Pacing on the three boards for optimal success in the acquisition phase of S2C
Broken Seesaws Part I
Turns out. There is no race. Most of us have probably heard by now that apraxia is a “brain body disconnect,” and that most, if not all of the nonspeaking community struggles with this reality. This is why we coach in a body based construct under the assumption that the intellect is intact. It makes sense. But, it’s easy to forget that because this is a motor impairment, learning new motor skills takes time, purposeful practice and is something that cannot and should not be rushed.
“IT FEELS MANIC AND IS ABLEIST FOR PEOPLE TO ASSUME THAT SLICING THE TIME IT TAKES TO ACHIEVE FLUENCY IS EVEN THE BEST”
– Geo
unreliable speaker, Age 11, laminate
There seems to be some confusion about when to move up on the boards. I have learned about progressing smoothly, and not so smoothly, by watching and learning from other people (what to do and what I do not want to do), by making a ton of mistakes myself, and by asking the experts – non speakers. Know better, do better should be tattooed on my spelling arm.
I believe that staying on the three boards until there is 80-90% poking or pointing accuracy, with flow, with minimal prompts, with purpose, regulation and stamina across several full sessions sets people up for a lifetime of clean, purposeful, open communication that is not stressful or overly taxing on their bodies, eyes, or emotions.
Flow:
Flow is the smooth movement between letters with the eyes and the body. The eyes are able to fixate and move from one letter to the next. Flow is tied both to stamina and the ordering of the sequence of motor skills needed to spell fluidly.
Order:
The order of look poke scan look poke scan look poke scan is not an easy motor plan especially initially. The three boards allow the client to practice not just accuracy, but the order of skills they need to myelinate with the least amount of cognitive recall challenge.
If your client or spelling son or daughter is consistently mis-poking, seems dysregulated and like they’re “stuck” for an extended period of time, they might be on a board that is too challenging for their current motor skill.
Prompts:
I misunderstood prompting when I was a new practitioner in training. I thought if prompts are to body motor what gas is to car motor that I needed to prompt my face off.
Our prompts are gas, but they’re meant to be just enough to get that particular motor moving and sustaining purposeful motion. If you give a car too much gas, you run the risk of flooding the engine.
Flooding the engine happens when there’s too much gas and not enough oxygen, and it means the car won’t start.
In general, a person who is ready to move to the 26 board will no longer need gestural or directional prompts on the 3 boards.
Purpose:
We are partnering with our clients and/or children to help them learn the purposeful motor skill of accurate poking/pointing which means that they need to practice purposefully. Purposeful practice is tied to particular prompting. Just enough to support without overwhelming or flooding the motor. This takes practice for the practitioner or CRP too!
There will probably always be factors that tempt us to “just try something,” or to rush and go too fast. But, just trying a one-word pink (open question) when someone still miss-pokes consistently on greens or spell words on the 26 board or doesn’t have flow on the 3 boards, is like throwing a new swimmer into the deep end “just to see what happens.”
So, what can happen if we push up on the boards too fast? What’s the big deal?
When I was in gymnastics, there was a skill we were all nervous about but also wanted to be able to do. It was a “flight series” on the balance beam. A flight series is two or more skills connected together, like a back handspring back handspring, or a back handspring layout etc.
Before we tried a back handspring on the high beam, we learned it on the floor. Then a line on the floor. Then a foam “beam” an inch high, then a low beam with someone spotting us.
If you couldn’t confidently, cleanly, and consistently do a back handspring on the low beam, there was no reason to think you could do it on the high beam.
Our coaches also made sure we were practicing like we wanted it to look once we mastered the skill. Not like this guy.
By the time I was 15, I was in the gym 30 hours a week. I spent a lot of time with my coaches, and I trusted them. If they told me I was ready to try something on the high beam with or without them spotting me, I generally believed them even if I was nervous. If one of them had thrown me up there to do a skill I was nowhere near ready to do, at the very least, I would lose trust in them, and our coaching relationship would be compromised. I would wonder if they knew what they were doing. I would probably also no longer have the same confidence in myself, and there’s a high likelihood I would get injured. My future in the sport could be affected.
When we push up on the boards ahead of motor acquisition or skip steps in the hierarchy, we run the risk of damaging the communication relationship and introducing anxiety to the spelling chair.
There is no shame in going back to find the place where motor competency allows someone to safely practice, be challenged, and gain skill.
Even if a skill is mastered on the low beam individually, like a single back handspring, that isn’t the same as mylenating the smooth connection of the skills like back handspring – back handspring. The flight series. Even if a person is poking individual letters with 80-90% accuracy but has no flow or ability to link the letters, it’s not time to move up.
Landing a flight series successfully on the low beam one time, two times, or even five times does not mean you go straight to the high beam. The body must myelinate the new skill to the point where it begins to become automatic in order to sustain the increase in difficulty while maintaining signals of safety. This is stamina.
When we push up on the boards before the skill is solidified, we run the risk of pushing the client from the regulated purposeful region of the brain into the space of fight or flight. In this space, impulses and loops are almost inevitable and new skills cannot be practiced with fidelity.
Additionally, as practitioners, we may then mistakenly assume the client has a more “complex motor” than they really do. At that point, we have facilitated a secondary problem that we now need to focus on fixing. We pushed someone before their brain/body connection was ready.
The time it takes for the body to myelinate a new piece of the acquisition puzzle is protective for the psychological well being of the client.
Therefore, my goal with my clients and my children is not open spelling, fluency, or keyboarding within a certain timeframe. My goal is the development of the purposeful motor skills they need to get to the letter they want, whenever they want, to the highest motor level that they want, without fatigue or anxiety, and with confidence.
Clean, open spelling and fluency is a byproduct of that goal.
We owe it to spellers to give them the space and the time they need to develop the purposeful motor skills to spell. Slow and steady wins.
About the Authors
Gigi Nelson is a certified S2C practitioner in CA. She writes at Magicpencil.substack.com
Geo Nelson is an unreliable speaker whose goal is to help people understand the internal operating systems of non speakers. He writes at iosemt.substack.com
