SLP graduate students get hands-on literacy experience – News

This semester, Dr. Ciera Lorio was awarded a Faculty Community Engagement Learning (FCEL) grant through Illinois State University’s Center for Civic Engagement. Lorio used this grant to enrich and support the curriculum for CSD 406: Language for Learning and Literacy, a graduate-level course that speech-language pathology (SLP) master’s students take in their second year of the program. This course was designed to teach students how to properly assess and treat language and literacy needs in individuals with communication disorders.

The grant funding supported a collaborative project between the University and a multiple of community members. Students engaged in a variety of learning activities throughout the semester, including three guest speakers who shared their experiences supporting individuals with literacy disorders; a dyslexia simulation to provide insight into the experiences of those with dyslexia; and a service-learning experience with children at the Unity Community Center (UCC). The service-learning experience provided students with hands-on practice implementing literacy strategies with children who had varying reading and writing needs. At the end of the semester, students presented their experiences implementing literacy interventions with children at the UCC and shared the literacy activities they designed with their peers.

The SLP graduate students shared copies of their literacy activities and materials with the UCC staff, allowing staff to continue engaging children in literacy activities during their daily literacy block and send those same activities home for UCC parents to implement with their children. With the grant funding, the CSD 406 class was also able to donate a total of 23 books and two DVDs to the UCC. The books selected were paired with student-designed, hands-on activities related to each book, and some books were specifically chosen in part because they had been turned into movies. This consideration was made, so the young readers could enjoy the books before experiencing their movie adaptations during the UCC’s movie day on Friday’s.

This community-minded learning experience seemed to have an overall positive effect on the SLP graduate students in CSD 406. Graduate student Kezia Orofeo reflected, “My experience working with children at the UCC was truly so fun! This project provided our cohort with another opportunity to apply the skills we learned in our courses and to give back to the community that has helped us grow as clinicians. We were able to observe diverse needs in terms of language and literacy, and this project helped refine our skills and link our learning to implement interventions.” Graduate student Hannah Rudkin developed several activities the UCC staff could use with the books in their library during their daily literacy blocks. She shared, “My partner and I chose 10 books from their library, varying from picture books to chapter books, and created activities for each of them. Our activities consisted of discussion questions, reflection questions, sequencing of events, and opportunities to get up and move around. We received great feedback from the UCC staff on our materials and activities, and the kids loved them!”

Lorio has been collaborating with the UCC for the last three years, and she hopes to continue the service-learning project with future cohorts of SLP graduate students. “According to the 2022 Nation’s Report Card, only 33% of fourth graders in the state of Illinois are reading at or above a proficient level. In other words, nearly 67% of children in our state are NOT reading at proficient levels. That’s over half of our fourth graders,” said Lorio. “This is a problem that everyone needs to work toward fixing, and I’m glad my students could be a part of the solution, if even in a limited way.” At the end of the semester, Lorio said she was able to observe her graduate students working with the children at the UCC. She noted, “Several children at the UCC raved about their ‘ISU teacher’ and how much they ‘loved’ them. It was really heartwarming to see that our SLP graduate students were providing more than just literacy support–they were also offering connection and forming positive relationships with children in our community.”