Student
The imaginary student’s name is Greg, and he has autism spectrum disorder – nonverbal autism. He has no problems with fine and gross motor skills, and the main sign of his condition is the lack of speech. The boy is nine years old, and he is in elementary school. Greg loves music, especially classical music, loves to work with a computer and a tablet. However, he does not like gym class, a violation of his personal space, and when he is commanded. Due to his disorder, he is isolated from society – the boy has not yet experienced negative emotions about this, but his parents – Helen and David, express great concern.
The boy’s condition is not severe, and for this reason, he does not need to take particular medicine now. The primary interventions to improve his condition are regular classes and family support. Teaching a boy at school using augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) devices is part of the process of improving his condition and has a goal. By the end of the school year, Greg, with the help of Proloquo2Go, will be able to compose phrases with three or more words and become more active in communicating with parents and a teacher, calmer in society.
Classroom environment
The room in which Greg’s class studies is medium-sized, quiet, and calm, is dominated by warm yellow-orange colors. During the day, children learn math, reading, expand their vocabulary, and learn a little about the world around them—classes in the classroom alternate with outdoor ones. The teacher emphasizes communication with children – he reads books to them, speaks about nature, and teaches arithmetic and writing. There are many materials for teaching in the classroom – books for children, notebooks for teaching writing, a projector for viewing some educational materials, aboard, and much more. A variety of alternative communication systems are designed to communicate with children who do not use speech. By using these means, children can answer questions and make requests. It is crucial to create conditions under which the child can use all possible means of communication. In this case, the absence of oral speech will not be an obstacle to studying or communicating with peers.
Activity and communication task
A child with special features who attends school with ordinary children will be more comfortable and easier to feel part of society than a correctional school graduate. Only studying a child with autism in a general education school does not guarantee him effective training in academic skills. However, such studying contributes to the formation of communicative behavior, the expansion of life experience, and, as a result, better socialization.
The purpose of working with non-verbal children is not to start talking but to enable them to develop practical communication skills so that their surroundings could understand them. When working with children with autism spectrum disorder at school, it is also essential to give them individual classes, since they cannot constantly be among other children. During such individual lessons, teachers can choose specific exercises for the practice of using AAC devices. For example, such activity the game “Guess Who” – a teacher can dress into a person of a certain profession, or show pictures with such people and ask the child to answer short questions “Who is it,” “What does he/she have,” “What can he/she do.” Without the device, non-verbal Greg could not answer them. If he had a desire to play – he could only show something with gestures.
Attending general classes for Greg is also very important – he can get used to other children’s company and observe their behavior. After a certain period of adaptation, the boy with AAC help answers questions – for example, on arithmetic. Also, after getting used to the children, Greg will be able to communicate with them, if he wants to. In this case, the teacher’s task is to warn the class about the special features of the boy and teach them patience.
AAC device
Proloquo2Go is an app that allows people to communicate with children and adults who are deprived of this opportunity. Its work is based on interaction with simple symbols and icons (1). The application is not limited to already prepared phrases, distributed into categories – at any moment, with outside help, users can create new phrases and meanings that will be convenient to use in the future. The application is made so that it makes a significant contribution to improving the user’s grammar. The user-friendly interface is easy to use – both children and adults can handle it.
A primary advantage of Proloquo2Go is that this is the app, and it can be downloaded to the iPad – users do not need an additional device. One only needs an email address and Internet access to register. A wide range of phrases and words, as well as the ability to add new ones, also distinguish it from the rest. The application has different customization capabilities depending on the user level, with the ability to expand tables as skills improve. After some training period, such an instrument will become indispensable for the communication of non-verbal people with others.
Reference
Proloquo2Go. Speak up with symbol-based AAC. [Internet]. AssistiveWare [cited 2020]. Web.