 children. There appears to be an increased incidence of Asperger's Disorder among relatives of those who have the disorder, suggesting a genetic component to the condition; a case of Asperger's in triplets fortifies the evidence for some genetic factors. While clumsiness is sometimes noted as a differentiating feature between Asperger's and Autism, some studies have shown no support for that observation. Asperger himself, as well as other clinicians, have commented on face blindness (prosopagnosia) as being present, perhaps denoting a sub-group of the disorder.
Savant skills, while not universally present in Asperger's persons, are very common, and generally include prodigious memory. When they do occur, in my experience, those special abilities in Asperger's tend to involve numbers, mathematics, mechanical and spatial skills. Many are drawn to science, inventions, complex machines and particularly, now, computers. Some such skills lead to PhD's in mathematics or other sciences and a goodly number of Asperger persons are gainfully, and highly successfully, employed in computer or related industries because of the natural affinity of Asperger persons to organization, numbers and codes. Steven Silverman examines the concentration and increasing numbers of Asperger's and Autistic persons in the Silicon Valley in an in-depth article on this phenomenon in the magazine Wired, in the December 2001 issue. That article points up the natural affinity of high functioning autistic persons for computer and related occupations, and examines genetic and environmental reasons why there might be such a startling increase of Autism and Asperger's disorders as has been reported in California generally, and in the Silicon Valley specifically.
Beyond merely describing the disorder that bears his name, Dr. Asperger was passionately involved in the teaching and training of his "autistic" patients and overall he was very optimistic about outcome using proper methods and techniques. While there are other "how to" books, his hints, tips and pearls for dealing with these special people cannot be improved upon. I refer specifically in his original paper to a very detailed "how to" section for teachers involved with these autistic persons with many specific, hands on illustrations for approaching these special people. He points out forcefully that "exceptional human beings must be given exceptional educational treatment, treatment which takes into account their special difficulties. Further, we can show that despite abnormality, human beings can fulfill their social role within the community, especially if they find understanding, love and guidance". He goes on to state that even though in many cases social problems can be so profound that they overshadow everything else, "in some cases the problems are compensated by a high level of original thought and experience that can often lead to exceptional achievements in later life".
From a research point of view, in attempting to tie specific causes to specific disorders, the beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names. In that quest classifications, groups and subgroups matter. But from an everyday, living-with-the-family, sitting-in-the-classroom, or going-to-work point of view, whether Asperger's Syndrome is the same as, or different from, or a sub-group of, Autistic Disorder really doesn't matter a great deal. In those daily settings classifications, labels and diagnostic categories can often be too stereotyping, too un-individualized, and too confining. Hans Asperger, when you read his original paper, is as staunch an advocate for the persons who have the disorder that bear his name as any I have seen along the way. Liberally laced in that lengthy paper, alongside some scientific and medical terms and astute observations are the words and actions that Dr. Asperger felt make a difference in the lives of these extraordinary people, whatever the cause of the condition: "true understanding; acceptance; love; guidance; exceptional human beings; special difficulties; genuine care; kindness; sensitivity; humour; outstanding achievements; dedicated and loving educators; determination; absolutely dedicated; and a right and a duty to speak out for these children with the whole force of our personality".
The May 6, 2002 issue of TIME magazine, on-line at http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101020506/scautism.hmtl has an in-depth section entitled "The Secrets of Autism." One portion of that article examines Asperger's disorder — "a.k.a. the 'little professor' or 'geek' syndrome". It examines the apparent "explosion" in Autism and Asperger's cases, especially in the Silicon Valley in California, raising the question of whether the reported increase in cases represents an actual rise in the number of new cases or rather simply a broadening of diagnosis. The article also presents a fairly comprehensive review of some of the newer research findings, particularly in the area of genetics, regarding the causes of Autism, Asperger's and related disorders.
Much more additional, useful information about Asperger's Syndrome can be found on the O.A.S.I.S (Online Asperger's Syndrome Information and Support) Web site at http://www.udel.edu/bkirby/asperger/. Another very useful resource on Asperger's Disorder is a 1998 book by psychologist Tony Atwood, entitled Asperger's Syndrome:A Guide for Parents and Professionals. The Frequently Asked Questions section of that book is particularly helpful for parents and other caretakers or teachers with respect to specific interventions and techniques for helping Asperger persons deal with specific behaviors, and reach full potential. An additional web site which provides perspectives by persons with Autistic and Asperger's disorders, rather than just information about them, can be found at http://www.ani.ac. That site is provided by "Autism Network International, an autistic-run, self-help and advocacy organization for autistic people".
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Asperger's and High Functioning Autism: The same or different disorders?
Often Autistic Spectrum Disorders are divided into three categories: Low Functioning Autism (IQ less than 70); High Functioning Autism (IQ greater than 70); and Asperger's syndrome. Using structural MRI imaging, Lotspeich and co-workers at Stanford and other facilities, attempted to see if there were differences in total brain volume, and particularly grey matter volume, between the low functioning autism, high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome groups. From prior studies a consensus generally seems to be developing that abnormalities in gray matter development, as opposed to total brain volume, seem to be the defining feature of autism compared to control groups.
