#TalkingAAC 2024

Registration is mandatory each day of the conference. Please check-in with the QR code both days. 

My daughter Maggie has finished school and transitioned to life in the community. But I was taken aback when she was described as a “success story”, because she is still an emergent AAC user. This session will ask you to challenge the definition of “AAC success” in the context of academic learning, friendships, autonomy, and being understood.

Many students with extensive support needs who use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) struggle to read or understand grade-level words, concepts, and texts. Explicit and robust vocabulary instruction can play an important part in addressing this need, with a call for greater investment of instructional time aimed at building students' receptive vocabulary and conceptual understandings. The session will focus on evidence-based practices for receptive vocabulary instruction and approaches for leveraging the high frequency words students are likely to have available on their AAC systems to express understanding of the words. The session will feature Building Bridges, a federally funded, open-source project. The session will feature a 5-day cycle as an example of an instructional sequence that applies evidence-based practices in vocabulary instruction, with a focus on how the sequence can be effectively adapted for students with extensive support needs who use AAC (Geist & Erickson, 2021). Participants will be provided access to free, web-based decision-making tools, instructional planning resources and a collection of example lessons.

The world of AAC is always changing and knowing what access methods, language apps and accessories out there can be a big job to navigate. Wouldn’t it be great to learn from a hands-on course to experience types of AAC from low-tech to high-tech, trial access methods and collaborate with team members from OTs to teachers and SLPs? Through this hour and a half course small teams will be given four real-life case scenarios and explore over 25 different AAC devices from robust low-tech systems to high-tech devices. Case scenarios include preschool to high school students with complex communication needs and a range of access methods.  Problem solve and build a total communication approach for your client while being led by a group of AT consultants with different backgrounds and experiences.  Trial different access methods from switch scanning to head pointing and eye gaze and consider mounting for AAC access throughout the day. We will collaborate and review different total communication plans and options as a group and discuss potential data collection ideas to show progress and growth. Don’t miss out on this hands-on course to review, learn or explore the world of AAC. 

Clinicians often find that successful use of AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) in schools involves more than evaluating and acquiring a device. Successful implementation requires a detailed analysis of how best to meet a student’s communication needs in various settings, while still honoring the student’s multimodal communication efforts. An implementation plan can greatly facilitate this process.

This session will offer teachers and SLPs an example of creating a comprehensive communication implementation plan. This plan, which has been piloted and revised over five years, was created to ensure that all steps, strategies, actions, and resources for successful AAC outcomes are documented and acknowledged across communication partners and settings. The form is based on current research and clinical best practices and weaves together concepts from Joy Zabala’s SETT Framework, The Lippitt-Knoster Model for Managing Complex Change, The Participation Model (Beukelman and Mirenda), and the Zone of Proximal Development. It also encourages evidenced-based practices including: Aided Language Stimulation, Communication Competencies (Janice Light), communication partner training, functions of communication (Janice Light), robust communication tools, core vocabulary, Descriptive Teaching Method (Gail Van Tatenhove), and debunking AAC Myths. Most importantly, this plan incorporates personal preferences and insights from the AAC user and familiar communication partners. This presentation will offer several case studies demonstrating how the thoughtful construction of an implementation plan can encourage evidence-based practices and support teams in identifying the routines needed to implement the AAC tool with success.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is dramatically impacting the lives of all of us, including students and individuals with disabilities, by taking traditional resources and supports to a new level of accessibility and sophistication. AI technologies can help individuals with disabilities participate in educational and leisure experiences, access information, and communicate more effectively. This includes the direct use of AI tools as instructional and assistive technology. Additionally AI tools can be used by professionals to increase efficiency, elevate the creativity and quality of lesson plans and learning materials, and analyze research, evidence, and data to reflect on practices and improve outcomes.  
This session explores some of the ways that educational professionals can use AI in an everyday context, along with the implications, benefits, and challenges associated with the use of AI. In the session, participants will learn exactly what AI is, and what it is not. Participants will be introduced to a variety of educational, creative, and productivity tools that leverage AI, including some that are likely already available to them. We will explore ways that learners can utilize AI, including increasing access to educational and therapy resources, providing feedback and insights, and enhancing learner or worker productivity. Participants will also explore ways that they can capitalize on AI to raise their own productivity, create customized therapy materials, and support their own professional learning. Participants will learn about strategies to use AI to: -spend less time writing emails, reports, and notes -make learning materials more accessible, including auto generated Alt-Text -enhance slide decks for professional learning or for use with clients -support spelling and grammar for clients (or themselves!) -expand vocabulary with word prediction and autocomplete -create custom reading passages to address decoding, comprehension and fluency skills -create custom voices for AAC -generate images with words -organizational and executive function support -analyze and synthesize research and data -and more!
Finally, participants will delve into necessary considerations regarding the implementation of AI, including data privacy, security, AI bias, ethical considerations, and reliability. This session will not be your typical sit and get lecture. Participants will get up close with AI tools through hands-on demonstrations, experiencing firsthand how they can be applied in therapy sessions. The presenter will share real-world case studies showcasing successful AI integration into educational practices, highlighting challenges overcome and outcomes achieved. As a group, we will share our experiences, concerns, and ideas about adopting AI in speech therapy and collaborate on the creation of a resource everyone can use and reference in the future.

