How to Write Stuttering Goals for School Age Students

Marisha (00:01.171)

Hello there and welcome to the SLP Now podcast. I'm really excited to be wrapping up our series on stuttering. Today we have Ashley Coverley with us. She is a speech language pathologist based in Louisville, Kentucky, and she works out at an outpatient pediatric practice. And she has a special interest in working with children, teens and adults who stutter.

and she has some really great experiences and I can't her bio like my version of her bio won't do her story justice. So I'm going to turn it over to Ashley. So Ashley welcome.

Ashley (00:40.515)

Hi, thanks for having me.

Marisha (00:42.449)

Yeah, I'm so excited to be having this conversation with you. And before we dive into, so today we're going to be focusing on or chatting about goal writing and kind of a peek at treatment. But before we dive into those things, can you tell us a little bit more about your story? Kind of what led you to specialize in this area and maybe like a snapshot of kind of what that journey has looked like?

Ashley (01:08.502)

Yeah, so I first got started, you know, choosing the SLP path, which we all kind of know is a long journey. When I first got started in SLP, I kind of knew right away in college what I wanted to do was focus on that. And I always felt like I wanted to be in a helping profession because I

love to talk and love to like get real with people, all that. think if I wouldn't have been in SLP, I probably would have focused on counseling, therapeutic kind of stuff somehow. I do think that was kind of always the path that I would follow. So in my undergrad experience, I went to Central Michigan University. I'm from Michigan originally, even though I'm in Kentucky now. I went there for my undergrad and

It was towards the end, like before I graduated, you, not all schools do this, but some can give you an experience to be a clinician, not just observe even in undergrad, but you don't always get that option. But I did have that option. So I was a student clinician in undergrad and my first patient was a child who stuttered. So I had absolutely no idea what to do with that because you don't learn.

anything about stuttering in undergrad, pretty much at all. Besides, this is what this is and SLPs treat it, right? Like we work with people. So it's pretty much the extent of the knowledge I have had at that time. But I had a good mentor who did know a lot about stuttering therapy. So that was my first experience with it. And even then it was not, I don't like to say it was not good, but it was not bad. It was just what it was. And it

did also expose me to a totally different approach than what I thought SLP would be, which is really cool. And I really loved working with the person and it was extra cool because there were siblings who stuttered and they went to the same clinic and we could do some like group therapy type stuff too. It was kind of cool. So that kind of got me like introduced to it at first. And I was thinking,

Ashley (03:30.06)

wow, I love this. And by the end of it, we were doing all kinds of things together. And so by the time it came to apply to grad school, go to grad school, I went to the University of Toledo, which has a stuttering intensive. Actually, I don't think they have anymore. They had a stuttering intensive option as one of your clinical experiences there. So my mentor who's Dr. Gobble, he led the intensive and while I was going there for grad school,

That's one of the things that kind of led me there is I knew I wanted to do that if I could. And, he came up with an extra graduate certification program sort of thing where you could tack it on to your masters. And I ended up doing that. So it was. It's official title is like advanced fluency treatment kind of thing. So had to take additional classes on top of all of our normal classes and then do the intensive.

and then do some research as well. And that was a really cool experience, a little more work, but pretty much all of it was based in counseling. So I really loved it. And I knew I wanted to like keep going and take everything further. So I just ended up graduating and making, centering a huge focus in who I work with.

Marisha (04:52.295)

That's amazing. And how cool that you had the opportunity to get like to earn a certificate with additional training. And like, because it sounds like you had additional courses and clinical work and research too. that's awesome. Really cool.

Ashley (04:58.126)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (05:08.876)

Yeah, yeah, it was pretty cool.

Marisha (05:13.991)

Yeah, and I got excited when you said you had extra counseling classes. I feel like we could all use a little bit more counseling, like coursework in our graduate programs.

Ashley (05:25.806)

Totally agree. I've heard of some programs saying they're adding like a counseling course in those shorter, usually over summer courses that are like six weeks. And I know some are looking into adding that into the coursework, which I think is amazing because I've used the skills I have with all the kids I work with, not just those who stutter. There's so many opportunities to use those approaches. It's really, really helpful.

