What is Augmentative Communication?

What is Augmentative Communication

Augmentative Communication is an alternate way to help students with language disorders use expressive and receptive language. Augmentative communication can be accomplished through the use of assistive technology devises such as computers and hand held devices. Low technology such as picture communication systems can also be used as augmentative communication. (http://learningdisabilities.about.com/od/ac/g/augmentative.htm

There are hundred's of different forms of augmentative communication and they are constantly changing as new technology is developed. Years ago I worked in a Developmental Centre with special needs preschoolers. Many of our students were non verbal and required the use of augmentative communication to communicate with the staff and children. At that time we were using communication boards with anywhere' from 4 pictures to 30 pictures depending on the mobility and range of motion of the children.

Here is a sample of a board for mealtimes. The student would simply point to the item that they would like to eat. With this board it would be a simple point to as there are no pictures to help the child form a sentence. All the pictures are of food items. With the picture communication system teachers can make boards for many of the daily activities. For some these boards work but if the child has limited mobility; such as Cerebral Palsy; these boards may be very limited. Also, the student may require many different boards to go with the different daily activities. Carrying them around and switching back and forth would limit thier use. They are a great way to get the student use to making choices.

While I was still working at this centre we were able to introduce a variety of different devices, such as switches, intellitools and computer programs. These tools were very new and still being developed. Throughout this blog I will take the opportunity to introduce many different forms of communication devices and who they would benefit. I am looking forward to learning about all the possibilities that are out there and how to best match the student to the device.