Lenora Edwards, Board Certified Speech-Language Pathologist and Chief Knowledge Officer at Better Speech, is a communication expert with over 15 years of experience specializing in pediatric and family-centered speech therapy.

Her expertise spans improving speech intelligibility, nurturing language development, and working with neurodiverse individuals, employing evidence-based techniques to help children of all abilities communicate more effectively. At Better Speech, Lenora leads initiatives to make quality speech therapy accessible to all families, empowering them to support their child's communication journey and unlock their full potential.

Takeaways:

• Children require a safe environment to express their thoughts and emotions effectively.
• Non-verbal communication plays a crucial role in conveying emotions and understanding others.
• Online speech therapy provides accessible support that can help children develop their communication skills.
• Parents often feel uncertain about their child's language development and require expert guidance.
• Observations from teachers and caregivers are valuable in identifying children's communication challenges.
• The pandemic has impacted children's social interactions and communication development significantly.

Website

https://www.betterspeech.com/

Social media Information

https://www.betterspeech.com/blog

https://www.youtube.com/@Better.Speech

https://www.facebook.com/yourbetterspeech

https://www.linkedin.com/company/better-speech/mycompany/

https://www.instagram.com/betterspeech

https://www.tiktok.com/@better.speech

Show Sponsor – National Association for Primary Education (NAPE)

https://nape.org.uk/

Discover more about Education on Fire

🔥 https://www.educationonfire.com/

🔥 Support the show with a One-Off Tip

https://educationonfire.com/support

🔥 Ecamm Free Trial – How I record and produce this show.

https://educationonfire.com/ecamm

🔥 Captivate.FM – My podcast host

https://educationonfire.com/captivate

🔥 Descript – My Editing Tool

https://educationonfire.com/descript

Some of the above are affiliate links, I may receive a small commission if you purchase via these but there is no cost increase to you. These links help support the channel so any clicks are greatly appreciated.

We want children to be able to express their wants and their needs and their thoughts and to have that robust vocabulary of our communication is non verbal.

So what does that mean?

That means my face is expressing emotion, my face is expressing communication.

My eyes, my mouth, everything my energy is communicating, not just my words, our ability to communicate with people and is very normal and we are hardwired for social interaction.

We are social creatures.

Helping children feel safe in their ability to communicate, helping them have these micro bursts of communication that are safe is so important because this is how they develop the skills to navigate the world and knowing where it's appropriate.

Hello, my name is Mark Taylor and welcome to the Education on Far podcast, the place for creative and inspiring learning from around the world.

Listen to teachers, parents and mentors share how they are supporting children to live their best authentic life and are proving to be a guiding light to us all.

Hi Lenora, thank you so much for joining us here on the Education on Far podcast.

One of the things which is so important to us is the fact that we want to give every child a sense of their best self and their best opportunity to learn.

Whether that's having breakfast, feeling comfortable, feeling in a position where they can ask questions, and most importantly, that they're actually able to communicate in the best possible way to obviously be their best selves, but enhance their learning and their education generally.

So I think this is going to be an incredibly important conversation.

So yeah, thanks so much for being here.

Thank you so much for having me.

I'm so excited to spend time with you and to have this conversation.

So whenever you want to jump in, we are good.

Amazing.

Well, let's start with better Speech for those people that haven't heard it before, come across it before.

What is it and how does it work?

First of all, Better Speech is actually an online speech therapy company.

And the wonderful thing about that is that we provide speech therapy services all across the world because of the fact that we are online and you get to work with an actual speech language pathologist and we're all certified and, and for example, in the United States, we are, we go to school for special training and then we have to become board certified and then we have to become licensed by the state.

So there really is quite the integrity component and upholding that level of what we're helping people do and how we're helping them do it, truly across the board.

And then we are also in other countries like yours, which is fantastic.

And people can work with us one on one from the privacy of their own home.

And we also provide speech therapy services to schools throughout the world.

And that, I think is a wonderful thing because that allows people to really have those speech therapy services that not only they want, that they need.

And I think that's the key thing, isn't it?

Is I think the certification, the feeling like you're in safe hands.

Because I know as a.

From an educator's point of view, but also from a parent's point of view, that sense that you sort of.

