Show Notes

On today’s episode of All Ears at Child’s Voice: A Hearing Loss Podcast, Tatum and Jessica interviewed Landon Lacey on the topic of Theory of Mind. Here are some of the takeaways:

1. Theory of mind is the idea that someone can know that what is in their head is different than what is in someone else’s head.
2. Children with hearing loss have difficulty with theory of mind because of a variety of factors, including:
   1. The requirement of understanding abstract language (emotion words) and mental state words (think, wonder, believe)
   2. Decreased incidental learning (not overhearing as many conversations)
3. These deficits appear in children with hearing loss as early as 17-26 months (Meristo et al., 2012)
4. There are things we can do about it!

 

Landon mentioned a powerful study that compared children with hearing loss to children with typical hearing on a nonverbal false belief task. Here is a link to that study: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1f42/52c470ad8ed2cafc1f4563ec6294814e1aac.pdf

And here is a picture of Tom and Jerry (listen to the show to know why this is here!):

Lastly, Landon mentioned a variety of resources for professionals, parents, and children. Here they are:

• The Giggle Gang by Jan Thomas
  • http://www.janthomasbooks.com/Books.html
• Hearing First Website
  • https://hearingfirst.org/en/blog/2017/09/21/Theory-of-Mind
• TED Talk by Rebecca Saxe
  • https://www.ted.com/talks/rebecca_saxe_how_brains_make_moral_judgments

 

Where to find Landon:

Landon.lacey@medel.com

Workshop: Mind Matters: Fostering Theory of Mind in Children with Hearing Loss

Show Transcript

Tatum: Welcome to Episode 6 of All Ears at Child’s Voice, a podcast discussing all things hearing loss. We aim to connect parents of children with hearing loss and the professionals who serve them. We’re your hosts. I’m Tatum Fritz.

Jessica: And I’m Jessica Brock. And today we have Landon Lacey on the show with us. Welcome Landon.

Landon: Hi

Tatum: Landon previously worked at Child’s Voice as a speech-language pathologist and Early Interventionist.  She now works as a Consumer Outreach Manager for the cochlear-implant company Med-EL. Landon, would you like to share about your work at Med-EL?

Landon: Sure. So I am part of the consumer team and I support people that have cochlear implants in learning how to use their device and their rehab process. I also talk to people who are thinking about getting a cochlear implant. And then I help professionals like you, learning how to use the devices and how to troubleshoot them.

Jessica: Landon before we introduce our topic for today, we thought we’d start by asking you if you have any favorite work stories from the past week to share with our listeners.

Landon: Yeah, there was a really cool experience that happened recently. This is the story of a mom, actually, in Minneapolis, who has been deaf for 15, 20, years. And she’s been okay with reading lips and everything, but she recently had a couple of kids and, for safety reasons, she was concerned that she wouldn’t be able to hear them if they were crying or if somebody fell down. So she decided she’s gonna get a cochlear implant. She got a Med-EL implant, and we had all really counseled her that she would probably just get environmental awareness. We didn’t want her expect any speech understanding or anything, she’d just know that somebody was crying. And they turned it on and a week later she was understanding everything her children said. So it’s been this huge miracle in her life and I love reading all of her emails and updates right now. *laughs*

Jessica: That’s amazing, a week later? That’s wild. I got chills.

Tatum: Oh ok, that’s so interesting.

Jessica: Yeah

Tatum: That’s a great story. Thanks for sharing Landon.

Jessica: Today, we’re going to talk about Theory of Mind, which is a favorite topic of Landon’s. Landon, you might want to share a little bit more about your experience studying this topic but we know you were involved in some research at UNC as a graduate assistant studying Theory of Mind. Is that accurate? *laughs*

Landon: Yeah, so UNC was doing a longitudinal study called “Outcomes of Children with Hearing Loss.” And they were looking a lot of different domains of children with hearing loss and where their deficits could be, and one of them was Theory of Mind. And so I was helping analyze part of the research on that end. And that was what really piqued my interest, and I didn’t realize how big of a deficit kids with hearing loss can have.

