Michelle is thrilled to join the multidisciplinary assessment team at the Calm Place! Michelle brings more than 25 years of experience providing speech, language and communication assessment and treatment services to people of all ages in her current local private practice, as well as in previous roles in education and healthcare. In our team-based psycho-educational and autism assessments, Michelle focuses on all areas of communication (understanding and use of language, speech clarity, social communication skills, etc.) and how these skills impact educational performance and the quality of social interactions. Michelle values a truly collaborative approach to assessment. She starts by ensuring a deep understanding of clients' and their families' experiences and concerns, and then customizes the process to address those needs.
Language difficulties often mimic or mask learning disabilities, ADHD and behavioral issues. A comprehensive language assessment can determine if a student's academic struggles stem from how they process, understand or express spoken and written language. By assessing areas like vocabulary, sentence structure and social communication, the SLP ensures that a child's challenges are recognized as specific gaps in the tools they use to think and learn, rather than being misidentified as a lack of intelligence or effort.
The ability to speak clearly is a foundational skill that builds self-confidence, helps forge strong peer relationships and closely links to early literacy and academic success. Phonological awareness is the ability to recognize and manipulate the sounds in spoken language. It is considered the #1 predictor of future reading success. Assessing speech sounds (articulation) and phonological awareness skills can determine if a child's reading errors stem from surface-level speech issues or an underlying difficulty with how sounds are represented in the brain.
Differences in social communication are core diagnostic features of autism. The Speech Language Pathology component of our autism assessments involves closely examining: