by Johanna Bailey

July 5, 2011

When my older son was three-years old he often did this thing where he'd repeat a word several times before moving on to the next one. It was a sort of stuttering but I didn't get the sense that his problem was not being able to get the word or sound out. Rather it seemed to be a sort of strategy for stalling while he thought of the next word he was going to say. I began to wonder if the problem could have something to do with learning more than one language at a time. I spoke with both his teachers at school and his pediatrician (all of them Spanish) and they told me not to worry about it. I have since learned that in Spain (at least compared to the USA and the UK), they typically do wait until a child is older to begin addressing speech problems. Luckily, in our case the word-repeating went away on its own. Nevertheless, the experience got me curious about the differences in approach towards treating speech problems in bilingual children. I also wondered if there was someone in Barcelona that parents of English-speaking children could turn to if they were concerned about their child's speech development.

Chrissy Bruce is an American speech therapist who works with English-speaking children in Barcelona. I asked her some questions about what she does and because I know that a lot of you may be interested in this topic, I thought I'd share her answers here with you.

1. What is your background?

I am from the US (Arizona), and have lived in Barcelona for about 15 years.  I came to teach English back in 1994 and fell in love with Barcelona.  I did go back to the States from 1996-2000 for graduate school and to complete a fellowship as a bilingual speech-language pathologist in Washington, D.C., but ever since the first day I arrived in Barcelona, I have known this was my home.  I am now married to a Catalan and have a trilingual four-year-old.  I have been a licensed speech-language pathologist for 12 years.

2. How did you start working as a speech therapist in Barcelona? 

I coordinated the special needs learning program at the American School of Barcelona for many years before opening my private practice in 2006.  I now work very closely with many of the international schools in Barcelona and have the pleasure of working with multilingual children throughout Barcelona.  I am absolutely passionate about what I do.

by Johanna Bailey

July 5, 2011

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