“Praise
your child when s/he speaks well; but this should not be taken as praise for
not stuttering; praise what s/he says, not how s/he says it. (1)
How
do you praise a child when he speaks well without praising how he says it? If you say “you sure know a lot about Pokemon©!” you are praising them
for what they said, not how they said it.
If you say, “I like how you used your easy speech when you talked about
Pokemon©,” you are praising them
for how they said it, not what they said.
I asked Eli how he might have felt if I had
intermittingly praised his fluent and natural speech when he was younger (he’s
17 now). He frowned and then responded:
“Praise the small
things. Praise things that matter. If you get lots of praise you will focus too
much on looking good in other peoples’ minds. Don’t praise something that is
commonly expected. Most people talk
without thinking about it. If I get praised for fluent speech, that tells me
that if I don’t get praised, I must be doing something wrong. I will think harder about my speech in order
to get more praise.”
“Praise things that matter.” If you praise a child
for fluent speech, they will get the idea that fluent speech is what “matters” to
their listener. Is this really the
message we want to risk sending? Doesn’t
that come with an inherent risk of adding more anxiety to communicating? Isn’t it pretty well-accepted that increased
anxiety contributes to increased tension and stuttering behavior?
I had a brief moment of hope when I read the
Stuttering Foundations “Tips for Talking With Your Child.” They say:
“Praise strengths unrelated to talking as
well, such as athletic skills, being organized, independent, or
careful.” (2)
Oh how I wish they had
said “instead of” instead of “as well.”
So close, but yet so far away. (Check the addendum at the end of this post for more examples.)
I seriously cannot
fathom any scenario where it would be appropriate and safe to praise a child
for fluent talking. It’s just not worth
the risk.
Keep them talking and
keep talking fun!
Best,
Doreen (Dori) Lenz
Holte
Addendum: Additional examples of suggestions in
professional publications to praise fluency.
“The
child’s disfluency should serve as an additional reminder to the parents to
compliment the child’s fluency.” Page
345, Stuttering Intervention: A
Collaborative Journey to Fluency Freedom, Shapiro, David
“Children
may be especially fluent when they are talking to parents at bedtime, providing
parents with the opportunity to comment on this “smooth speech” and to let the
child know that they can imagine how good it feels to talk easily.” Page 306, Stuttering: an Integrated Approach to Its
Nature and Treatment, Guitar, Barry
“Praise
your child’s talking; for example, “You are a good talker,” “I like the way you
said that,” or, “It’s fun talking with you.” (Actually, I don’t object to that
last one – it is referring to the content, not how it is being said.) Page 73, Fun with Fluency: Direct Therapy with the
Young Child, Walton, Patty and Wallace, Mary
No comments:
Post a Comment