March 8, 2006

Room 42 in the basement of McLaurin is game central.

One whole wall has shelves and shelves of board games and mind teasers. Another wall has stacks of toys given away as prizes.

There are stickers on the table, computers by the door and things hanging from the ceiling.

But you have to have an invitation to get in, and only a small percentage of the school gets to come.

Speech class is fun, teacher Kim Granger said. And her students look forward to coming, instead of thinking they are being pulled from the other children because of a problem they have.

For Kenneth from Mrs. Tuccio&8217;s class it&8217;s the Ss. Particularly s-blends like in the words strict or struggle. But each of the other three students in speech class Monday had a different verbal weakness.

Some just need to be reminded to slowdown, others struggle with letter combinations in the middle of words.

Either way, Granger spends 30 minutes a day, two times a week, targeting whatever weakness, they have.

Typically students come to speech in groups of two or three. Kenneth&8217;s group Monday had four because someone was making up time.

And there are always more boys than girls, Granger said. Kenneth&8217;s group was four boys.

Students are referred to speech at the beginning of the year by their parents or teachers. Many have been in a speech program in previous grades.

Because the group is small and the object of the class is to well, speak, students stay involved. In 30 minutes Granger used social studies and language to reinforce the speech lessons.

She made them write questions to match a given answer and had them verbally quiz each other. They read aloud from sheets of words for a sticker. And they played some game with a disgusting element called Ned&8217;s Head.

Inside Ned&8217;s head &8212; a large cloth head &8212; were all sorts of things, including his &8220;lost lunch.&8221; Everyone got cards and was assigned a body part to enter the head through &8212; Kenneth got an ear. They had a time limit to retrieve all the items on their cards by feeling around. At the end they had to tell us what they&8217;d found &8212; hard to pronounce things like Ned&8217;s loose screw.

For each speech activity they complete, students get a sticker. They also get to pick from a bin full of prizes for greater tasks.

Granger said she frequently has non-speech students stick their heads in and ask to come to speech. Her own students know when their speech class starts and always get themselves there on time.

These students are getting the help they need at no cost to their parents. The children don&8217;t dread the classes, and their academic skills are merely reinforced through the speech lessons.

They get specialized one-on-one attention based on what they need. (Granger tests them at the start of the year to identify their weaknesses.)

In a perfect world we&8217;d be able to offer this kind of personal attention to all of our students daily.

Too bad we can&8217;t all go to speech.

Julie Finley is the education reporter for The Natchez Democrat. She writes a weekly column based on experiences with Marty Tuccio&8217;s homeroom class at McLaurin Elementary. She can be reached at 601-445-3551 or

julie.finley@natchezdemocrat.com

.

julie.finley@natchezdemocrat.com

.