Thinking with Thought Bubbles

Carole Kaulitz, Emily Jaskowiak, and I had two presentations at the recent ASHA (American Speech Language Hearing Association) Convention in Seattle. One of the questions related to behavior that was asked by several individuals had to do with bubbling. Specifically, what do we draw in the thought bubbles? Here is a summary response:

1) All drawing is about thinking, and we need layers for thinking to make concepts. 2) All conceptual learning is dynamic and when connected to behavior occurs across space and time. Thought bubbles help provide the layers and the thinking before, during and after behaviors within an event making the processing easier for the learners. A). If the drawing is for intervention (after a behavior has occurred), then you draw what he was thinking or doing BEFORE the behavior you want to intervene; B). if the drawing is for prevention, then you draw any thought such as if the drawing is for going to the bathroom, the child was thinking about playing with his blocks because the child was playing with the blocks before he thought about going to the bathroom; then the child thinks about going to the bathroom before they leave the playing with the blocks; C). if the drawing is for an older child with lots of language, you let them fill the thought bubble with what they were thinking BEFORE the behavior you want to replace happened or sometimes to prevent behavior that you do not want.

The key is that our drawing is not artwork but thinking. Therefore, the thinking bubbles reflect what the child was, is, or will do, depending on the context. It is a way to give visual thinking to children so as to raise their level of knowledge for choosing behavior based on that knowledge. Remember neuroscientists affirm our language numbers in reporting that 95% of the population visually processes their world for knowledge purposes. The level of visual processing connects with the level of thinking and subsequent behavior. For example, if a child cannot make sense (semantics) out of their environment, then the drop to a sensory level and the behavior is out of control. The child neither remembers doing the behaviors that escalated and were unwanted nor can the child take responsibility for memories they don’t have. Therefore, over time, without raised thinking, the child’s behavior gets more aggressive or inwardly anti-social. However, if the child’s thinking is raised so that when the child experiences feelings that the child can express with language (not unwanted behaviors), then people in the child’s environment can help the child problem solve what the child uses language for (pragmatics and semiotics). In fact, sometimes, drawing helps bring a child’s thinking up from the sensory level to a preoperational level where the child can see themselves in the drawing which means the child can now begin to appropriately acquire adequate environmental meaning for pro-social behavior.