Cleft Palate and VPI resources are hard to come by as it is, let alone information in Spanish. Even if you are a non-Spanish-speaking SLP who works with diverse populations, it would still be nice to have something to show parents and caretakers.
Highlighting Great Work in our Field
We accompany craneofacial mission trips to Mexico and Central America, and we’ve found that Spanish cleft palate resources are super rare. Luckily, Dr. Cate Crowley at Columbia University put together some great resources that are used throughout Latin America to train other professionals working with cleft palate internationally. See Dr. Crowley’s work on the right.
Dr. Crowley’s site includes 14 videos containing information about the developmental differences, evaluations, and therapy. Each video is in Spanish but has English subtitles to follow along if you don’t speak Spanish.
Spanish Cleft Palate Videos and Tutorials:
La terapia del habla para la fisura del paladar: Evaluación y tratamiento
For Spanish speaking SLPs it is also registered with ASHA for .4 (4 hours of CEUs). The videos are in Spanish with English subtitles but the assessment and the readings are all in Spanish. The assessment piece has 20 audio/visual multiple choice questions and 55 written multiple choice questions. The audio-visual questions allow us to make sure people can identify different errors, as well as when an SLP makes errors in certain cleft palate speech strategies.
The VPI Pyramid
The Bilinguistics team has created a course that includes everything we have learned working abroad and at home in Texas. If you want to improve your treatment of cleft palate and VPI, check out this course: Maximizing Treatment Effects with VPI and Cleft Lip and Palate
It is packed with how-to videos and step-by-step instruction. It will equip you with the tools you need to tackle working with velopharyngeal insufficiency. It includes the reproducible VPI Pyramid which provides a simple framework for evaluation and rapidly creates baseline objectives for therapy. This pyramid will become a critical component of your VPI assessment and treatment.
Great Cleft Palate Information in Spanish
Dr. Cate Crowley from Columbia University in New York has come out with some great cleft palate information in Spanish for parents as well as professionals in other countries. I contacted her when I went to Guatemala with Austin Smiles. I distributed her 2012 videos to parents and employees of the hospital there. They were wonderful for training many parents at once. She has come out with some new resources that we’d like to share.
The Leaders Project
The Leaders Project has documents, a glossary, and over a dozen videos containing cleft palate information in Spanish. Their website is designed: “for practitioners, educators, and families. A primary goal is to make resources available to ensure that those from lower income homes, and bilingual and minority children and adolescents receive competent services.”
Cleft Palate Information in Spanish
Additionally, the Leaders Project has video tutorials to improve the speech of children with cleft palate. Enjoy and let us know anytime you come across great resources of your own!
