Interview with Martha Coen-Cummings, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, Speech-Language Pathologist II & Coordinator of Speech Pathology Services at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, Mason Campus
Share:
Linda Schreiber: May is Better Speech and Hearing Month! What a good time to talk about public awareness of the importance of communication. Thank you for visiting with me this afternoon, Martha, about a public awareness program that is alive and well in Ohio, called Sponsored Silence. Tell our read
Linda Schreiber: May is Better Speech and Hearing Month! What a good time to talk about public awareness of the importance of communication. Thank you for visiting with me this afternoon, Martha, about a public awareness program that is alive and well in Ohio, called Sponsored Silence. Tell our readers a little bit about your background with this topic today.
Martha Coen-Cummings: I am the current chair of the Ohio Speech-Language-Hearing Association's (OSLHA) Public Relations Committee and one of our key projects is called Sponsored Silence. I've been a member of OSLHA for more than 15 years and I served as president for the 1999-2000 terms. What led to this particular project was a desire by our association for a really significant and meaningful public awareness campaign that would launch many BHSM projects throughout the state of Ohio.
When I was president of OSLHA, I was presenting a Master's Class at the Australian Speech Pathology Association's conference. I was there in two capacities: as a guest lecturer on auditory processing and also as OSLHA's president. One of my purposes while attending that Australian conference was to compare notes with their elected officers (their national association's membership is about the same size as OSLHA's) and then relay the information to OSLHA's executive board. One great idea that came from those meetings was this Sponsored Silence program.
The Australians were the ones who came up with the entire idea. So we heartily give credit to them; as it was their baby! But what's interesting is that they were doing it for the same reasons, but on a nationwide scale: to promote public awareness of speech and hearing professionals, the types of kids and adults we see, who we can help, and to encourage young students to enter our profession.
Schreiber: So what is Sponsored Silence?
Martha: Our intent was to increase public awareness regarding the importance of communication and the profound impact and isolation that can occur when communication is disrupted or completely lost or taken away. During participation in a Sponsored Silence event, individuals experience what it is like to lose their ability to orally communicate. And we mean communication in any setting, whether that be social, educational, vocational, and within any type of employment location. What better way is there to make people understand the importance of communication than to take communication away?
Schreiber: How does it work?
Martha: We find an individual who agrees to be silent for a 15-minute period within his or her work day. The participant can specify the 15-minute period in the day that he or she will remain verbally silent, but it's recommended that this time period include daily routine activities associated with that person's job function. For instance, it really should include a time when there is an interpersonal task, like a phone call, rather than a time of doing paperwork. We prefer a time where there would be face-to-face communication.
So for 15 minutes, while this individual interacts with people, he or she must be silent and not speak. And the person cannot write anything down; he or she is not allowed to use sign (most don't know how to sign anyway and people observing this event won't know sign either). We give the person an augmentative communication device programmed with topic-related vocabulary.
This participant is prepared about a week before the event (usually by phone) and he or she chooses the 15-minute time period in the work day and the situation, so these individuals think they are going to walk into this event with no problem. They know the people that they're going to be talking with. They typically know, more or less, the topic area that they might be speaking about and that we're going to give them a communication device.
Typically, we will have graduate students preparing the person being sponsored. And the students get the information on vocabulary and they're responsible for programming the device.
We then film this 15-minute silent time when it's occurring. Ideally, this is filmed by a local TV station.
Schreiber: You are able to get the media to support you in this?
Martha: Well you invite the TV station and sometimes they show, sometimes they don't. So you want to be prepared to record the event yourself too. We have learned that "news" is very spontaneous. So when an event might be scheduled to be filmed or interviewed by the TV station, there could be a news event down the road that supersedes your story and you're out.
After the 15 minutes of silence, we interview and record that person about his or her experience. It's important to record the event itself; showing the person trying to communicate, and as well as the interview asking the individual's impression of what happened. Thus far, there has not been a completed project where the person was not completely amazed at how powerful and devastating the action of losing one's ability to communicate is!
Schreiber: Oh your interview of the person happens right after this 15-minute event. And it is the "after-event interview" that gets the word out to the public?
Martha: Yes, the silent participants do the talking about how important communication is and what the loss of communication is like; we as professionals don't have to say one thing. It's not SLPs or audiologist doing an advertisement and that's the important thing; it's a real-life experience with the silent sponsor.
