Don’t Miss These Visual Supports & the Chance to PrAACtice Language Facilitation Strategies

June 5, 2012 by - 1 Comment


Don't Miss Visual Supports & the Chance to PrAACtice Language Facilitation

We have to commend  and thank a classroom teacher who made it her priority to learn and share information about visual supports and communication. She developed a great wiki with many awesome visual support downloads.  She worked with a mentor through the Florida Partnership for Effective Programs for Students with Autism (PEPSA). The mission of this great  program is to enhance the education for students with autism spectrum disorders.  With projects like this, the education of everyone is enhanced. The visual supports are for PrAACtical activities and learning. Find your favorite and then apply language facilitation strategies when teaching communication with the symbols. Check this out at: http://pkautismvisuals.wikispaces.com/Welcome Academic Supports Basic Communication Daily Routines Fun and Games      

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LiveBinders: The Beginning

June 1, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


LiveBinders- The Beginning

We have always started our collaborative projects with a retreat (usually a day at the beach or park).  The retreat usually ends with a project and a plan to meet again.  Following the retreat that inspired PrAACtical AAC, we were spending hours upon hours on the computer searching   We were using pen and paper to write down urls to sites we wanted to share.  We couldn’t believe the great information that was available.  So when Carole told me to sit down and said “you have to look at what I found, it’s called LiveBinders“. I can still remember the exact moment.   It was like on T.V…..  the sun started shining through the window of my living room and music started playing.  We  couldn’t believe there was a site that was easy to use, would organize all the work we had done, let us look at and use other binders,... [Read More...]

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AAC & iPads to the Beach- It’s PrAACtically Summer

June 1, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


AAC & iPads at the Beach

Summer seems to have started in South Florida.  It is hot, really hot.  When it is really hot, swimming and water play seem to be a natural fit. We first promote the idea of water safety and make appropriate referrals.   But, we LOVE to promote communication in and around the water.  It used to be simple… no AAC devices too close to the water. We had some really cool no tech communication supports that worked in the water. We still use them. Has anyone made a communication kick board?  If not, we still highly recommend creating them. Stock up on clear contact paper.  Josh Harris, AAC Kickboard Style, (Photo taken from Tangible Symbol Systems Primer (free) 20-page document including basic information about tangible symbols, how to teach individuals to use tangible symbols to communicate and tips from parents and professionals http://www.designtolearn.com/uploaded/pdf/Tangible-Symbols-Primer-07-09x.pdf ) But now there are some great water protection iPad and... [Read More...]

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Magic Moments with Qwiki: PrAACtical Learning for Older Students and Adults

May 31, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


Magic Moments with Qwiki: PrAACtical Learning for Older Students and Adults

Magic Moments is an occasional series that discusses prAACtical ways of using favorite toys, games, apps, and selected websites for language and literacy learning. Our last Magic Moments post featured Toca Store, an app for children, so this time we raised our sights to address an older demographic. There are fewer age-appropriate, interesting materials designed especially for the AAC and learning needs of this age group so we are always on the hunt for creative ideas. Since we’re sharing digital curation tools as part of our May Strategy of the Month, we thought this would be a perfect opportunity to talk about ways to use Qwiki with clients who use AAC. and websites for communication learning.  – Qwiki is an aggregation tool that combines video and web interactivity into a brief multimedia presentation. In their reference site, Qwiki allows you to enter a search term and get an interesting overview of that topic with images,... [Read More...]

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35 AAC Posts You May Have Missed, May 2012

May 31, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


35 AAC Posts You May Have Missed, May 2012

The Fives 1. 5 Sites for Professionals who are Supporting Military Families with Special Needs Children 2. 5 Charitable Programs that Support Funding for Communication through Mobile Devices 3. 5 Sites for Tools & Tips on Self-Calming & Behavior Regulation 4. Five (More) Resources for Supporting Friendships in Individuals Who Use AAC PrAACtical Thinking Updated: 59 Free and Lite AAC Apps Magic Moments with Qwiki: PrAACtical Learning for Older Students and Adults PrAACtical Teaching PrAACtical Alert: How Your Junk Drawer Can Help People Who Use AAC Magic Moments with Toca Store Random App of Kindness Sticky Situation AAC ASD App From the Ivory Tower PrAACtical Resources: Evidence-Based Practice Maps PrAACtical Suggestions: 10 Ways to Help Families Make Informed Decisions about AAC PrAACtical Suggestions: How to Get Started with A New AAC Client, Part 1 International Cri du Chat Awareness Week Saying ‘I Love You’ on Mother’s Day iTaalk for Better Hearing and Speech Month... [Read More...]

