Director of School Therapy - Meet Lindsay

Video Transcribed:

Meet other Heartspring staff

Hi, I'm Lindsay Randle. I'm a speech language pathologist at Heartspring. I work with children ages 5-21, to help them build functional communication skills, enhance their social skills, and support their learning across all environments.

Communication and behavior go hand in hand with students at Heartspring. When they enter Heartspring, we work really hard at creating functional communication skills for them, so that their behaviors can decrease and their ability to communicate what they want and need, increase.

The students at Heartspring communicate in a variety of different modes. There are some students that are verbal communicators, while others use pictures to communicate, or communication books, or speech generating devices. We have some students that use simple communication devices that are static, and others that use more dynamic screen devices that are computer-like.

I provide direct and indirect consultative services for the students on my case load. That means that I see students one-to-one or in group sessions to run their goals and determine progress, as well as collaborate with their team members. Collaboration goes on every day, throughout the entire day, with multiple team members, including the teacher, other therapists, the parents and school districts through email or phone calls. I work to create data sheets and programs that the paraeducators run while I'm not directly working with the students, so that the students can practice their skills in multiple environments and multiple contexts.

The therapists are available during the day, evenings and the weekends to support the students programs in all environments and help them be successful.

From my viewpoint as a therapist, one of the greatest things about Heartspring is the level of collaboration with all the professionals, the parents and the school districts. We collaborate on a weekly basis, as well as day-to-day to see how the student's doing, how the programs are progressing, and what the next steps might be.

One of the greatest things about my job is that I get to see the moment that a student understands that communication means something. They "get" that either handing a picture, or pushing a button, or using their words mean something to them, and can get them what they want, without them having to have a behavior, that causes other problems throughout their day.

What's great about being a therapist at Heartspring is that I'm allowed to be creative and I'm given the freedom to develop unique and individualized programs for each student, which helps them to be motivated to communicate with whatever method that we've determined is the best for them.