1110 Search Results for Core
June 2, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Happy Sunday, AAC friends. We have some posts that you might enjoy. Monday – PrAACtical Groups: Tips, Tricks, & Positive Outcomes Tuesday – AAC Link Up Wednesday – Video of the Week: Voice Banking with Acapela My-Own-Voice Thursday – School Year of Core Vocabulary Words – Older Student Lessons: AAC Resources for June :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: And if you are thirsty for more, check out some past posts on activities and materials for AAC therapy and instruction. AACtivity Ideas to Jumpstart Learning Magic Moments with Verb Circus PrAACtical Ways to Make Decisions about Thematic Therapy Materials Why We Love AAC Language Experience Activities Vocabulary Activities: 5 Sites About Learning with Avatars AAC Intervention: 5 Activities with PrAACtical Potential
May 27, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
We hope that guest authors Marisa Portanova and Marnina Allis have inspired you to develop AAC groups for the children and adults you serve. Today, they wrap up their series with some final tips for creating and running successful groups. :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: PrAACtical AAC Groups Made Easy – Positive Outcome and Tips and Tricks Our AAC groups were a hit, and we want to help you all knock it out of the park as well! We had some great positive outcomes we would like to share to help with motivation to get started. Variety of communication opportunities – talking about their weekends, playing fun games like HeadBandz, giving opinions about a book read Language learning opportunities – within literacy contexts and natural social environments Social interaction opportunities are hard to accomplish in 1:1 settings between child and therapist. These groups allowed for peer-to-peer interaction as well. They allowed children to see other... [Read More...]
May 26, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Happy Sunday, AAC friends. Here are some posts you might enjoy. Monday – PrAACtical Groups: Let’s Be Authors Tuesday – AAC Link Up Wednesday – Video of the Week: Getting Ready for June School Year of Core Vocabulary Words Older Student Lessons Thursday – Starting a Journey with Stepping into AAC ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: Have a little more time? These might be of interest. Five Places for Shared AAC Materials Five AAC and Related Resources to Explore AAC Teamwork: Encouraging Colleagues #1 (downloadable) AAC Teamwork: Encouraging Colleagues #2 (downloadable) AAC Teamwork: Encouraging Colleagues #3 (downloadable) AAC: More Teaching, Less Testing (downloadable)
May 23, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Welcome back to our series on using the Stepping Into AAC program materials, a self-study program for families seeking to learn about and begin using AAC with their child, teen, or adult. In today’s post, we explore some of the things to do in preparation for starting an AAC journey and move into the first week of AAC learning activities. As you begin your Stepping Into AAC journey, there are 3 main things to do. Think about how you will organize your AAC learning materials and make a plan for incorporating AAC into your life. Starting in Week 1, you’ll do hands-on learning with your communication board (or device/app), watch informational videos, and read through documents. Prepare to select a communication board to use throughout this program. LINK to coom boards If you’re unsure of which one to use, don’t let that stop you. We’ll give you some guidance on... [Read More...]
May 20, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Our series on AAC group therapy continues with guest authors Marisa Portanova and Marnina Allis. In today’s post, they share ideas for helping young AAC users enhance their literacy skills. :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: PrAACtical AAC Groups Made Easy – Let’s Be Authors Last week, we discussed our ongoing weekly groups. Once we had success and saw progress made in the weekly groups, we came up with the concept of “AAC intensive groups,” where children would come in over a school break for a week and participate in the AAC groups for 5 consecutive days, for a longer stretch (about two and a half hours). This gave children a chance to interact with children from different classes and helped reduce the regression of learned AAC skills over the school break. During those weeks, we picked one book per day for the first 4 days. Day 5 was for review, discussing opinions of each... [Read More...]
May 19, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Happy Sunday, AAC friends. We have some posts that you might enjoy. Monday – PrAACtical Groups: AAC Let’s Have a Weekly Social Tuesday – AAC Link Up Wednesday – Video of the Week: Eyegaze & ALS Thursday – A PrAACtical Guide to Stepping into AAC ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: While you’re at it, here are some previous posts that may be of interest. Helping Beginning Communicators Expand Their Sentence Length 5 Ways to Make Semantic Maps More Effective in AAC Therapy PrAACtical Questions with Vicki Clarke: What’s the Role of Core Vocabulary? Communication Boards: Colorful Considerations Zooming, Masking, Distancing, & More: AAC-friendly Resources for Managing Coronavirus Challenges Let Me Tell You Something- Narratives for the Beginning Communicator
May 16, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Parents of children, teens, and adults who are learning to use AAC often find themselves in need of more support than they typically receive. Today, we are excited to launch a new series that addresses this need. This series is built around a unique collaboration between PrAACtical AAC and the Angelman Syndrome Foundation (ASF), bringing together our expertise to create a set of training materials that caregivers can use to build an AAC presence in their lives or expand its use in daily living situations. These materials are now available on both of our websites, ready to empower and support you in your AAC journey. In today’s post, you’ll learn about the Stepping Into AAC program and how to access the materials. Future posts will focus on the implementation of AAC by families who want to enhance communication at home and in the community. Who is the target audience for... [Read More...]
May 13, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
We’re excited to welcome back guest authors Marisa Portanova and Marnina Allis to extend the conversation about running AAC groups for children. Enjoy! :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: PrAACtical AAC Groups Made Easy – Let’s Have a Weekly Social Lions and tigers and AAC groups, OH MY! Group therapy can be intimidating. We have some tips, tricks and ideas we want to share to help you get started. Let’s jump in! So welcome back, and thanks for following along our AAC group’s journey with us. Within Blythedale Children’s Hospital, we have a school program run in coordination with the Mount Pleasant Blythedale Union Free School District. These children come to school on a regular school calendar, including the extended school year 6-week summer session. Once we were doing groups with our verbal children, we decided to start groups for our AAC users. We wanted to model core language and target literacy, so we made... [Read More...]
May 6, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Today we welcome two new guest authors, Marisa Portanova and Marnina Allis, to share their experiences in running AAC groups. ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: PrAACtical AAC Groups Made Easy – How to Get Started All speech language pathologists do group therapy. It’s a great way to work on pragmatic skills, but lots of other skills too. It can also be motivating and fun for the participants. Have you thought about groups for AAC users but weren’t sure where to start? We are Marisa and Marnina, SLPs at Blythedale Children’s Hospital, and we started groups for our AAC users. Over the next few blog posts, you will learn more about these, but today, we will discuss the overview and some tips and tricks that helped make them successful. Marisa and Marnina are SLPs at Blythedale Children’s Hospital in Westchester County, NY. They are part of the Assistive Technology team, where they do multi-disciplinary... [Read More...]
May 2, 2024
by Carole Zangari -
Here in the US, we’ll be celebrating Mother’s Day soon. If you’re looking for resources that you can incorporate into your AAC work, we have some ideas for you. These are great for highlighting core vocabulary, such as these: Pronouns: I, you, she, we, her, our Verbs: can, do, give, help, like, love, make, read, see, write Adjectives: good, nice, pretty, smart, strong Conjunctions: and, because, but, with Time Words: later, now, today, tomorrow Questions: what, who, where ACTIVITY SUGGESTIONS Read about Mothers and Mother’s Day with some of these books. Mother’s Day Book for Early Communicators by AAC with Annie Mother’s Day book highlighting core words ‘like’ and ‘give’ from Speech by Carrie. You can also check out this one which focuses on the words ‘help’ and ‘make’ and offers practice with several pronouns. From Boardmaker From Tarheel Reader (SDJ) From Tarheel Reader (Nicolaus) Cards and letters... [Read More...]