You're sort of handing over such an important thing, which is probably has quite a nerve and quite an emotional pull because you want your child to have the best opportunities.

And maybe you're feeling like this is something which is.

I don't know, it needs dealing with, is probably the wrong way of putting it, but it needs to have a focus and an empathy and a way of being supportive, but sort of letting go and letting like, say, the experts being able to help you completely.

You said that beautifully and definitely a way of navigating it.

You know, when people think of having children and those children go to school, it's a very typical thing.

And people anticipate that.

They anticipate working with educators.

They anticipate their child, whether it's at home, school, or going into school.

They anticipate that.

They don't necessarily anticipate working with a speech pathologist or physical therapist or a therapist of any kind for their child.

And a lot of the times parents will come to me and that initial interaction is I think something's.

Something's.

I don't know exactly what's wrong, but something's not quite right, and they're very uneasy about it and understandable.

The first thing I tell them is that it's not their fault.

No one did anything wrong.

And we are completely here to support you.

We're here to answer all your questions, especially because their area of expertise is their child.

Their area of expertise is not child language development.

And that's a very, very big distinction because they can go off of guidelines, but they're, again, just guidelines.

And we're the ones that come in and say, okay, here's the things that we're noticing and here's how we can help and how you can also help your child.

And I think that's a really important point where you were sort of saying, we think there might be a problem or we've noticed something.

What is that usually based on?

Is it the fact that they've got a friend who lives down the street who's the same sort of age, but they're not quite doing the same sort of thing.

Is it that there's an.

An obvious thing that they feel like is holding them back?

What are those sort of use cases that you often come across?

That's such a beautiful question because so many children are so different.

When we're talking about speech therapy, a lot of the time we're talking about two pieces.

So speech is how clearly I speak to people, what's the intelligibility, how clearly I say my sounds.

And for some kids, it might be they don't have the ability to say the R sound.

So instead of saying rabbit, they're saying wabbit.

Or instead of saying thank you, they're saying thank you.

So really it's the intelligibility.

And they might hear other kids talking and they'll think, I don't know if my kid is saying that.

Right.

Is that still appropriate?

Because there are developmental sounds that they go through, it's very appropriate to say thank you when they're very little because it's a different level of sequencing and the tongue has to move into a specific thing position.

So there is much more complexity to that.

When we're talking about language, language is a different component.

There's actually two parts to language.

The ability to receive information, to understand and process.

So when somebody says, okay, it's time to go get your shoes and then we're going to grab our coat and our hat and we're going to head outside, that's a lot of commands and a lot of direction.

I just gave that little one.

And if they're having trouble processing it, it's a receptive language difficulty.

If we're talking about expressive language, we're talking about the grammatical structure of our sentences, how clearly we're saying something.

So there's a couple moving pieces in that.

And some people will say, oh gosh, I don't know if my kid is saying that correctly.

They keep saying wah, wah, wah, and I don't know if that's coming across correctly.

Whereas other people will say, nobody seems to understand my child and I'm the only one that can understand my child.

So those are usually indicators, especially when we start to get around the age of 3, 4, or 5, we want non familiar listeners to have a pretty good idea of what our child is talking about.

And if not, that's usually an indicator that we want to communicate with a speech language pathologist and get a better idea as to what's going on and how we can support that child.

And I even Had a sense of calm as you were talking about it.

Because I, I mean, I'm not coming here with a child that I think sort of needs your support, but there was certainly that sense of, of one, not only do you know what you're talking about in that sort of the way of sort of chatting to me, but that sense of.

Of course there are lots of different areas to this.

So it's not suddenly my child is really struggling.

It's.

There might be just something which is.

Oh yeah, I can understand.

It's just this section of development or there's this particular area that can be helped with and then it's like anything where you're, where you're growing and getting older, isn't it?

So.

Oh yeah.

Well, we can just focus on that and then I can then see the next steps.

I can see I'm being supported, I can see how this is going to move forward and, and we're in the right space.

And like I said, there's an emotional feeling to that as well as that sort of practical element.

Yeah, absolutely.

Especially when parents are coming.