Tatum: Landon is also currently traveling the country leading a six-hour workshop for Early Interventionists on Theory of Mind and how best to incorporate it into your practice. We will go into further detail about how you can learn more about attending this workshop. So stay tuned.

Jessica: We should probably define Theory of Mind before we go any further. Landon, do you have a good definition for Theory of Mind.

Landon: Yeah, so Theory of Mind essentially is the idea that someone can know that what is in their head is different than what’s in someone else’s head. So it’s not a theory in the sense that we think this is something that happens. We know that this is something that happens, this is a fact. Theory of Mind is a fact. The theory part of it is that we are theorizing about what’s in someone else’s head. So right now when you sit here smiling at me, I’m theorizing that you’re hearing connecting with me and we’re enjoying this. But, I mean potentially you could be thinking about dinner or something else. So, all day long what we’re doing is reading what other people are giving us in terms of social cues and making a working theory about what they’re thinking about. So, Theory of Mind basically is just knowing different people think and feel and want and believe different things.

Tatum: What helped me understand Theory of Mind was learning about how it’s studied and how you can assess whether a child is developing Theory of Mind. So, that classic research example where a mom and her child are with a researcher in a room together and the researcher may put a cookie in the cupboard in from of the mom; when the mom leaves the room, the researcher moves the cookie to the fridge and asks the kid where they think mom will look for the cookie when she comes back. Below a certain age, children will say that the she will look in the fridge even though mom couldn’t have this  information since she was not in the room.

Landon: Yeah, and for a lot of people that task that you’re describing is synonymous with Theory of Mind. So that’s called the false-belief task, and it came about…they…researchers invented it in the early 80s. And it blew people’s minds, it was like this huge psychological revolution that all the sudden we realized three years olds couldn’t do that and five year olds could, and children with autism couldn’t do it and children with Down Syndrome could. And it became this huge subject of research that all pivoted around that task, that false-belief task, and so today if you go online and you google “Theory of Mind” usually what will come up is that activity, that false-belief task. But, when I talk about Theory of Mind, I’m looking at it from a more broad viewpoint where I look at it from the perspective of something that you acquire across the lifespan. So like, my husband and I are still working on this, right. I’m like, what are you thinking?

*Jessica laughs*

Landon: And it’s something that I think we never really fully get because we can’t read people’s minds but we get better at it as we go. So really there’s that narrow viewpoint, which is the false-belief task, and then the more broad view of learning how to engage socially and appropriately over the course of your life span.

Jessica: Yeah, I think one of the ways that you’ve phrased it to me before, which kind of makes me laugh a little bit, is we want our kids to make friends. We want our kids to grow up and have friends and relationships and this is a huge part. If you don’t understand that other people have a different perspective than you do, then you’re not going to be able to connect with people in a way that’s meaningful, which I think is something that’s really important that I did not realize we could work on in Early Intervention, with children that are under three. Do you want to talk a little bit about why children with hearing loss might struggle with Theory of Mind?

Landon: Yeah, definitely. There are a number of reasons. The first and probably one of the larger reasons is that they a lot of times have a language delay. Kids that have trouble with the semantics, syntax, pragmatics, they can have delayed Theory of Mind. One of the, one of the hallmarks of under-…of having Theory of Mind is being able to understand a lot of abstract vocabulary, those mental-state words like wonder, worry, thought, knew, felt…and those words are harder for kids to learn about. You really have to use words to describe a word, instead of just showing them like a zebra or something like that. The concrete vocabulary is so much easier. And so kids with hearing loss, a lot of times that are language delayed, they might have trouble with syntax and grammar but then they’re also having trouble with these words like the difference between frustrated and disappointed. And I think the language aspect plays a role but you know that being said, one of the things that has blown me away with the research is that there are a lot of kids that have average or above average language with hearing aids and cochlear implants that are still delayed in Theory of Mind. So I guess the bigger question there is why. And one of the answers to that is parent input. Parents of children with disabilities do everything they can to love and support their child and unfortunately sometimes that means making their child’s life as easy as possible.

