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ness and distinctness, "I am going to a picnic, and I shall take with me some pickles." The list should not be made too long. To introduce other sounds the formula can be changed to "I am going to the city," etc.

The Minister's Cat.-Each child in turn supplies an adjective for the cat, as "The minister's cat is an active cat." Adjectives can be confined to those beginning with one letter. The "grocer's dog," the "dairy man's horse," etc., can be substituted for the minister's cat.

Teakettle. One player retires from the room while a word is chosen which has more than one meaning, as "tire." This players then recalled and asks each of the others in turn any question he likes. The answer must contain the chosen word but for which the word "teakettle" is substituted. The one whose answer furnishes the clue to the word is "it" for the next time. If the word chosen were "tire" and the question is "What did you have for lunch to-day?" the answer might be "It would teakettle me to tell you all I had for lunch."

In which hand?-One player stands before the class. He has a small object which he hides in one of his hands, doing this with his hands behind his back. He then swings both arms with equally closed hands back and forth from his sides, saying, "It's hidden from sight, left or right, can you tell in which hand it hides?" The guess should be given by the formula “I think it is hidden in your left (right) hand"-not simply "right" or "left." If the guess is incorrect, "it" changes or pretends to change the object from one hand to the other, again swings his hands, and pronounces his formula for the next child's guess. The one who guesses correctly becomes "it." 2

The teacher must not expect rapid progress nor even steady progress. Conse quently she need never be discouraged, and the child should always be encouraged. There is no such thing as perfect speech. Every case is different and should be carefully studied daily. The full cooperation of the child's parents and companions must be secured as far as possible. A mere lesson once or twice a week is not sufficient; the child's speech must be more or less supervised (not in a nagging or annoying manner) daily, and, at the appropriate age, special but not burdensome exercises in reading or reciting should be carried out by the pupil out of school hours.

Private or class instruction?—The teacher of a child of school age may find it advisable to begin with private lessons, and personal attention may need to be continued for some time, but class work has its advantages provided the group is not too large. There is, or should be, mutual sympathy, helpfulness, and stimulation while confidence in speaking before others is obtained. In either case the instruction should be introduced with mental suggestion and the use of physical exercises. The children are always happy to end the hour with a game. Complex cases.-While the stammerer usually has a normal use of tongue and lips at times, there are cases in which both letter substitution and stammering

"In "Games and Other Devices for Improving Pupil's English," United States Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1923, No. 43, the teacher will find much excellent material which will serve the double purpose of improving speech and language. The cost is 10 cents. Order from the Superintendent of Documents, Washington, D. C.

Excellent suggestions as to methods of teaching kindergarten or preschool children will be found in "Mental Aspects of Stammering," by C. S. Bluemel. The Williams & Wilkins Co., Baltimore, Md.

will need to be treated at the same time, the emphasis being placed on the latter. Every stammerer (and for that matter the pupil without definite speech defect) is none the worse for the general efforts at better pronunciation and enunciation. The teacher should secure the cooperation of her classes in helping the stammerer. An appeal (in the pupil's absence) for sympathetic consideration of one who is as much handicapped as if partially blind or deaf, or crippled in limb, should prevent or stop the mirth or ridicule to which the stammerer is so frequently subject. At any rate, any behavior of pupils which adds to the selfconsciousness of the stammerer should not be tolerated.

There are all degrees of stammering. It may be well, in the beginning of treatment, to excuse the stammerer from recitations other than the answering of questions which require only a "yes" or "no" or other reply which he can readily make. Having established a sympathetic atmosphere in the class, and having, by special instruction, given the pupil some confidence, he should be gradually given more opportunity to take part in regular lessons. He should be checked in too hasty utterance and assisted, as far as need be, over difficulties of utterance. Because of his difficulty in oral expression the stammerer must not be looked upon as dull and he should be given ample credit for other evidence of good work. Incidentally it is well to make both the stammerer and his fellows conscious of anything in which the stammerer is superior. This makes for confidence on the part of the stammerer and respect by the pupils.