Marisha (05:54.545)

Yeah. Well, we might have to have a follow-up podcast episode about that. We do have a counseling episode in this series, but I feel like there's one episode won't cover all the things. So that could be really cool. Okay.

Ashley (05:57.376)

Mm-hmm. Yes.

Ashley (06:05.42)

Mm-hmm.

Marisha (06:09.381)

Awesome. And I love that story. So thank you so much for sharing your journey with us. then so let's transition into some of the content. And I feel like one of the questions that everyone asks when we talk about stuttering is goal writing. So what and I this is just going to be like a conversation where we'll get to start talking about things. It definitely won't be a comprehensive. But actually, what like tips or strategies or what do you think about when

Ashley (06:12.898)

Yeah.

Marisha (06:39.355)

when you're considering like goals for students. And I know that there's so much that goes into it. And we have an episode on assessment. So yeah, assuming we have a good foundation with those things, what would you recommend?

Ashley (06:49.198)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (06:53.102)

So it's funny because it's something that seems tricky, but once you really dive in, it's not as tricky as it seems like it could be. Right. So goal writing definitely goes hand in hand with the assessment process and with the treatment process, because it's most important that no matter who you're working with, it's going to be a person centered approach. So there's a lot of research that supports.

Working with the person to create goals leads to better outcomes. They're more motivated to meet those goals. They're going to pick the things that are important to them. Therefore they might actually try to create change. Right. We all probably have that personal experience too. So you talked about assessment. So typically if I can, I'm making these goals with a child during the assessment process or

if I can maybe the next few sessions, which is tricky because you have to have a plan of care in some way, right? And obviously there are other things to consider, right? If you're an SLP working in the schools, your goals have got to be oriented around the academic experience. I work in an outpatient setting, so I can be a little more flexible with my goals. I can make them about the school. I can make them about community, social, family, friends, all the things.

So I have little more flexibility compared to an SFB in school. So I think the biggest thing is back to assessment a little bit. During that evaluation, I try to answer at least one of these questions, right? I'm asking or probing, you don't have to directly ask even though I usually do directly ask, what would be different if...

things were different, right? If you could do the things you wanted to, what would they look like? I'm trying to find out maybe what avoidances are happening, speaking avoidances, stuttering avoidances, what do those look like? I want to know what feels helpful to the person. That's going to look different for everybody. I want to know what would help. So for example, I might

Ashley (09:17.4)

kind of give a rundown of something that a speech therapist could help with. Could teach you more about stuttering. We could find out how stuttering affects you more, all those things. Maybe I'm kind of giving a breakdown of what speech therapy can look like so that I know what would be helpful, what of these things could be helpful. And then overall impact, academic versus social impact for them.

So let's say you get a child who doesn't really want to open up during that process. That's where it can get tricky. I haven't had too much trouble like making at least one goal with a child, but I have had some where I came close to like, are we going to figure something out? I'm not sure if we can during the evaluation. So then I would refer back to maybe a teacher questionnaire, what they're observing in the classroom or a parent questionnaire, what they're observing now.

That being said, that's my last resort because what a teacher and a caregiver might perceive to be happening with the child could not be true at all, or could be a misplaced judgment, something like that. And that's usually why I defer to that or have it as evidence towards my assessment too, of course. But I might then make goals with the kid.

right then and there if they've given me some information. So I tell them, you know, I'm your speech therapist and we have to have goals when we're working together. We have to have something we're working towards and let's figure those things out together because I want it to be what's important to you. So there's different ways you can make some goals. think one of the most straightforward ways that I want to talk about is rating skills. One of, I'm not sure if assessment was talked about the Oasis.

That's when I use a lot, because it can give you a valid impact rating that you can use for your assessment. So within that assessment, there are rating skills. They're reading all kinds of things on there. So maybe we'll flip back through that and I'll say what really stuck out to you is something you wish was different on here. You rated it and you wished it was different. And we might just take that statement that was in there.

