Communication is an obstacle for a lot of my students. This can effect their ability to interact with peers. After a year of making phone calls and securing licenses we were able to create a communication board for our shared playground. This is the first one in our district. Hoping we can get it out to all schools so all students can be included!
We use Boardmaker to create everything. This is essentially a giant version of their Flip N’ Talk. You have to get a license from Boardmaker and then screen shot the image. It has to be put into Vector format to enlarge it without pixelating (this is something all sign companies generally ask for).
The original plan was to have it on a free standing sign. Down the line we hope to get to that. This was a prototype pretty much. The district also agreed to fund it this way since it was cheaper.
The vocabulary on the core board is developed by our district level AAC Specialist/SLP. She has a method that has determined a set of five levels. We use these level core boards based on children’s TASP scores and the same ones across the district. She is really the brains behind it all. I just had the idea to blow it up and put it on the playground. To learn more about to use it check out my post on AAC and Aided Language Simulation.
