My definition of Tier 3 intervention is that students work with me but are not enrolled in special education. The purpose is to see if they respond positively to the direct intervention that I provide. If they do, they are not referred for special education services. If they don’t, they are. I have found through the years, that almost all students I see respond positively and never go into the special education system.

Almost all of the information that I have seen given by SLPs involving RtI involves language issues. From my perspective, articulation/phonology should play a primary role in RtI. There are a ton of kids (particularly in kindergarten and preschool) who need help with fronting, s-clusters and the like. At the ASHA Convention, I went to a session that stated that the research shows a strong correlation between reading deficits and articulation/phonology deficits. Thus, they stated how important it is to remediate speech errors as early as possible.

I also realize there are problems inherent with RtI such as high caseloads that leave no time to do it, students moving to another school where the SLP isn’t offering RtI, no billing/payments for services, getting more schools/students added to your caseload because your enrolled caseload is low (due to working with RtI kids), etc.

Currently I’m doing a study with RtI articulation/phonology students. I work 2 days a week (I retired in 2011), have a caseload of about 20 and an additional 11 RtI kids (with 3 already remediated so I’m now working with 8). The older 3rd grade kids are mostly /s/ and /r/ issues and the kindergartners run the gamut from fronting, consonant cluster reduction/deletion to final consonant deletion. They are seen once a week individually for 10-15 minutes and are all making progress (i.e. they are responding to my intervention).

I’m curious to hear your thoughts and what your experience has been with RtI for articulation/phonology (steve@satpac.com).

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

Upcoming workshops: Phoenix Feb.1 and 2. April 13 in Elk Grove, CA and April 27-28 in So. Cal. Details at https://satpac.com/sacks-workshops/

Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

Looking for professional development for your school district or organization? Contact me steve@satpac.com for details.

Happy New Year to you and your families. I hope this next year that we continue to make the world a better place through helping our students and clients improve their communication skills which tends to make them happier, more self-confident and more productive members of our society.

I received an email suggesting that I share with you where the SATPAC profits go. In case you were unaware, 100% of SATPAC sale profits are donated and this year I targeted homelessness and food insecurity.
The vast majority of the money went to 3 groups:

Alchemist CDC

Alchemist Community Development Corporation (CDC) is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting Sacramento area residents in their efforts to create vibrant, equitable, healthy and diverse communities. They recently received a USDA Grant to work on the feasibility of a commercial kitchen where local cooks could come and produce their food for commercial sale. http://alchemistcdc.org/

Square One Villages

In Eugene, Oregon, Gib Hayes and his dog Sadie were among the first to receive keys to a tiny home at Emerald Village on December 23rd. The home was designed and built by Arbor South Architecture and a crew of dedicated volunteers. Dubbed “Gib’s Digs,” this tiny home comes in at 236 square feet-complete with a full bath, kitchenette, sleeping nook, and storage loft.

Prior to this, Gib was living in an unheated RV without plumbing. At age 75, his modest social security check was not enough to afford even the most basic apartment rental. But now for just $350 a month, Gib can afford a permanent place to call home at Emerald Village. This monthly fee covers utilities, maintenance and operating costs, as well as membership share in the housing cooperative that the resident can take with them if and when they decide to move out. https://www.squareonevillages.org/

Dakota EcoGarden

The goal of the Eco Village Project is to provide safe, sanitary, uplifting and dignified housing for the homeless in an environmentally sustainable manner and to provide a holistic environment that gives the mental, emotional and physical tools necessary to escape the endless cycle of homelessness. Completely funded through private donations, the Dakota EcoGarden has been a positive response to Fresno’s history of cruel and illegal treatment of the homeless. https://ecovillagefresno.org/

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

Upcoming workshops: Phoenix Feb.1 and 2. Tentatively scheduled: April 13 in Elk Grove, CA and April 27-28 in So. Cal. More details later at https://satpac.com/sacks-workshops/

Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

Looking for professional development for your school district or organization? Contact me steve@satpac.com for details.

Every couple of years, SATPAC has a big special. The time is now! Instead of $199, SATPAC will be 1/3 off or $133. This includes the program as well as a .6 hr. ASHA CEU webinar on the SATPAC Program and Approach which can be used for CEUs or just for reference. This special will be good for October and November. To receive this special, use the coupon code 1/3 Off .

