Back to school time for many of you has been underway for weeks. This time of year holds trepidation, excitement, stress, and anticipation. Back to school time is a time of promise, so promise your AAC users their best year ever!
A year or two ago, I posted a back to school planning guide for AAC. If you haven’t grabbed it before, you can get it here.
Many more SLPs are facing caseloads with AAC users/nonspeaking students or clients than ever before. As AAC becomes more and more mainstream we are getting better at getting systems into the hands of the individuals who need them.
However, not all SLPs are comfortable with implementing AAC. So many graduate programs do not offer coursework in AAC and, as it is not a required course for certification, SLPs often have little or no idea of where to start.
Emerging AAC users need lots and lots of modeling to learn to use AAC. I have written - and spoken - a lot about using Aided Language Stimulation. While the practice was discussed as far back as the 1980’s, many of us did not recognize that in order to implement AAC instruction we needed to be doing this all of the time.
Even more experienced AAC users need continued Aided Input (AI) to support expanding utterances, support for a variety of functions, and activities that expand syntax, morphology, and lexicon.
In my planning guide, you will find suggested planning for using Aided Language Stimulation (ALgS) in several activities students tend to like. There is also a blank planning page that you can use over and over as you become comfortable with using ALgS.
Have a great school year! And…. keep on talking.
You can find more information, freebies, and ideas at KidzLearnLanguage.blogspot.com
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