Ashley (11:40.096)

And figure out how to turn it into a goal. So if it was just maybe something to do with an avoidance, avoiding speaking, asking questions in class or something, it's very specific, but they really want to be able to ask questions in class. So I'll just write a goal that we started at a four on this writing scale and we want to end up at a five. started at a three. want to achieve a five, that type of thing. So reading skills can be super helpful. And.

You don't have to use something like the Oasis to create a rating scale goal. could, after having conversations about what would be different, what avoidances are happening, what feels helpful, you could have them rate some things regarding the conversations you're having and then create your goal that way. Another helpful thing to do is if they told you what they want to be different, maybe you're creating a goal that increases

them doing that specific thing, right? They really want to order food for themselves at a restaurant. They're going to do that two times during the treatment period or something like that. You can decide on that frequency with the kid you're working with, but that is a measurable goal because they're going to do it and report that they have two, three, four times, whatever it is by this end date. And that's the goal you're working towards. Maybe they've expressed wanting to.

learn more about stuttering, which happens that comes up a lot. Usually that's a big killer that we want to try to address right away. And sometimes people might write a goal like that they're able to answer questions about stuttering, things like that, which I think is helpful, but I think it could be even more helpful and like really practical, especially at school. And that you can actually apply, right? Maybe

they will form at least two statements that they could say to someone asking them a question about stuttering. And then you would have done all the education and use the stuff you learned to create some kind of statement you could tell someone or how you would answer their question. Or maybe they'll be able to answer, you know, three hypothetical questions about stuttering that a peer or adult may ask them something like that. So, so many ways to approach the goal writing.

Ashley (14:06.676)

But I think the most important thing is focusing on what's important to the child and figuring out where they can see the change. You know, what would be maybe what would feel the easiest to change? What's going to feel the hardest? Let's start with something easier in the middle and work our way up that kind of thing. But

Marisha (14:28.615)

Yeah, I love how functional and practical that is. It's just like, cause I feel like sometimes goal writing can feel really difficult, but you just broke it down in a really easy to understand way. Like we just speak, like have conversations with the child, figure out what's important and write goals to help them achieve what's important to them.

Ashley (14:32.398)

Okay.

Ashley (14:40.846)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (14:48.206)

here.

Ashley (14:53.73)

Yeah. And I think for those ones who you're not getting a whole lot of information, they just met you at this evaluation. It's tricky. You don't have that report yet. You can always, you know, use those questionnaires to kind of inform maybe the smallest goal you can, or maybe you write a goal based on the education stuff, because you know that is important. And then you write another goal that they're going to participate in goal planning somehow, finagle that in that way.

you can work on medical planning in your treatment sessions and add in some more goals if you need to.

Marisha (15:27.035)

Yeah, that's great. And that makes a lot of sense. And I love what you said too about the the stuttering education and like being able to form statements, maybe like to tell someone else about stuttering, because that could be like a cool dual function with some advocacy too. I love it. Like working smarter, not harder, tackling all the things. I love it.

Ashley (15:29.87)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (15:40.31)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (15:45.28)

Yes, exactly. I really like that one. Yeah.

Yes, yes, yes.

Marisha (15:54.931)

So is there anything else that you wanted to touch on in terms of goal writing before we kind of chat a little bit about like how we can transform that into therapy?

Ashley (16:06.178)

I think just the focus again on making sure it's what the child wants and explaining why you've chosen those goals to caregivers can also be tricky sometimes. But I think your plan of care, those goals can show a caregiver why this is important and keep that in mind too. Especially if your child has expressed that it's

Marisha (16:12.467)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (16:35.094)

important to them. That's why we're choosing this. We want it to be motivating those types of things and being like flexible in your goal writing because it's going to be a lot different than an articulation goal or a language goal. They're just a lot more. It's this idea of being broad and narrow at the same time and writing that line.

so that the goal is measurable and readable, but can be a little more open and flexible as you're working with some of the starters.

Marisha (17:13.137)

Yeah, and I think the use of rating scales is a great way to capture that, like those things that aren't necessarily super quantifiable, like if we use the rating scale, that gives us that, like the opportunity to target those types of things and still have good data for them. Awesome. So shall we dive into some treatment? Okay.

Ashley (17:23.957)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (17:33.163)

Yeah, definitely.