For Parents (Where They Are Also, of Necessity, the Teachers)

No matter how it begins or what its cause, the stammering child does not stammer intentionally. It is the last thing he wishes to do and the worst thing that can be done is to scold him or make fun of him. It does no good and it does do harm. The child can not do differently under the circumstances, and the circumstances must be changed if he is to change. The stammering child is said to be nervous. He usually is, but it is from being misunderstood, harshly corrected, or laughed at. His life at best is not a happy one. Kindness without coddling, sympathy, unlimited patience, constant encouragement, and wise helpfulness are needed. There must be established a calm and happy atmosphere in the home. Without the stammerer's knowledge it should be explained to other children in the family and to other of the child's associates that the stammerer can no more overcome his defects at once than one can stop the mumps or measles, but that if they will overlook his infirmity he will be helped in overcoming it.

The stammerer needs (as is explained on pp. 12 and 17) to be furnished every condition that will improve his physical health.

The special treatment of the beginning stammerer has been mentioned else. where (p. 4). If a child begins to stammer following an illness or a severe shock, he should be kept from talking as much as possible until physical recovery is complete.

On the more positive side the parents should help the child who begins to stammer by furnishing an appropriate word, or by gently checking him and asking him to repeat the sentence more deliberately. They can often help him

by repeating the sentence with him and then have him repeat it alone. The parents should cultivate and discipline their own speech until it is calm and clear. It will be worth the effort to all concerned.

The parent should see that the child of school age, under special speech instruction, is helped in carrying out the wishes of the teacher by the careful use of assigned exercises of speech out of school hours. He should be given every opportunity for play and for losing himself in books, music, or other absorbing activities which he finds to his liking. He should be encouraged to play with others in out-of-door sports, but he should never be driven in this direction. The child, already nervously worn, is not helped by exciting or exhausting exercise. Stammering has been observed by teachers of speech correction to be noticeably worse on Monday in children who have had a week-end of parties, late hours, and miscellaneous feeding.

The Stammerer Himself

The stammerer who would improve his speech must be something more than a passive participant in the process. The will to make the most of the training he receives will carry him a long way. Courage, patience, and persistence, and a sportsmanlike attitude toward the difficulties he must overcome will do the rest. The difficulty is not with the speech organs themselves but in gaining control of them (and therefore self-control) at all times.

Speech in all of us is tell-tale of general physical condition. Even those who talk well, speak with less force and distinctness when they are ill or fatigued. The opera singer who would keep his reputation must look after his food and his hours of rest and not be extravagant in his daily nervous expenditures in physical activity. The person in earnest for better speech will (a) take plenty of sleep or at least rest (10 hours will hardly be too much); (b) be up in time to eat leisurely a good breakfast; (c) be regular at his other meals and will include fruit, vegeta bles, and milk (in whatever form he likes), eggs and meat (once a day); (d) take no coffee or tea; (e) be out of doors for two or more hours a day in suitable weather and engaged in activities in which he is especially interested but which are not exhausting. Indoors there are, besides school studies, music, reading, and other mind-absorbing interests.

The pupil will cooperate with the work of the teacher, will carry out any speech exercises faithfully and endeavor to follow carefully the suggestions of the instructor regarding his speech. The speech teacher is only a help. Like the music student, the pupil must do the actual work of acquiring musical speech at other times as well as during the lesson. After all, there are few people who could not greatly improve their speech if they only tried.

The stammerer need not expect to secure perfect speech in a year. His progress from day to day may seem slow, but small improvement each week means large improvement in a year. He will, of course, have some off days. Like the tradi tional frog in the well, he may slide back a trifle on such days, but his later efforts should carry him nearer the top.

Handedness and speech.--In most persons (and most persons are right handed) the central switch station of the nervous system, by means of which the speech organs are manipulated, is situated in the left half of the brain, and therefore on the same side as the centers which control the action of the right hand. In persons who are left handed the speech centers are thought to be located in the right half of the brain, on the side of the centers controlling the muscles of the left hand.