This session will focus on PRC-Saltillo AAC apps LAMP Words for Life and TouchChat HD-AAC w/ WordPower. We will  review features and built in settings that can be customized. Case studies and hands on activities will be used to problem solve what customizations could be implemented to optimize  success.
Presenter: Darcy Lees, AAC Consultant
Vendor: PRC-Saltillo 

Proceeds will be used to create a scholarship fund for future #TalkingAAC Conferences.

Digital assistants can be integrated into weekly speech therapy sessions to teach clients that they are a portal to information that can be accessed at any point through a series of steps. The steps to access digital assistancs vary depending on the user's communication strengths (i.e., using their voice, using direct-selections on an iPad, and/or using their eyes to activate buttons on an iPad through infrared technology). Clients and their families learn to build trust in the technology by using skills learned in therapy for generalization into the home using the same portal.

The perception of digital assistants could be a privacy concern because they have a recording feature, but it can be turned off in a simple procedure where you choose not to save voice recording and opt out of voice recording. For example, to ensure that client and staff privacy are at the forefront of decision making, the following features need to be enabled on Alexa:
Go to Alexa App>Alexa Privacy> Manage your Alexa Data> Don’t Save Recordings
Go to Alexa App>Alexa Privacy>Manage your Alexa Data>Help Improve Alexa>Uncheck “Use of Voice Recordings”

Through the use of digital assistants, clients can learn independence and autonomy in the areas of communication, environmental access, medical support, and/or socialization.

Communication independence and autonomy can look like asking “What’s the date?”, “What is the Day of the week?”, “What is the time?”, “What is the weather?”, “When is the holiday?”.
Environmental independence and autonomy can look like using digital assistants to turn the lights off/on, turn on the TV, open/close doors, run the vacuum, and/or start the laundry.
Medical independence and autonomy can look like asking digital assistants to remind me to take my medicine, ask when a doctor’s appointment occurs, set a wake-up, set a timer, and/or make a to-do list.
Socialization independence and autonomy can look like digital assistants dropping-in on a family or friend, telling a joke, telling the news, playing a game, listening to music, and participating in cooking with recipes.

In addition,digital assistants features can be taught to promote clients’ independent knowledge seeking (Alexa read me a book, Alexa spell____), dual language capabilities (Translation from English to Spanish), and for adaptive listening mode (Recognize different speech patterns like stuttering and gives more time to finish speaking).

Digital assistants are an influential therapy tool that can be used as a portal to access information independently for all communicators.

We highly encourage you to BRING YOUR OWN DEVICE (e.g. iPad with AAC apps) for this hands on session. This presentation provides a real-life example of how one SLP trained her building to be better communication partners by providing hands-on activities that utilize the staff’s learning styles: competition, humor, and challenge. The presentation aims to provide family members, educators, therapists, consultants, and communication partners with a model of how to go about teaching or learning AAC strategies in a fun and low-pressure way. The ASHA practice portal identifies providing initial and ongoing training as a key role and responsibility of the school-based SLP (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (n.d.)) This model was created by pulling from a number of well-established and researched models, including SMORRES (Baud & Senner, 2016) and models of ongoing trainings to support staff learning opposed to one-time in-services (Andzik et al., 2019).