So uneasy, parents, guardians, whoever it is, they're uneasy about something and they don't know how to help and they feel disempowered, they feel helpless and they're thinking, I'm the parent, I'm the guardian, I should be able to help them.

And they just don't know what they don't know.

And it's not that they're stupid, it's not that they don't care about their child or whatever a critical inner critic person, a critical person might say, or an inner critic in your own head might say, none of it's true.

So when.

I guess this depends on the age, but when someone comes to you and then you.

Yes, I think we can, we can work and we can support with you.

What does that then look like?

Are there certain steps that, that you then take in that sort of practical.

How do we sort of move forward for here?

Sort of how many times a week?

What, what sort of way does the classes look like?

Definitely.

So depending on the age that we're seeing them, sometimes if they're three or four, parents will notice something and they'll say, I think something's not quite right or the physician might notice something.

When we start to get into more school age, we often see our first, our second grade teachers, even our pre K teachers share their concerns.

They're not being understood or they're not interacting with other children.

What else is going on there?

And that can Be really helpful because now we're getting observations from other people.

And sometimes parents are a little leery and they're thinking, well, I've never seen that when the teacher's expressing that and the teacher is saying, well, to the other kids that I've worked with, this is what I'm noticing.

You might want to investigate it.

And when somebody comes to work with a speech language pathologist or if they reach out to us at Better Speech, we like to get an idea of what's going on as quickly as we can.

So we'll interact with that child.

We'll ask for the parent or guardian and their input.

We'll ask, what else are people noticing?

Sometimes it's grandparents, sometimes it's babysitters, sometimes it's other people.

And the parents might not have a very good picture because if, let's say that child is an only child and they're often seen in the home with the parents, and then they go to daycare or they go to a babysitter or they go to grandparents, and now they're getting different social interactions.

Other people are seeing different perspectives.

So we like to get as much information as possible in addition to our.

What we consider our formal assessments or our informal assessments, such as if we do a standardized test or if we're noticing things as we're playing with them, as we're talking with them, what else is going on?

And from that, we make our recommendations.

Sometimes it's one time a week for 30 minutes.

Sometimes it's two times a week for 45 minutes.

It really just depends on where that child is and what the goal is.

We want children to be able to express their wants and their needs and their thoughts and to have that robust vocabulary.

And if it's not happening, that's okay.

How can we support them?

Where are we going?

Where do we need.

And I think, for me, I think when, certainly when my kids were younger, it's that sense of they adapt brilliantly because they're.

They're not interested in education, informal learning, they're just learning.

And so, like you say, if there are certain words they can't say, they do them in their own way and then they move on, or they avoid certain things, or they make themselves communicate and be who they are in a way that works for them.

And so I love that sense of, you know, understanding the landscape in all the interactions, because it definitely is true that, like, say, what they might do at nursery is very different to what they do at home.

And, and the fact that, you know, grandparent has a different conversational style or whatever.

And so you're going to pick up on things which as a parent you might not necessarily do.

So I can see how.

How valuable that really is.

Definitely.

And then as we start to get into.

I'm so glad that you're able to see how valuable that is.

Thank you.

When we start to get into a little bit older of a school age, so think like third, fourth, fifth grade or even middle school or what we're noticing is it's not so much articulation as it is the ability to communicate and carry a conversation.

Especially now that we are post Covid a number of years, we've seen the delay, we've seen the development of the impacts that occurred during that time.

And it's not bad, it's not good.

It just simply is how we can help support these kids.

Things that we're seeing is, can they tell us a story?

Is there a beginning, a middle and an end?

Are they asking questions and can they answer questions such as how or why questions?

Are they able to reason through certain things?

And I often encourage parents to, if they're not sure, strike up a conversation about what interests that child.

If we're going to go into US History and that child really isn't a history connoisseur and it's just not happening, that's okay.

Talk about the things that they like.

Talk about their friends, their music, the things that bring them joy, and see if they can answer questions.

See if they can engage in a conversation and move the conversation forward.

That is so important because these are communication skills they will need their entire life.

So if they're not happening now, how can we support them?

Do we need to get speech therapy involved?

Do we need to have group speech therapy?

Also, can they communicate with their friends?

Are they able to handle conflict in an appropriate way?

How do they navigate it?

