July 27, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Do you have a love-hate relationships with formal testing? Are you required to use normed tests with your minimally verbal clients? Looking for recommendations on which tests to use? AAC specialist Vicki Clarke has you covered! Like many of you, I’ve had mixed feeling when it comes to using normed assessment instruments with my AAC learners, particularly when we needed to modify the test materials or administration procedures in order for them to be able to participate and respond. If the client can’t point to pictures, give a verbal response, or sit through an entire test, we have no choice but to adapt how the test is administered. As we all know, when we adapt test materials (e.g., putting the test items on an eye gaze board) or procedures (e.g., partner-assisted scanning), we lose the ability to use the normative data. We can, though, compare our learners to themselves at... [Read More...]
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: assessment, tests
July 26, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Looking for ways to prAACtice using core words? Rachael Langley has been incredibly generous with her time in creating and sharing calendars with daily activity ideas. The current calendar (2016) provides suggestions for our Year of Core Vocabulary Set 2 words. You can look back at the 2015 calendar for prAACtice suggestions for the August Set 1 words, too.
Filed under: PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: A Year of Words, Calendar
July 25, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
The summer is flying by here in Florida and we’re starting to think about heading back to school. Teachers, therapists, and aides play a pivotal role in helping AAC learners develop skills with core vocabulary so that they have a body of words that can be used across activities, environments, and communication partners. There are lots of ‘right’ ways to support these students. Among them is an instructional approach in which a new set of core words is introduced every few weeks in order to build their experiences with AAC. Our Year of Core Words materials has two versions, one from 2013 (12 words/month) and one from 2014 (16 words/month; Different than the previous year’s core words). If you’ve been following along, or are just getting started, these resources may be of interest. Set 1 (2013) Words: any, bring, day, fall, give, hot, job, know, other, sick, sorry, together Set 2... [Read More...]
Filed under: PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: core words, download, Year of Core Vocabulary
July 24, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Here are some AAC posts you may have missed in your prAACtical week. Monday – Make It Monday: More Words, Please! Expanding Our Manual Communication Boards Wednesday – Open Source AAC Thursday – PrAACtical Supports for Young AAC Learners: Recipes for Success, Part 3
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: summary post
July 21, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Looking for resources so you can help families get comfortable with implementing AAC at home? SLP Sara Barnhill has you covered! In the third installment of the PrAACtical Supports for the Young AAC Learner, she generously shares some parent handouts created along with her colleagues at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU (CHoR). As a member of the Assistive Technology (AT) Core team, she is involved in AAC evaluations and therapy in the hospital’s clinics, out-patient program and Transitional Care Unit. CHoR’s AT Program is one of few comprehensive AT programs in Central Virginia. The program provides AT evaluations, equipment and training to people of all ages, enabling children and adults with disabilities to function more independently. CHoR’s AT team consists of four SLPs, two OTs, one PT, and one Therapy Practice Assistant. In addition to completing transdiciplinary evaluations and treatments, CHoR’s AT team is responsible for supporting staff and sharing AT information to five CHoR... [Read More...]
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: beginning communicators, downloads, parents, play
July 20, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
What’s better than a bunch of bright, dedicated professionals who love improving the state of AAC? How about a group that facilitates the collegial sharing of this kind of information?! In today’s post, Dr. Joe Reddington discusses his efforts to promote open-source AAC solutions. You can read about an earlier project, CommuniKate, here. ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: AAC Wins the Inclusive Technology Prize A few months ago, the nonprofit I run was given £50,000 to make open licensed resources (both materials and software) a key part of the AAC world. Figure 1: Kate McCallum and Dr Joe Reddington, winners of the Inclusive Technology Prize There are lots of definitions of open-licencing that make it sound more than what it is. Open-licencing is nothing more or less than letting people share. One of the reasons we really like PrAACtical AAC is that they release their work under Creative Commons, letting people make use of... [Read More...]
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: collaboration, emerging technology, open source
July 18, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
It’s another Make It Monday, our series on preparing core vocabulary materials for use with AAC learners. When we left off last week, we selected or created manual communication boards (MCBs) with a starter set of core words. Today, we pick up that thread by adding more words. If you are working with teams that are new to AAC implementation, have a difficult time with change, or are showing resistance to this “whole AAC thing,” you might want to start off slowly and use just the main communication board for a few weeks to build everyone’s confidence. You can add more words once they are implementing it fairly well. The way I see it: Strong implementation of a basic core board is better than weak implementation of a more robust board. It doesn’t take very long, though, to realize that as versatile as our core word MCB is, there simply... [Read More...]
Filed under: PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: core vocabulary, Make It Monday
July 17, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Monday – Make It Monday: Manual Communication Boards with Core Vocabulary Wednesday – Video of the Week: AAC in the Classroom for Students with Significant Disabilities – Implementation & Data Collection Thursday – PrAACtical Supports for Young AAC Learners: Recipes for Success, Part 2
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: summary post
July 14, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Parent training? Check! Preschoolers? Check! Language and play? Check! Core vocabulary? Check! SLP Sara Barnhill is back to share some resources she created along with her colleagues at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU (CHoR). As a member of the Assistive Technology (AT) Core team, she is involved in AAC evaluations and therapy in the hospital’s clinics, out-patient program and Transitional Care Unit. CHoR’s AT Program is one of few comprehensive AT programs in Central Virginia. The program provides AT evaluations, equipment and training to people of all ages, enabling children and adults with disabilities to function more independently. CHoR’s AT team consists of four SLPs, two OTs, one PT, and one Therapy Practice Assistant. In addition to completing transdiciplinary evaluations and treatments, CHoR’s AT team is responsible for supporting staff and sharing AT information to five CHoR therapy centers throughout Central Virginia. In this post, Sara shares two resources developed at the CHoR AT Program... [Read More...]
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: beginning communicators, core vocabulary, downloads, toys
July 11, 2016
by Carole Zangari -
Welcome to Make It Monday, a series in which we hope to inspire your team to create communication boards and instructional materials for students who need or already use core vocabulary. In the first post, Getting Ready for a Core Vocabulary Journey, we talked about getting set up to make materials for expressive and receptive language use. Today, we get into making manual communication boards (MCBs). About Manual Communication Boards The term manual communication board refers to a ‘no-tech’ AAC support that students can use to express themselves. Typically printed on paper and laminated, most MCBs have grids of words organized by part of speech (e.g., verbs in one area, adjectives in another). MCBs that are designed for use in a particular activity, such as doing an art project or participating in Circle Time, are called activity-based communication displays, or ABCDs. ABCDs were very popular in the early days of... [Read More...]
Filed under: Featured Posts, PrAACtical Thinking
Tagged With: communication book, core vocabulary