Ashley (17:40.174)

Yes.

Marisha (17:41.541)

So what can you tell us about treatment?

Ashley (17:44.334)

So we're back to this person-centered approach. We're always, I mean, everything we do as SLPs should be a person-centered approach, right? If you're working with a child who has a praxia, you're creating a functional word list and making that person-centered. But when it comes to stuttering, there's not really a linear plan you can follow, you know, and other things in speech there aren't either. But I feel like you at least can say, I'll try.

the complexity approach and I'll try cycles and figure out which one's better, whatever. This is more following child's lead, which puts you in the position of not having a plan, which for many SLPs can be a challenge. I know even for me that is. So in the approach to stuttering therapy, we're

following a child's lead, we're meeting them where they're at, right? So a lot of counseling approaches, Rebecca, counseling, right? I'm usually even pulling from different therapeutic approaches, Cognitive behavioral therapy, solution-focused brief therapy, avoidance reduction therapy, acceptance and commitment therapy. I'm trying to pull from those.

different approaches to find whatever resonates with someone better. Because I know for me, if I'm being counseled, I want somebody to like find what I like best. And that might mean I like this part of this and that part of that. And I want to try those together. And it's kind of like little melting pot approaches, which is cool. And I feel like all those things can create a like,

good foundation for following more of an identity model when it comes to stuttering. The stuttering community has really expressed how impactful it can be when you consider stuttering as part of your identity. Now, some people might disagree with that, which is completely fine. So you don't want to push that on anybody, but you want to know that there is an element of identity that can really impact a person. addressing that.

Ashley (20:02.958)

is important. And as long as you're meeting somebody where they're at, you can start to really explore that. So you're just finding what works best for somebody, right? And in treatment, you want to be as guiding as possible. But some kids really need to be led sometimes, which is tricky, because sometimes you have to know when it's okay with

to just have some awkward silence until we're going to find some kind of answer. Or maybe we need to just like get something and paper out and you can write if you can't, you know, have this conversation yet or do this back and forth. Maybe we can break it down in a different way so that at least we're some thoughts out, maybe not even feelings yet, stuff like that. So I think it's important to try to set the precedent.

early on that they're in charge of all of this kind of they're the ones who are leading where everything goes. You can obviously provide that education. think that's a big area, right? Another big area to consider is can we expose to the stuttering community anyway, if there isn't any in-person

you know, community available. Is there an online community? Is there just videos we can watch of people who started talking about it, incorporating that anyway? You know, just exploring and identifying thoughts and feelings and actions, avoidances. And then again, that acceptance and identity piece. What self perceptions does this person have exploring those? And then

what are their communication experiences and are there any barriers that exist? I think that kind of gets overlooked sometimes. Barriers could be a teacher not understanding stuttering fully, a caregiver not understanding stuttering fully, extended family, know, like aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, that can be a barrier too. And figuring out what

Ashley (22:27.63)

types of activities can help with all of that. some children might just like sitting there and talking it all out and writing stuff down as you go. Sometimes the only like activity I bring into the session is different colored pens and a bunch of paper so we can kind of like get it all out and get it down. Other times I might have like a little worksheet printed off that's going to explore this, this and this and I'm not going to

into the session being like, today we're going to do a rating scale all about feeling worried, right? It's not like that, but I'm going to have maybe a bunch of stuff printed based on other conversations we've had before, and if that comes up again, I might be like, okay, what's going to be helpful? If they're not sure, maybe I offer, we could do this to talk about it, we can do this, we could do this, like what feels like it would actually be helpful for you? And I would roll with that.

Or maybe I would based on the conversation we're having without the different colored pens and just write down everything and kind of look it over and be like, okay, what do we see here? What's sticking out based on everything we just talked about? I do have a lot of therapeutic activities that are go-tos for

someone, you know, when this comes up, we might use this activity. If this comes up, we're going to use this activity. Rating scales, of course, like always are helpful. And it doesn't even have to be a numbered rating scale. We might just make a scale of

the hard communication experiences, the communication experiences that feel easy, who I'm most comfortable talking to, who least comfortable talking to, all the different scales, all those kind of hierarchical activities. Those might also include like, like a zones sort of activity where you make like the circles and you have little comfort zones and the idea is try to move everybody in the middle zone where they're most comfortable. Or you could do any topic.