This study is the first neuroimaging work to investigate differences in brain volume specifically between autism and Asperger's patients. There were no differences between high functioning autism and Asperger's Syndrome on measurements of total cerebral volume (total, gray and white tissue), nor were there any differences between the Asperger's patients and the matched control group of non-disabled individuals in this regard. But mean cerebral gray matter volume for the Asperger's group was intermediate between the high functioning autistic group and the control group suggesting "a continuum in which cerebral gray matter volume increases with the severity of the PDD condition." However when specific neuropsychological testing, including verbal IQ and performance IQ discrepancies were analyzed, there was a suggestion that high functioning autism and Asperger's Syndrome were different disorders. The author's of the study summarize it in this way: "Our attempt to determine whether high functioning autism and Asperger's disorder are conditions on a continuum or are distinct biological entities was only partially successful. On the single measure of cerebral gray tissue volume, these conditions appear to represent a continuum of severity, with autism exhibiting the greatest aberrant neurodevelopment. However on multiple measures (ie, brain-behavior correlations of IQ with specific cerebral volumes) there is preliminary evidence of fundamentally different patterns of neurodevelopment between high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome subjects." The authors point out that other behavioral and cognitive studies have suggested autism and Asperger's may be clinically and neurobiologically different from each other, and family studies have suggested that Asperger's syndrome may be genetically different from autism as well. Their work suggests "that when high functioning autism and Asperper's syndrome are differentiated by history of language development, as they are herein, qualitative differences may surface when patterns of multiple measurements are examined.
So this study does not settle the question, but it does point in the direction that there are some basic qualitative neurodevelopmental and neurobiological differences between high functioning autism and Asperger's syndrome, and that they are not merely the same condition on spectrum that separates them only quantitatively. The study appears in Archives of General Psychiatry, March, 2004 issue (Volume 61:291-297, 2004).
For more information, please contact:
Darold A. Treffert, MD
St. Agnes Hospital, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin
Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry
University of Wisconsin Medical School, Madison
Personal Web site: http://www.daroldtreffert.com
e-mail: savants@charter.net
Friday, March 11, 2011
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=17214BB25728DDB0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqNJv5OBtq4&feature=BF&list=PL17214BB25728DDB0&index=1
Friday, March 04, 2011
Timber. Inflation Hedge
By Larry D. Spears
If you start a conversation about the building inflationary pressures already sapping consumer pocketbooks, that talk will almost certainly turn to such classic hedges as gold, silver and even crude oil.
But one of the best inflationary hedges of the 20th century is often forgotten - even though it's likely to be just as effective this time around.
We're talking about timber - and timber stocks. And the facts speak for themselves.
Investing in timber is a move virtually every investor should carefully consider.
Timber Trumps Inflation In case you're sitting in Oregon, Kentucky or some other state that's rich with forests - and therefore doubt the value of timber as an inflationary hedge. Here is some research to consider. If you look at this with an open mind, you'll see that timber is not only a great hedge against inflation, but it's a market-beating investment in virtually every type of investment environment.
If you need to be persuaded timber investing is a strategy you need to employ, consider that:
* In the modern era, inflation has never been a match for timber, which has risen faster than overall prices for more than a century. During America's last major inflationary period - from 1973 to 1981, when inflation averaged 9.2% - timberland values increased by an average of 22% per year. On average, the price of harvested lumber itself has risen more than 5% annually over the past 100 years.
* Since 1910, the value of timberland as an investment has risen faster - and with less volatility - than stocks as measured by the Standard & Poor's 500 Index. Since 1987 alone - in spite of minor losses in 2010 due to the U.S. housing slump - the Timberland Index maintained by the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries ((NCREIF)) has risen roughly 15% per year, compared to an annualized return of just 9.61% for the S&P 500.
* Timber investing has proven to be particularly alluring during bear markets. During the Great Depression, when stocks plunged more than 70%, timber gained 233%. And timber easily outperformed the S&P 500 during the 20th century's other major bear-market periods. Most recently, in 2008, when the S&P 500 lost 38%, the NCREIF Timberland Index gained 9.5%.
* Timber is a valuable tool for portfolio diversification since its price movements have a very low correlation with most other asset classes - less than +0.1.
* In spite of the glass-and-steel towers dominating the globe's urban landscapes, demand for timber is now higher than ever. The U.S. is the world's No. 1 consumer of wood products, using 27% of the timber harvested each year. The average American uses the equivalent of one 100-foot tree per year, and the rest of the world is quickly catching up. In fact, the United Nations now predicts demand for wood will double in the next 30 years, with China - already No. 2 in wood consumption - pacing the growth. As evidence of that demand, lumber exports from Canada to Asia have nearly quadrupled in the past five years alone.
* Although timber is considered a renewable resource and new trees are planted each year to replace a growing portion of the annual harvest, the world's wood supply is steadily shrinking (by an estimated 2.4% annually in the 1990s). In tropical regions, about 130,000 square kilometers (50,193 square miles) of forest is being destroyed each year. Roughly half of the forests that originally covered 46% of the earth's land surface are now gone, and 56% of North America's coastal rain forests have been destroyed. This is yet another persuasive argument that timber investing represents a significant long-term profit play.