Schreiber: Give us an example of people who have been willing to be silent.
Martha: We had a principal of a school be a silent sponsored participant. He was out on the playground during recess and we programmed his augmentative communication device to contain vocabulary related to playing "four squares," because that was the activity he usually did with the children at recess time. We programmed the vocabulary he chose and gave him a 32-cell (icon) device with which to communicate.
This principal was a "key player" because he is the one who is in charge of the budget for materials like communication devices. He said he "had no idea...that this was the first time he actually understand the need for a communication device yet how limiting the device could be." He only had limited vocabulary that was based on the four square game, but since HE picked the words/phrases, he felt like he was going to be "ready to go!" You just can't set this situation up any better! The need for communication naturally unfolded; with children approaching him with questions related to other topics that he could not answer!
You know and I know how communication works; that a 32-word grid isn't a lot of words. That may not be enough to be able to say something on a single topic unless you "leveled" the vocabulary (which this participant was not able to do, given the short time restraints he had to learn the device). Since most individuals would probably change topics at least 5-8 times in a 15-minute period, it placed him in a precarious situation!
Schreiber: That must have been a powerful moment for the principal.
Martha: What was so powerful with the interview of this principal was that an SLP could not have really "prepared him" by describing communication as a whole, nor could an SLP say anything with greater clarity [re: the importance of communication] than the principal described himself. While he was playing four square, another kid came up to him and said, "Oh Mr. McClellan, let's go play baseball and get a game set up." Normally he would have said, "Let's go do that." But he couldn't because he didn't have the vocabulary to get him to that "place" or topic. So it stopped his participation with that child.
What was also so great was that another little boy who was in a wheelchair was trying to talk to Mr. McClellan. The boy also had an AAC device; however, it wasn't on his wheelchair at that moment so someone had to run inside and bring the device out. That was a big eye-opener for the principal re: the need for communication. The need does not stop when the child leaves the classroom: it's in every event, every moment of the day!
In the very last five minutes of his event, some other children invited Mr. McClellan to join their social group (a group for some of our special needs kids) and the same thing happened; he didn't have the vocabulary programmed for the situation. It was another powerful moment that was completely unplanned. As the moment unfolded, it was clear to the principal that even with communication competence, only one child in the group could really converse. That boy led the entire conversation while the other kids were silent because their smaller AAC devices had too few vocabulary terms. The spontaneous event gave no time to program them for full participation. Mr. McClellan's comment was "I was so surprised. I thought that this device was going to be my safety net; I had no idea how it was going to limit my communication. After 30 years, I never realized how much a device, a professional's ability to program the device, the need for preparation of the vocabulary, etc. affected the kid's communication and participation in the classroom." We ended the interview with his great comment, "You don't know what you've got until you lose it." Bingo! Perfect!
Martha: A second person that participated this past year is actually one of our State representatives of Ohio. For this Sponsored Silence project, the Honorable David Goodman, a state senator, went into a nursing and rehab center in Columbus and had this 15-minute silent time period with the constituents in his district. It was great because some of the individuals that live in the Center had their own AAC devices. And he sat and had tea and lunch with them. And we had preprogrammed the device and taught him how to use it and then he had a very nice discussion with the individuals that lived there. It was a fabulous event.
Senator Goodman commented that he had never been in a situation like that. He had no idea of the difference the lack of communication ability makes. This is an individual who learned about communication and he can be a powerful ally in the state on issues related to speech-language pathology and audiology and budgets. We sent his event and interview to our local TV stations and it was aired and it was great.
Schreiber: What is the sponsor part of the program?
Martha: When I say sponsor, I mean that, if it's appropriate, the silent person's colleagues, families, children, or whomever have the opportunity to sponsor him or her, as a fund-raiser, to be silent for the 15-minute period. So for instance for Mr. McClellan, we set sponsorship as 25 cents a minute and anybody who wanted to participate signed up and we posted the sponsorships all over a wall at the school. This made the awareness facility-wide and brought a lot of people into the project. And the money that was collected went to the budget of the speech-language pathologist who used it to purchase an augmentative communication device for use in intervention.
Schreiber: Martha, you can be so proud of this program. It is such a great idea. There are just so many options for how you can implement it.