Landon: A lot of times what that means is that they do input those concrete vocabulary words, those preschool ready words, you know, “This is a pencil. This is a zebra.” And they stay away from feeling words other than really like happy and sad and scared and angry. And, really what these kids need is way more exposure to those abstract vocabulary words. But also, a lot of research has shown that parents of kids with hearing loss actually speak less to their children than they do to children that are typically hearing. And then, you know, you’ve got very obvious answer, which is just audiology management. If a child isn’t getting a cochlear implant until they’re 18 months old, two years old, then they’ve missed critical, critical time to be able to learn those types of words, if they’re pulling out their hearing aids all the time, if the batteries are dead, if they’re not mapped appropriately, they don’t have a great audiologist, all of those things impact of Theory of Mind development.

Tatum: Yeah, I feel that part of the reason behind it is less access to incidental learning. So our kids with hearing loss are not  able to overhear all the time at a distance so they’re missing out on those opportunities to observe maybe the way their family interacts, maybe the way their other siblings interact, or other kids in the daycare interact. Have you read anything about that?

Landon: Yup, that’s huge. Their listening bubble is decreased. And so, where a child that has normal hearing is able to sit in the living room and overhear mom and dad talk about how they’re concerned about paying the bills and maybe they don’t understand everything, but they’re picking up on I’m really worried, how are we going to…and they might choose to maybe not go ask mom for apple juice right then because it doesn’t feel like it was a good time, where as a kid with hearing loss isn’t picking up on all those words. And the way that I kind of think of it, and I haven’t read it like this anywhere, but this is the way that I think this, is kind of like triangulation. You’ve got two people that are talking and you’re not a part of their conversation but you’re triangulating, you’re on the outside of that conversation, and you’re going back and forth and back and forth in your head, trying to put together what they’re saying. And what that teaches a kid is that these two people have two different thoughts. They’re thinking two different things and they’re communicating it through these words. And that allows them to know that what’s in my head is different than what’s in your head.

Landon: And there are so many plus sides to developing strong Theory of Mind that I think that even if a parent has typically developing, typically hearing child, this should be a part of their repertoire, this should be a part of their parenting. They’re setting their child up to be a better spouse and to have better job opportunities and to be a better student in class, to be more likable. I mean, what we really want is to be able to communicate socially and for people to like us. What’s the point in having a really great vocabulary if nobody wants to be around you?

Jessica: Okay, so I’m thinking of a parent of a newborn child and maybe they’re listening to this and they’re thinking like “what is this girl talking about?” Like, okay in a few years I’ll start talking about, you know, that I’m mad about the traffic or that the storm that’s coming worries me, is that…can…can a parent of a newborn child, do anything to be in the process for setting their child up for success in terms of their child’s Theory of Mind?

Landon: There’s a lot that they can do. But I’m gonna start with one of the reasons why, and it’s one of the more powerful studies that I’ve read. This is a study out of the Netherlands that has kind of changed the way that I look at Early Intervention and Theory of Mind. So this woman, her last name is Meristo, she wanted to see if kids with hearing loss looked different than kids with typical hearing on that false-belief task at much younger age. So, a lot of people have said, well of course you can’t pass the false-belief task before then because you don’t have the language for it, you don’t have compliments, which is a sentence structure. And, so what this group did was they made a non-verbal false-belief task. She sat them on their parent’s lap and put a screen in from of them, and they used this eye gaze technology so the computer was able to measure how long the child looked at a certain areas of the screen and that was basically the child’s way of telling you, “I know…I know what’s coming. It’s gonna be over here.” So, what they did is they had video animation on the screen where there was a tunnel and it split into a Y. So, at the end of each of the legs of the Y there was a box And so, they used the classic Tom and Jerry cartoons in order to act this out. So Jerry, the mouse, goes into the tunnel at the base and then you can’t see, it’s opaque, and he comes out on one end, either the left or the right. And then he goes into a box on either end. And then, Tom, the cat, is watching Jerry, the mouse, and he wants to catch him. So after he sees that he goes through the tunnel, he goes to the right, he gets in the box on the right, then Tom goes into the tunnel. And that’s when they start measuring where the infant is looking. So, Tom goes into the tunnel, it’s totally opaque, is the kid looking at the box on the right or the box on the left? And that tells you that they know which side the cats gonna come out, right?

