Academic and Social Success School-Wide within the Park

AAC Strategies from Pre-K to Graduation Day! Supporting Academic and Social Success School-Wide within the Park Hill School District By Kristen Ponce , Tara Wineinger , Elisa Parker

augmentative communication

AAC Strategies from Pre-K to Graduation Day! Supporting Academic and Social Success School-Wide within the Park Hill School District Elisa Parker has been a Speech-Language Pathologist in the Early Childhood Special Education program for the Park Hill School District in Kansas City Missouri since she began her career 22 years ago. Her passion has always been working with children with Autism and facilitating Augmentative/Alternative Communication. Elisa has been the Autism Consultant for the Gerner Family Early Education Center for 8 years and the Assistive Technology Facilitator for 4 years. Elisa provides consultative services and training within her school district and various organiza - tions in the Kansas City area. Elisa serves on the Sophie’s Run board which is a non-profit organization that provides Assistive Technology to individuals in the Park Hill School District attending area. Tara Wineinger has spent 24 years in Special Education. Tara has always been involved in assistive tech- nology but the last 6 years it has been a full time position as the Assistive Technology Facilitator in the Park Hill School District. Prior experience includes special education teacher for grades K-12, self-contained and resource. Process Coordinator 5 years Diagnostic Coordinator 5 years. Tara has also presented at Closing the Gap and assist with moderating a Metro AT group in the Kansas City Metropolitan Area. Tara serves as Vice-President on the Sophie’s Run board which is a non-profit organization that provides Assistive Technology to individuals in the Park Hill School District attending area Kristen Ponce is a Speech-Language Pathologist for the Gerner Family Early Education Center in the Park Hill School District in Kansas City, Missouri. She received her master’s degree in Communication Sciences and Disorders from Rockhurst University in 2013. Kristen has a particular interest in working with preschoolers with autism as well as preschoolers who use AAC devices. Kristen has a passion for teaching her students to become competent and independent communicators. She has piloted several different forms of AAC groups in the preschool setting as well as pushed for increased literacy instruction for AAC learners. She is the author of the blog AAC to the Core describing her experiences working with students with complex communication needs who use AAC.

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Closing The Gap

In 2007, the Park Hill School District began conducting formal assistive technology (AT) evaluations as part of their consider- ations for individual student use. This began as a request from a parent who was looking for an evaluation for their child, but was turned away by local agencies due to significant wait lists. Sev- eral Park Hill therapists were involved in this evaluation process and approached the district requesting that a formal assistive technology team be created. A team was then created consist- ing of an occupational therapist (OT), a speech-language pathol- ogist (SLP), and a special education teacher as an additional duty to their normal caseload requirements. Over the years, our prac- tices in AT have evolved and so has our team. We now employ one part-time Assistive Technology Facilitators for Early Child- hood and one for K thru 12. We have moved away from conducting such formal, in district evaluations and have begun utilizing a wider variety of device trials and considerations. These trials could include, low-tech, mid-tech and high-tech systems. As soon as a student has been identified as having a need, these trials begin. The AT Facilita- tor joins the student’s school team to organize and offer sug- gestions about which types of systems to trial within the class- rooms and therapy rooms by teachers and therapists. AT can be

considered for any student who is struggling to make progress towards IEP goals and objectives and/or is struggling to access the general education curriculum and/or needs a different for- mat to demonstrate knowledge. AT is not limited to students who are non-verbal or minimally verbal, but can be considered for students who have poor speech intelligibility, learning dis- abilities, selective mutism and fluency disorders. AT trials could not take place without an arsenal of different levels of systems and supports. Over the years, we have increased our collection of devices and now have access to a plethora of iPads and low to mid-tech options. (See image 1) With the help of a variety of vendors and the missouri AT loan program (https://at.mo.gov/), we have had more access to products allowing the teams to find the best fit for each student, the environment, for the education tasks required. Starting as young as three years old, we can be- gin sending district-owned devices home with families for use at home and in the community. Prior to this happening, teachers and therapists had been monitoring student progress with the devices in the classrooms. When trials at home are being con- sidered, students are typically showing signs of independence with the device such as carrying it with them at all times and having the operational knowledge to be able to independently navigate the system. In order for the devices to go home, team members meet with the families to provide training and sugges- tions on how to implement in the home. This is offered individ- ually for parents on a 1:1 basis and in a larger format for multiple families together. (See image 2)

Image 2: Parent training occurs in large groups several times a year.

