This summer, I'm volunteering for the fourth time (I've done two previous full semesters and one summer session) at my school's nursery for hearing impaired infants and toddlers. Being a family-centered program, the children get lots of attention from graduate students, clinical supervisors and undergrad volunteers like myself while their parents go to a support group lead by a renowned professor.
In previous sessions, I had been paired with a toddler with hydrocephalus/CP. I assisted in his transition from the infant room to the toddler room, so that he could have a consistent person there with him every week. I help him in reaching for toys, moving around the room, and went with him to his short, individual therapy rooms. It was a wonderful experience, especially as a freshman. It helped me to develop a clear sense of what therapy is like.
This summer, I'm stationed in infant room again, though I try to sneak peeks into the toddler room, because one of the babies I had in two years ago is now a walking, talking big girl! She has moderate-severe hearing loss in both ears and has had hearing aids since I first met her when she was six months old. Her speech is just beautiful and like any toddler, she speaks her mind! We briefly fed baby dolls together recently and but she wanted to feed mine so she told me, "I'm going to feed BOTH now. Thank you."
I really enjoy being in the baby room, mostly because there is no agenda, we just get to play! But also, since the summer session just began, the toddler room isn't running so smoothly. The student-clinicians are still getting the hang of watching only their assigned child, which is difficult, because the kids want to interact with everyone. When a child goes unwatched for more than .2 seconds, the educator in the room often shouts at whichever student clinician is nearest to her to drop whatever she's been doing so the child will not go without enrichment any longer.
The nanny in me knows that kids this age often like to explore on their own, but I realize that parents (who are often observing through the one-way mirror) are paying a lot of money for their children to be enrolled.
I suppose this experience has taught me a few things:
1) I love babies. I'm totally content to hold a baby for hours, read him a few books, blow bubbles, sing/sign songs, and feed him.
2) I don't love toddler classrooms. While I believe that day care is certainly beneficial for kids, cramming all kinds of activities (which require numerous, big production-type, transitions) into a two-hour time slot just isn't practical. In our program, there is free play, focused-free play (where the clinicians try to keep their clients doing one activity while others pull their kids out for therapy), then snack which includes songs and a book reading while everyone is supposed to sit and eat quietly, clean-up time, teacher's choice (one clinician executes a group therapy activity like learning some new signs or words), music time, mom and dad time (parents come in for a big group sing a-long). I guess I wish we could just get rid of snack time. The kids aren't usually hungry, but they never hesitate to make a big mess that sends the educator into a Wipey-wielding frenzy!
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Be Creative
I have a lot of creative friends. For my 20th birthday, from one such friend, I received a small block of wood, painted maroon with a pencil sketch of two barefeet viewed from behind, some bits of white screening, and a piece of masking tape that says, 'I dreamt of laughter and pounding through ponds." It's lovely and I treasure it.
I've also had to pleasure of taking classes that focus on questions like "What IS performance?" (it's everything, in case you were wondering) or force us to think about rhizomes ("underground, horizontal stem of a plant that often sends out roots and shoots from its nodes") as a post-modern concept. And yet, I am not a creative person. During group projects, I'm the girl who cleans up everyone's contribution onto a neat power point and submits the Works Cited page. (APA, MLA, I do it all!)
I blame this on being surrounded by so many creative people. On of my friends just won $500 for a folk album he wrote and then analyzed in a 25-page artist statement for his Senior Honors Thesis. What. What? I have the opportunity to do a senior thesis to. On ANYTHING. Seriously. People to crazy things like write, direct, and star in a play perform on the subway or study medieval weaponry. Lots of people get involved, professors are psyched to witness young, revolutionary art and the Senior Honors Thesis showcase is the pride of my school (occuring at the same time as accepted students days). But guess what I'm doing? I'm studying AAC board construction. Basic boards made on Overboard or BoardMaker. Boooring. (To my creative friends, not me!) Personally, I think it's important research, meant to contribute to a part of speech-language pathology that helps people who really need it. Imagine if all your thoughts and feeling and knowledge could only be communicated on a device. You want it to work efficiently, right? Right. So that's why I'm doing my thesis on something, not so creative.
With the opportunity to make sculptures out of my own poo out the window, I need to look up other avenues to release the wild artist within. I'd considered painting, but the only subjects I thought of representing were the larynx or the feline cochlea. I really hope that once I have real clients someday I will able to regard speech-language pathology as what it is: a job. For now, it pervades many aspects of my life. Even my pleasure reading! I read A LOT of books written by doctors. It all started with a little flirtation with Dr. Atul Gawande in the New Yorker. Then I read his first book, then his second, then I read How Doctors Think by Jerome Groopman, then When the Air Hits Your Brain by Frank Vertosick, then Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder, and I'm finishing Another Day in the Frontal Lobe by Katrina Firlik and about to start Vol. 1 of The Social Medicine Reader. Don't get me started on all the medblogs I read!
I guess all of this means that I have no creativity flowing through my body, except maybe for ths artistry required to change the diaper of a squirmy eight month-old while managing a temper tantrum from his two and half year-old sister. I do this every week in my other role as The Nanny!
I've also had to pleasure of taking classes that focus on questions like "What IS performance?" (it's everything, in case you were wondering) or force us to think about rhizomes ("underground, horizontal stem of a plant that often sends out roots and shoots from its nodes") as a post-modern concept. And yet, I am not a creative person. During group projects, I'm the girl who cleans up everyone's contribution onto a neat power point and submits the Works Cited page. (APA, MLA, I do it all!)
