Your guide to Gestalt Language Processing and communication with Mariam Shapera

Laetitia: Welcome to The Neurodivergent Pulse where we explore the often misunderstood world of neurodivergence with experts, parents, teachers, and therapists. Grounded in lived experience, each bite-sized episode gives you something practical to try. I am your host Laetitia Andrac, AI expert, neurodivergent mum and founder of Understanding Zoe. This podcast is recorded on Dharawal country. I acknowledge that sovereignty was never ceded. It always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

Laetitia: Hello Mariam, welcome to The Neurodivergent Pulse podcast.

Mariam: Hi, thank you for having me.

Laetitia: It is going to be a very insightful conversation for everyone who is not familiar with a Gestalt language. But before we start that, I would love to give you the opportunity, Mariam, to introduce yourself and also tell us a bit more about how you started doing this work that I can see in your content on social media.

Mariam: Yes, thank you. So this all started from my inspiration which is my son, Joe, who is my middle child. So my background is I'm a family doctor and my husband and my three children, we live in Southern California. My oldest is nearly 11 and then she's neurotypical and then I have my middle child who's Joe. He's Autistic and then my youngest is just turned seven. He's neurotypical. So yeah, he's the inspiration behind all this.

Mariam: When we discovered, you know, we learn about autism in medical school, but it's just not at all the same. We had like one lecture on autism, lots of red flags, very negative based, deficit based, those kind of things. So but we did notice, especially comparing to my oldest, which we shouldn't compare, but we did. He was quieter, preferred to play alone, and kind of doing repetitively the same thing. Some stimming, very sensory, also love to stare at lights, very sensitive to sounds.

Mariam: So we went for his checkup at like 18 months. So you have like the 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, 12 months, and then at 18 months checkup, that's when you kind of around the time when you start to notice as they're supposed to go through the milestones, you know, some regression. And so my paediatrician was amazing. We were very lucky with her and she recommended a developmental assessment and we of course agreed with that and we had some people come over to our homes, that was a little bit intimidating. It was like three hours at our home, two strangers, ladies who he didn't know, my son. And they were kind of doing like rigorous testing on him and then at the end they gave us a checklist of everything that he couldn't do. Not really talking about his strengths, which we saw a lot of strengths in him. And that's it really. But at that time, and they said, you know, oh, he has a high risk of being Autistic. And that was when he was like nearly turning two.

Mariam: And so we started ABA, we started speech therapy. And yeah, you know, we didn't know much about anything about Gestalt language processing, nothing about neurodiversity, movement, neurodivergent brain, nothing. We did the ABA three times a week, which wasn't too much. And speech therapy once a week. And then by the time he turned three, we got the official diagnosis and then we had to switch our insurance companies because he turned three and that's how it was here. Anyway, so lots of compliance, now looking back at it these last few years, lots of compliance based interventions during the therapy, especially ABA and in speech, our speech therapists through our insurance did not know about Gestalt language.

Mariam: And it was during COVID I learned about Gestalt language processing and that turned things around for us and when I learned about neurodiversity and all those kind of things and he was home more, of course the kids were home, and so we did a lot of things hands-on with him, lots of online resources, read about books, learned about natural language acquisition, discovered Marge Blanc's book and just read about Gestalt language processing, you know, knowledge, you know. And we just did not go with, our therapist actually discharged us. She said, "Oh, I can't help him anymore. Go to the school." But the school wasn't enough. And so that's when we started looking for private speech therapist. And that's what we've been doing since then. So yeah, we've come a long way with that. And that's what kind of made me advocate for Gestalt language processing and neurodiversity and finding strengths in our children. Yeah. So yeah.

Laetitia: Thank you so much, Mariam, for sharing this story and I know that many parents, many advocates, many ally will resonate with that approach where you may start with the approach that is given to you which may be deficit based, medical based, which is the norm, right? And then through your own journey you moved into the neurodiversity affirming paradigm and really looking through the strengths and in that way becoming such a strong voice in the space. So thank you for sharing, you know, your own journey without hiding any parts because those are parts of your journey. So thank you so much.

Laetitia: So for anyone who's listening to this and they're not familiar with Gestalt language processing, can you explain a bit more what it is before we dive even deeper into that special interest topic of ours?

Mariam: Yes. So there are actually two ways to learn language. The most common way is analytic language processing which is most of us learn, and then is Gestalt language processing. So analytic language processing, usually have a baby for example, they pick up one word and then they add onto the word to make a chunk or a sentence.