Not Just an Inflation Hedge
If inflation isn't a worry for you, you still shouldn't ignore timber stocks. Historically, timber has proved itself to be a highly profitable investment - and thanks to rising global demand, timber shares should be top performers (as measured against other assets) in years to come.
Globally, the long-term supply-demand outlook for lumber - and for wood products in general - is highly bullish. And when you factor in shorter-term cyclical considerations - such as those related to the U.S. housing market - it gets even more attractive.
U.S. housing prices have experienced a major decline since 2006. And as prices have fallen, so has new construction. But while housing prices remain near their nadir, both buyer demand and building activity have started to increase.
The U.S. Department of Commerce, which tracks the U.S. housing market, reported that sales of new single-family homes rose to an annual rate of 329,000 in December, the highest level since the expiration of the federal-homebuyer tax credit in April (though the total for all of 2010 was just 321,000, down 14.4% from 2009). The available supply of new homes also dropped (from 8.4 months' worth of inventory to just 6.9 months' worth), and the median price leaped from $215,500 in November to $241,500.
Looking forward, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) also reported that pending home sales rose 2.0% in December, the fifth increase in the past six months, although the NAR's pending sales index was still 4.2% below year-ago levels.
On the construction side, the Commerce Department said U.S. home construction fell 4.3% in December to an annualized rate of 529,000, though some of the decline in housing starts was blamed on bad weather. More importantly, permits for new construction - a better gauge of future housing-market activity - rose to an annualized rate of 635,000 in December, well above expectations and the highest level since March 2010.
The number of potential homebuyers also is likely to increase in the months ahead: The Conference Board just reported that its index of consumer confidence climbed to 60.6 in January, sharply higher than expected and the highest reading since May 2010. Consumer optimism was particularly strong in terms of the outlook for higher wages and more job creation.
That prospective surge in housing demand bodes well for a continued rise in raw lumber prices, which have actually increased (25% in 2009 alone) in spite of reduced building activity over the past four years, thanks to lower output by lumber producers.
Top Profit Plays
Unfortunately, it's not that easy for individual investors to make direct investments in lumber. And it's even more difficult to invest in the land on which lumber-producing trees grow. Although 71% of North American timberland is privately owned (the rest resides in national forests), the owners are almost exclusively companies in the forestry business or Timberland Investment Management Organizations (TIMOs).
TIMOs, created in the 1970s after Congress mandated broader diversification for institutional investment portfolios, are similar to real estate investment trusts (REITs). But TIMOs cater to large investors - pension funds, mutual funds and some wealthy individuals who can afford the typical minimum investment of $5 million. At the end of 2009, TIMOs had about $24 billion invested in U.S. timberland, up from just $1 billion in 1989.
Given that significant "barrier to entry," the best way for most individual investors to tap into these substantial opportunities in timber is by investing in the stock of corporations that own lots if it. Two timber-investing possibilities worth considering are:
* Plum Creek Timber Co. Inc. (PCL), recent price $41.09: Plum Creek is based in Seattle, but has a long reach; it owns timberland in 19 states - from Washington to Maine and Wisconsin to Mississippi. Its forest holdings are also broadly diversified by species - from redwood and spruce, to ash and oak - as well as by age. The company also has a secondary division that focuses on mineral extraction and natural-gas production, giving it an extra edge in the inflation-hedge category. Plum Creek had revenue of $1.19 billion in 2010, producing earnings of $1.24 a share. The dividend of $1.68 gives the stock a very nice yield of 4.06%.
* Rayonier Inc. (RYN), recent price $59.83: Structured as a REIT, Rayonier owns, leases or manages around 2.5 million acres of timberland in the United States and New Zealand. It also owns three sawmills in Georgia and two specialty cellulose mills. The company produces both cellulose fibers and fluff pulp and engages in the international log-trading market. It also owns a separate portfolio of non-timber-related real estate. Based in Jacksonville, Fla., the company had 2010 revenue of $1.315 billion, which generated diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $2.54. Rayonier shares pay a dividend of $2.04 each, for a yield of 3.60%.
If you'd like more of a "nameplate" stock - not to mention one that's got more room to rebound from the effects of the recent housing downturn - a third possible timber-investing candidate worth consideration is:
* Weyerhaeuser Co. (WY), recent price $23.66: This Washington-based forest-products giant ($13.47 billion market cap) has customers worldwide, serving them with a wide range of construction materials, paper products, fibers and lumber. It manages 22 million acres of forests in 10 countries, and also has numerous mineral, oil and gas operations. Its real estate division also engages in property development, home construction and the real estate brokerage business. The stock traded above $50 a share in April 2010, but eased off in May and June with the rest of the market. Don't, however, let the current low price confuse you - it reflects a special stock-or-cash dividend of $5.6 billion (about $26 per share) paid Sept. 1, 2010, to stockholders of record in July 2010. That payout is a key step in Weyerhaeuser's plan to become a REIT. The company reported $6.55 billion in total revenue for 2010, up from $5.52 billion in 2009. That translated into diluted earnings per share of $3.99 for the year, up from a loss of $2.58 in 2009. The stock pays a regular dividend of 60 cents a share, representing a yield of 2.55%.
