What Others are Saying about SentenceShaper

Contents of this page

How seven men are achieving things with the help of SentenceShaper at an aphasia clinic

Read about (and hear) a speech created with SentenceShaper and played to a thousand people

A computer lab at an aphasia center reports:

When we asked Chrysa Golashesky, the computer coach at the Adler Aphasia Center in Maywood, NJ, how things were going with SentenceShaper, we received the following answer, which is used with permission and shortened a little.

8-29-2006

There are seven gentlemen using the software. They represent about 10% of the members who come through the computer lab each week. They are the initial group selected because they all produce some language, usually speaking in phrases. The vast majority of them are very PC literate so they can work the software independently. Lastly, they are very open to trying new software.

I believe that 4 of the men are considering purchasing the software for their home use in the not too distant future. They still want someone to sit next to them to remind them about uses of the software and/or to customize words. They require a knowledgeable user at home before they can make the software investment.

You asked about the applications that members have expressed. Two of them come in the lab specifically to use Sentence Shaper sometimes for hours at a time. One is trying to compose some sentences that he can use when he is asked for some business advice requested by friends and family. He works on them at the center; then his computer partner helps him to send them as MP-3 files to his e-mail at home, so he can practice them there.

Another gentleman just sent his son off to college. When the young man does well on a test, or could use a few words of encouragement, he would like to record sentences and forward them as MP-3 files to his son so he can hear his dad's support.

...I have to admit that it amazes me when I look up and hear some of these fellows reveling in their complete sentence expressions. They are very proud of themselves, as they should be.

Then about two months later, on October 23, she added this update:

Since I last wrote, one of our members has returned to the workforce as a graphic artist on a part-time basis.  He is in the process of building a custom set of vocabulary terms in the Sentence Shaper Word Finder Editor.  He has a version of photo processing software that is voice activated, so he wants to construct verbal commands.

Another gentleman is running for councilman in his town.  He is also building his Word Finder Editor with campaign terms to help him develop portions of his speeches, and prepare answers to questions that he anticipates receiving.

Here's an update about the councilman: see our page about Ken Albrecht using SentenceShaper.  And here's another page showing a successful use of SentenceShaper, as Bob Durham reports on a trip he took.

A speech to a thousand people results from working with SentenceShaper

One of the first aphasia survivors to use SentenceShaper was Mrs. Elaine Wolpe. The devastating impact of her aphasia is movingly described in her son David J. Wolpe's book, In Speech and in Silence: The Jewish Quest for God (1992, Henry Holt & Co). In the spring of 1999, when her husband, Rabbi Gerald Wolpe, retired from Har Zion, his congregation of thirty years, Mrs. Wolpe used SentenceShaper to create two speeches of farewell.

If your computer has a sound card and can play mp3 files, you can click the button below to hear the last minute or so of one of her speeches. (It will play in a new browser window, so after it's over, just close it and this page will still be here.)

It is well worth listening to (as well as reading) because of her deeply expressive intonation. We believe that it is a very important feature of SentenceShaper that it allows users to communicate in their own voices.

Here are the closing lines of Mrs. Wolpe's speech:

Har Zion, thirty years of work and good memories…Sisterhood and Men's Club and services. Wonderful, wonderful children. Now that the end comes, wonderful memories. Now my reign is through and next year, young people, and good people. My husband -- unbelievable. Wonderful man; kind man, kind heart. New rabbi, but never, never try and imitate Rabbi. I love Rabbi and I love family. A lucky girl, a lucky family. Now we're through, but wherever we go, I'm here, and Rabbi's here. Goodbye, goodbye.

A few months after these speeches, Rabbi Wolpe wrote a moving letter of gratitude to Unisys Corporation, where Dr. Linebarger was employed. Parts of this letter are quoted below. (All quotations and the sound file of Mrs. Wolpe's speech are reproduced here with the permission of the Wolpe family.) Mrs. Wolpe's two speeches are also mentioned in a book about Rabbi Wolpe's retirement: The New Rabbi by Stephen Fried (2002, Bantam Books: pp 150, 262).

Rabbi Wolpe's letter (1/4/00)

Fourteen years ago my wife collapsed in our home from the rupture of two brain aneurysms. This began a scenario of brutal adaptation to the damage inflicted by the trauma. She went from a college administrator and public speaker to an aphasic who was, fortunately, cognitively sound, but unable to express her thoughts. For two years she could utter only a nonsense syllable and then after intensive speech therapy some pattern of conversation emerged. It has been a struggle for her and her family; only someone with her indomitable spirit could have survived.

Then, through her work at MossRehab, Elaine was introduced to Marcia Linebarger who began to work with her [using SentenceShaper]…[This work] produced two of the most poignant moments of my life. I retired as rabbi of Har Zion Temple in PennValley this past spring. Elaine and I had spent thirty years in the congregation and it had been a time of absolute joy. It was an emotional parting and I spent a great deal of time preparing my remarks. I did not know that Elaine was doing the same thing.

Marcia and Elaine worked at the computer with what Marcia explained was a "processing prosthesis." It allowed Elaine to place words in a memory pattern and laboriously to produce a speech of farewell to our friends. The first was at the Sisterhood luncheon in her honor and the second was at the farewell banquet. The sight of close to 1000 people weeping, my sons, daughters in law and I among them, was a tribute to their feelings about her and their admiration for her courage.