Ashley (24:37.55)

hierarchies are also helpful with the goal planning because if this is our goal, we can't just tomorrow do this thing. So what are the steps we'll take to get there? We don't have to identify every step, maybe just like the first two steps. And then we keep adding onto it. I'm doing a lot with any cognitive cycles, right? You're feeling something, you're thinking something, you're acting away because of that.

And is this cycle helpful? What is a more helpful cycle look like? Are you change? What part of that are you changing to make it more helpful? What can you try? Maybe there's like two different things you can try and see if there's a different outcome for you. See if you like that better. That can be really helpful to just break down one situation.

and you're figuring out what happens, how do you think, and act before, during, and then after. And then you can kind of start to see patterns. Maybe you're doing that for tons of situations. Finding the pattern together and figuring out what would, if we change something, would it help? What's gonna change? Another really helpful activity that I like to do that comes from the acceptance and commitment therapy is

actually writing down what someone's communication values are. So what do you value about communication? You know, getting close to friends, making new friends. Maybe you love talking about video games with your dad. Like what kind of communication values do you have and reframing, you know, if I'm meeting my communication values, then that's

the most important thing I can be doing and making sure those communication values are being met, which another is a great, also a great way to approach goals. because picking one of those communication values, maybe that the child doesn't feel like they're meeting. How do we help with that communication value? and then just identifying different solutions. love to do cost benefit analysis.

Ashley (27:00.054)

which we take, you know, one situation, maybe it's something they avoid. Maybe it's, a particular thing, like a class presentation, whatever it is. What are the costs? What are the benefits of doing X, Y, Z and breaking it down? And then, you know, are there any consequences of doing something this way? Are there benefits of doing something this way? What does that look like? What do you want to try?

Are you fine with things being like this? Because sometimes the answer is yes. And I'm like, all right, let's focus on something different. It's focused on something that matters to you right now. So, and within that, you're usually focusing on a lot of self advocating and brainstorming and figuring out actual actionable things that someone can do. Because I think sometimes we can talk a lot about something, but

What will the action look like? How will you know you feel better about this? How will you know this is different? What would, what evidence would lead you there? You're like changing something, you're thinking differently. How is it going to be different? And that can be really helpful. And then you can overlook just like some emotional learning in general too. Some kids have never gotten to talk about their feelings about this. So.

we're just talking about feelings. You're talking about the difference between, you know, feeling guilty and feeling shame. Like you're kind of breaking down what these feelings are and maybe other ways you felt them so you can kind of compare it to the experience that you might be having with stuttering. The classic iceberg, most people do know that it's still a great way to talk about those things and what

Again, listeners might perceive versus the speaker's actual experience. Everything you do in the therapy room, and you can talk to a child about this, is going to be about the speaker's experience and the way to change that iceberg and make it look different, make the feelings under the surface a better.

Ashley (29:24.692)

experience for the speaker. So I think just being able to set the precedent that these are the things we're working on in therapy can be really helpful. And we're trying all kinds of different solutions to create change that's meaningful.

Marisha (29:47.325)

So many options. I love it. And so a lot of questions are coming up that I think I'm going to ask two follow up questions if that's okay. So, because you shared a lot of kind of counseling approaches and like you had that amazing training in your graduate program, but have you come across or like if you

Ashley (29:48.654)

So many.

Ashley (29:57.518)

Okay, yes.

Ashley (30:04.12)

Mm-hmm.

Marisha (30:11.635)

Like what would you recommend to an SLP who didn't have that in their graduate program? Like have you come across any favorite like trainings or like books or resources? Because I feel like a lot of this, like to do this well, we really need to have that background knowledge.

Ashley (30:29.28)

Yeah. think that firstly, not an official training or anything, but engaging with the stuttering community. You will learn an incredible amount. And I know you talked with Ezra and they gave so many great insights. but Instagram is full of people who stutter, who are just sharing their experiences and providing that level of.