For investors who don't want the risk of a single-company investment, there are several exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that hold a broad portfolio of timber stocks, including those just mentioned. Two of the leaders are:
* Claymore Beacon Global Timber Index Fund (CUT), recent price $21.93: This fund attempts to mirror the performance of stocks making up the Beacon Global Timber Index, which is composed of companies from around the world that own or lease forest land, harvest trees for lumber and other wood-based products, and that produce such finished products as lumber, paper and even packaging. All have a minimum market capitalization of $300 million, and trade in the United States as common stocks, American depositary receipts (ADRs), or global depositary receipts. The fund's 52-week low of $8.00 a share occurred during last May's "flash crash." But its "effective (non-flash-crash) low" for the year was around $17.50 in late August, meaning it has gained about 28% over the past six months. The fund paid a 59-cent dividend in 2010, good for a current yield of about 3.00%.
* The iShares S&P Global Timber & Forestry Index Fund (WOOD), recent price $47.34: This ETF seeks to mirror the price and yield performance of the S&P Global Timber & Forestry Index, which consists of roughly 25 publicly traded companies engaged in the ownership, management or upstream supply chain of forests and timberlands. These include forest products companies, timber real estate investment trusts (REITs), paper-products companies, paper-packaging companies and agricultural-products companies. The fund bottomed with the rest of the market in early July at $21.05, climbing steadily since. This iShares fund has no regular declared dividend, but paid two special dividends totaling $1.12 in 2010. The expense ratio is 0.48%.
If the housing market finally moves into a full-fledged recovery, and the consumer middle class continues to emerge in countries around the world (both virtual certainties), then timberland and wood products should continue to follow the bullish path that they've followed for the last 100 years.
And that means that timber investing shouldn't be viewed as just an inflation hedge - it should be looked at as a core investment strategy every investor should employ.
If you start a conversation about the building inflationary pressures already sapping consumer pocketbooks, that talk will almost certainly turn to such classic hedges as gold, silver and even crude oil.
But one of the best inflationary hedges of the 20th century is often forgotten - even though it's likely to be just as effective this time around.
We're talking about timber - and timber stocks. And the facts speak for themselves.
Investing in timber is a move virtually every investor should carefully consider.
Timber Trumps Inflation In case you're sitting in Oregon, Kentucky or some other state that's rich with forests - and therefore doubt the value of timber as an inflationary hedge. Here is some research to consider. If you look at this with an open mind, you'll see that timber is not only a great hedge against inflation, but it's a market-beating investment in virtually every type of investment environment.
If you need to be persuaded timber investing is a strategy you need to employ, consider that:
* In the modern era, inflation has never been a match for timber, which has risen faster than overall prices for more than a century. During America's last major inflationary period - from 1973 to 1981, when inflation averaged 9.2% - timberland values increased by an average of 22% per year. On average, the price of harvested lumber itself has risen more than 5% annually over the past 100 years.
* Since 1910, the value of timberland as an investment has risen faster - and with less volatility - than stocks as measured by the Standard & Poor's 500 Index. Since 1987 alone - in spite of minor losses in 2010 due to the U.S. housing slump - the Timberland Index maintained by the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries ((NCREIF)) has risen roughly 15% per year, compared to an annualized return of just 9.61% for the S&P 500.
* Timber investing has proven to be particularly alluring during bear markets. During the Great Depression, when stocks plunged more than 70%, timber gained 233%. And timber easily outperformed the S&P 500 during the 20th century's other major bear-market periods. Most recently, in 2008, when the S&P 500 lost 38%, the NCREIF Timberland Index gained 9.5%.
* Timber is a valuable tool for portfolio diversification since its price movements have a very low correlation with most other asset classes - less than +0.1.
* In spite of the glass-and-steel towers dominating the globe's urban landscapes, demand for timber is now higher than ever. The U.S. is the world's No. 1 consumer of wood products, using 27% of the timber harvested each year. The average American uses the equivalent of one 100-foot tree per year, and the rest of the world is quickly catching up. In fact, the United Nations now predicts demand for wood will double in the next 30 years, with China - already No. 2 in wood consumption - pacing the growth. As evidence of that demand, lumber exports from Canada to Asia have nearly quadrupled in the past five years alone.
* Although timber is considered a renewable resource and new trees are planted each year to replace a growing portion of the annual harvest, the world's wood supply is steadily shrinking (by an estimated 2.4% annually in the 1990s). In tropical regions, about 130,000 square kilometers (50,193 square miles) of forest is being destroyed each year. Roughly half of the forests that originally covered 46% of the earth's land surface are now gone, and 56% of North America's coastal rain forests have been destroyed. This is yet another persuasive argument that timber investing represents a significant long-term profit play.
Not Just an Inflation Hedge
If inflation isn't a worry for you, you still shouldn't ignore timber stocks. Historically, timber has proved itself to be a highly profitable investment - and thanks to rising global demand, timber shares should be top performers (as measured against other assets) in years to come.
Globally, the long-term supply-demand outlook for lumber - and for wood products in general - is highly bullish. And when you factor in shorter-term cyclical considerations - such as those related to the U.S. housing market - it gets even more attractive.
