According to Lonna Oster, Speech-Language Pathologist of the Rainy River District School Board, augmentative-alternative-communication devices are becoming more commonplace in local education settings to address a rise in students who have “challenges communicating.” Oster said these augmentative-alternative-communication devices support minimally verbal or non-verbal students’ comprehension in learning the meaning of speech sounds with verbal, written, and symbolic prompts. Moreover, these devices provide relevant examples for whatever course material students are learning at the time, and Oster suggested the use of these devices is going well for students.
“The devices are used primarily to support our students who are non-speaking or maybe minimally verbal, or maybe just have difficulties with their speech sound production skills,” said Oster. “There’s definitely been an increase in the number of students who are requiring the devices. As to why that is, we don’t really know.”
“We use [the devices] to support these students in expressing their needs, wants, and sharing their thoughts. It allows them to participate more fully in their educational programming and allows them to be able to engage and connect with their peers,” said Oster. “I would say there’s been an increase in students who have challenges communicating.”
So, one way the Rainy River District School Board has addressed this is with some “low-tech” devices students can use.
“There are different types of devices that students can use. We have some that are what we consider low-tech devices. So, those would be a device that maybe would only have a few symbols on them, or it might just be like a single symbol where they would push a button and it would give a speech output,” said Oster. “So, something like, they push the button and it would say more if they were requesting more. You could kind of program whatever you want in that.”
But, there are also more “high-tech” options available for students.
“A lot of our students now are using what we would consider more high-tech devices,” said Oster. “That is generally an iPad with a specific app on it … the opportunities are endless with the symbols that you can put on there.” Adding, “It’s really just a picture.”
According to Oster, the use of symbols in augmentative-alternative-communication devices is similar to how a child learns to use a device.
“It’s very similar to how a child learns to use a device,” said Oster. “They start just learning what the symbols mean, and then start combining them together to make sentences.”
“There are endless opportunities for the pages [students] can navigate,” said Oster. “So, they may have a page that’s Christmas, or they might have a page of whatever they’re studying in school, if they were learning about space, we could have a whole folder or page that would just have vocabulary associated with space. So the planets, you know, things like that, that would be relevant to what they were learning in the curriculum at that time.”
