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What is Alphabet Therapy?

Mary McMahon
Mary McMahon
Mary McMahon
Mary McMahon

Alphabet Therapy is a technique which is used to enable communication for children with Angelman Syndrome, a serious genetic condition which causes profound developmental delays. It involves teaching the subject the alphabet and a series of key words, and showing the subject that by pointing to key words or spelling out concepts, he or she can communicate with other people.

This technique was developed by Terry Jo Bichell and Cristina Valle. The two women combined principles from Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) and the Rapid Prompting Method (RPM) to teach Bichell's son the alphabet, spurring the creation of a study to research the possibility of using Alphabet Therapy on other children with severe developmental disabilities. While expressly designed for people who suffer from Angelman Syndrome, a condition caused by the partial deletion of genetic material on the 15th chromosome, Alphabet Therapy has potential for other people with developmental disabilities as well.

Angelman Syndrome is a condition caused by the partial deletion of genetic material on the 15th chromosome.
Angelman Syndrome is a condition caused by the partial deletion of genetic material on the 15th chromosome.

Applied Behavior Analysis involves using known information about behavior and learning to facilitate a productive educational session. The session leader looks at what works and what doesn't for the individual student, and utilizes existing information about how people learn to make the lesson as effective as possible. For example, people tend to repeat behaviors when they are rewarded for them, and abandon behaviors which meet with a neutral or negative response, and this can be used to encourage learning behavior. ABA is used in a wide variety of fields beyond treatment for people with developmental delays, and in addition to teaching people, it also encourages them to maintain and use the skills they acquire.

The Rapid Prompting Method is a technique for teaching autistic children developed by Soma Mukhopadhyay to communicate with her autistic son. This technique involves a very rapid, focused session with the subject, focused on providing prompts which stimulate a response. RPM is supposed to facilitate learning, reasoning, and communication skills, with a focus on showing people that they can make choices, and those choices have consequences.

In the case of Alphabet Therapy, instructors combine the tools utilized in these techniques to teach a child the alphabet. Once the child learns the alphabet, the teacher can start to string together letters to form key words and concepts. To communicate, the child can point at labeled cards, or individual letters of the alphabet, if they wish to spell things out.

The idea behind Alphabet Therapy is that people with Angelman Syndrome have the potential to communicate, if they are given a chance to do so. By focusing on a child in a one on one session and using innovative teaching techniques, it is possible to give the child a voice of his or her own.

Mary McMahon
Mary McMahon

Ever since she began contributing to the site several years ago, Mary has embraced the exciting challenge of being a LanguageHumanities researcher and writer. Mary has a liberal arts degree from Goddard College and spends her free time reading, cooking, and exploring the great outdoors.

Learn more...
Mary McMahon
Mary McMahon

Ever since she began contributing to the site several years ago, Mary has embraced the exciting challenge of being a LanguageHumanities researcher and writer. Mary has a liberal arts degree from Goddard College and spends her free time reading, cooking, and exploring the great outdoors.

Learn more...

Discussion Comments

Kennedy Angelman

Thank you for providing information about Alphabet Therapy on this site.

There is more to teaching academic and communication skills than identifying letters of the alphabet and stringing them together.

Kind regards, Fae L., Angelman Program Coordinator, Vanderbilt Kennedy Center

anon17255

Ultimate goal of Alphabet Therapy is communication; The child initially learns to identify the alphabet- upper and lowercase letters, learns to identify letter sounds, words important to the child (example, the child's name, "Mom", "Dad", a favorite food, etc.), and initially learns to identify colors, shapes. If the child has the ability to make verbalizations or verbal approximations, then along with a receptive response, the child will be required to give a receptive and expressive response.

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    • Angelman Syndrome is a condition caused by the partial deletion of genetic material on the 15th chromosome.
      By: Giovanni Cancemi
      Angelman Syndrome is a condition caused by the partial deletion of genetic material on the 15th chromosome.