U.S. housing prices have experienced a major decline since 2006. And as prices have fallen, so has new construction. But while housing prices remain near their nadir, both buyer demand and building activity have started to increase.
The U.S. Department of Commerce, which tracks the U.S. housing market, reported that sales of new single-family homes rose to an annual rate of 329,000 in December, the highest level since the expiration of the federal-homebuyer tax credit in April (though the total for all of 2010 was just 321,000, down 14.4% from 2009). The available supply of new homes also dropped (from 8.4 months' worth of inventory to just 6.9 months' worth), and the median price leaped from $215,500 in November to $241,500.
Looking forward, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) also reported that pending home sales rose 2.0% in December, the fifth increase in the past six months, although the NAR's pending sales index was still 4.2% below year-ago levels.
On the construction side, the Commerce Department said U.S. home construction fell 4.3% in December to an annualized rate of 529,000, though some of the decline in housing starts was blamed on bad weather. More importantly, permits for new construction - a better gauge of future housing-market activity - rose to an annualized rate of 635,000 in December, well above expectations and the highest level since March 2010.
The number of potential homebuyers also is likely to increase in the months ahead: The Conference Board just reported that its index of consumer confidence climbed to 60.6 in January, sharply higher than expected and the highest reading since May 2010. Consumer optimism was particularly strong in terms of the outlook for higher wages and more job creation.
That prospective surge in housing demand bodes well for a continued rise in raw lumber prices, which have actually increased (25% in 2009 alone) in spite of reduced building activity over the past four years, thanks to lower output by lumber producers.
Top Profit Plays
Unfortunately, it's not that easy for individual investors to make direct investments in lumber. And it's even more difficult to invest in the land on which lumber-producing trees grow. Although 71% of North American timberland is privately owned (the rest resides in national forests), the owners are almost exclusively companies in the forestry business or Timberland Investment Management Organizations (TIMOs).
TIMOs, created in the 1970s after Congress mandated broader diversification for institutional investment portfolios, are similar to real estate investment trusts (REITs). But TIMOs cater to large investors - pension funds, mutual funds and some wealthy individuals who can afford the typical minimum investment of $5 million. At the end of 2009, TIMOs had about $24 billion invested in U.S. timberland, up from just $1 billion in 1989.
Given that significant "barrier to entry," the best way for most individual investors to tap into these substantial opportunities in timber is by investing in the stock of corporations that own lots if it. Two timber-investing possibilities worth considering are:
* Plum Creek Timber Co. Inc. (PCL), recent price $41.09: Plum Creek is based in Seattle, but has a long reach; it owns timberland in 19 states - from Washington to Maine and Wisconsin to Mississippi. Its forest holdings are also broadly diversified by species - from redwood and spruce, to ash and oak - as well as by age. The company also has a secondary division that focuses on mineral extraction and natural-gas production, giving it an extra edge in the inflation-hedge category. Plum Creek had revenue of $1.19 billion in 2010, producing earnings of $1.24 a share. The dividend of $1.68 gives the stock a very nice yield of 4.06%.
* Rayonier Inc. (RYN), recent price $59.83: Structured as a REIT, Rayonier owns, leases or manages around 2.5 million acres of timberland in the United States and New Zealand. It also owns three sawmills in Georgia and two specialty cellulose mills. The company produces both cellulose fibers and fluff pulp and engages in the international log-trading market. It also owns a separate portfolio of non-timber-related real estate. Based in Jacksonville, Fla., the company had 2010 revenue of $1.315 billion, which generated diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $2.54. Rayonier shares pay a dividend of $2.04 each, for a yield of 3.60%.
If you'd like more of a "nameplate" stock - not to mention one that's got more room to rebound from the effects of the recent housing downturn - a third possible timber-investing candidate worth consideration is:
* Weyerhaeuser Co. (WY), recent price $23.66: This Washington-based forest-products giant ($13.47 billion market cap) has customers worldwide, serving them with a wide range of construction materials, paper products, fibers and lumber. It manages 22 million acres of forests in 10 countries, and also has numerous mineral, oil and gas operations. Its real estate division also engages in property development, home construction and the real estate brokerage business. The stock traded above $50 a share in April 2010, but eased off in May and June with the rest of the market. Don't, however, let the current low price confuse you - it reflects a special stock-or-cash dividend of $5.6 billion (about $26 per share) paid Sept. 1, 2010, to stockholders of record in July 2010. That payout is a key step in Weyerhaeuser's plan to become a REIT. The company reported $6.55 billion in total revenue for 2010, up from $5.52 billion in 2009. That translated into diluted earnings per share of $3.99 for the year, up from a loss of $2.58 in 2009. The stock pays a regular dividend of 60 cents a share, representing a yield of 2.55%.