Laetitia: Yeah.

Mariam: And that's how they learn language. So and with Gestalt language processing which is the other normal but less common way to learn language and it's more common in Autistic, they say maybe 85, 90% of Autistic individuals learn language this way. With the language processing you're actually learning a chunk, a phrase, be like two, three words or it could be like a whole script, which sometimes like is like so amazing for me, like a whole script that they just pick up and then they play it all back again. So yeah, and it's kind of like the longer way to eventually get to flexible, like grammar, you know, self-generated language. But sometimes in some children they do go through the stages quickly and it's divided into stages. So, Gestalt language processors as we call them, they go through different stages of the NLA, which is natural language acquisition framework.

Mariam: And yeah, I think with Joe, definitely Gestalt language processor and now I'm looking back, I don't know, like my daughter is neurotypical but she did have speech delay and we're very close to starting speech therapy for her way before I knew about Gestalt language and she was about three, three and a half and she was just babbling. I remember when we were all done with potty training as well and everything and then suddenly she starts conversing. So, I'm not sure with her. And apparently there's a spectrum they say too between ALP and GLP. That's still in research, that there is like some individuals are more GLP then some a little bit ALP. So, it's not like 100%, you know.

Laetitia: Yeah, I love that. Thank you for explaining to everyone and I know that it's something that is really close to home, you know, the way that Zoe learned how to read. She was really struggling in Australia, the way they learn how to read. I don't know if it's the same thing in the US, but it's not like this that I learn how to read in France. It's what they call learning some golden word.

Mariam: Okay.

Laetitia: So, you have to learn some word and then put those words into a sentence and then whereas for Zoe it was easier to learn a whole sentence with that word in the sentence rather than repeating the and so on. So definitely through affirming speech therapy, she developed that confidence around it's okay to learn a whole sentence.

Laetitia: And so we're going to go through echolalia in a second. But before we do that, I would love to understand, or not so much understand but share with everyone on this podcast who's not really familiar with an affirming approach of Gestalt language, would you like to explain to us what an affirming approach of GLP looks different to a non-affirming approach of tradition therapy approach?

Mariam: Yeah, before I answer your question, just quickly, it's important that a therapist is knowledgeable in their child language processing and knows about that, that's very important. And then obviously have them come and when they're like saying that they're not neuro affirming, then okay, are they really? So that's when you observe and see how they're doing with the child, making sure you're there too, like allowing you to be there, that's like the first thing, you know.

Mariam: But honestly the most important thing is the connection. Is there a connection and how are they starting to work on that connection? Because if there's no connection nothing else can happen. That's very important. And then there is a few things, you know, following the child's interests. Sensory regulation is very important. For example my son, he loves, Joe loves being outside. So that's his interest but I know that it keeps them regulated like lots of our kids. So we do our sessions outside and that's okay. Before we used to have ABA, he used to have to earn to go outside.

Laetitia: Oh my gosh.

Mariam: So he would sit down on the table. It was like on the sofa in our room in our house and he would have to like point to different things. Show me the car, show me this, blah blah. Okay, now you can go outside, you know, kind of thing. So just as an example, so has to be well regulated and it's different for every child. They have that sensory file which your OT can help you work through.

Mariam: And so with Joe, for example, he loves pressure in his feet. And so we have our speech therapist always providing that pressure, movement, of course, lots of our kids love movement during therapy. So we have our peanut ball, the other round physio ball outside, we have the hammock, just lots of movement. We have music on the background. And just, you know, it's okay to move from one thing to another based on what is interesting to him.

Mariam: Other things also having an AAC device. So again, that comes and goes. So he is provided with an AAC device as an alternative communication for him and it comes and goes with him. Sometimes he's interested to use it, sometimes he's not and that's okay. We just have that with him. The speech therapist has one and he has one. And then other things like of course like basic things like not forcing eye contact, just have some eye contact when he's comfortable with people, otherwise not so much. And you know, like not sitting on the table. Well, we used to do lots of that in ABA. So, no requirements on the table when you're doing therapy. No hand over hand. And things like that. No, we don't even do like the rewards, the things they don't even work for him anyway. So, we don't do any of that. And just try to make it natural because that's at the end that's how he learns language as well. It's, you know, whatever is natural for him and makes sense. So yeah, we have a very good speech therapist right now and so we make sure, you know, always doing that and I'm involved and see what she's doing so I can learn.