I blame this on being surrounded by so many creative people. On of my friends just won $500 for a folk album he wrote and then analyzed in a 25-page artist statement for his Senior Honors Thesis. What. What? I have the opportunity to do a senior thesis to. On ANYTHING. Seriously. People to crazy things like write, direct, and star in a play perform on the subway or study medieval weaponry. Lots of people get involved, professors are psyched to witness young, revolutionary art and the Senior Honors Thesis showcase is the pride of my school (occuring at the same time as accepted students days). But guess what I'm doing? I'm studying AAC board construction. Basic boards made on Overboard or BoardMaker. Boooring. (To my creative friends, not me!) Personally, I think it's important research, meant to contribute to a part of speech-language pathology that helps people who really need it. Imagine if all your thoughts and feeling and knowledge could only be communicated on a device. You want it to work efficiently, right? Right. So that's why I'm doing my thesis on something, not so creative.
With the opportunity to make sculptures out of my own poo out the window, I need to look up other avenues to release the wild artist within. I'd considered painting, but the only subjects I thought of representing were the larynx or the feline cochlea. I really hope that once I have real clients someday I will able to regard speech-language pathology as what it is: a job. For now, it pervades many aspects of my life. Even my pleasure reading! I read A LOT of books written by doctors. It all started with a little flirtation with Dr. Atul Gawande in the New Yorker. Then I read his first book, then his second, then I read How Doctors Think by Jerome Groopman, then When the Air Hits Your Brain by Frank Vertosick, then Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder, and I'm finishing Another Day in the Frontal Lobe by Katrina Firlik and about to start Vol. 1 of The Social Medicine Reader. Don't get me started on all the medblogs I read!
I guess all of this means that I have no creativity flowing through my body, except maybe for ths artistry required to change the diaper of a squirmy eight month-old while managing a temper tantrum from his two and half year-old sister. I do this every week in my other role as The Nanny!
Monday, May 21, 2007
The Living is Easy
I planned to create a post that outlined all the courses I've taken in the past three years. But, it's summer. I go to bed at 2am and wake up at 11am. I just can seem to fit that kind of a task into my life right now.
The worst part about summer as a college student is finding a job. I have applied to at least 50 jobs since April. And now I have one. A really, really good one at the Ivy League-Affliated teaching hospital up the street. I'm a research assistant on Saturdays in Newborn Medicine. Saturdays. That's it. I worked really hard to prepare for the interview. I wore a new dress. I did all of my orientation tasks on time (Tb testing, etc.) I learned all of the tasks involved in the job quickly. I enthusiastically accepted an offer to work solo two weeks ago. I interviewed an exhausted post-partum mom by myself. I was professional and got answers for all my questions. But they only want me on Saturdays. Hmph.
Spencer thinks I should just give up and apply for this job:
" Nationally syndicated public radio program is looking for a (poorly) paid Intern to help with:
1. Program production... help producers screen callers to be on the program.
2. Light office work... sort/open mail, answer phones, go to Post Office, walk dogs.
3. Research… odd jobs for website and newspaper column.
4. Reception… entertain/fend off tourists who wander in off the street.
5. Weight management… help us consume a freezer full of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream.
Requirements: Good ear for what makes entertaining radio. Sense of humor. Reliability. Tolerance of dogs, slobs, and tourists."
Sounds fun, huh? FYI poorly paid = $7.75 an hour! Ouch.
I resolved not to check my e-mail or apply for anymore jobs today. I'm driving myself nuts. So, this is how my jobless Monday will progress:
-Brush teeth
-Wash dishes that have been rotting since Saturday
-Make espresso (thank God someone has a job in this house!)
-Select an outfit from the floor
-Go outside to decide if I can wear sandals
-Go to the library
-Read a doctor book to fill the Grey's Anatomy hole
-Go to Cambridge
-Search for a dress to wear to summer weddings at the Garment District
-Dine on pizza with my accomplished, employed boyfriend
HIRE ME!
The worst part about summer as a college student is finding a job. I have applied to at least 50 jobs since April. And now I have one. A really, really good one at the Ivy League-Affliated teaching hospital up the street. I'm a research assistant on Saturdays in Newborn Medicine. Saturdays. That's it. I worked really hard to prepare for the interview. I wore a new dress. I did all of my orientation tasks on time (Tb testing, etc.) I learned all of the tasks involved in the job quickly. I enthusiastically accepted an offer to work solo two weeks ago. I interviewed an exhausted post-partum mom by myself. I was professional and got answers for all my questions. But they only want me on Saturdays. Hmph.
Spencer thinks I should just give up and apply for this job:
" Nationally syndicated public radio program is looking for a (poorly) paid Intern to help with:
1. Program production... help producers screen callers to be on the program.
2. Light office work... sort/open mail, answer phones, go to Post Office, walk dogs.
3. Research… odd jobs for website and newspaper column.
4. Reception… entertain/fend off tourists who wander in off the street.
5. Weight management… help us consume a freezer full of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream.
Requirements: Good ear for what makes entertaining radio. Sense of humor. Reliability. Tolerance of dogs, slobs, and tourists."
Sounds fun, huh? FYI poorly paid = $7.75 an hour! Ouch.
I resolved not to check my e-mail or apply for anymore jobs today. I'm driving myself nuts. So, this is how my jobless Monday will progress:
-Brush teeth
-Wash dishes that have been rotting since Saturday
-Make espresso (thank God someone has a job in this house!)
-Select an outfit from the floor
-Go outside to decide if I can wear sandals
-Go to the library
-Read a doctor book to fill the Grey's Anatomy hole
-Go to Cambridge
-Search for a dress to wear to summer weddings at the Garment District
-Dine on pizza with my accomplished, employed boyfriend
HIRE ME!
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