For investors who don't want the risk of a single-company investment, there are several exchange-traded funds (ETFs) that hold a broad portfolio of timber stocks, including those just mentioned. Two of the leaders are:
* Claymore Beacon Global Timber Index Fund (CUT), recent price $21.93: This fund attempts to mirror the performance of stocks making up the Beacon Global Timber Index, which is composed of companies from around the world that own or lease forest land, harvest trees for lumber and other wood-based products, and that produce such finished products as lumber, paper and even packaging. All have a minimum market capitalization of $300 million, and trade in the United States as common stocks, American depositary receipts (ADRs), or global depositary receipts. The fund's 52-week low of $8.00 a share occurred during last May's "flash crash." But its "effective (non-flash-crash) low" for the year was around $17.50 in late August, meaning it has gained about 28% over the past six months. The fund paid a 59-cent dividend in 2010, good for a current yield of about 3.00%.
* The iShares S&P Global Timber & Forestry Index Fund (WOOD), recent price $47.34: This ETF seeks to mirror the price and yield performance of the S&P Global Timber & Forestry Index, which consists of roughly 25 publicly traded companies engaged in the ownership, management or upstream supply chain of forests and timberlands. These include forest products companies, timber real estate investment trusts (REITs), paper-products companies, paper-packaging companies and agricultural-products companies. The fund bottomed with the rest of the market in early July at $21.05, climbing steadily since. This iShares fund has no regular declared dividend, but paid two special dividends totaling $1.12 in 2010. The expense ratio is 0.48%.
If the housing market finally moves into a full-fledged recovery, and the consumer middle class continues to emerge in countries around the world (both virtual certainties), then timberland and wood products should continue to follow the bullish path that they've followed for the last 100 years.
And that means that timber investing shouldn't be viewed as just an inflation hedge - it should be looked at as a core investment strategy every investor should employ.
Thursday, March 03, 2011
Jessica (Jess) Stone.....blog
http://jessicamstone.com/blog/my-speech-story-the-curse-and-the-%E2%80%9Ccure%E2%80%9D/
She said: "I realized that the way I thought about my stuttering – and not the stuttering – was the real problem. I had put such suffocating pressure on myself to have perfect speech, never noticing that even fluent speakers speak imperfectly. On the bus home, I marveled at the prison I had created for myself; and I alone knew the way out. I felt incredibly liberated."
She said: "I realized that the way I thought about my stuttering – and not the stuttering – was the real problem. I had put such suffocating pressure on myself to have perfect speech, never noticing that even fluent speakers speak imperfectly. On the bus home, I marveled at the prison I had created for myself; and I alone knew the way out. I felt incredibly liberated."
Douglas Wing and Connie never replied to my Emails and never answered my Phone calls
http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2011/02/27/1888362/a-problem-of-kings-commoners.html
Feb, 27, 2011
Stuttering: A problem of kings, commoners
stuttering: Tacoma workshop Saturday
DEBBY ABE; Staff writer
If it were up to him, 13-year-old Chase Cloutier would give tonight’s Academy Award for best actor to Colin Firth for his portrayal of King George VI in “The King’s Speech.”
The Gig Harbor youth wouldn’t be afraid to hand the Oscar to Firth and say a few words in front of millions of viewers, even though he shares a noticeable trait with the British ruler. Chase stutters.
“It’s a good, good, movie of a person who stutters who overcomes his fears,” Chase said in an interview. “He still stuttered in the end. Cause you know ... you can’t be magically cured.”
Chase and countless other people who stutter are praising “The King’s Speech” as a movie that offers a realistic glimpse into the sometimes agonizing, sometimes triumphant world of people who stutter.
Firth’s King George VI, called Bertie by his family, finds himself uncomfortably thrust into the spotlight in 1936 when his brother gives up the throne to marry an American divorcee. Bertie has stammered all his life and dreads being in the position of having to speak officially, especially in public. The movie focuses on Bertie’s therapy with an Australian elocutionist.
The film has won accolades from groups representing speech therapists and people who stutter for raising public awareness about stuttering. Speech-language pathologists have encouraged their adolescent and adult clients who stutter to see the movie, which is rated R.
It’s sure to be a topic of discussion at the 14th Annual Stuttering Workshop at Larchmont Elementary School in Tacoma on Saturday. Many families who have attended in the past say it’s a life-changing event that allows children who stutter to finally meet other kids and adults who stutter.
“Most movies portray stuttering in a negative light. It’s either something to be laughed at, or a person who’s mentally unstable stutters. That’s not what stuttering is like,” said Tacoma speech-language pathologist Elaine Saitta, who also stutters. “The general consensus is it’s nice to see a movie that portrays stuttering in more of a real way. It’s not perfect, but it does a pretty good job.”
Saitta, who runs a support group for teens who stutter, organized an outing for them and their parents to see the movie and talk about it.
The families all could identify with one particularly painful scene in which Bertie fails miserably as he stands before a microphone trying to speak at a stadium packed with spectators.
“Watching him struggle and that feeling of being stuck and everyone staring at you is a feeling people who stutter understand very well,” Saitta said.
Even the most mundane activities, from buying a candy bar to answering the phone, can be difficult for people who stutter. Some people who stutter do whatever they can to avoid the situations altogether.
“It can be very handicapping if the person allows it to be,” said Staci Schmitt, a speech-language pathologist in Olympia. “Someone can stutter a lot but not be bothered by it. Others might have more of a mild stutter but are very conscious of it; it impacts their lives because they don’t want to talk.”
That’s where Chase was until he began therapy with Saitta a couple of years ago.
