Department of Communication Arts and Sciences

Sabbatical Leave Report, Spring 2008

The purpose of this sabbatical leave project was to continue my study and research in neuroscience of speech, swallowing and language, both for the classroom and over the Internet. My research concentrated on diverse aspects of neuroscience. It included information on prevention of cerebral vascular accidents (strokes), pharmacotherapy for strokes that were not prevented, and innovative remedial techniques when prevention and pharmacotherapy were not effective. Normal structures and blood flow were also researched and studied. In addition, material on a variety of neural lesions that result in speech, swallowing, language, and executive function problems was researched. Also included was state of the art information on the diagnosis and remediation of communication disorders resulting from a variety of causes including traumatic brain injury, and cerebral vascular accident. 

The three neuroscience courses that I worked on during spring semester 2008 are CMSD 620 Neuroanatomy of Speech, Swallowing and Language, CMSD 636 Neuropathologies of Language and Cognition, and CMSD 642 Neuropathologies of Swallowing and Speech. I currently teach all three courses on campus and over the Internet. My on-line students come from as far away as India and China, and in North America, from Florida to Canada. In addition to adding a great deal of information (text) to the three courses, I took classes on Dream Weaver and Vista and added interesting links to text, video clips, and graphic images. Many of the graphic images I used are my own. I developed them with a good deal of help from the Technology and Learning Program at the University. I have given permission to a number of professionals who wanted to use my illustrations. Among them is John Woo M.D., Ph. D., from the University of Pennsylvania Medical School who used my illustration of meningeal anatomy during a presentation this year at Johns Hopkins University.

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