Children with normal auditory processing have skills that those with APD, or auditory processing disorder, do not. The child without APD recognizes that words can have multiple meanings. He can understand language and speak it in conversation. And he can recognize when language is supposed to be funny or figure out riddles and puns. These are called metalinguistic skills.Ambiguous language isn’t a problem in the child without APD because he can draw inferences to determine the meaning of a sentence. For example, if you tell a child without APD, “A penny for your thoughts,” you won’t expect the child to ask for the penny.
You could say that a child without APD has language dexterity; he’s able to move to and fro in conversation easily.
Children without APD didn’t have to be taught these skills; they come automatically and are expected to appear.
But in those with APD, the lack of these skills can make life challenging and frustrating because he or she doesn’t understand that something is funny, doesn’t understand what others are talking about, and doesn’t understand that not everything people is literal.
Those with APD need instruction to develop the language dexterity needed for life. What type of instruction does a child with APD need from parents and experts? How do you teach a child that when you say he should think out of the box, it doesn’t mean that somehow he was sitting in a box to begin with?
There are different techniques that can be used to help children with APD make up for their deficits.
- Remember the Gossip Game, sometimes called the Telephone Game? This is where one child tells a secret to another child who passes it along to another. The secret is announced after the last child receives it and found to be vastly different than the original version. This game improves auditory skills along with the ability to discriminate and recognize changing acoustic cues.
- Parents can play Simon Says games with their children. This game depends on waiting for the word commands to change (auditory vigilance) while integrating both sides of the brain.
- Playing games such as Pictionary or crossword puzzles increase metalinguistic skills.
There are many other strategies that are used by experts to teach a child metalinguistics. Researchers have made plenty of discoveries that are used in effective programs for those with APD. Language dexterity can indeed be learned. Get more information about the auditory processing disorder treatment offered by Gemm Learning