In
November, I attended the Palin Parent Child Interaction (PCI) therapy workshop
along with around 25 other SLPs from UK, Canada and Norway. The workshop lasted
two days and was packed with information, discussions and teaching videos. The
course trainer was Vicky Crofts, and she did a very good job teaching us. It
was interesting to get more knowledge about the PCI program.
The PCI
program build on an understanding that stuttering (or stammering as they say here
in UK) has a multifactorial cause. In this model, there is four factors: physiological,
speech and language, psychological and environmental factors. The child who
stutters has an individual combination of factors that have contributed to the
stuttering problem (Kelman & Nicholas, 2008). Furthermore, parents often
have an instinctive knowledge of what to do when their child starts to stutter,
and this knowledge would be identified and used in the treatment.
The program
for preschool children consist of assessment of stuttering and the child’s environment,
followed by six sessions during six weeks, and then a period of six weeks for
stabilization. After the six weeks consolidation period is over, the child’s
progress is reviewed. For preschool children, the program mainly focus on
interaction between the child and parents, such as interaction strategies (like
following the child’s lead and pausing) and family strategies (like turn taking
and confidence building). The program is individualized for each child, based on
their personal/individual vulnerability and the context of the family. One
important part of the program is the “Special time”. Special time is a sort of
quality time for the child with the parent, playing games or doing other kind
of activities that the child wants to do. The strategies the parents decided to
focus on are used during Special time. Special
time last only for 5 minutes and should be done at least three times a week.
During the
course, we learned to use different forms for assessment. Video observation of
parent-child interaction with later viewing together with the parents, as well
as parent counseling, is an important part of the therapy. When watching videos
of the trained SLPs using the therapy, it looked so easy and smooth. However,
when we were asked to roleplay the therapy in the course (one being SLP and one
being parent), we soon discovered that it was not easy at all!
One
characteristic of the therapy is to focus on the positive and good stuff that
the parents do when communicating with their child. It is so much more easy to see
what is not working and get hung up on that! I believe that using this positive
approach in therapy could be a good way to help parents to support their child.
It makes them more certain of what they do that is good and build their
confidence in being able to help their child.
If you want
to learn more about Palin PCI, you can read their handbook (https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/9781351688253
). Here is also a link to a research article about the program by Millard,
Edwards & Cook (2009). https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17549500802603895?casa_token=2ib4oDzru04AAAAA:8JF4o14AhkpZGOmIswY8S3hOwifpvd1LlvvrbBjgEtu0UN8YIbTh47mYeP-ZjxSIwJvu_H0ShOI If you are
able to read Norwegian, here is a summary of the program by Olsen (2014). https://norsklogopedlag.no/uploads/docs/logopeden/3_2014/3-14_parent-child_Olsen.pdf
For the
EST-team, Hilde