I begin my fall workshops in October going to Kansas City, St. Louis, Chicago, Minneapolis, Sacramento/Elk Grove and Palo Alto/Los Altos as well as 2 presentations at the ASHA Convention. Check this link for the specifics:
https://satpac.com/sacks-workshops/

I got 2 unsolicited emails this week from SATPAC users. Here they are:

#1

I used your program throughout the day and it worked perfectly! I have an 8 year old boy with a lateral lisp that my director and I can not fix ! Today with your program the little boy and I were able to achieve success using cvvcvvc ( beetseet, etc….) He was very proud of himself and I was so happy for him!

Thank you for developing this fantastic program and I feel fortunate that I was able to learn from you…thank you… , (more…)

I just scheduled my workshops for the fall. After listening to feedback about my previous workshops, I decided to do a little bit of revamping. So instead of presenting almost exclusively /r/ and /s/ information, it is now Remediating the 7 Most Common Error Sounds Using the SATPAC Approach. The emphasis is still on /r/ and /s/, but I’ve found over the years some good success with other sounds too and now will present that information.

My schedule will be Kansas City-October 12, St. Louis-October 13, Chicago-October 26, Minneapolis- October 27, Elk Grove, CA -November 2 and San Jose-November 3. See https://satpac.com/sacks-workshops/ for the specifics.

I was excited to find out that both my submissions to ASHA were accepted! One will be a poster session (along with Peter Flipsen, Jr.) on an /r/ study that we did and the other is a one-hour talk about using SATPAC with highly unintelligible middle school kids.

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

Looking for professional development for your school district or organization? Contact me steve@satpac.com for details.

I began my career in 1980 and went to my elementary school for my first day as an SLP. I was very excited! When the day was over I felt really discouraged and motivated at the same time. I realized that I didn’t know how to help many of my articulation kids and particularly the /r/ kids. I said to myself, “They are paying me lots of money and I don’t know what I’m doing!” But it motivated me to begin a quest to become an expert in remediating articulation/phonology disorders. Although I learn new things all the time in my 37th year working in the schools, I’ve felt quite competent for the last 20 years or so.

I’ve been presenting workshops to other SLPs, SLPAs and parents for the past 12 years. This has been exciting and instructive getting lots of praise for the /s/ and /r/ information I share as well as trying to figure out how to make my workshops better and more relevant. I’ve gotten lots of constructive feedback and now feel confident that my revised workshops next school year are going to be the best I’ve ever done.

So, I decided to only work one day a week in the schools next year and will travel anywhere in the country to do workshops. If your school district or organization would like me to come and present, I’m available!

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

Would you like a free SATPAC Program and free .6 hr. ASHA CEUs? If you are interested in hosting a live summer workshop, contact me at steve@satpac.com

Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing. As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs. Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

In the last newsletter, I talked a lot about the necessity for palatal constriction to make a correct /r/ sound. Research using MRI images by Suzanne Boyce in Secord, Boyce, Donohue, Fox and Shine’s book, Eliciting Sounds, shows that to make a correct /r/ sound, there also needs to be pharyngeal constriction!

The MRI of the /ɑ/ (p. 146 Secord et al.) shows excellent pharyngeal constriction as you can see that that the root of the tongue is closing off the pharyngeal area. With the /i/ sound as you can see in the next image, you get a high arched dorsum. You also get a wide tongue with the lateral margins on the back molars leading to excellent palatal constriction. According to Boyce, the vocal tract is narrowed by the blade plus a part of the dorsum. But with /i/, there is no pharyngeal constriction as you can see how open the pharyngeal area is.

Having taught /r/ successfully for years and having no knowledge of pharyngeal constriction, it occurred to me that the success of the facilitating contexts EERGA, EERSHA and EERDA (which I use) has to do with coarticulation. The student is anticipating moving into the /ᴂ/ which is very close to the /ɑ/ pictured here and thus achieves pharyngeal constriction. In fact, Boyce pointed out to me that this is probably the case from the evidence in her chapter that the /ɑ/ probably shapes pharyngeal constriction.

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

Would you like a free SATPAC Program and free .6 hr. ASHA CEUs? If you are interested in hosting a live summer workshop, contact me at steve@satpac.com

My upcoming workshops are in Baldwin Park, CA May 5, Anaheim May 6 and Elk Grove May 15. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/sacks-workshops/

Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing. As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs. Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

Through much of my career, I was unaware of various /r/ positions. I just did whatever I could to get the sound. That all changed when I started going to oral-motor workshops where I learned about the back or bunched /r/ and the retroflex /r/.

I teach the /r/ sound typically starting with the post-vocalic /r/ and always using the back /r/ because it is a more economical movement than the retroflex /r/ in most contexts. Over the years, I’ve had much better success with generalization/transfer with the back /r/. I use facilitating contexts like EERGA, EERSHA or EERDA. Through coarticulation, EERGA encourages the tongue to be placed back for /r/, EERSHA more central and EERDA more in the front. Because all kids have different oral structures, one of these productions will typically be significantly better than the others.