When the district began to increase the use of AT, in particu- lar AAC, one of the largest struggles was in the area of building sustainable capacity for such a program. Building such a capac- ity started with defining the expectations for staff and students.

Image 1: Switches on loan through Missouri AT program utilized in play while teaching commenting in AAC.

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The expectations were defined as: students of all ages should have access to their AAC systems in all school environments. The goal is for each student to feel that their words matter. Honor the communication; no matter the form. Additionally, we knew that if we were to have AAC in all environments, staff in those environments would need to be trained. Training opportunities have occurred consistently since 2013 for teachers, teaching as- sistants and therapists. Guest speakers and device representa- tives are brought in at the beginning of the school year for large group professional development. Personalized and follow-up training, specific to age level and student needs, are provided by the district’s AT Facilitators and SLP’s who are passionate about AAC implementation. Training for regular education staff occurs during monthly early release days, and at times, as an alternative to staff meetings. Our success is due to the dedication the build- ing principals and other administrators have placed on these trainings. Principals are and continue to be flexible in allowing teachers to attend trainings so student success can be ensured throughout the school day. Training for specials teachers including art, music, PE and li- brary also occur on a yearly basis. Over a five-year period, the school district prioritized the training of these art, music, PE and library teachers. Staff trainings were offered followed by in class

supports for students with disabilities while attending specials classes. This is an integral piece to the success students have while in these classrooms. Teachers now know how to support the communication of their students, which has decreased be- haviors and increased the learning experience and social rela- tionships in the classrooms. Having these support staff mem- bers on board has generated such a collaborative environment in which both teachers and students are supporting each other, creating natural supports for everyone. (See image 3) Within the school environment, instruction in AAC is based on developmental language norms, the environment and ed- ucational tasks and expectations for each individual child. At the preschool level, the focus is more play-based and promotes early communication development. (See image 4) As students move to elementary age, this focus is expanded into specific academic areas such as reading, writing and math and is also used as a tool for behavioral management. In middle school, the focus is shifted to activities of daily living by incorporating tasks such as making phone calls, placing orders, emailing daily com- munication notes and attending school social functions. At the high school level, the focus really becomes on employment and independent living skills. In developing these priorities by each age level, we needed to provide teachers with the appropriate tools necessary to ensure student success. Our specialized programs are provided with one classroom iPad to be used as a backup if students forget their device or for Aided Language Stimulation. This provides the opportunity to have various AAC apps and vocabularies available for our staff to learn and use. Saltillo’s TouchChat with WordPower and Chat Editor are our most widely used tools and resources. In addition to using these products as stand-alone AAC systems, we have created materials such as adapted books, posters, flip books, navigation sequence prompts and cues for modeling target vo- cabulary. Chat Editor has made a huge impact in our classrooms

Image 4: Visuals attached to AAC devices to support teaching and modeling of self regulation phrases.

Image 3: Using AAC during art activities.