These are all things that are part of speech and language communication.

And I think talking about the pandemic is important, isn't it?

Because the thing that I often forget when you're talking about young people is it's the percentage of their life that any particular thing is.

So it's like you sort of remember that TV shows were kind of part of your entire childhood when they were only on air for like four years.

But you forget if you're only eight, then that's half your life.

So therefore you're bound to think it's the entire thing.

And so, like, say, especially those children who were relatively new, young in education during the pandemic that was a large amount of their time where they're interacting in a different way.

Their, their chances of being in the same place as people in playing and communicating have to have been affected.

Like I say, and I love the way you fact you said it wasn't good or bad.

It just is.

Because I think having that sense of just, well then what can we do now?

And what's important now it takes away the fact of it should have looked like this.

The world doesn't work like that.

You know, our lives were affected by many things.

It's just understanding where we are and what we can do and how we can move forward in a positive manner.

Absolutely.

And when it comes to everything that occurred, whether we want to call it a two year span or a three year span, however long, people were wearing masks.

Okay, so watch as I'm talking to you.

I just removed a whole lot of communication from my face and our face.

There's a statistic out there, and the conservative one would be 70 plus percent of our communication is non verbal.

So what does that mean?

That means my face is expressing emotion.

My face is expressing communication.

My eyes, my mouth, everything my energy is communicating.

Not just my words.

My words are often the last thing because this is how we communicate.

We involve our hands, we involve our body, we involve our face.

When the mask was involved, especially for little ones, a lot of this communication and ability to understand emotion was removed.

Also little ones, very specifically, as they're developing their communication skills, they're watching our mouth, they're watching our eyes, they're watching all of this engagement.

And when that was removed, there was a disconnect in that component of communication.

So now as a speech language pathologist, we're seeing kids and we're going back and we're helping them understand emotion, we're helping them understand sarcasm and jokes and joy and sadness and what that looks like on our face as we're talking and how that individual, as they're reading a story, are they having that appropriate emotional response to that story and are they involved in the characters?

These are absolutely pieces that are a part of communication and they're so important that we notice them now.

So for example, I grew up in the 90s.

I used to have to call for a pizza.

I used to have to, when my parents, if they wanted to have a coffee, we went into the store, we watched that transaction, that communication.

Hi, how are you?

I'd like a large decaf coffee.

Can I get some.

We saw that normal communication.

If I, if my mom was in the grocery store and she had to step away from the cashier and run and grab something, it was okay for me to stand there and wait and not have a meltdown if I couldn't find something.

It was very appropriate to go up to somebody in uniform in the grocery store.

Excuse me, can you help me find the olives?

What aisle do I find them in?

These are all very normal pieces of communication.

Very appropriate pieces of communication that children today completely missed.

They didn't have that general interaction.

And a lot of the time we now get to pick up our groceries.

Depending on where you are, you don't even have to communicate with anybody.

You don't have to call and ask for movie times, you don't have to call and ask for a pizza.

And it's really important that we go back and we offer these communication skills and these practices, these micro bursts of communication to our children.

They need to know that yes, communication is safe and what is appropriate.

If somebody pulls up in a car and says, hey, do you want candy?

We need to help them understand how to get help and know that's not appropriate communication.

We also need to help them understand when somebody goes in to get a coffee, it's appropriate to talk to them.

It's appropriate to say, hi, how are you?

And especially if you're at a restaurant, it's appropriate to place your order.

Hi, I'd like a burger and fries please, and I'll take a water.

That's very appropriate.

It's such an important thing, I think, understanding that bigger picture, isn't it?

And how you're just learning all the time, you're picking things up all the time and like say that's just about the modern age and I guess it's where it's a moving target all the time, isn't it?

But where that kind of, that gradient is, you know, because we're going to spend more time online, I don't think that's going to change.

But actually we know that as humans we want to spend more time interacting in that kind of social, in the same place kind of way.

But I hadn't quite thought about the interactions of just day to day life because they're just not there anymore.

And that's probably my age.

The fact that like you say growing up and the majority of my life, that's what it just was.

And I've sort of moved into this sort of digital world.

But people that have been born into it, you forget they just haven't had all that experience.

