Saying Your Words with “Verve”
Mar 21, 2012
By the author, Jim Doti
The next four pages are critically important to the narrative structure of the book. Up to this point in the story, Jimmy has had a challenge thrown at him (being cast in the play), and he hasn’t figured out how to confront this challenge.
One way for him to do […]
Continue Reading →Speech Helpers
Mar 20, 2012
By Dr. Judy Montgomery, CCC-SLP, Professor, Chapman University
A 7 year old boy made this diagram of his “speech helpers” with the guidance of his speech therapist. He knows that he uses all these muscles to talk every day.
Jimmy bunched up his tongue in one direction, when he needed to smooth it out instead! […]
Continue Reading →Rehearsals Begin
Mar 15, 2012
By the author, Jim Doti
While it’s been almost 60 years since I appeared in “The Elves and the Shoemaker,” one of my lines in the play that I distinctly recall saying is, “Now that’s a good idea.” My recollection of this was aided by the fact that […]
Wow, isn’t it incredible?
Mar 13, 2012
By Dr. Judy Montgomery, CCC-SLP, Professor, Chapman University
This diagram shows the muscles and body parts in our chest, neck and head that enable us to speak. Air is pulled in through our nose and mouth (oral cavity) into the lungs. Oxygen is removed from the air and sent to our brain and blood; carbon […]
Continue Reading →Creating a Comfort Zone
Mar 08, 2012
By the author, Jim Doti
I think it’s time to change the scenery and move the action away from the school. I do that by first describing a scene that reconnects Jimmy with his mom and Blackie outside of the school. There, his mom directly observes the kind […]
Corrections Happen In the Final Sketches*
Feb 29, 2012
By the Illustrator, Lisa Mertins
Once Jim and I went over my initial storyboard, it was time to finesse the drawings in their – almost – finished form.
I tightened them up with Jim’s corrections and now I’ll admit to one of my shortcomings; Being detail oriented. A few posts back I mentioned the difference […]
Continue Reading →The Play is Cast
Feb 29, 2012
By the author, Jim Doti
Everything in the narrative thus far has been preparatory to the main plot. We know, for example, that Jimmy has a speech defect and that children laugh and ridicule him for it. We also know a bit about his mom, his dog, Blackie, his teacher and a few of his […]
Continue Reading →Speaking Clearly Only Sounds Easy to Do!
Feb 28, 2012
By Dr. Judy Montgomery, CCC-SLP, Professor, Chapman University
One of the advantages that Jimmy and other children have in the elementary school years is speech therapy sessions at school! Children learn how to produce the sounds that are difficult for them and usually in a very short time. Then they have to practice until it […]
Continue Reading →The Illustrator’s Storyboard
Feb 24, 2012
By the Illustrator, Lisa Mertins
Ann Cameron is Associate to the President. She’s the person I do lots of my correspondence with when Jim is tied up with his day job. Along with the manuscript, she emailed an additional file that had great pictures of Jim and his […]
Teasing about Speech Often Hurts
Feb 22, 2012
By Dr. Judy Montgomery, CCC-SLP, Professor, Chapman University
In this book, Jimmy talks about experiences related to a speech difficulty that are all too common in the early school years. He is just learning to be a “talker” like those more accomplished speakers around him, but his fine motor system is still immature and he […]
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