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Closing The Gap

Image 6: Kaytlin Westbrooke (SLP) meets with Collen Manly (parent) as part of a parent AAC training.

students’ AAC at home. Additional opportunities that can be provided to families include; parent-teacher conferences, team meetings and individual appointments. (See image 6) Our ultimate goal in providing these parent trainings is to empower families to take on the responsibilities and ownership of their child’s communication. We help support our families in seeking outside resources to acquire their own personal, fam- ily-owned, communication systems. Due to the fact that our devices are district owned, if a family moves to another district, that system is unable to go with the child. We never want to see a child go without communication and our district is fortunate to have a nonprofit organization that helps us support fami- lies in our district in seeking their own devices. Sophie’s Run at Lake Waukomis was started by a local family, Jim and Theresa Edwards, in memory of their daughter Sophie. Sophie was a stu- dent of the Park Hill School District who suffered from a variety of developmental and medical disorders including a communi- cation delay. Sophie’s family searched for a system that allowed her to be able to communicate for herself. They finally found an eye gaze system that was successful for her; however, Sophie passed away one week before her communication device was delivered. Her family founded this organization so no child would have to wait to communicate. To date, Sophie’s Run has started a loan library for the school district, awarded 92 families with personal communication devices, and provided various equipment necessary for students who are visually impaired to move on to secondary education. To find out more about So- phie’s Run at Lake Waukomis go to www.runsophies5k.com. With so many students accessing AAC devices, we have had multiple student success stories over the years. A preschool success story includes multiple students who began using AAC systems at the age of three years old. These students were invited to attend an event in a regular education

as we are able to project different vocabularies onto our smart- boards and use them as a classroom tool for all learners during group instruction. As students move through their education- al years, these tools are used in general education classrooms, specials, and on student laptops. These tools are allowing our students to demonstrate their knowledge in ways they would previously not been able to. Students are able to create writ- ten products and copy and paste it into many different forms for their teachers and families. Creating emails to families has been one of our most exciting applications for students elementary through high school age. (See image 5) In an effort to continue to build support for our students, we frequently offer a variety of types of training to our families. Family Night is an evening training that lasts about three hours and includes dinner and childcare. Parents are offered a variety of sessions to attend such as, beginning and advanced courses in AAC, and how to use AAC in the community. We also offer other relevant topics to families such as guardianship, setting up a trust, opening community-based services cases, and sensory strategies for the home. Sessions are presented by school thera- pists and community members. Evenings like this allow families to establish relationships with each other and build their own support networks. They also learn new ways to support their Image 5: High School students use Chat Editor to write emails to their parents everyday. Students utilize the picture icons, word prediction and copy/paste features in Chat Editor.

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cluding reading, writing, social skills and expressive communica- tion. With the tools and resources we have acquired, we are bet- ter able to identify a child’s individual and academic strengths and use those to mold their educational pathway. In the future, for us as a district, we hope to expand AAC into more general ed- ucation classrooms and across all grade levels. We also want to continue to empower our staff members to promote AAC as the norm and embed AAC theories and instruction within all areas of the general education curriculum.

Image 7: Olive Bruders and her blue pig.

classroom. In this classroom, they were challenged, along with their peers, to state their names and one activity that they liked to do. Each of these students were able to independently navi- gate their devices and participate with their typically develop- ing peers to answer the questions without adult support. An elementary success story involves a student who recently acquired her very own personal device. She was on a weekend outing with her family at the local farmers market and spotted a man making balloon animals. This student was asked what she would like and she used her device to say “blue cylinder.” Her mom explained that the man was making animals, so she changed her statement to say, “blue, pig, thank you.” (See image 7) One of the biggest success stories involves staff members, not students. An elementary school librarian inquired as to why some of our students with special needs were not checking out library books. After some discussion about the known impor- tance to literacy, language development, communication and the limitations of these students, the librarian asked if she could adapt books to fit their needs. With support from the AT facil- itator for the initial five books, she then developed a library of adapted books using building funds and volunteer labor. The school PTA became involved and began donating to the cause. Others followed her lead. Starting the 2019-2020 school year, we will have four elementary buildings with adapted book sections with 150 books each. Through the growth of our AT program, our AAC program has expanded to include hundreds of students with a variety of needs. We have seen growth in all areas with our students, in-

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