Tatum: That makes sense.

Landon: Yeah, so they habituate the kid to this. The mouse goes on the left, the kid looks on the left. The mouse goes on the right, the kid looks on the right. And then, they decided they’re gonna test it. So, they set child up to be able to test this by introducing a change where the mouse climbs out of one box and runs over to the other side and gets in the other box. And, the cat watches him do this. So you get to see that the cat knows that the mouse is made this change. And so, the child watches the boxes and chooses the right or the left. And then, in the actual experiment what they do is they have the mouse go into one box and then the cat leaves the screen. So the cat hasn’t witnessed this change. The mouse goes into the box on the right with the cat watching, and then after the cat leaves moves into the box on the left. And then, the cat comes back on the screen and goes into the tunnel. Where does the child look? Does the child look where the mouse actually is?

Jessica: Right.

Landon: Or does the child look where the cat thinks the mouse is? Where the cat last saw the mouse? And that really is exactly what you were describing, Tatum. That’s that false-belief task. Do they know that mom’s moved from the basket to the cupboard? Does mom know that? And so what they found, at 17 to 24 months, was that kids with hearing loss bombed it and kids with normal hearing passed with flying colors.

Jessica: Oh my gosh. That’s way younger than the classic verbal false-belief task.

Landon: So what is it that has made their experience so different in the first year and a half of life to the point that they, they…zero percent of children with hearing loss passed this.

Jessica: Oh my gosh.

Landon: Ninety percent of kids with hearing did.

Landon: Yeah, yeah. So all of that is just to say that there can be a deficit that shows up at a very, very, very young age. And waiting until kids are at four to five to be able to pass that false-belief test, at eight or nine not really making friends, older and having behavior problems, really is not the right time to target it. The right time to target it is the day the child is born. So what you guys had asked is how parents should do that. And if I were a mother of a newborn or a therapist working with a mother of a newborn, some of the things that I would coach them to do, is to use desire vocabulary and desire vocabulary, usually at that age, is focused a lot on the word want, need, don’t want, don’t like and directing it really just towards the child, “Oh you want this? This is what you want. This is what you need. I don’t think you like that. You do not want this.” And just letting that child start to understand the contents of their own mind. And once they understand the contents of their own mind at around 18 months, then you can start pointing out what other people like and don’t like or want and don’t like. “You like that one. Your brother doesn’t like that. That’s not the one he wants.” And that juxtaposition at an early age sets them up to be able to be successful.

Jessica: That’s awesome. Yeah, I don’t think that…I mean I’m not a parent of a newborn but I don’t think that would be intuitive necessarily for me to do. I don’t know, what do you think?

Tatum: Yeah, it’s hard to say as someone who is a speech pathologist.

Jessica: Right. *Laughs*

Tatum: *laughs* It’s hard to think back to the time when we weren’t thinking of these issues. Something that I think of though is when you first start with a family, they do have this newborn that was just diagnosed with hearing loss, it’s hard to come in and say, here’s this other deficit you need to worry about in addition to the whole…I mean the main thing I feel like our families are thinking is will my kid ever talk? And then it’s hard to come in and be like this is something else we need to focus on. So how do you recommend that therapists incorporate this, explain it to families, bring it up without putting more on their load?

Landon: Yeah so, if I were picking up a new family, they have a six-month-old that was profoundly deaf, I definitely wouldn’t use the word Theory of Mind. I think that can be too academic and intimidating. But I would start talking about social-emotional development, wanting to develop that. And I think kind of a non-invasive, easy way to get parents to put it on their radar softly is just to include a section in your notes for that. So you’ve got your speech goal, you’ve got your language goal, and then sometimes people call it “cognitive,” but I think you can also just call it “social-emotional.” What you’re working on is their ability to self-regulate, to make requests.

