817 Search Results for praactical teaching
June 16, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
One of the best things about being an AAC interventionist is that it allows you to play and find creative ways to teach and practice language. In this post, we’ve compiled some of our favorite posts about teaching core vocabulary, early communicative intents, and more advanced language skills to people learning AAC. – – Early Language Magic Moments with Toca Store (app) Magic Moments with Toca Boca Doctor (app) PrAACtical Play with Playskool Busy Gears (toys) Magic Moments with Stop and Go (app) HijAACked! Putting an AAC Twist on The Hallelujah Flight (free e-book, website) Magic Moments with Disneyland Explorer (app, free) Magic Moments with Painting with Time (app, free) 5 Apps to Tempt Commenting and Other Language Functions (app) – More Advanced Language Magic Moments: AAC Intervention with BrainPOP (app and website) Magic Moments with Qwiki (app and website) HijAACked! AAC & Anti-Bullying with Stand Tall, Marylou Melon (free... [Read More...]
May 31, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
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...]
May 24, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
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...]
May 18, 2012
by Robin Parker -
Did we fail to mention that we are at Twitter Stage 4 ? (uh oh… we just found a 1-46 Twitter Stage Scale). Twitter seems to be our favorite medium for getting and giving information quickly. Although we still have so much to learn, as the song goes, here are a few of our favorite things: 140 Characters– We love to shorten directed learning and teaching. We only recently realized that listening to long (or short) lectures is not how we PrAACtically learn. The 140 character limit helps us ‘flip’ the learning by letting us give a short ‘teaser’ and a link. We love this. HashTags- It took us awhile to understand hastags and now we love them. Edudemic published a great A-Z Dictionary of Educational Hashtags that we refer to often. It is great to have everything in 1 place. Twitter Speak- We love the cool abbreviations that help you say... [Read More...]
May 15, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
– This is the first week of a new semester for us, and that means we get the pleasure of introducing a new crop of student SLPs to clients with AAC needs. We’ve been busy looking at lesson plans, discussing goals and objectives, listening to ideas for therapy activities, and helping to develop plans for data collection. With those recent conversations buzzing in our ears, here are some thoughts about getting AAC therapy sessions off to a good start. – 1. Connect with the client and family before the first session. Take some time to plan out questions that will help you get to know their expectations, family culture, and daily routine. 2. Know the history. Go beyond the diagnosis and device. Take time to research what’s been done before, how that worked out, and, if you can, how that was perceived. Knowing where the client has been on his/her... [Read More...]
May 12, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
Hope you are having a great Better Hearing and Speech Month! Our May Strategy of the Month continues to focus on building our Professional Learning and Resource Network in prAACtical ways. This week we’ll be posting about Twitter. – While some of you may have been early adopters of the microblogging trend, I just didn’t see the value of Twitter until the past year. As one who doesn’t much care what Paris Hilton had for breakfast or who sat next to whom at the Heat game, it just didn’t interest me. Robin, on the other hand, was tweeting away and kept telling me about wonderful connections she’d made that way. “I’ll get around to it one of these days,” I thought but kept putting it off until I was out of excuses. Once I was involved, it only took a week or so before I was hooked on the vast... [Read More...]
April 30, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
It’s easy to daydream when you’re sitting in the sun. It is a stunningly beautiful day here in south Florida. “Too nice to stay indoors,” my mom would have said, and so I’m sitting outside with my laptop working away. Before long, my mind starts to wander. – Ever think about what you would do if you weren’t an SLP? For me ‘reading teacher’ would be pretty close to the top of the list. – I was one of those kids who spent hours in the children’s library just devouring books. Melinda Cox Free Library was my home away from home, and In those days it was run by the Edgar sisters, Miss Martha and Miss Alice. They tolerated no nonsense in ‘their’ library and the adult books were strictly off-limits to young people. We were confined to the Littleton room, a well-stocked children’s section, where I spent most of... [Read More...]
March 24, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
There’s nothing more depressing to us than walking into a classroom in the spring and seeing pristine visual schedules. Why? Because it probably means that the students aren’t really using them. We cheer when we see schedules that are rumpled and dog-eared, not shiny. Show me a battered and tattered visual schedule, and I’ll show you one that gets used every day. Sadly, that’s not always the case. – The bridge between having a visual schedule and consistently using it is one that many learners don’t seem to cross. Here are some of our ideas for helping your AAC learners to the other side. – 1. Have a plan to teach the schedule. If you are working one-on-one with a learner, you can easily implement the schedule and get them using it with most-to-least prompting. If you’re working with a group or a classroom, consider staggered implementation. Teaching 12 beginners... [Read More...]
March 2, 2012
by Robin Parker -
The Secret to Succeeding At Anything We found this very cool photo message through Russ Ewell on google + (re-posted from Robert Nahas) and it really sums up our learning and teaching philosophy. Everyone can improve in their communication, behavior, and organization skills (and anything else). These are some examples of PrAACtically New resources that exemplify the photo message: 5 Examples of Success after Plan A For Employment- Walgreens Rocks For Communication Intervention- Speaking Up Too Late For AAC Apps- 39 Free & Lite AAC Apps For Expectations & Awareness- From Service Dog to SURFice Dog! For Independent Living- hanging with 20 somethings with special needs
February 18, 2012
by Carole Zangari -
One of the first things that many SLPs ponder when doing an AAC assessment is about how language will be stored on an SGD, no-tech communication tool, visual support or AAC app. The issue is this: What symbols are best for this person’s communication aid? This is never an easy question to answer, but the proliferation of symbols used in visual supports, communication aids, SGDs, and AAC apps has made the process even more challenging. – There are several ways in which we go about answering that question, but that’s a post for another day. In this post, we want to share some of the most comprehensive sources for identifying your symbolic options. Here are some sites you may want to bookmark. – 1. A Guide to Selecting Pictures and Symbol Sets for Communication by Sally Millar 2. Comparison chart of AAC symbol sets and systems by Spectronics 3.... [Read More...]