The model being described in this presentation was implemented by an SLP at a post-secondary school (students ages 18-26 years old). In the first year, all staff were asked to participate in a 10-week, once a week, 15-minute training session led by the SLP. In the second year, returning staff completed a 5 week, once a week, 15-minute training, while new staff participated in the full 10-week model. Each training session included a quick lesson on a specific AAC training (ex. Wait time, no hand-over-hand, prompting hierarchy, aided language input, etc.) and a short activity (ex. Uno, guess-who, shared book reading, etc.). After the second year, the SLP gave a survey to gather feedback regarding the training and plan for future implementation/modification. Survey results indicated:
-a wide variety of learning outcomes such as knowledge of different applications, software features (word finder, editing), difference between vocal communication and communicating with a device, etc.,
-half of the survey respondents thought the amount of training was good while the other half felt they would benefit from monthly refreshers following completion of the training model,
-after training, staff feel comfortable using a variety of communication devices and strategies within their classroom,
-staff model on average 10-20 times per day, and
-staff would like continued training on techniques to increase buy-in, learning new programs/softwares, editing/adding words, etc.

Since completing the second year of training and analyzing survey results, the SLP has utilized a number of other strategies to promote an AAC culture within the building including AAC groups, modeling competitions, positive praise, etc.

The purpose of this presentation is to share our team’s experience implementing both low and high tech AAC in our preschool classroom while providing a safe space for an open and honest discussion with attendees to learn from everyone in attendance. When our current preschool special education team came together two years ago, we were overwhelmed with the level of communication needs in the classroom. There were between 20-24 students in our district Early Childhood Special Education classrooms, and all were non- or minimally speaking. Every caregiver listed communication as their primary concern at an IEP. We were experiencing a significant increase and escalation in behaviors as a direct result of these communication concerns.  Our team knew that we needed a more comprehensive and robust approach to support communication, and we were overwhelmed thinking about how to move forward. We were intimidated by all of the ideas and information coming from seasoned professionals or experts at conference presentations, consultants, and every SLP/Early Childhood/ASD/parent account on Instagram telling us what we should (or shouldn’t) be doing to create the ideal communication-focused classroom. We decided to jump in, knowing that mistakes would be made as we continued to learn.        

With the support of our county’s assistive technology and ASD consultants, we determined which supports we would use (108-icon county-wide core board and speech generating devices) and decided to focus our efforts on these areas:
Training of all staff
Modeling without expectation across all classroom activities
Supporting and involving families

The presentation will go into detail about what each of those areas looked like for us and how moving forward to just get started impacted our classroom, students, and their families. In each area, participants will be encouraged to share their thoughts, experiences, and ideas with the expectation that no one is the “expert,” and we can all learn from each other.

All Means All.  All people have a right to the relationships, experiences, and instruction that help them develop communication skills. This requires access to a language system, which can be either low-tech (as in a paper-based booklet), high-tech (as in a dedicated device), or some combination. AAC support is critical to effective literacy instruction since learners must express their thoughts, ideas, and wishes during early or emergent routines. Additionally, effective literacy instruction is socially constructed. Therefore, all learners must have the means and the opportunity to engage actively, constructively, and socially.

Beyond providing AAC support for language use and development, laying the foundation for literacy and language growth is predicated on providing comprehensive literacy instruction. Accordingly, the development team at Building Wings created at literacy program to reflect this evidence-based approach for young learners. Throughout this four-year program, parents and teachers can access implementation supports (real-time videos plus paper-based instructional guides) to quickly and seamlessly deliver daily cycles of the five emergent routines that comprise comprehensive literacy instruction (Erickson & Koppenhaver, 2017). These include shared reading, predictable chart writing, alphabet/ phonics instruction, and daily opportunities to engage independently with reading and writing.
Presenter: Karla Rachfal - Educational Solution Specialist 
Vendor: Building Wings, LLC 