I begin by using infant tongue depressors for placement and stabilization. The one under the tongue (starting holding the tongue high and pushing straight back on EER-see picture) helps develop the correct placement while 3 tongue depressors taped together and held with the back molars stabilize the jaw. Without the tongue depressors, I frequently get a tongue position which drops as the jaw drops and this typically sounds like EE-YA/EER.

The reason I start with EER is this; with the /i/ sound, you get a high arched dorsum and a wide tongue with the lateral margins on the back molars leading to excellent palatal constriction.

The first 3 SATPAC practice lists all begin with EER to get a consistently correct motor pattern with the high arched dorsum and the wide tongue. For list 4, all the /r/ sounds are said. It is not unusual for students to have difficulty with sounds like AR, OR and OOR for a couple of reasons. First, the starting position up to this list has always been /i/ with the high arched dorsum. For AR, OR and OOR, the tongue starts down and needs to be elevated to be said successfully. Many students leave the tongue down leading to an incorrect /r/. Second, they often leave their lips rounded for OR and OOR and again say an incorrect /r/. At this point I have them go back to the big smile that they were doing with EER. All the various post-vocalic /r/ positions are diphthongs of ER. So EER is really EE-ER, AR is A-ER, OR is O-ER, etc. The problem at this point appears to be that the lax tongue for OR doesn’t lead to a wide enough tongue for palatal constriction. By having the student say O-ER transitioning from lip rounding to smile will lead to the correct /r/ sound. Note that this is not the natural way that we say OR. Typically we leave the lips rounded. But at this point, the student needs to work on the wide tongue for palatal constriction. Over time, as the student develops this consistent motor pattern with the wide tongue, this will become unnecessary and they will be able to use normal lip rounding and still maintain palatal constriction.

Next month: Teaching R the Way I Do – (Part 2)

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

I am available to present for professional develop both live and via live webinars. Contact me steve@satpac.com for more information.

My upcoming workshops are in Monrovia, CA May 5, Anaheim May 6 and Chico May 15 and I will be presenting at the CSHA Convention on March 17. Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing. As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs. Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

Homework is essential for successful speech remediation. As Pam Marshalla wrote in her book “Carryover Techniques”, In building any skill or change in behavior, rehearsal, practice and drill are absolutely necessary. Is it possible to develop excellence in sports, music, cooking or modifying speech without rehearsal, practice and drill?

I did some figuring and discovered that if a student is receiving speech services in a group of three for 30 minutes, once a week, the student is getting speech for .5% of his waking hours. The odds are that the other 99.5% of the time, the student is using his speech incorrectly. Just a few minutes of practice a few days a week can make a big difference in shifting this 99.5 percent from incorrect to correct speech.

How should we deal with students who do not do their homework? I frequently have this problem. The way I operate is that I give homework but don’t ask that it be returned. The reason for this is that I’ve learned over the years that it’ s not worth hassling with because most kids do not return their homework. I don’t want to waste time coercing them with things like sticker charts. I simply go by the students’ progress. If they are not progressing after 3-4 sessions, I call their parents. Often, the parents are not getting the homework. I stress for example, that I send a homework paper every Tuesday so check in the backpack for that. SATPAC lists can be emailed through a feature on the lists which is another way to deal with that problem.

I’ve presented many workshops where I’m asked what if they don’t do their homework due to various things like the parents being too busy with work or not understanding what to do. Those are legitimate concerns but my experience has been that there is always someone the student can practice with. At school there are classroom aides, parent volunteers, super star students from other classes, etc. At home there might be siblings, aunts, uncles or friends.

One of the keys to successful homework is to send home only what the student can do accurately. So in SATPAC, if we are working on list 2 in therapy, the student is practicing list 1 at home. I recently got an email from an SLP who is using an innovative method for her students’ speech homework. It is called Google Classroom which her district uses. She records the SATPAC lists and her students are able to access them at home and repeat the nonsense words after her.

So make sure you give homework and you will notice how much of a difference it makes in speeding up the remediation process!

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

I am available to present for professional develop both live and via live webinars. Contact me steve@satpac.com for more information.

My upcoming workshops are in Tucson January 19 and in Tempe January 20 and 21. I just added the Saturday, January 20 workshop due to demand. There is also a May 6 workshop in Anaheim. Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. Go to the new SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing. As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs. Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

Wishing you all a happy holiday season and for a more peaceful loving world!