So it's going to make a massive difference.

Very much so.

And I know a lot of children that I see online for speech therapy, they'll tell me, I don't like going to the grocery store with my mom because she left me at the counter and I didn't know what to do.

I don't like to order because I don't know what to say.

And a lot of the time when they'll say, I'll ask them a question and they'll say, you know, did you talk to anybody?

Did you ask the cashier how they are?

No.

Why not?

That's weird.

They don't know it's appropriate.

They have no idea that it's okay to talk to people because they're all only noticing it's a stranger.

Don't talk to a stranger.

When our communication, our ability to communicate with people is very normal.

And it's also, we are hardwired for social interaction.

We are social creatures.

Helping children feel safe in their ability to communicate, helping them have these micro bursts of communication that are safe is so important because this is how they develop the skills to navigate the world and knowing where it's appropriate.

And also, if you want to go all the way down to the very core of it, they have a voice and their voice matters and we want to hear it.

That's where these skills start.

And there are two things that suddenly struck me.

One was the fact that what we really need to understand is the fact that we talk about well being, but we often think of it in terms of this amount of time on a screen or this amount of time doing this, or I'm anxious because of, I don't know, let's say online bullying, whatever that happens to be.

But I think that is one very part of the spectrum.

But it's quite a long way up.

And I think like you said, understanding all these things we've talked about so far as part of a human experience means that your well being is going to be different.

So if you're always anxious about speaking to somebody because you don't speak to somebody, when your natural human instinct is to be somebody who wants to be interacting, then you can understand how a lot of this is building up without us even knowing about it or actually even being in on our radar.

And the second point was the fact, this is why I love the podcast so much, because we're talking about better speech, we're talking about an online tuition, we're talking about.

And actually we know we're not talking about speech specifically.

We're not talking about, you know, what I perceive that might be.

If I go to the website and see all the fantastic stuff you do when you're sort of broadcasting, that is a.

This is what we're offering.

And I think that ability for us to have conversations even in this particular realm, to be able to say, yeah, this is what it's all about, because we're still talking about the human, you know, and we're having the proper conversation despite being on different continents.

But at the same time, it makes such a big difference because even bearing in mind I've done 400 odd podcasts now, just a education on fire, there are things I hadn't thought about in that way and I've spoken to hundreds of people doing it, and I just hope that the people listening can actually sort of better pick up on that.

So, of course, if there's someone who needs help in terms of sort of speech therapy and having the professional support that's needed, then absolutely, that's why we're having this conversation and we can share that.

But there must be a microcosm of other things that people are thinking about that they hadn't come across where they're like, my life can change now just by understanding this, or the fact that normally we do a drive through and why don't we just park up and we'll actually go in order, even if we then take it away.

Because like you say, that interaction is making a positive difference, which hadn't even crossed my mind before.

I think it's fantastic.

I'm so glad.

Thank you so much.

Yeah.

Communication is so important to me and how we, not only how we communicate with the world, how are we communicating with ourselves?

What is our mindset?

And this especially, I think, goes into something that I'm very passionate about when I'm with children, especially children, because their mindset, feeling empowered, feeling like they have a voice, feeling like they get to choose to and use that voice.

And that as, as a teacher, as a speech therapist, yes, I'm there to help them, but I'm also there to help support them.

I want them to feel like they can share their thoughts with me, that if something's uncomfortable for them, that they can talk to me, that they can express that where they're not going to be judged, they're not going to be shamed, they're not going to be guilted for that, and we can have that conversation that starts to shift their mindset, that maybe they're not Broken, maybe that they're totally fine and it's just a shift in perspective is all that we need to help them recognize.

Oh, I wasn't comfortable in the grocery store because I didn't know what to do.

Nobody told me what to do.

Now I have a plan.

Now I know what to do.

Oh, I'm not helpless.

Oh, I can take that step.

Oh, this feels so much better.

That is so important because we want them to feel strong and we want them, we want to communicate to them in a way that feels.

I know this is becoming a very cultural word in the us Want them to feel safe.

But ultimately what that means, we want them to feel like they can talk without being judged.

There's no shame.

They're not bad, they're not messed up.

It simply is.

And how we can support them, how we can help them is what matters most.