Martha: There are. And of course if you make a difference in one person's life, you've made a difference, and I happen to believe that's why we're here!
Schreiber: Martha thanks for sharing this idea. I hope many more associations or student associations will take on this concept for their next public awareness event. For more information, contact Martha Coen-Cummings, at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, 513-636-6824, or email her at Martha.coen-cummings@cchmc.org
Martha Coen-Cummings: I am the current chair of the Ohio Speech-Language-Hearing Association's (OSLHA) Public Relations Committee and one of our key projects is called Sponsored Silence. I've been a member of OSLHA for more than 15 years and I served as president for the 1999-2000 terms. What led to this particular project was a desire by our association for a really significant and meaningful public awareness campaign that would launch many BHSM projects throughout the state of Ohio.
When I was president of OSLHA, I was presenting a Master's Class at the Australian Speech Pathology Association's conference. I was there in two capacities: as a guest lecturer on auditory processing and also as OSLHA's president. One of my purposes while attending that Australian conference was to compare notes with their elected officers (their national association's membership is about the same size as OSLHA's) and then relay the information to OSLHA's executive board. One great idea that came from those meetings was this Sponsored Silence program.
The Australians were the ones who came up with the entire idea. So we heartily give credit to them; as it was their baby! But what's interesting is that they were doing it for the same reasons, but on a nationwide scale: to promote public awareness of speech and hearing professionals, the types of kids and adults we see, who we can help, and to encourage young students to enter our profession.
Schreiber: So what is Sponsored Silence?
Martha: Our intent was to increase public awareness regarding the importance of communication and the profound impact and isolation that can occur when communication is disrupted or completely lost or taken away. During participation in a Sponsored Silence event, individuals experience what it is like to lose their ability to orally communicate. And we mean communication in any setting, whether that be social, educational, vocational, and within any type of employment location. What better way is there to make people understand the importance of communication than to take communication away?
Schreiber: How does it work?
Martha: We find an individual who agrees to be silent for a 15-minute period within his or her work day. The participant can specify the 15-minute period in the day that he or she will remain verbally silent, but it's recommended that this time period include daily routine activities associated with that person's job function. For instance, it really should include a time when there is an interpersonal task, like a phone call, rather than a time of doing paperwork. We prefer a time where there would be face-to-face communication.
So for 15 minutes, while this individual interacts with people, he or she must be silent and not speak. And the person cannot write anything down; he or she is not allowed to use sign (most don't know how to sign anyway and people observing this event won't know sign either). We give the person an augmentative communication device programmed with topic-related vocabulary.
This participant is prepared about a week before the event (usually by phone) and he or she chooses the 15-minute time period in the work day and the situation, so these individuals think they are going to walk into this event with no problem. They know the people that they're going to be talking with. They typically know, more or less, the topic area that they might be speaking about and that we're going to give them a communication device.
Typically, we will have graduate students preparing the person being sponsored. And the students get the information on vocabulary and they're responsible for programming the device.
We then film this 15-minute silent time when it's occurring. Ideally, this is filmed by a local TV station.
Schreiber: You are able to get the media to support you in this?
Martha: Well you invite the TV station and sometimes they show, sometimes they don't. So you want to be prepared to record the event yourself too. We have learned that "news" is very spontaneous. So when an event might be scheduled to be filmed or interviewed by the TV station, there could be a news event down the road that supersedes your story and you're out.
After the 15 minutes of silence, we interview and record that person about his or her experience. It's important to record the event itself; showing the person trying to communicate, and as well as the interview asking the individual's impression of what happened. Thus far, there has not been a completed project where the person was not completely amazed at how powerful and devastating the action of losing one's ability to communicate is!
Schreiber: Oh your interview of the person happens right after this 15-minute event. And it is the "after-event interview" that gets the word out to the public?
Martha: Yes, the silent participants do the talking about how important communication is and what the loss of communication is like; we as professionals don't have to say one thing. It's not SLPs or audiologist doing an advertisement and that's the important thing; it's a real-life experience with the silent sponsor.
Schreiber: Give us an example of people who have been willing to be silent.
Martha: We had a principal of a school be a silent sponsored participant. He was out on the playground during recess and we programmed his augmentative communication device to contain vocabulary related to playing "four squares," because that was the activity he usually did with the children at recess time. We programmed the vocabulary he chose and gave him a 32-cell (icon) device with which to communicate.
