Stage Three of Gestalt Language Processing: Single Words and Structure Building

How to Support kids in Stage 3 of Gestalt Language Development

In the journey of gestalt language development, Stage Three is a pivotal point where autistic children begin to explore the flexibility and variability of language. This stage involves breaking down parts of gestalts (phrases or scripts) further into single words. Understanding and supporting your child during this stage is crucial for fostering more independent and creative language use. In this post, we’ll dive into the key characteristics of Stage Three and share practical tips for helping your child navigate this important phase.

You can read more about “What is Gestalt Language Processing?” here, about Stage ONE here, or about Stage TWO here. Now, in this post we will focus on stage three, which is when a child is breaking down gestalts and phrases into single words. A gestalt can be described when related to language as a phrase, chunk of language, or string of words. It can also be referred to as scripting, immediate echolalia, delayed echolalia, or a phrase. Stage three, is all about finding each word and preparing them for the endless possibilities of sentence structures with various word orders and combinations.

Supporting your child in Stage Three of Gestalt Language Development

Stage Three of gestalt language development is characterized by the child’s ability to start deconstructing whole phrases and scripts into individual words or smaller components. This deconstruction allows the child to experiment with and understand the variability of language. It’s a significant step towards developing more flexible, spontaneous, and self-generated language.

Up until now, most words have been attached to others in phrases and scripts. They are just learning to take each word apart from it’s gestalt and combine it with others. I explain this like a lego house. At first, your child has a lego house (stage 1), we then show them to take the roof and add it to another set of walls (stage 2). Now they are taking each individual lego apart and learning how to make new designs. Just like with legos, this takes time.

Key Characteristics of Stage 3

In stage 3 you will hear single words used to reference items. You may notice pointing paired with these single words or self correction to find the “right” word. Word combinations may sound choppy or involve pauses. This is just your child finding the exact word from all their gestalts that they want to use. Model the more intentional speaking speed and allow space for this.

Modeling

The focus of this stage is creativity, flexibility, and experimentation of combinations. (notice grammar was not mentioned once) Grammar comes in later stages, so here we celebrate every new combination as our GLPs learn how access all the words from the gestalts they have acquired. This can feel unnatural as adults, but we want to focus on nouns, adjectives, and locations. It can be hard, but don’t focus on grammar yet, when your child says “I juice” to request juice, celebrate that they have created this unique utterance on their own. Model ”I juice” “cold juice”, “purple juice”, “juice cup”, and more unique combinations to encourage separating all the gestalts stored in their brains with no grammatical restraints. Think about sentences and how variable word order can be. I can say “That juice is cold” or “That’s some cold juice”. Keep this in mind when combining words and don’t stress about “correct” order but rather model various combinations. Stage three might seem like a step back, but focus on slowing down and noticing all the ways you can combine words. Get interested in the same thing the child is interested in. Make two-word statements about things they are noticing. See how many combinations you can make around a single item/idea. Allow time for the child to start to organically pair words together. You might be able to “see” the wheels turning in a child’s head as they sort through their library of gestalts and pick out which word they want. Provide that time and model at a similar pace.

Next, we will discuss Stage 4, which is diving into grammar.