“I wouldn’t talk a whole lot in class and around school. I wouldn’t raise my hand to answer a question, or talk to kids to ask them for a pencil or if I could have help with a project or anything,” said Chase, a seventh-grader at Kopachuck Middle School.
“I was just scared they would mimic me or tease me or something like that. I have been teased before, quite a few times. It made me feel a bit bad. It’s something I can’t change.”
Preschoolers who stutter as part of their language development often outgrow it, but most youth who stutter into adolescence will continue to stutter, Saitta said. “Adults who stutter will probably always stutter,” she said.
Researchers aren’t exactly sure what causes stuttering, but believe it involves a combination of genetics, neurological predisposition and the environment. It’s not caused by nervousness, lack of intelligence or a psychological problem. “I often tell people I don’t stutter because I’m nervous,” Saitta said, “I’m nervous because I stutter.”
With therapy, people can learn to manage their stuttering. It may involve techniques, such as gliding into a word or focusing on how sounds are produced. One labor-intensive technique, for instance, requires a person to speak in chunks of three or four words, then take a breath, Schmitt said. Some methods show people how to “pull out” and move on if they’ve already gotten stuck on a word.
“The other thing I work really hard on is acceptance, and just being OK with it. The more we fight it, the more it will happen,” Saitta said. “The goal of therapy is often to be able to say what you want to say when you want to say it.”
Since each person’s speech impediment is unique, therapies vary significantly with each individual.
And techniques have changed radically since the 1930s when Bertie was searching for help.
Talking with marbles in the mouth, smoking to relax the larynx, and swearing – tasks that experts have Bertie attempt to stop stuttering – have been shown to be ineffective, Schmitt said.
“The therapy was painful to watch,” she said. “That was before the field (of speech-language pathology) was established.”
But some of the therapies enlisted by Bertie’s therapist, Lionel Logue, played by actor Geoffrey Rush, are used successfully today. Talking in different social settings is a commonly used tool.
In his therapy with Saitta, Chase said, “she taught me to advertise, which is you go up to shops and to people and tell them you stutter and ask if they’ve known anyone who stutters and what their stuttering was like. Or it can be as helpful as saying, ‘My name is Chase. How much does this cost?’”
He didn’t stop at one-on-one conversations. In sixth grade, he gave a speech about stuttering to his leadership class. On National Stuttering Awareness Day last October, he stepped onto the school stage to talk about stuttering, and manned a table to hand out buttons and brochures about stuttering.
“It was awesome,” Chase said. Students told him, “‘I didn’t know you stutter. That’s cool.’ I got a lot of good, good comments.”
Through practice and therapy, he said, “probably the biggest thing I learned was to be OK with it. ... Otherwise I wouldn’t get to speak with The News Tribune, write a paper, speak at school or be on the radio. It’s opened a lot of great opportunities for me.”
Debby Abe: 253-597-8694
debby.abe@thenewstribune.com
STUTTERING WORKSHOP
What: National Stuttering Association Tacoma/South Puget Sound 14th Annual Stuttering Workshop
When: 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday
Where: Larchmont Elementary School, 8601 E. B St., Tacoma
Cost: Free, though donations are accepted
Who: For children who stutter and their parents
Details: Workshops on stuttering led by national and local experts; kids games and activities, free pizza lunch.
Preregistration and info: Mary Turcotte at 360-507-4761 or mturcotte@osd.wednet.edu; Connie Haines at 253-677-6800 or ConnieDHaines@gmail.com; Douglas Wing at 253-314-1745 or douggloriawing@msn.com.
Sponsors: Tacoma, Sumner and Olympia school districts; Pepsi of Tacoma.
Articles on stuttering and “The King’s Speech”: National Stuttering Association at www.nsastutter.org or The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Leader at www.asha.org/leader.aspx.
Feb, 27, 2011
Stuttering: A problem of kings, commoners
stuttering: Tacoma workshop Saturday
DEBBY ABE; Staff writer
If it were up to him, 13-year-old Chase Cloutier would give tonight’s Academy Award for best actor to Colin Firth for his portrayal of King George VI in “The King’s Speech.”
The Gig Harbor youth wouldn’t be afraid to hand the Oscar to Firth and say a few words in front of millions of viewers, even though he shares a noticeable trait with the British ruler. Chase stutters.
“It’s a good, good, movie of a person who stutters who overcomes his fears,” Chase said in an interview. “He still stuttered in the end. Cause you know ... you can’t be magically cured.”
Chase and countless other people who stutter are praising “The King’s Speech” as a movie that offers a realistic glimpse into the sometimes agonizing, sometimes triumphant world of people who stutter.
Firth’s King George VI, called Bertie by his family, finds himself uncomfortably thrust into the spotlight in 1936 when his brother gives up the throne to marry an American divorcee. Bertie has stammered all his life and dreads being in the position of having to speak officially, especially in public. The movie focuses on Bertie’s therapy with an Australian elocutionist.
The film has won accolades from groups representing speech therapists and people who stutter for raising public awareness about stuttering. Speech-language pathologists have encouraged their adolescent and adult clients who stutter to see the movie, which is rated R.