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Getting the Scoop on AAC

May 30, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


Getting the Scoop on AAC

When I first heard about curation being the next big thing on the internet, I had a hard time seeing how I would have time to get involved. Less than a year later, I can’t conceive of being on the internet without my curation tools. Every day, something comes up that I want to store on a curation site. And it’s almost every day that I send someone to those places for a specific tool, video, article, etc. – In addition to Pinterest, which we blogged about earlier, we are frequent users of Scoop.It and LiveBinders. Each one has its unique properties and so, they are each useful for different things. – Scoop.It is a pictorial magazine where you can collect and share websites related to topics of interest. Unlike Pinterest, with Scoop.It, you can add things that do not have a sizable image. Anyone can view Scoop.Its, but if... [Read More...]

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5 Sites for Professionals who are Supporting Military Families with Special Needs Children

May 27, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


5 Sites for Professionals who are Supporting Military Families with Special Needs Children

— Being in the military? That’s some tough stuff. Having a child with AAC needs? Lots of challenges there, as we all know. – Both? Hard to imagine — As professionals, few of us know much about the unique pressures and demands on military families of children with special needs. In this post, we highlight some resources that SLPs, educators, and others can use to educate ourselves and provide better supports to these families. – 1. U.S. Department of Defense Domestic Dependent Elementary and Secondary Schools (DDESS) Special Education Information and information on the The Interstate Compact on Educational Opportunity for Military Children 2. Military Homefront pages on Special Education and Assistive Technology with link to TRICARE Extended Care Health Option (ECHO) 3. Military Child Education Coalition Special Education Leadership Institute (SELI) 4. STOMP: Specialized Training for Military Parents, a project dedicated to training and support of families who have a... [Read More...]

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PrAACtical Alert: How Your Junk Drawer Can Help People Who Use AAC

May 26, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


PrAACtical Alert: How Your Junk Drawer Can Help People Who Use AAC

I don’t think there is a house I’ve ever been to that hasn’t had a drawer that looked something like this. If your junk drawer has some old phones (you know, the ones you saved ‘just in case’), consider digging them out and putting them to good use. – The folks at Different iz Good, one of the wonderful groups featured in our post on charitable groups that support AAC, have a cellphone drive program that helps fund the iPhones and iPod touches that they provide to people with significant communication challenges. Besides donating your own old phones, you can also put out collection boxes in schools, places of employment, the library, your gym, etc. Once you have 3 or more phones, shipping them is free. – Get the details at their site along with printable letters, mailing labels, and such. – –

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PrAACtical Resources: Blogs We Love

May 24, 2012 by - 3 Comments


PrAACtical Resources: Blogs We Love

Our BHSM Strategy of the Month has focused on developing our Professional Learning Network, and in this past week we’ve shared some of our favorite internet sites. We can’t finish out the topic, though, without mentioning some of places where we spend time each week. When I first started following blogs by other SLPs, K-12 educators, and professors, I had no idea how much content was out there. Over the years, I’ve become more and more thankful for the wealth of information these bloggers  so generously provide. Like anything else, blogs are a varied lot – some good, some not so good, and a few seriously excellent ones. – Here is ASHA’s 2012 list of the best blogs in SLP and some of our favorite blogs for AAC, AT, and tech-related content: Jane Farrall (http://www.janefarrall.com/blog/) Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs (http://teachinglearnerswithmultipleneeds.blogspot.com/) Speech Techie (http://www.speechtechie.com/) The Speech Dudes (http://speechdudes.wordpress.com/) Spectronics (https://www.spectronicsinoz.com/blog/)... [Read More...]

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It's PrAACtically Memorial Day!

May 24, 2012 by - Leave your thoughts


It's PrAACtically Memorial Day

Memorial Day Weekend is big for us.  We remember, appreciate, and honor the people who have protected our freedoms.  We both have annual relaxing weekends planned.  As we started to get ready, though, we started looking for Memorial Day AAC materials.  It was surprising to see that there was not much to be found.  We found some gluten-casein free Memorial Day recipes, which are great, but what about symbols to go with the recipes or symbols to explain the holiday and what about AAC language activities for the typical long weekend or trip?  Not much….   So as we began preparing for our own weekends, these are some of the things we have done or are doing for PrAACtical AAC at home and on our mini-vacations: – Before We Leave Create a personal participation story (modified social story) so ALL the children can SEE the language for the trip. Here’s something that... [Read More...]

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