(Monthly Tip) Concussions: How Speech-Language Pathologists Can Help

Monthly Tip

January 2022

Concussions: How Speech-Language Pathologists Can Help

Concussions are a common injury, especially in children and adolescents. They can result from many different situations, including sports injuries, car accidents, and falls. Although many concussion symptoms resolve without intervention, some children may experience persisting challenges. These challenges often become apparent when students return to school and increasing academic demands place stress on their cognitive load. In fact, it is estimated that 145,000 children and adolescents in the United States are living with lasting cognitive, physical, or behavioral effects that can impact them at school and into adulthood.

Affected Cognitive Skills

A concussion can impact an individual in many areas. While each child may present with different symptoms and effects, here are some cognitive skills that may be affected:

Attention. Students may struggle to sustain attention during class, in conversations, or during activities, especially for extended periods of time. Fatigue and headaches following a concussion are common symptoms that negatively affect attention.
Memory. Concussions can affect short-term and long-term memory, which students need to learn new material. When children struggle to recall information, they may grow angry or confused, which could result in task avoidance.
Executive Functioning. These skills require higher-level cognition, which is often challenging following a concussion. Impaired executive functioning skills may make it difficult to make decisions, think flexibly, set goals, initiate and self-monitor tasks, plan, organize, and problem solve. When children struggle with these skills, navigating the challenges of both daily living and school can feel extremely overwhelming.
Language. Following a concussion, students may struggle to recall words, understand conversations, or follow directions. They may also find it challenging to comprehend what they read and to engage in the writing process.
Social pragmatics. Concussions can impact children’s ability to participate socially. They may find it hard to follow a conversation, maintain topics for extended periods, or regulate their emotions.

After a concussion, your children may face a variety of challenges. It can be easy for them to feel disheartened, so it is important to help them utilize strategies to address the specific difficulties that they are experiencing. While not an exhaustive list, here are some methods that you and your children can implement at home:

Break down daily activities or tasks into steps. Completing a task, whether simple or complex, can be overwhelming for students suffering from a concussion, as they may struggle to recall the task or make a plan to complete it. In this situation, help your children make a checklist that breaks down the task into specific smaller steps. For example, when watching TV, the steps might be: “1. Grab remote. 2. Sit on couch. 3. Choose channel. 4. Watch TV.” You can even write the steps down and then place them out of order and have your children put them in the correct order. As they progress, they can try this with bigger tasks, such as preparing a meal or grocery shopping.
Play memory games. Memory games are an effective and fun way to help your children improve their short-term and long-term memory. One game that you can try is to memorize a list of five related words (e.g., five words related to food or to movie titles) and then ask your children to recite them back. The next day, ask your children to recall the five words. If they struggle, provide context clues to help them remember the targeted words. As they progress, you can give them a list of five unrelated words or increase the number of words that they must remember. Other games that support memory are Concentration and Distraction.
Play naming games. Naming games can support word retrieval, which is a common challenge that children who have been concussed experience. When playing, describe an item and ask your children to name the item. Use as much detail and specific language as possible at first – color, shape, function, etc. As your children progress, you can use vaguer or more abstract language. Naming games are also effective tools to help your children with language as well, as you can take turns describing items and trying to name them. Taboo and Headbandz are other fantastic games that support the development of semantics and retrieval skills.

Concussions impact individuals at all levels, so it is important they can implement strategies in every facet of their lives to manage the effects. School can be particularly challenging for students who have been concussed, so encourage your children to try some of these strategies:

Create checklists. Making a checklist is an easy but effective way for students to stay on task and remember directions. For example, when a teacher gives a set of verbal instructions, your children can jot down the directions as steps to refer back to. This is something that your children can practice at home so that they become used to doing this at school.
Underline and annotate. If your children have a difficult time understanding directions and texts, help them underline key words that they can reference later. Engaging with a text in this manner can also help your children determine if there are any particular aspects of language that they are struggling with after their concussion.
Use a planner. A planner is the first step in submitting assignments on time and staying aware of deadlines and events. Whether your children use a physical or digital (e.g., Google Calendar) planner, this tool will enable them to recall their obligations and better plan out their time.

Final Thoughts

Lasting effects from concussions can be concerning. However, the Speech-Language Pathologists at Thinking Organized are equipped and ready to help your children. We begin with an initial consultation session to determine in which areas your children may need support. Depending on the area of need, we treat with strategies that clients can implement in their daily lives, whether at school, work, or home. Treatment approaches include direct training of these areas through functional practice, internal strategies, recommendations for apps, and/or environmental modifications.

We are very excited to start our new Concussion and Cognition program at Thinking Organized. Please feel free to reach out to office@thinkingorganized.com if you have any questions, or if you would like to set up a consultation if you or your children have experienced concussion-related symptoms.

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New Year, New Me

By Colette Hapi

HAPPY NEW YEAR AND WELCOME TO 2022!

With the new year comes a profound sense of “newness.” Suddenly, we’re empowered and excited by the opportunities that a new year brings and come up with all sorts of New Year’s resolution ideas. We’re excited for a fresh start and all of the things that we plan on accomplishing. No wonder the hashtag #NewYearNewMe is so popular!

If you’re anything like me, your resolutions list will be about one mile long, fraught with things that you want to change, like taking up new hobbies, meeting new people, getting better grades, reading more books, or working out more. However great our intentions are, the statistics say that only about 10% of us ever achieve our New Year’s resolutions and break free from our bad habits. As much as it saddens me to say, I’ve been part of the 90% who don’t meet their resolutions far too often. One of the main reasons is that I usually make too many resolutions. Until recently, I hadn’t even thought about the fact that my long-winded list of resolutions was a reason for my downfall. In my attempt to be as detail-oriented as possible and address every area of my life, I created too many expectations and unrealistic goals. As a result, this huge list caused me to feel exhausted and completely over it by the third week of January.

By trying to create so many drastic changes at once, I essentially shocked my system because I didn’t build those habits over time. It’s no wonder that I reverted back to my comfort zone and completely ignored my attempts to improve myself. So this year, I’m taking a different approach.