Because of this possible relationship of the speech and hand centers in the lefthanded person, the belief is current that an attempt to change from the use of the left to the right hand may disturb the working of the speech center and produce a disorder of speech. If such is the case, it must be of rare occurrence and probably the result of drastic methods used to secure the change from left to right hand work. Based on the idea that the right-handed stammerer may have his speech center developed on the right side of the brain (on the opposite side from the side controlling the right hand), it has been suggested that such a speech defective should be trained to be left handed, thus bringing the speech and motor centers into a closer relationship. Cures from such training have been reported, but the mental suggestion accompanying the cure needs to be taken into consideration as producing or helping to produce the cure.

From what knowledge we have it would seem that, at school age, the change from left to right handedness (when not accompanied by emotional stress) is not likely to disturb normal speech, and there is very little ground for attempting a cure of stammering by changing the use of the hands. Where, in a left-handed child, attempts at change makes the speech worse, such attempts should cer tainly not be continued. The speech defective has enough to overcome without adding other difficulties.

Other Speech Conditions

Foreign, Family, and Provincial Dialect

In many children mispronunciations which might seem to be due to defects in the organs of speech are due to the pronunciations which they have derived from a previous use of a foreign language, from contact in the home with those who speak such a language, or they are the results of the imitation of local and peculiar speech. The pupil may not be aware of his mispronunciations, and the treatment consists of making him aware of this, of demonstrating the true sounds, and in cultivating the habit of correct pronunciation.

Mispronunciations may be due to early methods of speech (baby talk) which have been more or less encouraged or, at any rate, not discouraged in the home. In speech, as in other matters, we follow the line of least resistance until we are urged or dragged out of our habitual rut.

Speech defects of this nature can be detected by the methods already given. More than one error of pronunciation may be found, and these should be corrected one at a time.

Cleft Palate and Other Conditions Producing a Nasal Voice

A normal nose is important for good speech, but in cleft palate and some other conditions too much of the vocal sound passes through the nose. The “nasal twang" is bad enough, out with an abnormal opening between the mouth and nose speech may be more or less unintelligible.

If the nostrils are closed, by pinching with the fingers, and the vowels are sounded a vibration will be felt in the fingers if the sounds pass too much into the nose. By practice the sounds should be directed more to the mouth, in which case the vibration will more or less disappear. The vowels should also be com bined for such practice with the consonants, except m and n and ng, which require the open nose for their use.3

Nasal Obstruction

Anyone who has had an obstructive cold in the head realizes the need of the normal nose for clear speech, especially of words containing m and n. Where there is an unavoidable chronic obstruction in the nose or impaired resonance in the cavities of the head communicating with the nose, careful practice of exercises with words containing m and n will improve the speech to some degree.

Seriously Delayed Speech

Most children are able to make use of at least a few words by the age of 18 months, but some do not acquire the art of speech until later. When the age of 4 is reached without the use of intelligible language, training in this direction should be attempted. An examination should be made first to determine whether the child hears normally and if there are other defects affecting the use of the voice.

Teaching should begin with the simplest sounds. The following suggestions are made by Helen M. Peppard:

When teaching a sound to a child whose speech images are retarded the teacher should take the child's face between his hands. The child should watch closely the teacher's mouth while the latter produces a simple sound, such as p. The teacher should continue making the same sound until the child can produce it. His eyes should then be covered by the teacher's hand, shutting out all visual stimuli that would cause distraction from the auditory impression, and the sound ah should be made close to the child's ear. This is done in order to give sufficient quantity and quality to the sound to make a strong impression. It will be necessary to make the sound several times very distinctly. Then the teacher should face the child. The child's hand should be placed on the teacher's throat, so that he can feel the vibration when the teacher says ah. (The mouth should be well open.) The child should then produce the sound.

It is well not to let the child attempt the sound more than once each time after the teacher has given it, for as yet his concept is not sufficiently definite for him to use it as a model. If it were, he would need no more training on that sound. The teacher should then slowly produce the sounds in succession as p-ah, p-ah, developing the papa. Other combinations should be taken up in the same manner. Progress will be very slow. The teacher must remember that, with such a case, the

For further material regarding the teaching of cases with cleft palate the reader is referred to "The Correction of Speech Defects," by Helen M. Peppard, and "Defects of Speech," by Ida C. Ward.

• "Correction of Speech Defects." New York, The Macmillan Co.

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