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From: Lynne Shields
Date: 10/16/02
Time: 9:58:05 AM
Remote Name: 199.217.208.172
I do not know of any articles that deal directly with fluency therapy for children with ADHD. Someone else may be able to help out here. There is an article in the April 2001 volume of Language Speech & Hearing Services in Schools by Arndt & Healy entitled "Concomitant Disorders in School-Age Children Who Stutter" which includes mention of children with ADHD.
I have worked with a child having a similar profile to the child you wrote about. Of course, each child, even with a similar set of diagnoses, will not be the same and may not respond to the same treatment methodologies. With that caveat in mind, I can share with you that the child I worked with was able to eventually master the easy talking skills we worked on, albeit over a longer time than a child with no attention issues. I used a variety of ways to help the child gain the skills, including getting comfortable and relaxed in a beanbag chair to get the idea of more relaxed talking. I also worked separately on phonological and stuttering issues, as this child had difficulty focusing on more than one skill at a time. I basically alternated work on speech sounds and on stuttering. I emphasized relaxed ways of talking in working on the phonological skills, too, but did not specifically focus on stuttering during that time.
Best wishes as you work with this child. Hope these ideas may be useful to you, if not with this child, then with another down the road.
Regards,
Lynne