Autism Spectrum Disorders and Stuttering

Autism Spectrum Disorders and Stuttering Brochure

Tips for parents

If your child is stuttering, treat him as you would any other child: with kindness and respect. Above all, convey total acceptance. Working on communication and fluency skills is a challenge that affects all areas of a child's day; therefore, the child needs as much support, encouragement and acceptance as possible. When he is speaking, try to focus on the following:

• Listen to what your child has to say. Use facial expressions and other body language to convey that you are listening to the content of the message and not to how your child is talking. Maintain eye contact.

• Allow your child the time he needs to finish his thoughts.

• Help all members of the family learn to take turns talking and listening. Objects such a microphone or a salt shaker at the dinner table can be passed to indicate each person’s turn. This provides a good model for the child with an ASD and helps her to feel like your family is “in this together.”

• Choose specific and brief times to work on strategies in the midst of everyday activities, such as 5-10 minutes during bath time. Short consistent practice is often most effective.

Tips for therapists in structuring sessions

Structure activities according to a consistent, organized schedule that the young person has helped to create. Post these routines in the therapy room so he is aware of the schedule and what comes next. The ASD population benefits most from direct engagement; this is contrary to the ADHD population who respond to rewards.

Therefore, you should teach and practice tools in the context of play or preferred activities to keep the young person engaged, and to make activities meaningful. If activities are meaningful, she will remember and use them outside therapy. Research indicates if children with ASDs are not first engaged, all the rewards in the world will not lead to generalization. Therefore, engagement is key.

For example, if the child is engaged and motivated to have a snack, have her practice speech tools when asking for the snack.

• Keep instructions simple, clear, and concise. Be sure that the child is engaged with you, and present directions multiple times if necessary. If there is no response, try simplifying the directions and/or adding visual/contextual cues. For example, simplify “Get your coat so we can go outside” to “Going outside. Get coat” while pointing to the child’s coat.

• Provide visual cues, concrete examples and drawings to increase comprehension. For example, try stretching Playdough while practicing easing in to a speech sound “e e e a s y.”

• Increase the child’s self-monitoring skills and awareness of how behaviors affect interactions with others. Focus on the accuracy of self-assessment of his speech in simple and complex speaking situations. Then teach problem solving to allow him to change his speech accordingly.

• Keep in mind the child’s level of functioning: some are quite literal and need more concrete examples, such as rating their use of speech tools “thumbs up” or “thumbs down,” while others can use more cognitively-based rating systems, such as using a scale from 1-5.

• Address overall communication skills. By introducing and modeling appropriate skills such as eye contact, volume, rate, and listening skills yourself, you will help to increase the child’s confidence and self-esteem while reducing speech-related anxiety.

• Young people with ASDs benefit from working with socially stronger peers who can act as role models. To foster generalization of new skills, explore grouping the individual with others who have similar speech characteristics and who are good social models. This will provide an optimal setting to practice fluency tools, social skills, and overall self-monitoring.

CELEBRITY FOCUS

Mel Tillis

Mel Tillis, born Lonnie Melvin Tillis, was an influential figure in country music, both as a songwriter and a performer. His journey to fame was marked by overcoming personal challenges, including a stutter that he turned into a defining part of his public persona.

Darren Sproles

Darren Sproles, a former player for The Philadelphia Eagles, the New Orleans Saints and the San Diego Chargers, made history in 2007 when he became the first player in NFL history to return a kickoff and a punt for his first two NFL touchdowns in the same game. In 2021, he was selected to be inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.

Bruce Willis

While the world knows Bruce Willis as an A-list actor, few know that he struggled with stuttering throughout his first 20 years.

Walter Bruce Willis was born in 1955 in West Germany to his German mother, Marlene, and his American GI father, David Willis. The family settled in David’s hometown of Penns Grove, New Jersey in 1957, and the couple has three other children.

Bill Walton

From BillWalton.com

Thank you for your interest in my life long problem with my speech and communication skills. I was a very shy and reserved young man who could not speak at all without severely stuttering until I was 28 years old. Always a success in the classroom and on the basketball court, I took refuge in the things that I did well as a youngster. A straight A student, my athletic abilities covered the deficiencies that limited my overall growth and development. The game of basketball was my religion, the gym my church. It was a convenient way of avoiding my responsibilities of developing my human relation skills.

When I was 28, a chance encounter at a social event with Hall of Fame broadcaster Marty Glickman completely changed my life in so many ways that things have never been the same since, nor have they ever been better. That day, in a very brief, private conversation (one way, mind you, since I literally could not speak at the time) Marty explained, patiently and concisely, that talking, communicating was a skill not a gift or a birthright and that like any skill, whether it be sports, music, business or whatever, needed to be developed over a lifetime of hard work, discipline, organization and practice. Marty gave me some simple tips that day and then encouraged me to take those keys and apply them to methods of learning that I had received from the special teachers that I had come across in my life, particularly the 6 Hall of Fame basketball coaches that I had played for throughout my career. The beginning of my whole new life was as simple as that. No gimmicks, tricks or shortcuts. Just the realization that with some help, guidance and a lot of hard work that I too could do what seemed so easy, simple and natural to everyone else, yet seemed impossibly out of my reach and comprehension.

Dave Taylor

Dave Taylor has been on the Stuttering Foundation's list of Famous People Who Stutter for many years, but probably few people know all of the unique accomplishments of this former hockey great who was born on December 4, 1955, in Levack, Ontario.