Jessica: I mean what you’re working on in therapy with a six-month-old is all of the foundational communication skills so it’s pretty easy to wrap up social-emotional skills into that because you should be looking for ways that a baby is communicating wants and things that they want and things that they don’t want.

Landon: I also think that for a lot of therapists they talk about joint attention in those early ages as well. And joint attention is fundamentally related to Theory of Mind. If I look at something across the room with baby a couple of feet away and I point at it, you know maybe there’s a ball, and I point at it  and say, “Look there’s your ball,” and baby looks at the ball, and baby looks back at me. We’ve accomplished joint attention but what we’ve also accomplished is that baby has just read my mind. I’m not just a mechanical arm waving across the room. I’m showing that child that there’s something over there that you’re interested in and that is the earliest form of mind reading is joint attention and we can do that at a very young age. And we can add that into our therapy lesson plan. So it doesn’t have to say, my child isn’t going to have a deficit in social skills in sixth grade.

Jessica: So we’ve talked about gesturally communicating with pointing things out to kiddos, talking to them, are there other ways that parents of really young children can start to work on Theory of Mind?

Landon: Yeah, so I think probably one of the best ways to work on it is through literacy. And, I think sometimes parents are at a loss with what to do with some of those really early developing books. I mean what do you do with Where’s Spot? You know, what do you do with these flap books and these feeling books? And that is an area I think that Early Interventionists and parents can explore a lot more. So almost all kids in Early Intervention have those flap books, and one way you read it is just to label all the vocabulary. There’s an alligator and then you turn the page. And one way I think a lot of therapists, including myself, aren’t doing it is incorporating those mental-state words. So instead of just opening it up, there’s an alligator, supposing what could be behind it. Maybe having everybody in the room do it. “Dad, what do you think it is? Dad thinks it’s a bear. What do you think it is mom? Mom thinks it’s a cup of coffee.” You know and really showing the child everybody in this room thinks it’s something different. And then you can use other vocabulary. You know, like Spot’s mom doesn’t know where he is, she’s so worried. I wonder what she’s going to do. What do you think is behind this flap? One of my favorite authors is Jan Thomas, and she does series of board books for kids called The Giggle Gang.

Landon: They’re super cute and they’re geared toward exposing kids to some of these concepts that different people like different things. Like everybody in one of the books wants to make Cow a birthday cake with sugar and flour and eggs but Duck wants to put a turnip in it. And everybody’s like we’re not putting a turnip in the birthday cake. And then at the end you realize Cow loves turnips, you know. And it’s that kind of fun, silly exposure to multiple ideas through literacy that I think really makes a big difference.

Jessica: Yeah, I love books as a way to do that. I think I’ve also done a similar thing with wind up toys. Like, do you think it will jump or do you think it will walk?

Landon: Oh, I love that.

Jessica: Which is a little bit more for kids who are like difficult to pend down for reading. I think you should definitely keep trying to read books to your kids, but as a different, as a similar goal, but a different activity.

Landon: Yeah.

Tatum: I’ve had tea parties type things with some of my kids where all her animals tried different foods, pretend foods, and we talked about which animals liked it and which animals don’t.

Landon: And then are you able to give them one of those pieces of food and say, “Give it to one of the puppets,” and see if they are able to give it to the right puppet?

Tatum: That would be great, we have not done that. I have…Laura, another therapist at the center, and I, have focused a lot on play development so there is another level of play development that I was unaware of where you have to interact with…with managing multiple characters within play at once which is when… and at the same time you had come and talked to us about Theory of Mind, so I was like oh we can use this at the same time and talk about which animals like it and don’t like it. But that would be really great.

Landon: Yeah, just doing a quick check to see, you know, we told her over and over again the lion doesn’t like the chocolate, the lion likes the broccoli. And then if you got a couple puppets out and you say, here’s some chocolate, give it to one of them, who does she give it to.

