Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Free Everyday Math iPhone / iPad apps
McGraw-Hill is offering all of their Everyday Mathematics iPhone / iPad apps for free until May 6 in honor of Teacher Appreciation Week. There are ten of them. They are pretty much only going to be useful for school-age children, but free is free and I can save them for a couple of years until Michael and Ava are ready for them.
Shadow Play
Ava was playing with her shadow in the basement playroom. She was standing on a step stool and the setting sun was coming in through the basement window lighting up the wall. Ava noticed her shadow and was delighted. She waved and played with it for several minutes and her Daddy was able to catch it on film. I stole the pictures from him and put them together so you could see.
Tuesday, May 3, 2011
Speech-Language Pathology Topics: Complexity of Motor Planning - An Example
Childhood Apraxia of Speech is a neurological disorder of the motor planning of speech. Here is one small example of how complicated that motor planning can be.
You might think that a /b/ is a /b/ is a /b/. Or you may have thought, correctly, that making a /b/ at the beginning of a word is different than making a /b/ in the middle or at the end of a word. But it gets even more complicated than that.
Say the word "book" five times in a row out loud, but before you say it the last time, freeze your mouth in the position it is in when you are about to make the /b/ sound. Your mouth should be pursed a little, almost like you're about to give someone a kiss.
Now say the word "bee" five times in a row out loud. Again, stop before you say it the last time freezing your mouth in the position it is in when you are about to make the /b/ sound. Your lips should be pressed together, almost like you just put on chapstick or lipstick and are spreading it evenly around.
Even though the words "book" and "bee" both begin with the /b/ sound, the motor planning for producing the /b/ is very different. For the first /b/ in the word "book," the motor planning involves the muscle motions necessary for lip rounding (because the following vowel is a rounded vowel). For the second /b/ in the word "bee," the motor planning involves the muscle motions necessary for lip spreading (because the following vowel is a vowel that involves lip spreading).
The difference between those two initial /b/ sounds is just one small example of how complicated motor planning really is. I just thought the example was interesting and I wanted to share.
You might think that a /b/ is a /b/ is a /b/. Or you may have thought, correctly, that making a /b/ at the beginning of a word is different than making a /b/ in the middle or at the end of a word. But it gets even more complicated than that.
Say the word "book" five times in a row out loud, but before you say it the last time, freeze your mouth in the position it is in when you are about to make the /b/ sound. Your mouth should be pursed a little, almost like you're about to give someone a kiss.
Now say the word "bee" five times in a row out loud. Again, stop before you say it the last time freezing your mouth in the position it is in when you are about to make the /b/ sound. Your lips should be pressed together, almost like you just put on chapstick or lipstick and are spreading it evenly around.
Even though the words "book" and "bee" both begin with the /b/ sound, the motor planning for producing the /b/ is very different. For the first /b/ in the word "book," the motor planning involves the muscle motions necessary for lip rounding (because the following vowel is a rounded vowel). For the second /b/ in the word "bee," the motor planning involves the muscle motions necessary for lip spreading (because the following vowel is a vowel that involves lip spreading).
The difference between those two initial /b/ sounds is just one small example of how complicated motor planning really is. I just thought the example was interesting and I wanted to share.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
