Pre-Congress CLAN Workshop (May 15th)

Workshop Description

Free CLAN software (developed with funding from the US NIH and NSF) can make both clinical and research work in stuttering and other disorders more efficient and informative. This workshop will prepare attendees to create their own media-linked speech samples using the open-access, free CLAN software suite, and annotate them for fluency and other behaviors of interest. Users will then practice using CLAN to generate fluency (FluCalc) and language profiles (Eval/KidEval). The session will also address use of FluencyBank resources for teaching as well as research, with examples of teaching activities and published research projects. This session is underwritten in part by NIDCD funding.

Registration Instructions

This pre-conference workshop is provided at no cost. To register, contact Dr. Nan Bernstein Ratner at nratner@umd.edu.

Authors

Dr. Nan Bernstein Ratner

Nan Bernstein Ratner (University of Maryland) is co-founder of FluencyBank (fluency.talkbank.org) with Brian MacWhinney (Carnegie-Mellon University). FluencyBank was established using funding from the National Science Foundation and the NIDCD, and is maintained using funds to TalkBank from NIDCD. Neither she nor Brian MacWhinney receive any compensation from the use of TalkBank resources or software, and they are not compensated for workshop presentations. Professor Bernstein Ratner also currently also serves as Chair of the TalkBank advisory board, a non-compensated position.

Dr. Shelley B. Brundage

Shelley B. Brundage Ph.D., CCC, BCS-F, Fellow-ASHA, is a professor and chair of the Department of Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences at the George Washington University (GWU). She teaches a graduate course on stuttering and mentors undergraduate and graduate research students. Her research addresses clinical questions that enhance the lives of persons who stutter, by improving procedures for assessment, treatment, and clinical education in stuttering. She has received multiple awards for teaching excellence and mentoring. She is the author of numerous research articles. She is the co-author of two books, A Handbook on Stuttering and Writing Scientific Research in Communication Sciences and Disorders.

Dr. Erica Lescht

Erica Lescht, M.A., CCC-SLP, is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Communication Science and Disorders at University of Pittsburgh. She received her B.A and M.A. in Speech-Language Pathology from University of Maryland. Her research interests focus on the development of language, executive function, and learning in children, with a focus on children who stutter.

Carly Rosvold

Carly L. Rosvold is currently pursuing a dual Master’s/Ph.D. program in Hearing and Speech Sciences and Speech-Language Pathology at the University of Maryland, conducting research in Dr. Ratner's Language Fluency lab. She completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Maryland in 2021, earning a B.A. in Speech and Hearing Science with a minor in Neuroscience. Her research focuses primarily on fluency and child language development, particularly on the establishment of early linguistic predictors of eventual persistence or recovery status in children who stutter near onset.