augmentative and alternative communication (AAC)
Summary: In this article we will share our journey as an SLP and early childhood special education teacher in a center-based class- room with autistic preschoolers where we successfully embedded AAC best practices. We will take you through our previous teaching methods, our shift to neurodiversity affirming practices, and successful implementation of AAC within our class- room. We will discuss our lesson planning and the collaboratively designed curriculum. Integrating AAC into a Center-Based Preschool Classroom: Collaboration is Possible!
SARA CARRIGAN, BA, M.Ed. Sara Carrigan has been an Early Childhood Special Education teacher since 2004, dedicating most of her career to supporting autistic children aged 2-5 in center-based preschool classrooms within public schools. Since July, Sara has expanded her impact by working with children and families and is currently working as an Early Interventionist. She is deeply passionate about empowering families to advocate for their child’s success in every setting, fostering meaningful growth and connections along the way. LEAH CARPENTER, MS, CCC-SLP. Leah has been working as a speech-language pathologist since 2017. She holds an educational and health license for the state of Minnesota and her ASHA CCCs. Most of her career has been spent in schools; specifically, early childhood special education. She is now a clinical instructor at Minnesota State University - Mankato. Leah is passionate about making communication more accessible to non speaking individuals and creating an environment to facilitate neurodiversity-affirming practices.
INTRODUCTION : Any SLP will tell you that establishing buy-in with adults is one of the most significant barriers to successful implementa- tion and use of AAC. How will the child ever learn their AAC if no one is willing to teach them? How do we get more adults on board that AAC should be used more often than 2x/week for 20 minutes? It is not an easy feat, but Sara Carrigan (special education teacher) and Leah Carpenter (speech-language pa- thologist) accomplished such a high level of collaboration that AAC was eventually embedded within curriculum planning for an early childhood special education (ECSE) classroom. But let’s start at the beginning, where most of us start - traditional instruction and service provision during specific “work station” times.
Our ECSE journey began together in 2020. We had two centerbased classes of autistic 4-year olds, 4 days a week. Our classroom ran as many did, a traditional early childhood special education classroom. We had a schedule that included play, work time, circle time, snack, and gross motor time. Students were supported through visuals for communication, most of- ten through low tech AAC such as activity boards, teacher cre- ated visuals or customized snack mats. Work stations were structured times for teacher, speech-language pathologist, occupational therapist and paraprofessionals to target identi- fied goals and objectives and teach “preschool academics.” Play was often one of those stations. Each child had a schedule of color coded tables to rotate through 4 different stations. We
February / March, 2025 | https://www.closingthegap.com/benefits-of-membership/ 37 Closing The Gap © 2025 Closing The Gap, Inc. All rights reserved.
BACK TO CONTENTS
Made with FlippingBook Ebook Creator