Marisha (30:37.651)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (30:58.302)

advocacy for the community. think I've learned the most from people who stutter by far. It informs everything that I do or talk about or work on with kids. It's just extremely impactful. And also by exploring that community, you're seeing different things you might be able to show the kids you work with too, which is a great and helpful thing as well as send to caregivers, teachers, anything like that. You can kind of

say things that you think are helpful and all of that. But I think the training I'd recommend the most, which I've done, is the avoidance reduction therapy with Vivian Siskin and her team. It is extremely comprehensive, extremely helpful for SLPs who

aren't quite versed with stuttering approaches and it kind of encapsulates the most important elements that we should be addressing in therapy. It's probably the biggest thing I focus on in my therapy. know, avoidances are typically what are impacting kids, teens, adults who stutter the most. And it can help with

all age ranges too. So I feel like it is a really valuable training.

Marisha (32:27.941)

Yeah, and do you can you tell us a little bit about like what the training looks like?

Ashley (32:32.942)

Mm I did mine online. They have some in person as well. So it's a long one. I can't actually remember two days, three days. No, two and a half. Actually can't remember now. Um, but it kind of starts from the foundation into what therapy looks like assessment goals, all the things. So that's why it's very comprehensive. And it's just focusing the most on

how you can talk about avoidances, how you can explore avoidances, how you can reduce the avoidances, not you, but the person you're working with, how you can help too. And it also does incorporate these other therapy approaches, right? Because the cognitive behavioral stuff, the solution focused stuff, the acceptance and commitment really goes along with avoidances because you're

typically avoiding something because you're perceiving it to be helpful to avoid that thing. And there are more helpful things you can do like that with any type of thing we experience as humans typically. So it's just very phenomenal. And they have people who stutter who are there to talk about their experiences too, which is really awesome. Yeah, it's pretty cool.

Marisha (33:56.935)

And that's through the Siskins-Saturn Center, right? Okay, yeah, I'll link to that in the show notes. And so for anyone listening, you can just click the link attached to the episode and then I'll have like a recap of the whole episode. I'll include a link to where you can find out more information about the training and then also anything else that we've discussed as well as.

Ashley (34:00.11)

Correct.

Ashley (34:03.79)

Awesome.

Marisha (34:22.957)

links to follow Ashley on Instagram too. but then, okay. So that was super helpful. and then is it okay if I ask my second question? So I'm curious if we can walk through just because you did a really nice job of outlining like the goals and bunch of different options for how we can approach.

Ashley (34:35.34)

Yes.

Marisha (34:48.773)

treatment and like the biggest takeaway I think is like Even if we have a specific goal that we want to target It's really child blood and it'll depend on how the child comes into the session It's not like okay, if you have this goal you have this worksheet and this worksheet So I love how you Explained that and then gave some examples of things that we can have like in our toolbox so to speak But I'm curious if you could give an example

Ashley (35:04.382)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Marisha (35:18.649)

And it can be a hypothetical kiddo, but maybe an example of like a goal that you wrote with a student and then an example of like an activity you did in therapy just to like connect those two. If this was a whole day workshop, we could go through like more things, but I'm curious if we can just get like one example of what it might look like.

Ashley (35:40.904)

Yeah, definitely. Let's do like a rating scale one since we talked a lot about that. So what's a good hypothetical? Maybe a child has had expressed they wanted to not, you know, avoid we'll go back to like the asking questions or maybe answering questions kind of either one, asking or answering questions in class. And they're saying right now they never ever do it like they will absolutely not.

answer or raise their hand, nothing. So we wrote the goal that they're going to do it. You know, they were at like a one, which is a never, they never ever do it. Maybe they just want to get to like a two or a three. That's what we wrote the goal for. So when they come in, this is super multifaceted because they're avoiding doing that in class. So first I would, you know,

talk them about it in general. Like, tell me more about it. We're just talking it through, talking it through. And then I'm thinking, let's say it's going in this direction. That way you can kind of have a good scene in your mind. Let's say they're really talking about how anxious they feel beforehand, that kind of thing, whatever the feeling is. So maybe I would, I have like a nice little printout of this, but you can just write it down to where you're looking at

how they're thinking, how they're feeling and how they're acting or like the sensations too. I think that can be overlooked. Like what does your body feel like when you maybe it's this we're thinking of the time where like they knew they had to answer a question. It was like a teacher requirement or something. Like everybody has to answer at least one question today or something like that. So we're going through before you did that, what were you thinking, feeling, doing, what sensations were there when you did it.

