Empowering young voices through confident communication at the 2024 Camp Chit-Chat
The NAU Communication Sciences and Disorders Department recently concluded a successful third season of Camp Chit Chat. Local children aged 5–13 with communication disorders attend the camp three days a week, participating in many fun-filled activities at NAU’s Flagstaff mountain campus. The program aims to give children who may otherwise not be able to attend a typical summer camp a camplike experience. At Camp Chit Chat, the children make friends and have fun, with the overlay of participating in speech-language-hearing therapy provided by NAU graduate students.
Each day, a group of eager children and equally eager graduate clinicians gather for the fun outside, playing the usual summer camp games. “It’s a great opportunity. Gaining real-life experience and getting to play games with the kids all day,” says Eris Kershaw, a graduate student in the speech-language pathology program. “It’s learning through fun.”
This year’s camp hosted nine campers paired with nine graduate student clinicians. The smaller group allows campers one-on-one time with a partnered clinician and creates an “environment of acceptance,” says Krystle, a mother of two campers. “It’s a group I feel comfortable leaving my children with.”
The camp is directed by Angie Rockow, clinical educator and supervisor in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, and implemented by graduate clinicians in the Northern Arizona University Speech-Language Hearing Clinic. The graduate clinicians plan the camp each summer to fit the needs of their campers, planning games and activities in addition to specialized one-on-one therapy with them in mind. Activities are designed to build confidence in communication. Many of the activities are designed with the classroom in mind. Campers work on building classroom confidence as they gather in a more classroom-like environment for the second half of the camp day. There, they practice skills by speaking to their peers, raising their hands to answer questions, and helping their leaders read names aloud. Campers earn summer camp badges to practice their memory recall by describing activities from the day before with their partnered clinician.
“The mission of Camp Chit Chat is two-fold,” says Angie Rockow, program director. “It emphasizes the training of our graduate students in the treatment of pediatric communication disorders, while simultaneously providing children from the community with communication disorders a fun and interactive summer camp experience that targets their specific needs.”
Camp Chit Chat has been a success; just look at the smiling faces in these photos! Plans for next summer are already underway!
Contributed by Business Administration, Marketing undergraduate student, Katie Fahy