Infant Intervention

              Dr. Zimmerman applauds the enthusiastic response of students, from left,
Judy Wright, Heather Broyles and Stuart Moore. (Journal Photo by Andy
Sharp)
Infant Intervention
Unique local program to be in
spotlight at national seminar
By WARY DURUSAU
Journal Staff Writer
The children seem very young for a
classroom setting. They range in age
from several months to 3 to 4 years —
and some of them have been in
school for as much as a year already.
The children are part of a unique
local program designed to provide
early help for physically and
mentally handicapped children in
developing learning skills —
especially communication skills.
Locally, the 'infant intervention'
program has been in existence for
six years and will be in the spotlight
at the national American Speech and
Hearing Association convention to be
held in Detroit Mich, next week.
The educational program for
infants through toddlers is a
combination of efforts by the Caddo-
Bossier Association for Retarded
Citizens, the state Office of Mental
Retardation and the LSU School of
Medicine's speech pathology
program.
Lucy Poulsen of C-BARC, Linda
Jones representing the state and Dr.
Barbara Zimmerman of the Mollie
Webb Speech and Hearing Clinic wilt
give a 90-minute presentation on the
local infant intervention program at
the convention.
The three women will be presenting
a mini-seminar on organizing an
infant intervention program. "Ours
is a how-to presentation," Dr.
Zimmerman said. "We want to show
other people around the country —
this is what we did and you can do it
too."
Mrs. Poulsen explains the program
is unique in several respects. "It's
unusual that you find the cooperation
of as many agencies as we do in this •
program and for so many years we
did not have programs for
handicapped and developmentally
delayed children until they reached
traditional 'school age,' " she said.
While the program is housed and
administered through the C-BARC
offices, it serves many children who
are not mentally retarded. The
program is open to any child with a
learning disability, Mrs. Poulsen
adds.
The program concentrates on
developing children's
communication and physical
response skills through a variety of
programs.
"We have to first teach a child
several things before we can teach
him any basic concepts," Dr.
Zimmerman said. "We have to teach
him to attend. If a child is not able to
stay with us for minutes at a time
then we won't be able to teach him
anything."
Another focus of the program is ons
getting children to imitate. Dr.
Zimmerman says imitation comes
naturally for normal children but not
so with developmentally
handicapped youngsters. "Finally
we have to find a use for language.
Children are just like adults — they
don't like to work and
communicating is work. So we have
to find a reason to make them want
tp communicate," she added.
"We used to say 'We are going to
teach this child to talk,' " she said.
"Now we say we are going to jtry to
teach the child to communicate and
if the child does verbalize then
hallelujah. But we want to develop
the child's congnitive processes too
— not just to be able to repeat words
but to understand meanings and
concepts."
Dr. Zimmerman said it is
important for a child first to be
"receptive" to language before he or
she can be expressive. "This is
where the family is important
because they can help a child
develop these skills," she added.
While there are classes offered at
the C-BARC Goldman School daily,
Mrs. Jones heads up a staff of 'home
trainers' who visit in the homes of
handicapped children in a 13-parish
area.
The home trainers service an area
ranging from Webster Parish to
Sabine Parish. "The home trainer
teaches the parents what types of
exercises and toys will stimulate the
child," she said. " I t also gives us a
chance to check up on the child to see
what, if any, progress has been made
— to see if the child needs to be
brought in for physical therapy or
speech therapy."
Mrs. Poulsen said involving the
parents is a main emphasis of the
program. "Many times they need
help as much as the child. It's
(having a handicapped child) a
devastating experience — and it
happens to rich people, poor people,
blacks and whites," she said. "Many
times there are emotional problems
with the parents. Sometimes when
we send out a home trainer the first
thing we encounter is fear and
suspicion."
Getting parents and the children
Dr. Barbara Zimmerman works with Linda Wilson using an infant
audiometer to check her hearing level. When Linda hears sounds
from the audiometer, she looks for the clown face on the front of the
device to light up
into the program at the earliest
possible stage is very important, Dr.
Zimmerman said. " I f a parent
comes in with a 4-year-old who
hasn't been here for this training, not
only have we lost valuable years but
we also have to convince the parents
that we aren't going to hurt this little
one," she said.
The program involves use of special
educational techniques individually
tailored to fit each child. Much of the
educational equipment —
particularly reading materials —
has been adapted for use with the
younger children.
"It's only been in recent years that
we've seen the development of
appropriate tools for evaluating the
non-verbal child," Dr. Zimmerman
said. One program which has been
adapted for the infant program is the
"Rebus" reading program.
Close cooperation and coordination
between the speech pathologist and
the classroom teacher is another
trademark of the C-BARC program.
"Too often a speech pathologist is a
person that comes and goes. In this
program much of the material has
been introduced to the child in the
classroom before he or she sees the
speech therapist," Dr. Zimmerman
said.
In a demonstration session, Dr.
Zimmerman works with three 2-
year-olds. Dividing a box of colored
blocks, the speech pathologist tells
each child to place one block on top of
another. "Stacking blocks is easy for
a normal child, but many of our
children lack gross motor
coordination," she said, adding, "the
exercise has a dual purpose of
teaching a child to follow
instructions. If a child can't follow
instructions I can't teach him."
Another tool used by Dr.
Zimmerman is an infant
audiometer. The instrument emits
beeps — the volume of which is
controlled to test the child's hearing.
"In many children we find hearing
problems that can be easily
corrected, but if they're not it will be
a serious handicap to their ability to
communicate."
Language and communication
skills have not been emphasized in
training handicapped children
before because "many people felt a
child had to reach a certain
, intellectual level before speech
therapy would help."
But Dr. Zimmerman says the
opposite is true. "But if we don't
teach a child to communicate at an
early age then it will be harder later
on for him to learn," she said.
Mrs. Poulsen said 100 children are
presently involved in classes at the
Goldman school, with about 86
children being served through the
home visits program. " I t may be a
status symbol to have a waiting list
but we don't have one. We don't turn
anybody away — they needed help
yesterday," she added.
The six-year-old program was
designed by a committee that
represented a cross-section of
educational and medical authorities.
"We had the top local people
involved and they really put in a lot
of time on this," Mrs. Poulsen said.
"We had everything mapped out, the
procedures and everything before
we held bur first development
assessment clinic for children."
The infant program is already
showing signs of success. Dr.
Zimmerman said a group of 20
children randomly selected from the
program were tested and all showed
progress in areas of communication,
social and emotional development
and motor skills.
"In some of the children we saw a
year's development in a six-month
period, but most averaged an eight
month growth in six months," she
said.
"Our level of expectation for these
children is high," Mrs. Poulsen said.
"But it is tempered by the knowledge
that these children do have some
handicaps. If we don't set priorities
and goals for these children how will
we know what they can do?
"I personally don't think we have
touched the hem of the garment as to
what these children can do," she
added.