Tatum: Yeah

Landon: Yeah, starting to realize that, you know, being able…and that really setting them up for the opportunity to in preschool and kindergarten know that their friend loves a certain puzzle and choose to get it and bring it to their friend because they know that’s going to strengthen the bond and they want to make them feel good and it’s those types of things that set them up for that. But you brought up another great point of pretend play. I mean pretend play, just like joint attention, it is Theory of Mind. If you are playing grocer, you’re putting yourself in that person’s shoes. You’re pretending to be mommy taking care of a baby and that requires that you are able to empathize with them and think the way that they would think.

Jessica: When you and I first started talking about Theory of Mind, it was not something that I was thinking a lot about. And then we started talking about it and I thought to myself, oh I kind of, like I’ve kind of do some of this stuff, like I don’t call it Theory of Mind and I don’t call it you know social-emotional, but within things that we are already working on we’re targeting it, so I think one of the things that I’ve thought would help some of my parents is explaining why we’re doing some of this stuff. I’ve introduced it to parents of young children, like babies. I don’t remember exactly how I said it, but it was something like that. It was like, well we’re already working on talking, talking, talking all day long to our kiddo and we talked about a lot of different nouns and a lot of different verbs and today we’re gonna think about emotions. So we’re gonna give her box that she can’t open and talk about how it might make her feel. And, fortunately, that kiddo had an older brother who thought it was hilarious that she couldn’t open the box (*laughs*) so it was a very fun, easy, functional way to incorporate it. And this family took off with it, like a few weeks later, she started…the kiddo started crying and the dad, I don’t remember what he said, but he said something like, “oh that made you sad that”…you know, whatever, “you fell down,” or something “did that hurt?” You know, “look at your brother, he’s really mad that we’re not playing with him.” And it was just really cool to watch like just that one little goal, that one little activity had kind of set the wheels turning for them, so.

Landon: There are a lot things that parents can do. I mean you brought up the sibling thing. Siblings in the home are great. And how many times are parents like locking the sibling upstairs during EI sessions. I’m like, bring them down, there’s some conflict to resolve, we need to talk about it. Yeah, so I mean even if you just want to set up that type of activity for a sibling to be involved and tell them mom, you know we’re just going to practice using mental-state language to troubleshoot how difficult this playdough activity is gonna be with both of your kids here. I think it gives them an opportunity to spread their wings a little bit.

Jessica: Another way that you mentioned…I mean there are a million different ways that you can work on Theory of Mind, right? But one of the ways that you taught me how to work on it, is talking through a lot of the things that we think to ourselves. Do you want to expand on that a little bit, do you know what I’m talking about?

* Jessica laughs*

Landon: Yeah, absolutely. So the way that I put it is you have to turn the inside out. I think as parents so

I think a lot of times that we don’t want kids to hear the negative things that go on in our head, like if there’s a little one that’s playing on the floor and you’re around the corner you spilled coffee on your shirt, you might think, “Ugh god, this is my favorite shirt, now I have to go wash this. I’m gonna go get another one, but you might not let a kid overhear all all that, but actually that’s a great opportunity for them to hear your disappointment and also to realize it’s not the end of the world. And that kid probably will spill something on their shirt and they might be able to remember how you self-regulated in order to solve that problem.

Tatum: While our families are thinking of what to incorporate or therapists are thinking what to incorporate, what milestones should we be looking out for when it comes to Theory of Mind?

Landon: Yeah, that’s a great question. So in infancy when a kid is newborn up through like 18 months, we’re looking for joint attention, we want them to be able to pay attention to what somebody else is looking at and look back up at at them and maybe enjoy looking at the same thing together, whether that’s a book or a ball or whatever. And that, as we said earlier, are some of the earliest forms of mind reading so that joint attention is really important. And then as they get older, looking for them to be able to engage in pretend play. They’re not just running the cars down the stairs but they’re pretending like they’re somebody else and are kind of animating their toys in their heads other than just like vehicles crashing into each other. So that pretend play is really, really important and it’s something that can be facilitated as well and taught. And then between three and five years old, that big milestone is the one that we talked about, that false-belief task. But before then some kids really develop a nice ability to  anticipate people’s preferences. So pre- false-belief task, post pretend play, kids should learn to be able to do something that they are able to show who likes what. And one way you can, I know we talked about not testing kids, but one way that you can test them on this is…it’s called the goldfish-broccoli test where you can have two different bowls and you sit down with the kid and you put goldfish in one and broccoli in another. We know which one the kid would like, right?

