8 Things I Learned This Semester in USU’s online 2nd Degree Program

I’ve just finished my semester of classes at Utah State University in their online 2nd degree program! Woohoo!

I took 2 courses over the 2014 summer session: Phonetics & Developmental Phonology and Language, Speech, and Hearing Development. It was an interesting semester, but I’m definitely glad its over. In this post, I’m going to give you a list of 8 things I Learned

1) The IPA

The IPA is not a beer. It’s actually an deeply useful tool for slps and other language professionals. It is the International Phonetic Alphabet; basically it is an alphabet of symbols where each symbol has exactly one sound; not like English where a letter can have 3 or 4 different sounds. It is useful because it creates a sort of universal way to write exactly what people are saying.

I’d learned it before when I was in introduction to linguistics as a freshmen in college. So learning it again has been a lot of review, but my Phonetics/Phonology course went a lot more in depth with it than I’d seen before. For example, I learned about r-controlled vowels and I learned about allophonic variations of phonemes and how to transcribe them.

2) Online Class Can Feel Lonely

This isn’t directly related to SLP stuff, but I definitely learned it. Online classes, while incredibly practical, can be lonely. I realized pretty early on that I missed the social parts of school like chatting with friends before class, getting to ask questions and dialog with the profesor, and discussing homework in the library.

I tried to overcome this by using the discussion boards, but it doesn’t feel the same to me. Another tactic I employed was scheduling a phone call with my professors. This was a nice chance to get to know them both a little more.

I’m definitely going to keep up with my online courses (I don’t really have any other option at this point), but I know now not to except any of the fun social stuff. 

3) Learning Letters

Did you know that children tend to learn the letters of their own name before others? It makes sense when you think about it, but I was interested to find out there’s actual research that supports this! It’s called the own-name-advantage. Isn’t that wild?

As it turns out, we’re not entirely sure when children learn which alphabet letters but there are a lot of theories that show which ones tend to come first. For example, we usually learn the letters at the beginning of the alphabet before those at the end. Or letters that produce their own sound (like B) are usually learned before letters that don’t (like X which is the /eks/ sounds).

4) Transcribing Connected Speech

I know I mentioned the IPA above, but learning to use the IPA to transcribe connected speech is a totally different ballgame. It is so hard! To do it, you have to listen to have sound someone produces and write down the corresponding symbol. Sounds simple unless you know the IPA and how specific it can be. Did you know, for example, that the “p” at the beginning of “pop” is not the same sound as the “p” at the end of the word pop? Yeah. See how long it takes you to hear the difference.

It truly amazes me that our brains can hear and process all of these slightly different sounds like easily and quickly!

5) We still don’t know how we learn language

People like to think science has all the answers, but that’s not really the truth. We have a lot of different theories on how our brains acquire language, but we’re still not really sure if any of them are right or if its a combination of all of them. Some people think its kind of like condition (like with Pavlov and his dogs) and others think it is because of some special part of brain – but the truth is simply: we don’t know yet.

6) What’s Normal and What’s Not

I should start off by saying that I don’t really believe in “normal” as far as most things go. In terms of language development, “normal” means what is typical.

As an SLP, I’ll need to know by what age a child should be doing what things linguistically. Obviously things aren’t as clear cut as “You’re 3-years-old you should know the difference between X and Y,” but there are ranges and generalizations: Sounds that should be produced correctly, the ability to ask certain kinds of questions, use of words indicating proximity, etc. If I know what a “typically developing child” should be doing at a certain age, then I’ll be able to spot children who might not be developing their language skills correctly. This is probably one of the most important things I’ve taken away from the class.

7) Acquisition of language sounds (phonemes)

We learn certain sounds before others. What!? Yeah. For example the “mmmmm” sound is usually one of the first acquired! It comes along with “p” “h” “w” “b.” There’s been quite a bit of research into this and there’s a fairly standard order in which we learn the sounds in English. The accepted their says its because of 1) the complexity of the sounds (we learn easier ones first) and 2) the frequency with which we hear the sounds (more frequent means it is learned sooner).

This varies from language to language! for example, “z” is one of the last sounds learned by Arabic speakers but its near the “middle” for English speakers.

8) The correlations between socioeconomic status and school success

Almost every chapter in my textbook mentioned this one. The higher your socioeconomic status, the more likely you are to succeed in school. It is a sad and simple truth, and one that is especially important for SLP’s and educators.

This starts showing up in infants. There is a long studied relationship between socioeconomic status (SES) and middle ear infections, and this make sense if we think about it. If you’re barely living paycheck to paycheck, can you take the time off work to bring your child to the doctor when you think he has an ear infection? Could you even pay the doctor bill? More middle ear infections seems to be related to language delays… which are related to lower success in school.

I think it is so important to recognize this sad reality so that we can work to change it. How can we claim that we are equal in our right to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness if some people are born at a disadvantage that is clearly seen before they even start school?

So there you have it! 8 of the many things I learned this semester in USU’s online 2nd Degree!

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