This principal was a "key player" because he is the one who is in charge of the budget for materials like communication devices. He said he "had no idea...that this was the first time he actually understand the need for a communication device yet how limiting the device could be." He only had limited vocabulary that was based on the four square game, but since HE picked the words/phrases, he felt like he was going to be "ready to go!" You just can't set this situation up any better! The need for communication naturally unfolded; with children approaching him with questions related to other topics that he could not answer!
You know and I know how communication works; that a 32-word grid isn't a lot of words. That may not be enough to be able to say something on a single topic unless you "leveled" the vocabulary (which this participant was not able to do, given the short time restraints he had to learn the device). Since most individuals would probably change topics at least 5-8 times in a 15-minute period, it placed him in a precarious situation!
Schreiber: That must have been a powerful moment for the principal.
Martha: What was so powerful with the interview of this principal was that an SLP could not have really "prepared him" by describing communication as a whole, nor could an SLP say anything with greater clarity [re: the importance of communication] than the principal described himself. While he was playing four square, another kid came up to him and said, "Oh Mr. McClellan, let's go play baseball and get a game set up." Normally he would have said, "Let's go do that." But he couldn't because he didn't have the vocabulary to get him to that "place" or topic. So it stopped his participation with that child.
What was also so great was that another little boy who was in a wheelchair was trying to talk to Mr. McClellan. The boy also had an AAC device; however, it wasn't on his wheelchair at that moment so someone had to run inside and bring the device out. That was a big eye-opener for the principal re: the need for communication. The need does not stop when the child leaves the classroom: it's in every event, every moment of the day!
In the very last five minutes of his event, some other children invited Mr. McClellan to join their social group (a group for some of our special needs kids) and the same thing happened; he didn't have the vocabulary programmed for the situation. It was another powerful moment that was completely unplanned. As the moment unfolded, it was clear to the principal that even with communication competence, only one child in the group could really converse. That boy led the entire conversation while the other kids were silent because their smaller AAC devices had too few vocabulary terms. The spontaneous event gave no time to program them for full participation. Mr. McClellan's comment was "I was so surprised. I thought that this device was going to be my safety net; I had no idea how it was going to limit my communication. After 30 years, I never realized how much a device, a professional's ability to program the device, the need for preparation of the vocabulary, etc. affected the kid's communication and participation in the classroom." We ended the interview with his great comment, "You don't know what you've got until you lose it." Bingo! Perfect!
Martha: A second person that participated this past year is actually one of our State representatives of Ohio. For this Sponsored Silence project, the Honorable David Goodman, a state senator, went into a nursing and rehab center in Columbus and had this 15-minute silent time period with the constituents in his district. It was great because some of the individuals that live in the Center had their own AAC devices. And he sat and had tea and lunch with them. And we had preprogrammed the device and taught him how to use it and then he had a very nice discussion with the individuals that lived there. It was a fabulous event.
Senator Goodman commented that he had never been in a situation like that. He had no idea of the difference the lack of communication ability makes. This is an individual who learned about communication and he can be a powerful ally in the state on issues related to speech-language pathology and audiology and budgets. We sent his event and interview to our local TV stations and it was aired and it was great.
Schreiber: What is the sponsor part of the program?
Martha: When I say sponsor, I mean that, if it's appropriate, the silent person's colleagues, families, children, or whomever have the opportunity to sponsor him or her, as a fund-raiser, to be silent for the 15-minute period. So for instance for Mr. McClellan, we set sponsorship as 25 cents a minute and anybody who wanted to participate signed up and we posted the sponsorships all over a wall at the school. This made the awareness facility-wide and brought a lot of people into the project. And the money that was collected went to the budget of the speech-language pathologist who used it to purchase an augmentative communication device for use in intervention.
Schreiber: Martha, you can be so proud of this program. It is such a great idea. There are just so many options for how you can implement it.
Martha: There are. And of course if you make a difference in one person's life, you've made a difference, and I happen to believe that's why we're here!
Schreiber: Martha thanks for sharing this idea. I hope many more associations or student associations will take on this concept for their next public awareness event. For more information, contact Martha Coen-Cummings, at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, 513-636-6824, or email her at Martha.coen-cummings@cchmc.org