Japs and his
family met the speech therapist – a young student from United States who had
come to Kenya in October 2011 to support children and families with speech
impairment. It was a terrific experience working with Jon. Japs and Jon became
best of friends and quite easily got along. Jon was easy-going and an
extrovert, willingly volunteering his services to improve the lives of children
who are having all kinds of speech difficulties, especially children with
autism and stutter. Jon’s schedule with Japs was every Tuesday in the
afternoon…this routine was consistent until mid-December when Jon took a break
to go on a safari at the Masai Maraa. He sure deserved a break.
He came back in
January 2012 to wrap his volunteer work and in February, went back to USA…I
shall forever be grateful for the tremendous work that Jon did with Japs. Before he left, he handed over instructional
materials on how I would get into the therapy exercise with Japs. (a) Noisy
play is great!! (b) Naming of objects with ONE word only. Use object
immediately (c) Gesture + word is BEST! (d) Describe things in simple terms as
you work/play/wash/put clothes on. (e) Try to encourage Daryle to make sounds
or copy your lips (f) PRAISE and be specific, example; GOOD SPEAKING (g)
Objects easier than pictures to use with communication (h) The KEY is MOUTHING
objects (i) TRY TO USE LITTLE LANGUAGE. Jon also gave out two activity sheets; Objects
of Reference and Now-Next. I was instructed to be doing these activities twice
a day for 10 minutes, well I must admit that it’s not been easy being
consistent but every time I remember Jon and his natural friendship with Japs,
I push myself and all in helping Japs to become verbal – I am very confident
that we are getting there.
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