In the last newsletter, I talked about speech kids transferring to my schools and when I ask them what they do in therapy, they typically reply “Play games.” Games are fun and kids like them but what is critical is keeping the focus on speech. I will incorporate games into therapy after the target sounds have been established and practiced and are ready to be transferred into conversation.

In my workshops I ask if the games promote the following key elements of the SATPAC Approach: 1) lots of correct productions of the target sound; 2) natural prosody and 3) using a conversational rate. If they do, they can be valuable motivators; if not, they can waste everyone’s time.

Here are my 5 favorite games: 1) Barrier games; 2) Tally Counter Contest; 3) Board Games w/preschoolers; 4) Home Activities w/pictures and 5) Story Creation.

Here are my 5 most UN-favorite games: 1) Fishing for Pictures; 2) Picture Cards w/Phoneme Loaded Target Sounds; 3) Board Games; 4) Making stuff – crafts, pictures, etc. and 5) Puzzles.

(To see descriptions and comments of each game, go to this link: https://app.box.com/s/m8h9kd4q6ri3sbsxz25bgg04sjyvzlsn )

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

I am available to present for professional develop both live and via live webinars. Contact me steve@satpac.com for more information.

My upcoming workshops are in Tucson January 19 and Phoenix January 20. Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations. However, unlike my live presentations, the webinar is less expensive. You can get the webinar and the iSATPAC Program which typically sells for $199, both for $150. Go to the new SATPAC website for details. Here is the link: https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing. As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs. Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

Also, I’ve developed a referral incentive program for my 6 hr. online webinar for SATPAC owners. Email me steve@satpac.com if you would like the details.

I just finished a series of workshops and part of my presentation has to do with metacognition.  The simple definition is being able to think about your thinking.  I use it in a big way in speech so that the student can understand what he/she is doing or not doing to remediate speech correctly.  So for example, if I have an /r/ student and we are working on the SATPAC facilitating context word EERGA, and the student says EE-A-GA, I will say to the student, “You said EEAGA instead of EERGA, what happened?”  Because the student knows that in order to say EERGA correctly, he/she needs to keep the dorsum high for palatal constriction, move the tongue back on the top teeth and keep the tongue wide, he/she analyzes what happened.  I will frequently get the response, “My tongue dropped.” which is probably correct.  I ask the student to try EERGA again and it is usually a better production.

This metacognition is really helpful to the student and can be applied to all aspects of the student’s life-not just in speech.  In talking to kids and adults I know who have completed speech therapy, they rarely are aware of what they did to remediate their issues.  It is as if we as SLPs did something magical to them and they were fixed.  By using this metacognitive approach, it shifts the responsibility to the student and when they finish, they also get all the praise; “You learned what you needed to do and you did it-congratulations!”

Which brings me to a conversation that I will have with my students at times.  I’ll ask what they are working on and what they need to do to say the sound correctly.  I expect my students to know this information.  When I get a new student to my school from another SLP, I always start there; “What are you working on? and the most frequent response I get is:  I DON’T KNOW.  I then ask what they do in speech and the most frequent response I get is (you guessed it):  PLAY GAMES.

Needless to say, this is not a very positive reflection upon us as professionals.

NEXT NEWSLETTER:         How to Appropriately Incorporate Fun into Therapy While Keeping the Focus on Speech.

Stephen Sacks
SATPAC Speech

P.S.  If you noticed that my picture changed, it’s because today is my dog Remy’s 6th birthday!

Our new website is up!  It looks just like the old one but there is a world of difference in its functionality.  The free CEUs are now back too.

I got a recent inquiry asking if I had any plans to come to NY.  Because I live in Central California and still work part-time, it’s difficult unless I get a specific offer which can then be arranged.  This recently happened with a group from the Washington, DC area.

However,  I do have upcoming workshops in Tucson January 19 and Phoenix January 20 as well as Anaheim on February 4.  Because I want SLPs from all over to use and understand my program, I have a .6 CEU ASHA webinar that is basically the same as my live presentations.  However, unlike my live presentations, the webinar is less expensive.  You can get the webinar and the iSATPAC Program which typically sells for $199, both for $150.  Go to the new SATPAC website for details.  Here is the link:  https://satpac.com/workshops/webinar

I am available to present for professional develop both live and via live webinars. Contact me steve@satpac.com for more information.

The are two 3 hr. webinars (Using the SATPAC Approach with Highly Unintelligible Middle School Students
and The 7 Stages of Phoneme Development) available for viewing.  As always, you can earn ASHA CEUs.  Each webinar is $49 or $79 for both.

Also, I’ve developed a referral incentive program for my online webinar for SATPAC owners.  Email me steve@satpac.com if you would like the details.