Caring for Your Voice: Teachers and Coaches

Sheree Haughian is an elementary-school teacher-librarian with the
Dufferin County Board of Education.

Preventive medicine has a special place in the psyche of the 1990s, as
indicated by the number of health books rising on bestseller lists.
Teachers and coaches, who rely on their vocal powers on a daily basis,
are the stated target audience for this collection of anatomy lessons,
corrective exercises, voice training tips, and case studies.

Caring for Your Voice is probably best read while confined to the
house with a bout of lingering laryngitis. Then it might seem easier to
cut out the caffeine that dries out the vocal cords or take other
measures to avoid the uncomfortable intrusion of a throat probe.
Unfortunately, the voice is one of those physical functions people
don’t take too seriously—until they lose it.

It’s difficult to imagine anyone with enough spare time to slog
through this book as a merely preventive measure. Once a chronic voice
crisis develops, this kind of self-help intervention, however medically
worthy, may not solve the problem. Perhaps this book would be most
useful as a supplementary text for those attending a voice-treatment
clinic, or as part of a professional library for teachers who may be
facing a long-term disability.