So where did this passion come from in terms of you being a chief knowledge officer of an organization?

I imagine that wasn't your initial starting point when you had sort of had this sort of drive to be involved in this world.

So give us a little bit of your sort of potted history of how this passion, which comes across so beautifully in terms of even just chatting now into the role that you're in at the moment.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I have always been a talker and I don't think I realized how important communication was to me until probably the last six years of my life.

So I'm almost 40 and I got into the world of speech therapy because I liked helping people communicate.

I liked helping.

I especially had a young girl that I used to babysit with and she was non verbal.

And our communication was really through gestures, through high excitement, through comforting her and how we were able to help keep her calm and engaged with her family.

I was a babysitter at the time.

I was 17, 16, 18 at that point.

I didn't realize how important that was until I got to look in the rearview mirror a number of years later.

And how people communicate, I think is very important, but we don't really understand why until we start to get into the truly internal conversation that they're telling themselves on repeat.

And if they're telling themselves that they're not good enough, if they're telling themselves that they're bad at solving problems or that they can't do something, that's going to be very disempowering.

Not only do I love to help people change their conversation externally, I love to help people shift their conversation internally because it's just as important.

And there are things that we don't necessarily talk about until you get into the world of personal growth and development, when truly how you communicate with yourself is one of the most foundational skills that you will ever build upon.

And then you start to think about, we won't go down this rabbit hole, but how the whole education system even starts like you say, because starting with those conversations in the most appropriate way, depending on whatever age, you can build your education system up from there, from a knowledge based thing.

But I think certainly as we, as we start to go even more into this century, it's going to be even more key for everybody as our, as our lives change, like I say, the way we work change and certainly the way we communicate change.

And I love that the way you put it there, you know, how we communicate with ourselves is the starting point for everything.

And I think even understanding that you do communicate with yourself, because I think so many people don't even understand that that's a key area.

I mean it just opens up a whole new world.

Doesn't really does.

You said that beautifully.

A lot of people have no idea and it's just what they know.

But those thoughts got there over time.

That communication, that information was played on repeat over time.

And until you go in and shift it with intention, with focus and going, do I really want to tell myself on a daily basis that I'm not enough?

It will change your entire life when you start to notice your own thoughts, how you talk to yourself, how you think about yourself and then how you show up in the world.

And people often ask me, well, how do I know?

Listen, as you're talking to other people, everything that you're thinking and how you talk to yourself is coming right out your mouth.

So if you're saying, well, the problem with this is, and that's a problem, and this is a problem, you focused, you're focused a lot on problems.

Oh well, how about this?

Well, how about that?

You're focused a lot on solutions.

How you talk to yourself external, how you talk to the world externally is that narrative that you're playing internally.

So if you're curious, start writing down the things that you're saying and you will find where you are on the map and you get to choose where you want to go next.

And I think for me that kind of sort of completes a circle in a positive way.

In terms of parents, in terms of if you have a child that's being helped and supported, what you're saying to yourself is one thing what you're saying to everyone around you, what you're saying to the people who are supporting you, what you're saying to your child is going to have a big difference as well.

And so it's such a key thing to be aware of, like, say, and it's a whole journey, which, however that is.

And that's a.

That's a whole different podcast series, let alone a podcast episode.

But certainly that idea of.

Of where that begins is, Is so key.

And so I'm always interested.

Is there a particular teacher or an education experience that you've had that had an impact on you?

And is there any sort of correlation between what you love about what you're doing now and the impact that you're having that you sort of could take from that, or even if it's a positive or negative experience?

The two that came to mind, especially when I heard that question I had.

I was terrible person in math when I was younger.

I just did not have math skills beyond your basics, addition and subtraction.

It just didn't work for me.

And my dad was very, very supportive.

My dad would sit with me night after night with a ton of scrap paper at the time, and we would go through math.

And what I remember, I don't remember a lot of the math that we focus on, but I remember him being very, very patient.

And that, I think, was something that really helped me because I would get so frustrated, and he was able to help calm me down.

And there was also a teacher, his name was Mr.

Torque, and he was our education teacher.

So I actually grew up with a diagnosis of being learning disabled, and I needed special additional time on tests.

