Mirror, mirror on the wall: Reflections on speech‐language pathologists’ image as advocates, activists, and aides

Abstract

Traditionally speech‐language pathology, along with other educational and rehabilitation‐based professions, has approached disability from a deficits‐based or medical‐model perspective with an aim toward normalizing or ameliorating a child's atypical behaviors or performance. However, an alternative perspective rooted in a social model of disability has been growing for several decades. This model argues that although an individual may experience challenges due to a specific impairment (motor, communication, social), their true disability results from the barriers to access and opportunity created by society, and seeks to identify ways to break down such barriers and capitalize on an individual's strengths to meet individual challenges. Although self‐advocates in the disability community first proposed the social model of disability in the 1970s, it remains unfamiliar to many clinicians and educators. As such, this paper aims to introduce clinicians to models of disability, with recognition of disability from a cultural lens, and acknowledgment of disability's intersectionality with ethnicity, social class, and gender. The role of speech‐language pathologists in promoting self‐advocacy, activism within the disability community, and the shifting role of teaching (aid) is then discussed through a strengths‐based lens.

Reconceptualizing the Family to Improve Inclusion in Childhood Disability Research and Practice

“…Service providers and researchers have a critical role to play in advocating for health services, systems, and policies that promote the inclusion, functioning and well-being of children with disabilities and their families (32). At the broadest level, we should align with Article 5 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which recognizes that the following people have a duty help children to exercise their own rights over time ".…”

“…Service providers and researchers have a critical role to play in advocating for health services, systems, and policies that promote the inclusion, functioning and well-being of children with disabilities and their families ( 32 ). At the broadest level, we should align with Article 5 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which recognizes that the following people have a duty help children to exercise their own rights over time “…parents or, where applicable, the members of extended family or community as provided for by local custom, legal guardians or other persons legally responsible…” ( 33 ) and Article 2, which protects children from discrimination, including that which stems from their parent's or guardian's sex, ethnic or social origin, political or other opinion ( 33 ).…”

A Critical Analysis of Standardized Testing in Speech and Language Therapy

“…5 Medical model of disability castigates disability as a lack or a deficit located within the individual. It utilizes medical techniques to assess and treat disability with the goal of fixing the individual to achieve normalcy (see Donaldson et al 2017 for a discussion of this model as it relates to speech and language therapy).…”

Teaching Language and Literacy Through the Visual Arts: An Interdisciplinary, Literature-Based Approach

“…In evidence-based practice (EBP), educators integrate children’s needs, strengths, interests, and preferences with research and expertise (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, 2005). Educators who capitalize on children’s individual strengths, such as nonverbal intelligence or cognition, maximize learning and motivation and facilitate growth, self-determination, and self-advocacy (Donaldson et al, 2017). A “strengths-based approach to teaching empowers children by supporting them in identifying how they best learn” (Donaldson et al, 2017, p. 7).…”