It has long been acknowledged that teaching and modeling core words is an appropriate place to begin intervention for AAC users. (www.project-core.com) Over my years as mother and homeschool teacher for a child with multiple disabilities including complex communication needs, I have utilized various plans for working on core vocabulary including Speak For Yourself Learning to Speak AACtion Plan and PrAACtical AAC’s Year of Core Word and School Year of Core Word resources.
When my son started combining core vocabulary to communicate across settings with varied communication partners and for different purposes, it seemed appropriate to consider his growing vocabulary needs. I began explicit instruction on additional tier 1 words beyond core and tier 2 words to increase his receptive and expressive language skills. (Comprehensive Literacy For All, Erickson and Koppenhaver.) I used instructional strategies such as examples/non examples, word relationships, and stories. (“Robust Receptive Vocabulary Instruction for Students With Significant Cognitive Disabilities Who Use AAC” Geist and Erickson, Teaching Exceptional Children.) While my experience is limited to working with one child, the frequency that new vocabulary was use spontaneously used mimics the reported research results that I’ve based my intervention on. In my session, I will share our journey and hope to encourage teachers, SLPs, and parents to consider explicit vocabulary instruction beyond core words.

Participants will be able to summarize why explicit vocabulary instruction beyond core words is needed for individuals with complex communication needs. Participants will complete hands-on activities with vocabulary words to better understand the role of the student and to build capacity for teaching others. Participants will be able to identify word lists for consideration, understand the role of using existing core vocabulary on a speech-generating device to build receptive vocabulary, and describe three strategies for teaching vocabulary.

The world of AAC is always changing and knowing what access methods, language apps and accessories out there can be a big job to navigate. Wouldn’t it be great to learn from a hands-on course to experience types of AAC from low-tech to high-tech, trial access methods and collaborate with team members from OTs to teachers and SLPs? Through this hour and a half course small teams will be given four real-life case scenarios and explore over 25 different AAC devices from robust low-tech systems to high-tech devices. Case scenarios include preschool to high school students with complex communication needs and a range of access methods.  Problem solve and build a total communication approach for your client while being led by a group of AT consultants with different backgrounds and experiences.  Trial different access methods from switch scanning to head pointing and eye gaze and consider mounting for AAC access throughout the day. We will collaborate and review different total communication plans and options as a group and discuss potential data collection ideas to show progress and growth. Don’t miss out on this hands-on course to review, learn or explore the world of AAC. 

This session explores the challenges AAC users face in finding, building, and maintaining intimate relationships. It is very easy to become hyperfocused on the technology, vocabulary, and other minutiae of AAC. Everyone supporting an AAC user needs to take a step back and remember the purpose of AAC is to form relationships. It is very important not to neglect relationship goals that AAC users might have. It is also important to remember that AAC users have the same emotional needs as everybody else, and we all need to help support them so they can participate in the fullest possible range of human experiences. To that end, participants will leave the session being more mindful of the importance of supporting their clients’ development of communicative competence.

A discussion of communicative competence will be at the beginning of the session as it is the foundation for building any type of relationship. It is composed of three constructs: functionality of communication, adequacy of communication, and sufficiency of knowledge, judgment, and skill. In addition, there are psychosocial factors such as motivation, attitude, confidence, and resilience. The presentation will explore these areas.
There are many possible reasons an AAC user could find it challenging to form intimate relationships. There can be physical, developmental, or cognitive differences on top of the communication differences, and the presenter will explore some of these potential challenges. These challenges may include:
• Pragmatic and receptive language challenges
• There is often uncertainty around when and how to disclose a disability before or during the first date.
• Understanding safe sexual practices and consent
• For individuals needing a personal care attendant, it can be a challenge to get privacy with a potential partner and to negotiate boundaries with a PCA
• Social Security rules that disincentivize disabled adults getting married
• Being in the LGBT community
• Societal attitudes towards the sexuality of persons with disabilities
There is a myriad of potential challenges. It is the presenter’s goal to inspire attendees to think more about how AAC can be utilized to increase the quality of life of AAC users. The presenter wants the participants to understand potential barriers and to support whatever steps are necessary for an AAC user to have emotional experiences which are as rich and broad as possible. Furthermore, the presenter wants the participants to understand that many AAC users want a partner and to experience the same intimate bond that most people have the luxury of taking for granted.

This session will walk you through key features of both the Core First and Motor Plan Pagesets.  Audience members will be able to feature match both options for their AAC user’s needs.  We will participate in a robust discussion about pageset selection and benefits for a wide range users.
Presenters: Brigitte Evariste, Pediatric Solutions Consultant Michigan East & Joel Allchin, Solutions Consultant Michigan 
Vendor: Tobii Dynavox

Proceeds will be used to create a scholarship fund for future #TalkingAAC Conferences.