Anne Gardner '76

Anne Gardner, MA, SLP graduated from CU in 1976. She is a Speech Language Pathologist with 30 years experience working with preschool children and currently resides in Comox, BC. Anne co-authored the "Partnerships in Speech and Language" course for early childhood educators and is currently re-writing this course with two other SLPs. She wrote “Talking Together”, a parent manual and “Talking Together-The Movie”, a video for parents on Speech and language strategies to use with their children. Anne also co-created the “Moe the Mouse” speech and language theme box with Margaret Chesterman. Ann has presented workshops on this program across the province and is known for making them dynamic and fun. In 2008, the program received a special commendation from the Coastal Health Service Delivery Area, part of Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH).

Young Learner with Moe the Mouse

The goals for the "Moe the Mouse" program are to support children with speech and language delays by engendering pride in aboriginal culture and heritage. The program encourages pretend play and interaction to support language and speech sound development. It is comprehensive and extremely rich in materials. Cultural components include family/home involvement, elders as teachers, traditional language, animals and arts, stories, music, and songs.(see examples below) Another of Anne’s current projects is assisting in writing a TV series based on promoting imaginary play within the Aboriginal culture. The series will be shown on a national Canadian network, Aboriginal People’s Television Network. Anne writes that she has two sons, Simon who is 26, and Michael, 20. Both are at University of Victoria, Simon in education and Michael in the arts. Michael is an actor and had a fairly significant role in Stephen King’s movie Dreamcatcher. He played the “young Henry” and was involved in 10 days of filming complete with his own driver and Lincoln SUV and director’s chair. “Mother loving every minute of course!” For more information on Moe the Mouse contact Anne at annegardner@shaw.ca or Lynn Mc Bride at lynn@acc-society.bc.ca

Samples from Moe the Mouse