Laetitia: Yeah. I love what you said here, Mariam, because all of those elements that you mentioned can be green flag and red flag. And I know for us, we've tried many different speech therapy before finding one with green flag. And now when she comes at home, it's like wherever Zoe wants to see it and however Zoe wants to have a session and it's so beautiful then to see that bond that they're creating and that trust and how much she cares and she uses Understanding Zoe a lot, our speech, to write in Understanding Zoe what's been happening and share it with the rest of the village. And she's truly deeply caring. So if you listen to this, Michaela, big shout out to you. She is absolutely an absolute legend and I wish every parents, every children who wants to go with this speech could find their own Michaela or this SP, like it sounds you found a great one as well, was really affirming and connecting with a child's interest and here to help them, you know, find their own way to communicate whichever way is the best for them. I love that.

Mariam: Yes. Yes. And we found ours through Meaningful Speech, I believe it was. Actually the first one we had was Meaningful Speech and then she had to move out of state so she recommended this one. It was a friend. But yeah, Meaningful Speech registry was how and it keeps increasing, like more and more speech therapists are there.

Laetitia: Oh amazing. So yeah, we'll put that in the show notes. Thank you so much for sharing this. And I had another question for you which is something around the myth and misconception of Gestalt language processor and Gestalt language processing. So would you mind sharing some myth and some misconception about this profile?

Mariam: Yes. So we had belief in this too actually at the beginning. For example, when I was younger and before we knew about Gestalt language processing, we would ask him a question and he would just repeat the question back and thinking why is he doing that? Like it's just, you know, echoing it back to us. The echoing is very important. So, we avoid questions. Right now, he is starting to kind of answer the where and what questions now going kind of into stage three, but we're still avoiding questions and we do more declarative language.

Mariam: But yeah, at the beginning we used to ask so many questions and I do that earlier too, a lot of the time you think why is he doing that, why is he echoing, why is he saying some script from some cartoon he watched like yesterday, you know. And a lot of the time we cannot ignore that, you know, it's something going on there. I would say probably with Joe maybe like 80% at least is communication and the rest is probably just like regulation. But it could be both too kind of depending, you know, how a state is, communication, regulation, if he's communicating something, he's going into a meltdown, you know. But like such a big chunk of it is communication, it's important and we have to kind of be the detective and figure out what that is because it's not literal a lot of the time.

Mariam: And then we kind of try to model but again sometimes the modelling he doesn't get that and we have to figure out why. Sometimes dyspraxia plays a role and I know he has some degree of that as well, like he's thinking it but it's difficult for him to say it and alternative AAC is important or sign language or some visual or something, until we can help them, you know, more. So yeah, but echolalia is the big one I think and that was many years ago they used to, I think, connect that with schizophrenia and things like that, right, with the, when they like are seeing things or hearing things. And yeah.

Laetitia: Yeah, I know what you mean and that's where, you know, there is a high risk of them masking.

Mariam: Oh yeah.

Laetitia: You go down the route of ABA therapy and we're a podcast all about neurodiversity affirming here. So I am allowed to say that and this is what I claim. So if you go down that path you will encourage masking and actually echolalia and scripting, and you know, are really helpful for children who have Gestalt language processing or for adult as well, you know, it's really important.

Laetitia: So you mentioned a few times the different stages. Would you mind, for any listener who now is curious being like, oh what is stage one? What is stage two? What is stage three? Would you mind sharing a bit more about that with them?

Mariam: Yeah, I'll keep it very simple. Yes, you know, especially the earlier stages it's really easy to recognise. So stage one is the echolalia we've been talking about, the whole chunk that they first learn. And then stage two, and going from one stage to another, we don't know how long that will take. Each child is very different. Speech therapy and the earlier you start it will help.

Mariam: So stage two is when they start to break it down. And initially Joe was stage one of course and then when we had the speech therapist, he started getting to stage two like maybe a year after and it was so exciting. Like it's what we call mitigation. So for example, he has a phrase which is stage one that says let's play and then let's eat, you know, will become for example. So eat, what's going on now instead of play. That'll be stage two. So they're kind of breaking it down and they're switching. So they'll take a little bit of this one and put in the other sentence, the other phrase. So mitigation, stage two is breaking it down. And then stage three is breaking it down further to single words.

Laetitia: Yeah.

