Your experience with teachers over the years

pog it

Hey all,

I don't want to bore people by repeating some of my own experiences but given how big a deal school is when you are young and when you are also having to also learn how to cope with/manage your speech problem I was wondering how other people who have suffered from a speech problem at some stage, have found teachers? Were they sympathetic, heartless, ignorant of the problem, ignore the problem....

For my own part my experiences were different in primary and secondary school. I was partly bullied (psychologically) by one my teachers at primary school which was subtle and deliberate, and yet the other teachers mainly seemed to 'teach' more, rather than getting us to read out loud so I don't remember having problems in other classes apart from that one bullying teacher. I did actually confront that bully since and they avoid my gaze now when they see me at mass, (the odd time haha) etc. (They're local).

In secondary school I was constantly asked to read out loud as my problem went up and down and so teachers I suppose maybe thought I didn't suffer too much and also probably didn't want to leave me out when they were going down each row as they asked students to read out loud.
Every day in school was agony for me, character-building yes, but pure unadulterated agony!

Would be great to hear of others' experiences. Do you think teachers need more education on how to approach students with a speech problem?

Chickus

Hi, I am a primary teacher and in my school at the moment we have a very high incidence of speech and language disorders...some due to sucking of soother til the child starts school and often continued after school hours..
The staff in my school are very pro-active in dealing with this issue, we have had training from a speech and language therapist (at our request)in carrying out oral motor therapy with children..
We are extremely patient with such children and make sure they get their psychological assessment for diagnosis (this is so the child can obtain extra support hours)..they are put on waiting list for cherry orchard but this is huge and it is often 2-3 years before they receive any help from an actual speech therapist..therefore relying on the teacher who is not trained in this area unless it is part of their own personal professional development.
It does depend on the school and I understand that there were difficulties in the past with teachers but I honestly think this is and has changed significantly, in the whole area of special needs..."Inclusiveness" is the buzz word for past 6 years

pog it

Chickus wrote: »

Hi, I am a primary teacher and in my school at the moment we have a very high incidence of speech and language disorders...some due to sucking of soother til the child starts school and often continued after school hours..
The staff in my school are very pro-active in dealing with this issue, we have had training from a speech and language therapist (at our request)in carrying out oral motor therapy with children..
We are extremely patient with such children and make sure they get their psychological assessment for diagnosis (this is so the child can obtain extra support hours)..they are put on waiting list for cherry orchard but this is huge and it is often 2-3 years before they receive any help from an actual speech therapist..therefore relying on the teacher who is not trained in this area unless it is part of their own personal professional development.
It does depend on the school and I understand that there were difficulties in the past with teachers but I honestly think this is and has changed significantly, in the whole area of special needs..."Inclusiveness" is the buzz word for past 6 years

Hi Chickus.

It's great the teachers in your school showed initative in seeking expert advice- particularly when it applies to those children with problems that could have been avoided.

However, I should have said that I was talking about a stammer specifically and although some may do, most speech problems would not fall under the realm of "special needs" so I think that term can be outlawed for the purposes of the discussion here. Most students suffering from a stammer do not need extra support hours. They need more cop on from teachers and their confidence to be built up.

A very simple and effective approach from the point of view of the child who stammers is for the teacher to NOT ask them to read out loud too often. Sadly, some teachers (and this is still and will always be the case) don't actively "teach" as much as other teachers, and get kids/students to read out loud a lot more often (so they effectively teach less).

So a simple (and you would think obvious) strategy for the teacher would be to limit how often they get that child to read out loud in class. Other than that yes, of course include the child/student in all other activities

Again, the majority of stammerers do not fall under "special needs" status, and in fact a lot of students with this problem are amongst the more academically gifted. It's another reason why they might get singled out for bullying by some sadistic teachers like the one I had.

Would be really grateful to hear from others who had a stammer at school about how they found teachers dealt with the problem.

bohsboy

I still shudder to this day when I think of "a paragraph each" and it getting closer and closer.

I had two teachers that took a special interest in my problem and were very supportive. Another one just blatantly skipped me when going around the class asking questions which was a huge relief at the time but was of no benefit to me.

The worst case I had was a college lecturer who tried to humiliate me in front of a couple of hundred students.

To be fair, times have changed and people are a lot more supportive but to be honest I hated every single second of school because of the constant stress.

TaraLo

I didn't realise all through national school that I had a speech problem, mine is that I had a slight lisp and that I couldn't pronounce th's or r's, r's were especially bad and came out very clearly like l's. How I never noticed I don't know, other than that everyone skirted the fact, apart from one or two kids saying that I sounded funny (to which I replied no I don't, your weird) , and that since I'd had the problem my entire life, I didn't sound different in my head.

It wasn't until secondary school that two teachers made comments to my parents and recommended a course of action which resulted in my being sent to speech therapy. I was never skipped in readings and the teachers were very supportive. It should have been addressed sooner but when it was, it was dealt with very well.

pog it

Is it not a case that primary school teachers are not given any guidance/education in relation to this problem?

Even above, where one teacher did post here, they lumped a stammer in with speech problems deriving from sucking a soother, despite them being completely different things. So despite their best intentions, it's clear primary school teachers really need to be taught about this.

cynder

So soother sucking is to blame for my 5 years olds speech and language disorder, if that's the case the experts are just a bunch of nut jobs.

My boy is in the 1st percentile for expressive, receptive and phonologicalspeech and has diddle de squat to do with sucking a dodi when he got upset.

I find my son's junior infant teacher has higher expectations than his slt and ot. She wants him to do homework and his struggling with it and has tantrums at home. He has an sna at school and is able to perform better. He now knows his letters but us struggling with words and can't do sentences. He has 4 resource hours a week.

They say his ssld will follow him through school.

Pat40433

Spent most of my school days "dossin/mitchin" because of my stammer, nothing, absolutely nothing could have been worse than being humilated during classes - Only option was to avoid school as often as possible - even if that meant getting caught. Teachers were totally ignorant to the problem, with one even questioning if I actually had a stammer in front of a packed classroom at one point!!!! nightmare to say the least. Have developed exceptional masking skills over the years!! Having a stammer is something I wouldnt wish on my worst enemy. Has anyone on here tried using GABA (medical tablets).

U_Fig

In general my parents were very good in notifying the teachers in advance. I was always top of my class and got on well with all my teachers..being asked to read was a bit of a problem..never went well. A lot of teachers approached me about the problem...and we worked out that I was relatively ok answering questions but I prefered not to read paragraphs.. I did have one teacher that insisted that I not be left out because of it and made me read.. English teacher..Shakespeare was a fun experience..that's hard to read at the best of times..she stuck with me even tho I took like 10 times longer than everyone else... She was really supportive although sometimes she'd ask If she could skip me because of time constrains..I'd rather she skipped me all the time..

Tho the school were great really.. I got an exemption from the Irish and French oral exams getting marked more on my written was good..