Classroom-Based Language Goals and Intervention for Children Who Use AAC: Back to Basics

Abstract When working with a preschool or school-aged child who uses aided AAC, much of the speech-language pathologist's (SLP's) focus is commonly on the AAC tools that the child is using. SLPs will often talk with educators and parents about the technology itself, and sometimes, many of the child's IEP goals center around use of the AAC technologies. Many educators (and sometimes even SLPs), however, are often reluctant to use technologies with which they are not comfortable. In the midst of all of the complications that come with technology use, it can be helpful to remember that AAC technologies are simply tools that provide the child with access to language. Most children who use AAC experience language deficits (e.g., Binger & Light, in press), and the purpose of AAC is to provide the child with a means of overcoming these language deficits. Given these facts, the goals, objectives, and intervention techniques that SLPs use with children who use AAC should not, in many cases, be very different from ...