Mariam: And that's kind of like going to how babies, ALPs, analytical language processors may talk which is like single word and then add on. So yeah, stage two is mitigation, breaking it down, kind of like more flexible language, makes kind of maybe less literal, like you can hear like the communication more. And stage three is single words which is weird because now it's like you think okay, they've gone backwards, right? Like it's a single word. It can also be like, they say like a noun and adjective, you know, like blue sky or something like that. Noun plus noun, noun and adjective.

Mariam: And then then it starts to get a little bit more complicated. So from stage four to six. So four, five, six, it's a grammar is starting to come in and that's when you can also see them maybe asking questions and maybe you can also ask them questions. So the W questions, you can start doing that in speech therapy from stage four to six. So they start to kind of say the wrong type of grammar in those stages. And that's definitely you need to have a speech therapist there who is well, you know, versed and knows about all that kind of grammar because it's not very straightforward. There's like a whole chart, Marge Blanc with her book which is like a big textbook. She has like all these charts at the back that you can reference to. So yeah, it's very interesting.

Mariam: But right now Joe is stage two to three. I see some threes when he's saying like one single words or noun plus noun, or it's very interesting, or two nouns. And I always get so excited when I hear the stage threes. Or some new stage two. And just because they're stage three or two doesn't mean that they still don't have the gestalts.

Laetitia: Yeah.

Mariam: It's just that they may break them down quicker now as they go through the stages, you know. And if they're having, say they're not well regulated or something like that, they may also go back to stage one more and start scripting and to help with regulation as well.

Laetitia: So yeah, cool. It's dynamic, you know, and that's something that many people don't understand, the dynamism of neurodivergence and autism and Gestalt and ADHD and so on. So I love what you shared here.

Laetitia: Something that is a question that I didn't share previously with you. So feel free to tell me if you're not comfortable answering this one, which is how then school can support or the other way around create difficulties for children with Gestalt language processing? Because, you know, I know that's why we moved Zoe from one school to another.

Mariam: Yes.

Laetitia: She was in a public school and then she moved into a Montessori school where it's more like the way of learning is, it's appropriate for Gestalt language processor. So she didn't had to learn those words and then move from the golden word to the blue word to the, you know, those simple word that she needed to learn and which wouldn't work for her. So how, what has been your experience or what have you seen in the experience of other parents with Gestalt language processor children going into school and what can support those children to help the teacher who may be listening to this podcast, and what can be, you know, adding more difficulties to those children, just to help the teachers listening to this or for the parents listening wanted to share this with their teacher.

Mariam: Yes. Okay. So we actually from the beginning Joe was in this school from the age of like three in the preschool and then it continued and now he's 8 years old and he is in grade three. So we've been having basically the same group of therapists, although one left, but kind of the same environment he knows. So when I learned about Gestalt language processing, I actually communicated to the speech therapists. And at that time she was very open. We were very lucky with the school district. She was very open to learning about Gestalt language. And so what I did, she hadn't heard of it, but she was very keen to learn. And so I emailed her and I gave her some booklets from my speech therapist actually. I gave it to her and she read about it. And there's a natural language acquisition course, an NLA course, that I told her about as well. And I think she said at the time that the school was going to pay for that course for her to take, for her and for her other coworker, speech therapist. So that was the first thing and she's still learning, you know, she actually left, but there's another one now that's also still learning. They are comfortable, I feel like, with stage three, but beyond, the kids kind of more like you have to learn more and Joe hasn't got that stage yet, but still.

Mariam: Then during the IEP meeting, so we have, it's very important to create goals for specific Gestalt language processors, the speech therapy goals. So I have to make sure that, you know, I look at the report a few days before the meeting and make sure that they're not doing the ALP approach, you know, like the same with Zoe, like adding on the words, you know. So we make sure right now we have all the phrases, they're modelling those, they're device, making sure he's regulated during his session. So we're very lucky we have a good school district and I haven't had any problems with that. And I also had like an advocate who knew about Gestalt language come in, not, well she was on the Zoom during the meeting. So just to make sure everything is in line.

Mariam: So, but I can see maybe, you know, some school districts could be frustrating, some may not be willing to learn, right? Some teachers like this is what we do. This is what we're going to go through. This is our standard, how we teach our kids. And then there's frustration. They don't get far ahead with their speech goals. But yeah, I have to really stay on top of that. That's the most important thing during the IEP meeting for me, the speech therapy goals. And they've been good with that.

