Adaptive stepsize selection for tracking in a regime-switching environment

Purpose Nearly 50% of school-based speech-language pathologists (SLPs) provide services to school-age children who use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). However, many SLPs report having insufficient knowledge in the area of AAC implementation. The objective of this tutorial is to provide clinicians with a framework for supporting 1 area of AAC implementation: vocabulary selection for preliterate children who use AAC. Method This tutorial focuses on 4 variables that clinicians should consider when selecting vocabulary: (a) contexts/environments where the vocabulary can be used, (b) time span during which the vocabulary will be relevant, (c) whether the vocabulary can elicit and maintain interactions with other people, and (d) whether the vocabulary will facilitate developmentally appropriate grammatical structures. This tutorial focuses on the role that these variables play in language development in verbal children with typical development, verbal children with language impairment, and nonverbal children who use AAC. Results Use of the 4 variables highlighted above may help practicing SLPs select vocabulary that will best facilitate language acquisition in preliterate children who use AAC.

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Teaching Partners to Support Communication for Adults with Acquired Communication Impairment

Perspectives on Augmentative and Alternative Communication ◽

10.1044/aac22.1.4 ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 22 (1) ◽

pp. 4-15 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Laura J. Ball ◽

Joanne Lasker

Keyword(s):

Practice Patterns ◽

Communicative Competence ◽

Communication Disorders ◽

Communication Impairment ◽

Communication Partner ◽

Communication Partners ◽

Selection For ◽

Communication Needs ◽

End Of Life Communication ◽

Lateral Sclerosis

Abstract For adults with acquired communication impairment, particularly those who have communication disorders associated with stroke or neurodegenerative disease, communication partners play an important role in establishing and maintaining communicative competence. In this paper, we assemble some evidence on this topic and integrate it with current preferred practice patterns (American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, 2004). Our goals are to help speech-language pathologists (SLPs) identify and describe partner-based communication strategies for adults with acquired impairment, implement evidence-based approaches for teaching strategies to communication partners, and employ a Personnel Framework (Binger et al., 2012) to clarify partners? roles in acquiring and supporting communication tools for individuals with acquired impairments. We offer specific guidance about AAC techniques and message selection for communication partners involved with chronic, degenerative, and end of life communication. We discuss research and provide examples of communication partner supports for person(s) with aphasia and person(s) with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis who have complex communication needs.

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