It’s sure to be a topic of discussion at the 14th Annual Stuttering Workshop at Larchmont Elementary School in Tacoma on Saturday. Many families who have attended in the past say it’s a life-changing event that allows children who stutter to finally meet other kids and adults who stutter.
“Most movies portray stuttering in a negative light. It’s either something to be laughed at, or a person who’s mentally unstable stutters. That’s not what stuttering is like,” said Tacoma speech-language pathologist Elaine Saitta, who also stutters. “The general consensus is it’s nice to see a movie that portrays stuttering in more of a real way. It’s not perfect, but it does a pretty good job.”
Saitta, who runs a support group for teens who stutter, organized an outing for them and their parents to see the movie and talk about it.
The families all could identify with one particularly painful scene in which Bertie fails miserably as he stands before a microphone trying to speak at a stadium packed with spectators.
“Watching him struggle and that feeling of being stuck and everyone staring at you is a feeling people who stutter understand very well,” Saitta said.
Even the most mundane activities, from buying a candy bar to answering the phone, can be difficult for people who stutter. Some people who stutter do whatever they can to avoid the situations altogether.
“It can be very handicapping if the person allows it to be,” said Staci Schmitt, a speech-language pathologist in Olympia. “Someone can stutter a lot but not be bothered by it. Others might have more of a mild stutter but are very conscious of it; it impacts their lives because they don’t want to talk.”
That’s where Chase was until he began therapy with Saitta a couple of years ago.
“I wouldn’t talk a whole lot in class and around school. I wouldn’t raise my hand to answer a question, or talk to kids to ask them for a pencil or if I could have help with a project or anything,” said Chase, a seventh-grader at Kopachuck Middle School.
“I was just scared they would mimic me or tease me or something like that. I have been teased before, quite a few times. It made me feel a bit bad. It’s something I can’t change.”
Preschoolers who stutter as part of their language development often outgrow it, but most youth who stutter into adolescence will continue to stutter, Saitta said. “Adults who stutter will probably always stutter,” she said.
Researchers aren’t exactly sure what causes stuttering, but believe it involves a combination of genetics, neurological predisposition and the environment. It’s not caused by nervousness, lack of intelligence or a psychological problem. “I often tell people I don’t stutter because I’m nervous,” Saitta said, “I’m nervous because I stutter.”
With therapy, people can learn to manage their stuttering. It may involve techniques, such as gliding into a word or focusing on how sounds are produced. One labor-intensive technique, for instance, requires a person to speak in chunks of three or four words, then take a breath, Schmitt said. Some methods show people how to “pull out” and move on if they’ve already gotten stuck on a word.
“The other thing I work really hard on is acceptance, and just being OK with it. The more we fight it, the more it will happen,” Saitta said. “The goal of therapy is often to be able to say what you want to say when you want to say it.”
Since each person’s speech impediment is unique, therapies vary significantly with each individual.
And techniques have changed radically since the 1930s when Bertie was searching for help.
Talking with marbles in the mouth, smoking to relax the larynx, and swearing – tasks that experts have Bertie attempt to stop stuttering – have been shown to be ineffective, Schmitt said.
“The therapy was painful to watch,” she said. “That was before the field (of speech-language pathology) was established.”
But some of the therapies enlisted by Bertie’s therapist, Lionel Logue, played by actor Geoffrey Rush, are used successfully today. Talking in different social settings is a commonly used tool.
In his therapy with Saitta, Chase said, “she taught me to advertise, which is you go up to shops and to people and tell them you stutter and ask if they’ve known anyone who stutters and what their stuttering was like. Or it can be as helpful as saying, ‘My name is Chase. How much does this cost?’”
He didn’t stop at one-on-one conversations. In sixth grade, he gave a speech about stuttering to his leadership class. On National Stuttering Awareness Day last October, he stepped onto the school stage to talk about stuttering, and manned a table to hand out buttons and brochures about stuttering.
“It was awesome,” Chase said. Students told him, “‘I didn’t know you stutter. That’s cool.’ I got a lot of good, good comments.”
Through practice and therapy, he said, “probably the biggest thing I learned was to be OK with it. ... Otherwise I wouldn’t get to speak with The News Tribune, write a paper, speak at school or be on the radio. It’s opened a lot of great opportunities for me.”
Debby Abe: 253-597-8694
debby.abe@thenewstribune.com
STUTTERING WORKSHOP
What: National Stuttering Association Tacoma/South Puget Sound 14th Annual Stuttering Workshop
When: 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday
Where: Larchmont Elementary School, 8601 E. B St., Tacoma
Cost: Free, though donations are accepted
Who: For children who stutter and their parents
Details: Workshops on stuttering led by national and local experts; kids games and activities, free pizza lunch.
Preregistration and info: Mary Turcotte at 360-507-4761 or mturcotte@osd.wednet.edu; Connie Haines at 253-677-6800 or ConnieDHaines@gmail.com; Douglas Wing at 253-314-1745 or douggloriawing@msn.com.
Sponsors: Tacoma, Sumner and Olympia school districts; Pepsi of Tacoma.
Articles on stuttering and “The King’s Speech”: National Stuttering Association at www.nsastutter.org or The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Leader at www.asha.org/leader.aspx.
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