Mariam: And sometimes they say the AAC device is a distraction for him. So that's a little bit, you have to kind of see what's going on there because you have to be careful with that. So we've tried to find ways around it and they've really tried to like maybe create like something like a visual, like another AAC in front of him but not the actual AAC, you know, we try to get around it so that he can still learn but not take it away, like have a visual, not take away the language, things like that, you know. They become very, very good with communication, that's important. And I try to make sure who is the speech therapist, who's his OT at the beginning of the year. And usually the teacher coordinates that. So and he's in the same class so he's familiar with same kind of students but the same classroom.

Mariam: So yeah, but we'll see how things go and the next IEP meeting is at the beginning of the next year. So, so far as I gave the material and things, so that's important, you know, and I even designed like a pamphlet. I eventually plan to give a Gestalt language to the school to distribute if they can, whoever they want, the parents or whoever.

Laetitia: So I love that you're doing a lot, it sounds like you're doing a lot of advocacy and education and sharing that with the school, which is, you know, something that we end up doing a lot as parents of neurodivergent kids is we become the experts and we educate everyone, which is a lot. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that.

Laetitia: I want to ask you around one message for advocacy. Like if you had one message for policy makers, associations, NGO, governments on this topic, what would it be?

Mariam: I think the myth, I should say, of thinking that speech, spoken language is above other modes of communication, including myself. You know, I made this mistake. I didn't want him to have a talker initially. I was thinking, "Oh, this is going to delay speech." So, making that more accessible in schools and I know things are getting better and there's more devices out there and there's free apps and things like that. But there are some states in this country that are really behind with that. So, I think the accessible communication because it can be so frustrating for those individuals when they have the language, I mean, inside and they cannot get it out and we expecting only the speech, you know, like they have a dyspraxia and that's just so frustrating for them. So providing alternative modes.

Laetitia: Yeah, thank you. Thank you for saying that. That's really powerful and really needed. So I just have one last question before we close which I always love to ask the guests, a quick question about themselves. So what is your go-to comfort item or activity for you to recharge after doing so much advocacy, so much support, so much education? What is your go-to?

Mariam: There's quite a few things but I would say probably if I could do two, say two, one would be having my sweet treat in the evening when the kids are, or it's trying to sleep, you know. The other one is try when I have time when they're at school, taking a walk, short walks, it's very important, just a short walk, you know, doesn't have to be something long, just something outside, it has to be outside, to increase my heart rate and just kind of, so those would be the two things I would say. Not too much but you know they get me through the day.

Laetitia: I love it. Very similar like for me, the little chocolate in the evening, you know, with a cup of warm beverage and then a walk when I can with my puppy is really something that I love as well.

Mariam: Yes. You have a puppy. You know, we're thinking about getting a pet because I know it helps.

Laetitia: It really helps. Yes. We got him during COVID and he was encouraged by our child psychologist to help with the anxiety and companionship and, you know, social isolation. We can talk about it on another time but this is really something that really helped and the connection, like last night he was on in her bed and really patting him and talking to him, really really soothing. It's beautiful to watch their connection.

Laetitia: So before I let you go, I just want to give the opportunity for anyone who listen to this podcast and like, okay, how can I connect with Mariam? What is the best way? How can people find out about you? Can read your book, can connect with you? What's the best way for that?

Mariam: The two best ways would be either through Instagram, which is my handle, mariamshaperatales, and then the other way is my website, which is the same thing. It's like www.mariamshaperatales.com. And then yeah, my book, my second book was more of an autism book. My first one's also inspired by him and my second one was kind of more highlighting his strengths and neurodiversity. That's just basic whatever Amazon and all those online places.

Laetitia: Yeah. Amazing. We'll put all of the link in the show notes for everyone to be able to connect. Thank you so much, Mariam, for taking the time to share about Gestalt language and your own experience with Joe. Thank you. Thank you.

Mariam: Thank you for having me and thank you for your time.

Laetitia: The quick pulse check with Zoe now. Zoe, do you ever like saying certain phrases over and over?

Zoe: Yes, it is something I do very often.

Laetitia: Thank you, Zoe, for sharing. And how does it feel when that happened in your head?

Zoe: It was kind of annoying because you just keep repeating it over and over.

Laetitia: Thank you for sharing, Zoe, and joining us for this quick pulse check. That's a wrap for The Neurodivergent Pulse. If this helped, follow the show and leave us a quick review on your favourite platform. You can even share this episode with someone who needs it. You can learn more about our platform at