by Margaret Moore, PRC-Saltillo Ambassador
AAC Awareness Month: Vibe Up in AAC
October is AAC Awareness Month, a celebration to raise awareness of the many ways in which people use AAC to communicate. As I make my final preparations to participate in AAC Awareness festivities—namely PRC-Saltillo’s Professional AAC Vibe webinar on October 1st and Southern Connecticut State University’s October 4th AAC/Assistive Technology Expo, where I will be a presenter—I’m inspired to think about the meaning and goals behind the celebrations. To me, there are two main aims to strive for.
The first goal is to promote awareness of how disabled individuals communicate using their AAC devices. This is a great opportunity to show and explain to, not only assistive technology professionals, but also the general public how a user can operate their device. This may mean detailing and demonstrating the access methods already being or available to be utilized. During my presentation and panel discussions, I will discuss how and why I alternate between two access methods, my eye tracking and joystick—as I use my PRC-Saltillo Accent 1000 as both a speech device and a Windows tablet, my Look eye tracking module allows me to use WordPower and NuVoice, my speech software, at optimal efficiency. My joystick, on the other hand, permits me to scroll through menus and documents and to highlight and edit text on the Windows side of my device with great accuracy and in the least time-consuming manner. In explaining how my access methods work, I hope to promote understandings that people will need to be patient with me and all other AAC users as it takes a few moments to type thoughts to share with a device. I also strive to make others aware of how users have the need, right, and desire to express ideas and feelings and to be respected just like everybody else even though they are using nontraditional modes to speak.
The second aim is to learn as much from other users and AT professionals as we hope to teach. This month comes with an increase in opportunities to connect with consultants and communicators, observe and learn about methods and techniques they use, and incorporate those into your patients’ or your own AAC experience. Of course, this gives more people a chance to operate their devices with optimized efficiency.
I hope you seize the chance to delve deeper into learning more about AAC this month!
There are no comments yet. Be the first to post!You must be logged in to post.
Communicators In Action