Once we got the boys communicating through our work with Disney videos, we needed to get their behavior under control. A wonderful therapist who worked largely with the deaf community recommended a token economy. It saved our lives! Here are some of the basics..... Token Economy "One of the most important technologies of behaviour [...]
The Power of Sound: A Therapy Worth Listening To? Auditory and language processing deficits can be multi-faceted and complex, and knowing where to turn to help a child with these challenges can be overwhelming for parents. Sound or listening therapies might be helpful for some children, and in fact, anecdotal evidence abounds of children [...]
3 Ways Technology Can Help Students with Autism by Meghan Bogardus Cortez Twitter Meghan is an associate editor with EdTech: Focus on K–12. She enjoys coffee, cats and science fiction TV. Digital tools have the power to help students with learning disabilities communicate and gain confidence. It is a statistic that most Americans would [...]
The Use of Technology in Treatment of Autism Spectrum Disorders Statistics released from the Center of Disease Control (CDC) indicate that 1 out of 68 children in the United States will be diagnosed with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Studies indicate that 20-30% of these children will be unable to communicate their wants, needs, [...]
Speech Therapy Speech-language pathology is a field of expertise practiced by a clinician known as a Speech-language pathologist (SLP), also called speech and language therapist, or speech therapist, who specializes in the evaluation and treatment of communication disorders and swallowing disorders. The components of speech production include: phonation, producing sound; resonance; fluency; intonation, variance ofpitch; [...]
Speech therapy from reading: our story Anyone who knows me will tell you that I place high importance on Speech and language therapies. I spoke about our good friend Elaine Stevick in a recent post, who did such great work with our boys and our team over the years. This post dealt largely with [...]
Your speech therapist and developing language. When Val and I look back on the boys' early years, we could remember several specialists who provided communication therapies to the boys. But there was a core to the boys' problems. When you cut through all the behaviors, the anxiety and the confusion one thing was clear. Behind [...]
Picture Exchange Communication (PECS) I had the opportunity to speak with another wonderful mom recently from Sidney about her 7 year old son Matt. Matt's primary communication system is PECS, or picture exchange communication. Receptively Matt was able to hear and understand single concept sentences, like bed time or jump on the trampoline. Sentences [...]
Online autism speech and language programs How we achieved the level of speech and language our boys now have is of interest to many parents. Val and I receive hundreds of messages everyday seeking information and advice based on our experiences with Conor and Eoin. Many of these e-mails relate to online speech and [...]
Autism Communication and instructional strategies We often get questions from families about how to manage their child's Autistic behavior, in particular the use of Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA). While Val and I researched an attempted to use ABA with our boys, it was not a success. We had to find another answer. We are [...]
