Christine is a delightful eight year old girl, who is being seen for speech and language therapy once a week at the San Jose Scottish Rite Language Disorders Clinic.  She was originally brought to our clinic by her mother, who was concerned about her speech and language development.  The family was referred by the San Andreas Regional Center.   At four years of age, Christine was diagnosed with high functioning autism by her public school.  As a result of this diagnosis, Christine displayed difficulty with expressive language skills, as well as social skills.  At that point in her development her mother stated, “She just repeated what I said.”

When therapy was initiated, Christine was working on answering questions, using appropriate pronouns, producing descriptions of items and objects and improving her functional and conversational language skills.  Over the course of her treatment, Christine has made steady progress.  Her receptive language skills (the ability to understand language) were quite high, testing in the normal range for her age.   Christine struggled most with expressing herself and relating to other peers and adults.  It was difficult for her to form meaningful and appropriate conversations.  

Many of Christine’s expressive language goals have been mastered.  She is now working on fine tuning her grammar skills as well as her ability to create sentences correctly.  She was recently placed into a group treatment session with a peer of similar age and treatment goals.  By working with a peer, Christine is able to practice her social skills in “real life” encounters and conversations.  Since the change from individual to group therapy, Christine has been more vocal with both her peer and her therapist.  She initiates more conversation and is expressing herself more easily.  It is hoped that this behavior will carry –over into the interactions that Christine has with her peers at school.  

Christine’s mother states that she can now ask for what she wants at home, answer questions and produce comments about her thoughts and activities.  Her mom stated, “We can communicate more and I don’t have to worry about what I should do for her or think about what she needs.”  Her mother reported that by finding the San Jose Scottish Rite clinic, “I feel proud of myself as a mother for finding a good place for my daughter to get help with her problems.”