Kevin Castillo
Professor Eric Kufs
English 114 A
15 August 2014
The Letter R
Girl, world, purple, red were some of the many words I was unable to pronounce. It all started when I first attended school. I attended a daycare about ten minutes from my house when my parents were notified that I had a speech impediment. My teacher was very nice but struggled in trying to understand me when I would read out loud to the class. I didn’t put much attention to my speech impediment but my teacher was greatly concerned and told my parents that I should seek some type of help. At the time, my parents believed it wasn’t a big deal because I was only 5. My speech impediment followed me to elementary school. It soon became a problem because I was starting to replace the letter “r” with the letter “w”. It was starting to become more noticeable and more embarrassing. Unlike my daycare, my classmates were less understanding of my problem. At one point, my fourth grade teacher had to tell the entire class about my speech impediment so they wouldn’t keep asking me why I would talk funny or why I didn’t know how to say the word girl or world. I started to feel very insecure because I was the only student at my elementary school that had a speech impediment.
Ms.Burch, my fifth grade english elementary teacher was one of the few people that helped me with my speech impediment. She spoke to the schools principle and convinced her to hire a speech-language pathologist. Basically a person that I would have a daily class with and would do practices and exercises on pronouncing certain words. I was grateful that my teacher was able to convince my principle in getting me a speech teacher but sadly each class felt like I was saying the same words over and over again without any improvement. I eventually moved on into middle school with the same problem. This time it was worst because I was getting asked in every class why I would speak in a funny way. It made me very frustrated and insecure.
At least I wasn’t alone this time. I found other students in my school that had speech impediments. Eventually, we all got put together in a class that was taught by a friendly but not so wise speech teacher. He was very confused on how to teach all of the students with different speech impediments. It did bother me that no teacher was able to help me but I was glad that I met the other students because we soon made a game that would help each of us improve our problem. It was a very simple game in which we all would say words that we had trouble with but whoever said the word the fastest and correctly would get a lunch ticket. A lunch ticket that was given to all of the students in our school but like many school lunches, the portion sizes are very small. Kids always wanted more than one lunch so we would all gamble with our lunch tickets and play one on one or two on two games. It was fun and somewhat effective. I started to pronounce words much more quickly.
Towards the end of middle school, I was more comfortable in interacting and having conversations with students but I still had the fear of reading out loud in class. I had to face that fear in my 9th grade english class. I was probably picked at least once a week to read a chapter out loud in class. At first, it would make me so nerve racking that I would sweat and my hands would shake. One time, the book I was reading from fell to the floor because my hands shaking at a ridicules speed. I was lucky enough to have students in my classes that would not ask questions or make fun of me. They seem much more understanding than my elementary and middle school peers.
Now I’m a college student and have no problem speaking in front of the class or having a conversation. My struggle affected me almost my entire life and now that I reflect on it I feel that I could not have done it without my parents, teachers, and my middle school classmates that shared the same struggle as me. My whole personality changed from being a shy and antisocial kid to a loud and sociable college student.
Professor Eric Kufs
English 114 A
15 August 2014
The Letter R
Girl, world, purple, red were some of the many words I was unable to pronounce. It all started when I first attended school. I attended a daycare about ten minutes from my house when my parents were notified that I had a speech impediment. My teacher was very nice but struggled in trying to understand me when I would read out loud to the class. I didn’t put much attention to my speech impediment but my teacher was greatly concerned and told my parents that I should seek some type of help. At the time, my parents believed it wasn’t a big deal because I was only 5. My speech impediment followed me to elementary school. It soon became a problem because I was starting to replace the letter “r” with the letter “w”. It was starting to become more noticeable and more embarrassing. Unlike my daycare, my classmates were less understanding of my problem. At one point, my fourth grade teacher had to tell the entire class about my speech impediment so they wouldn’t keep asking me why I would talk funny or why I didn’t know how to say the word girl or world. I started to feel very insecure because I was the only student at my elementary school that had a speech impediment.
Ms.Burch, my fifth grade english elementary teacher was one of the few people that helped me with my speech impediment. She spoke to the schools principle and convinced her to hire a speech-language pathologist. Basically a person that I would have a daily class with and would do practices and exercises on pronouncing certain words. I was grateful that my teacher was able to convince my principle in getting me a speech teacher but sadly each class felt like I was saying the same words over and over again without any improvement. I eventually moved on into middle school with the same problem. This time it was worst because I was getting asked in every class why I would speak in a funny way. It made me very frustrated and insecure.
At least I wasn’t alone this time. I found other students in my school that had speech impediments. Eventually, we all got put together in a class that was taught by a friendly but not so wise speech teacher. He was very confused on how to teach all of the students with different speech impediments. It did bother me that no teacher was able to help me but I was glad that I met the other students because we soon made a game that would help each of us improve our problem. It was a very simple game in which we all would say words that we had trouble with but whoever said the word the fastest and correctly would get a lunch ticket. A lunch ticket that was given to all of the students in our school but like many school lunches, the portion sizes are very small. Kids always wanted more than one lunch so we would all gamble with our lunch tickets and play one on one or two on two games. It was fun and somewhat effective. I started to pronounce words much more quickly.
Towards the end of middle school, I was more comfortable in interacting and having conversations with students but I still had the fear of reading out loud in class. I had to face that fear in my 9th grade english class. I was probably picked at least once a week to read a chapter out loud in class. At first, it would make me so nerve racking that I would sweat and my hands would shake. One time, the book I was reading from fell to the floor because my hands shaking at a ridicules speed. I was lucky enough to have students in my classes that would not ask questions or make fun of me. They seem much more understanding than my elementary and middle school peers.
Now I’m a college student and have no problem speaking in front of the class or having a conversation. My struggle affected me almost my entire life and now that I reflect on it I feel that I could not have done it without my parents, teachers, and my middle school classmates that shared the same struggle as me. My whole personality changed from being a shy and antisocial kid to a loud and sociable college student.