COMPONENT 11. TRANSFER AND MAINTENANCE OF FLUENCY

Rationale: Fluent speech is generally easily achieved within the 
clinical environment. However, this fluency is of little value unless
the speaker is able to transfer his/her new skills into his/her normal
communication environment.

Research: 

Adams (1991) - transfer activities should be conducted systematically 
and must involve active participation of the clinician and
significant adults in the child's environment. 

Gregory (1991) - the school environment is an excellent place 
forextending the use of improved speech. This transfer of speech
skills is facilitated early on in the therapy process.  

Peters and Guitar (1991) - the goal of this phase of therapy is
to transfer the child's fluency from the therapy situation to a
wide variety of other settings and other people.

Ryan & Van Kirk (1974) - are convinced that those clients who 
are enrolled in maintenance programs have better fluency than 
those clients who are not enrolled.  


Activities/Techniques:

For Transfer: 1)  use ongoing strategies
              2)  define a hierarchy of situations from easy to
                  difficult
              3)  use different physical movements
              4)  increase audience size and encourage "quests" in
                  therapy

For Maintenance: 1)  weekly or monthly telephone checks with the 
                  parents
              2)  sessions are reduced to weekly, biweekly, 
                  monthly, etc.
              3)  intermittent home practice in structured and
                  unstructured activities
              4)  have the client make a tape of several 
                  conversations at home.  Have him/her grade their
                  performance on several areas such as rate, soft
                  contacts, and stretches; and then bring the tape 
                  to therapy so the clinician can give his/her
                  feedback.