Communicating is About Relating

A JPEG image of the don;t demand communication poster.

When we demand communication from an AAC user, we risk making communication feel like work.  We want it to be about relationships.  Forcing someone to use their device can build task demand-related anxiety.  Let’s remember to use least to most prompting, and put the personal connection first. We can respond to the non-verbal communication we receive from our partner and use that as an opportunity to model on their device.

Click here to download the PDF of this poster.

Kathryn Helland

Kathryn is a certified speech-language pathologist and works with children and adults with complex communication needs. She has been with the TechOWL team since 2015 and is currently working on her doctorate. She would like to examine how to best support AAC users in higher education.

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