I needed additional accommodations for growing through the educational system.

And this was back in the 90s.

And my.

My educational teacher, his name was Mr.

Torque.

As I mentioned, he was also my tutor, and he was another person who sat with me for math and science and was very, very patient.

And keep in mind, I saw this man probably for 30 minutes before school started, every single day, Monday through Friday.

And I then had a class with him every single day, and then I had tutoring with him on Thursday evenings.

So for me, the thing that stood out the most was people that were patient with me when I was frustrated, because I could be very, very mean and cross my arms, sit back, and I'm not going to do it.

And they're like, okay, then do it where I'm right here with you.

And they understood that I was frustrated with math.

I wasn't frustrated with them.

And they could have Easily taken it personally because I'm sure my fiery 12, 13, 14 year old self was not the nicest person, but they understood that I was frustrated with math and being patient and quite literally saying, it's okay, we can do this.

And going painstakingly step by step through those processes truly was completely pivotal for me.

And how quickly did you realize that all of the support you, you needed in that area wasn't necessarily who you were in terms of what you could thrive at as well, because you, you know, you obviously have forged the life that you wanted, like I say, by understanding that communicating and talking and being social opened up a whole world which isn't related to the like, say, advanced maths or anything like that.

Even though at the time in the education system you kind of feel like you're failing in this particular area, therefore it must be failing generally, rather than it's just a silo of one particular thing.

Yeah, definitely.

I did not realize how, how helpful they were to me until I went to the other extreme and I went through.

So I needed so much help in middle school and high school to the point that by the time I got to college, I had, I was tapped out, I was done.

I was like, I will figure it out myself.

And I actually got this determination mindset from my stubbornness, which is kind of a good thing, depending on how you want to look at it.

And I started to do things by myself, but almost to a flaw, to the point that there was a situation in my life that I became so extreme and I had refused to tell anybody.

I refused to ask for help at all for years on end.

And I actually curious minds.

I had an eating disorder and I refused to ask for help until it came to a certain point in my life where it was going, nora, you're going to have to ask for help because this isn't good anymore.

We are officially beyond able to help ourselves.

You have to ask for help.

And when I started to ask for help, my mindset shifted again and I realized I wasn't helpless.

I realized I actually knew how to ask for help.

And it didn't make me stupid, it didn't make me helpless, it didn't make me messed up, it didn't make me broken.

I knew that there was something I didn't know.

And from that entire experience, this new mindset became the mindset that I choose to have on a regular basis.

I love that.

So important.

And I can, you know, you can just see how important that is when you're helping children in, in the terms of.

Of what we're talking about today, because you need the patience, you need the understanding, you need all of that ability to.

To offer the help, but also receive the help and be able to have that communication.

Yeah.

Amazing.

Yeah.

Now, is there a piece of advice you would.

You've received yourself which you find important, or certainly some advice you might give your younger self?

Looking back, and I caveat it always, but the fact that our younger self might not take it, and probably even more so, bearing in mind what you've just said.

I know, I know.

I totally agree.

Two things that I would say was one, when I was very little, my dad used to tuck us in at night.

And every night he would say what your mind can conceive and believe.

And when I was little, I would say, you can have a piece of cheese, but it really is what your mind can conceive and believe you can achieve.

And it's something that I still carry with me today.

And it's by Napoleon Hill and it's a beautiful quote, and it was something that I thought was such looking back again, didn't know it at the time.

Looking back, it's such a positive message to give a child as they fall asleep, because what that does is the conscious mind captures it and then transfers it to the subconscious mind and they stay in that realm all night long and they build that resilient mindset from those positive experiences.

And that's a great thing.

And the second thing I would share to my younger self would be keep going.

Even if you're in the stink of it and it does not feel good and oh my gosh, this is a terrible day.

Keep going.

It'll be okay.

Yeah, I think certainly for me as well, understanding that life has seasons and you might think I've got the answers and I want it to be different now.

You don't have all of those pieces in place and you don't have all of that control and also how you fit in other people's lives as well.

So you might be ready, but there might be someone that you're working with or around that isn't so.

Therefore, that season is going to take its natural course.

