Aphasia Initiative has multiple group therapy sessions that meet every week, ranging from watching and engaging in television shows together to learning ways of communication technology—and now, improv classes. Credit: Courtesy of Arin Sheeler.
Ohio State’s Aphasia Initiative, a program to provide group rehabilitation sessions for people with aphasia, is partnering with university comedy group Eighth Floor Improv to conduct improv classes as a mode of speech therapy.?
Aphasia is a condition that stems from damage acquired in the brain that causes expressive and receptive language to be affected, according to Arin Sheeler, the Aphasia Initiative language pathologist behind these improv classes. Aphasia after a stroke or from a brain tumor, and it affects a person’s ability to speak clearly and follow conversations, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Sheeler also said that a person with aphasia may not always communicate verbally what they mean to say.?
The Aphasia Initiative was started in 2015 to help treat this diagnosis by program director Jennifer Brello, who conducts different, free group sessions weekly that are designed to aid the speech of adults living with aphasia. An example is a session in which participants watch and discuss television series or delve into technology as a communication support tool, according to Sheeler.
Many undergraduate and graduate students also take part in assisting with these sessions for class credit, getting hands-on experience with rehabilitation programming through the exercises, Sheeler said.
“We predominantly see people in a group therapy setting and we operate on a philosophy called the life participation approach to aphasia,” Sheeler said. “It’s a very person-centered model where we are working with people to really target functional activities of daily living and interests, hobbies [and] activities that are meaningful to them.”
The idea came when Sheeler conducted speech therapy over the summer for teenagers who stuttered, which incorporated improv classes to develop communication confidence. There, she realized the same classes could also assist those with aphasia.?
This led her to reach out to Eighth Floor Improv, which provided her with two members willing to come in each week to teach improv.
Then, at the beginning of the fall 2026 semester, Sheeler decided to add improv classes as an option for a weekly group session.
One of the improvisers is Leo Pierre, a second-year in computer science and information, who goes to Pressey Hall every Tuesday afternoon to teach improv games and lessons.
“I was almost nervous about it, but then I thought it could be good to get that opportunity to help teach and I thought that it seemed like it was just good for the community,” Pierre said. “I thought anybody should have the opportunity to do improv so I just wanted to help with that.”
Sheeler said that improv classes help members with aspects of communication such as multimodal communication, conversational skills, social participation and cognitive flexibility.
“This is a way for them to engage in a therapeutic rehab that is going to help to further rebuild and reprogram the wiring, the neural pathways in their brain,” Sheeler said. “It’s just one additional way to provide a therapeutic experience that they have likely never had before in their rehab journey. That’s interesting and fascinating to them to know that there’s not just one way of doing therapy.”
Mason Melvin, a third-year in French, is an Eighth Floor Improv member who also teaches classes with Aphasia Initiative, who said that he and Pierre plan lessons by keeping accessibility and beginner skills in mind.
“I think we’re fairly intentional about it, because we need to pick something that’s relatively simple, kind of quick, because you don’t want to spend 45 minutes doing one thing, but also just accessible to everybody, something that everybody can participate in and will hopefully enjoy participating in,” Melvin said.?
Students who are taking the course that helps out with Aphasia Initiative pair up with the participants with aphasia during these improv sessions. Sasha Men, a second-year in speech and hearing science said that participants are able to use communication devices like whiteboards or phones to do a scene together.
Men said that in the four weeks that Aphasia Initiative has been doing improv classes so far, she believes that she can see improvement in confidence among members.
“I did see some people being more chatty or talking more in the group style than the first week,” Men said. “There’s definitely some activities you can tell when some of our participants enjoy more or less.”
Melvin said he feels honored to come in each week and teach improv to members of Aphasia Initiative.
“I appreciated that there was enough trust put in me and Leo to be, you two can take control of this, because it’s a new thing. It feels like a big thing,” Melvin said. “I feel like we’re doing something that’s fun and important to these people.”