Jessica: Yeah, the goldfish.

Landon: So you pick up the goldfish and you nibble on it (*makes chewing sound*) and you say, “Ugh, I don’t like that, yuck. And then you pick up the broccoli and you say, “Mmm, I love broccoli. This is really good.” And then you play together and you kind of reinforce it and then you put your hand directly between the two bowls and you say, “I’m hungry, I want some.” And, under 18 months they’ll usually give you a goldfish and then typically over 18 months they’ll give you the broccoli. That would, that would  be one of those flags to you, they know what I like, they know that this is an important thing to me. And then, as they get older, some of the things that you’re looking for are being able to understand irony and sarcasm, being able to pick up on a social faux-pas. Kids with hearing loss, when they get older,  can be pretty literal and sometimes they can be really gullible. And we want them to be able to not take speech at face value. If I say, “Great job participating today” (*sarcastic voice*), I don’t want them to say, “Thanks.” I want them to know that they need to do a better job the next time, you know. And those are some of the things that really start showing up in middle school and high school and that we want to target at a young age so that they are able to participate socially so that they’re not the one that’s the butt of the joke.

Tatum: So why don’t we start wrapping up. Before we close out do you have any books or resources that you’d like to recommend for families or professionals?

Landon; Yeah, so two of the ones that I love, and I’m talking Early Intervention, are any kind of flap book and I do love Jan Thomas’s books from The Giggle Gang. Cow’s Birthday is just a brilliant, brilliant book. But really the best resources are those spur of the moment life things and your voice. Any kind of misunderstanding is a gold mine. And I think parents should start seeing those breakdowns as a really nice opportunity to be able to explain what happened and why. In terms of professional resources, things that professionals can dive into, Hearing First has a couple of really great articles on Theory of Mind, including one that can be used as a parent handout.

Jessica: let’s maybe wrap up. Thanks everyone for joining us for another episode of All Ears at Child’s Voice. Landon, if our listeners want to find you, where can they find you?

Landon: They can reach me through email landon l-a-n-d-o-n dot lacey l-a-c-e-y at Med-EL, m-e-d-e-l dot com. *laughs*

Jessica: Awesome

Tatum: We’ll also put that in our shownotes. *laughs* Also, listeners, if  you are interested in learning more, Landon is currently traveling around the country giving a six-hour workshop titled Mind Matters: Fostering Theory of Mind in Children with Hearing Loss. It’s designed for Early Intervention therapists to learn how to do this a little bit more effectively in their own therapy. To learn more, visit our episode show notes or feel free to email Landon with questions.

Jessica: Landon, thank you so much for joining us. We really appreciate you taking time to talk about something we know you really care a lot about and I think our listeners will really benefit from it. So thank you so much.

Landon: Yeah thank you for having me.

Tatum: And listeners, we’d love to hear from you. Therapists, do you work on Theory of Mind already with your families and in your practice? And parents, were you already familiar with this topic or is this something new for you?

Jessica: Yeah, so let us know. Thank you everyone for joining us for another episode of All Ears at Child’s Voice.

Tatum: We’re your hosts. I’m Tatum Fritz.

Jessica: And I’m Jessica Brock.

Tatum: And as always we’re on instagram and twitter. I am @TatumFritzSLP and Jessica is @JessicaBrockSLP.

Jessica: You can also email us at podcast@childsvoice.org and find episode show notes and archived episodes at Child’s Voice’s website, childsvoice.org.

Tatum: And if you’re interested in learning more about Child’s Voice, Child’s Voice is on facebook as well as twitter and instagram with the handle @childs_voice, no apostrophe.

Jessica: We will see you next time.

Tatum: Bye

Jessica: Bye

Landon: Bye

Jessica: And from our friends at Child’s Voice…

Child’s Voice students: Bye, thanks for listening.