And the patience thing, again, is probably the theme for the show today is something which is beautifully shared, really, really important.

Now, is that a resource you'd like to share?

And this could be anything from a video, song, podcast, book, film, but something that's had an impact that you'd like to people to listen to.

Oh, gosh.

Well, keep listening to your amazing podcast I think that's important and I love conversations that allow us and invite us to keep an open mind.

So especially in this world where people are constantly saying, look at this or do this, do this, do that, just notice it, be curious about it and then have that decision of is this right for me, do I want this?

Is this going to support me?

And you get to choose.

And I think that's the biggest thing is helping people wherever they are in their life, recognize that you're getting to choose.

You don't have to do something if somebody else is telling you and you don't think it's right fit for yourself.

You get to choose what you want for yourself and to notice that and to be curious if you're saying, you know, I've never explored that, but I'm kind of curious about it.

Don't worry what other people say.

Allow yourself to drop your own judgment to yourself and to keep that open mind and that open heart because it can lead you to amazing places.

Yeah, love that.

Now, obviously the acronym FIRE is important to us in terms of feedback, inspiration, resilience and empowerment.

What is it that strikes you either word for word or as a, as a collective group of words when that first comes up?

I love all of these words.

I think they're so beautiful.

And for feedback, I think noticing what is this trying to teach me?

Or if you're with your child and you're noticing that the things you're trying aren't helping, allow it to be feedback.

You as the parent, as the guardian, you're not failing, you're not doing something that's wrong, you're simply getting feedback and to let yourself know, oh, okay, maybe I can find a different way to navigate.

Let me be curious about that.

Let me be open to it.

And I love the idea of inspiring people because isn't that such a wonderful gift to give, to be able to encourage them and inspire them to help themselves and to help their child in ways that are meaningful to them.

And I think resiliency is cultivated again and again and again and again and again.

It's not this one experience.

It is continuously building on that strong mindset and allowing yourself to notice that you did not fail.

You only got feedback and you can keep going.

And to empowerment.

I think that's a great one because we want people to be heard.

And when we think about empowerment, I like to think of it in a non judgmental way because there are so many times these words in our culture can get thrown around and thrown in a headline that doesn't necessarily effectively communicate the true essence of what empowerment is.

We want people to be encouraged and to stand up and to feel like they're heard.

And it can happen in a way that is not being judged in a way that's not being shamed, in a way that's not being guilted.

Allow yourself to feel that true empowerment.

I think for me, one of the key takeaways is that sort of the little and often and that kind of thing, because, like, you know, we talked about the.

The one piece of advice or.

Or the one particular thing which.

Which people can often pick up on.

But I think that regular conversation, the fact that with most things with our children, I always think it was never the one conversation we had to have.

It was the millions of conversations which are kind of the same, but sort of similar.

Different when they're six to when they're seven or even yesterday to today, depending on their emotional state, even.

And I think understanding that all of those little things together are the things that become the bigger picture.

And like, say, I think to be kind to yourself and not to overthink it.

And like you say, feedback is key.

Whether whatever the outcome you think may or may not be there, it is what it is.

And I can.

If I want to change it, then that's fine.

If I think it was great, then that's great too.

But just moving on piece by piece is such a.

It's such a wonderful way of putting it.

Yeah.

Beautifully shared.

So what would you like people to do next?

Where should they go?

Find out more about you, find out more about the organization and what those next steps might be if they think it's appropriate for them.

Absolutely.

If you have concerns about your child's speech and language communication or wherever they may be, or even in your speech and language communication, go ahead and reach out to us at Better Speech, because the best thing that's going to come from it is a conversation.

And you will then get to decide if it's a fit for you and your family, if it's related to your child or if it's a fit for you.

And that, I think is a wonderful thing.

So simply visit betterspeech.com and we can actually connect you with a speech language pathologist as early as the next day in some cases, which is really nice, considering a outpatient clinic.

Sometimes you might have to wait three months.

So we are here, we are able to support you, and we would love to do what we can to help you.

Nora, thank you so much for joining us.

I really appreciate your insights and the way you put all that together so beautifully.

So, yeah, thanks so much indeed.

Thank you so much for having me.

It was great spending time with you.

And thank you to your listeners.

Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.