You answered it, you've spoken for the class. Same thing, what were you thinking? What are you feeling? What are the sensations? What do you do? It could be multiple things in all of those sections and then afterwards, same thing. So we're breaking it all down and figuring out where was everything more intense, most intense for you? Was it before you went to talk? Was it while you were or was it afterwards or more than one? And then from there,

Ashley (38:07.596)

this might be something we're working on for multiple sessions going forward, but we kind of have it all mapped out. So going forward, we might start working on thought reframing. We might start working on some acceptance-based work about, you know, what is it going to feel like if I sit her in front of the class? What's going to happen if I just do it?

You know, what are, what do I think people are thinking? What are they probably thinking if it was realistic? Even if they are thinking that thing, does it change anything about me? You know, we're breaking all those things down. Maybe we're working on then the steps to asking the question, right? Maybe they're going to talk to the teacher and they're going to start raising their hand when they know the answer to the question, but they don't want to be called on yet. Right? Maybe that's one of our steps.

Maybe we're doing, you know, kind of like picking and choosing what we're answering. If it's like a really short answer, like you're in math and all you have to do is, you know, answer an equation or something. I don't know if it's like a one word, two word answer. Does that make you feel more confident to answer the question? If so, maybe we can start there. And then the more you do of that, we can do more.

of those longer answers, right? We're brainstorming. Maybe we're doing cost benefit analysis. Like, what is it costing? What are the benefits of answering and stuttering when you answer? What does that cost? What are the benefits? Are there consequences? Are there outcomes you like? Breaking it down, right? So it's just...

finding whatever works best too because that might look different for everybody. A kid might not like the cost benefit analysis kind of bad. Maybe they like something else better. breaking all that down.

Marisha (40:09.329)

No, that's super helpful to have just like a more narrowed down example because there's so many goals we could target and so many approaches we could use. So it was really nice just to be able to hear like you kind of brainstorm. Okay, if we're like, if we have this example of a goal, like here are some things that I might consider for that student. But again, not all the approaches will be a good fit for all students. So we get to meet them where they're at.

Ashley (40:14.274)

Mm-hmm. Yes.

Ashley (40:30.381)

Yeah.

Ashley (40:38.83)

Mm-hmm.

Marisha (40:39.047)

So yeah, I love that. Thank you so much. Was there anything else you wanted to add or any last thoughts around this conversation?

Ashley (40:45.742)

I think just I want to reiterate again how important the stuttering community is. If you can get kids involved, you know, I talk with lots of adults who stutter and I think any adult I've ever talked to who stutters who's involved in the stuttering community at whatever age they got involved, they will say, that's when everything changed for me. That's when I saw this differently. That's when I could do this, this and this. That's when things were different.

in a positive way, very, very seldom negative experiences. And I think even, and this was in research, I'm not making this up, even the people who had, you know, I don't want to say negative experiences, but didn't feel it was a positive experience. They didn't have any negativity towards it. It was more neutral, like not for me versus, you know, that didn't make things any worse. didn't impact me negatively. The data didn't really.

show that. So stuttering community involvement is huge and you know there's so many virtual ways to do that now which is really cool.

Marisha (41:55.345)

Yeah, and Ezra shared her experience or shared their experience about that. And so that was a few episodes ago also. And that can be a good resource to get some ideas. And I feel like we've talked about some of those aspects as well in terms of the stuttering community. yeah. then, yeah, but this was so helpful. Thank you so much, Ashley. And

Ashley (42:12.365)

Mm-hmm.

Ashley (42:22.734)

Thank God.

Marisha (42:24.593)

Yeah, I hope that those of you listening got some good takeaways as well. And then this is officially a wrap on the Stuttering Series. So thanks for helping us close this out, Ashley.

Ashley (42:36.504)

Thank you for having me. It was so fun.