Feedback in Speech Therapy

Full transcript

Hi, I'm Nicole Kolenda, speech-language pathologist, professor, and founder of Voice for Possibility. Today I'm going to give a quick lesson on the two different types of feedback that we use in speech therapy. These types of feedback are based on the principles of motor learning, so they're known as KR and KP feedback.

We'll start with KP. KP stands for knowledge of performance feedback, and it's really critical to think about and plan out the type of feedback that you will be using with your client. This is what we do as speech pathologists, and it's something that over the past couple of months I've been encouraging the parents of the clients that I work with to think about.

Knowledge of performance

So what is knowledge of performance feedback? This is feedback that is typically used early on in goal attainment. If we're teaching the bilabial "b" sound, and maybe the target word is "bee," we'll have the child say "bee," or, what animal goes "bzzz"? We'll have them say "bee," and then we'll say to them, "I love the way you put your lips together for that 'b' sound."

That's very specific feedback. We are letting our client know that not only are you getting it right, but you're getting it right because of where you set up your articulator placement.

Knowledge of results

What we like to do in speech therapy is start with this knowledge of performance feedback, which again is very specific, and then we eventually pare down to a knowledge of results feedback. That would just be, what animal makes that sound, and the child says "bee," and then we just say, "Great job," and we don't say anything else.

The reason it's critical to really plan this out is that, obviously, we can't always begin with knowledge of performance feedback. We want the child to be able to generalize the skills, and the reality is that they're not going to be walking down the street or engaging in conversation with their friends at school or their parents, having a little feedback angel on their shoulder. They're going to eventually have to self-identify and be able to self-correct errored productions.

So we try to teach this, and I have also been teaching this concept of feedback to the parents of the clients I treat, because they are really at home implementing a lot of the targets that I've set up for therapy.

A yoga example

To put it into another framework, I like to talk to my students about when I learn a new yoga pose. I'm not good at yoga. So when I go in and the yoga teacher is teaching a new pose, what is most beneficial for me in the moment is for her to come up to me and give me knowledge of performance feedback, or adjust my body in space, because my hips don't go anywhere and I'm so tight. That way I know where I need to go and what that body configuration looks like for that pose. It's crucial for me early on to get that type of feedback.

But later on, maybe a couple of weeks later, hopefully if I'm doing well, all she has to do is give me a look and say, "Good job, Nicole," and I know that I have put my body in the positioning that is allowing me to be successful with that goal. This is all taken from principles of motor learning, and we know speech is a motor act. That is why this type of feedback is successful.

Planning your feedback

So I encourage you to think about and plan for the type of feedback that you will be giving your client or your child, and how important that is in shaping speech clarity. Again, we start with knowledge of performance feedback: "I love the way you put your lips together for that 'b' sound," or "I love the way your lips came out for that vowel, 'ooh.' Such a good job with that too." Then later on, "Great job, you're doing really well," and just pull back.

I hope this has been helpful. If you have any questions, you can reach me at [email protected], or you can just reply to this video that I will be posting. If you have any other topics you would like me to discuss, I would love to hear from you. Also, take care, everybody.