Therefore, to help people achieve their dreams Home Depot decided not only to market home improvement products and building materials to builders, but also targeted their market to those who wanted to do it themselves.  Many could afford to make home improvements by learning to do it themselves.

Home Depot decided to provide classes to those who wished to learn how to do home projects like tiling floors, replacing cabinets, installing new plumbing and electrical fixtures, decking and room additions.  One could walk into Home Depot on a weekend and find posts of weekend classes on just about any subject that the homeowner wished to learn.  Imagine providing continuing education to home owners!  Perfect!

And you know something, people started to realize they could do a comparable if not better job than many subcontractors, if they just knew how to do it.  Home Depot provided that opportunity.

A great concept!  I must applaud the thinking of those at Home Depot.

Now why couldn’t the same concept apply to specific speaking difficulties, like aphasia speech therapy?  Could it be possible that a family member, spouse or family friend could learn how to improve a severe speaking difficulty by learning the steps of how to do aphasia speech therapy or speech and language stimulation with children?

Like Home Depot’s home improvement why should there not be speaking improvement that can be done at home for those with aphasia or speech and language delay?  An approach to home training the loved one or caregiver that can start at the very first speech therapy visit and subsequent visits could revolutionize the health care industry especially since there are limitations on the number of visits allowed which drastically affects the  amount of time a client or patient can receive skilled care.

The health and rehabilitative industries must provide the training for caregivers and family members if it truly wishes to provide for the best care for those with aphasia and children with delayed speech and language.  The monies provided by insurance and Medicare runs out quickly.  If the rehabilitative industry is going to truly serve the needs of communication impaired persons, it must implement training for its therapists to not only treat those with speaking difficulties, but also to simultaneously train caregivers, loved ones and spouses.  In that way it can help fulfill the potential dreams of those with speaking difficulties for better talking.

We must follow the lead of companies that have progressive ideas and empower people to take on more responsibility for what they value.  In this case it is the opportunity for better speaking because those at home are taking a more active role by learning the necessary steps to help assure speech improvement for as long as it takes.

Moshe Mark Ittleman, M.S., CCC/SLP is a senior speech language pathologist who has worked in some of the nations’ best rehabilitation hospitals and specializes in complex speech language pathology (aphasia speech therapy) of adults and children (speech and language stimulation for delayed speech.  He is the author of The Teaching of Talking which helps caregivers and speech pathologists learn simple speech and language stimulation methods to help loved ones and clients talk better.  He is currently on tour and visiting communities throughout the Western United States.   The Teaching of Talking Method is for those who have aphasia and children with speech and language delay.  Ittleman also guest lectures graduate students in speech language pathology and provides online mentoring for caregivers and those with aphasia.   He and his wife also travel internationally consulting with Colleges, Universities and private individuals and families.  

To find out more about The Teaching of Talking and to learn if it would be a good approach for your client or loved one with aphasia speech therapy  Click here:  http://teachingoftalking.com/screeningtestanddocs for free screening speech test and reports.  

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Please do not hesitate to contact the author at [email protected] if you have any questions, or concerns.

Moshe Mark Ittleman, M.S., CCC/SLP
Speech Language Pathologist-Author
E-Mail:  [email protected]
Website:  http://www.teachingoftalking.com
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