Life and AAC

Watching Julia's dance competition

I wrote a glowing post (on Thursday) of how Emma is doing so great with Evie at home and school and that very same day she came home with a note saying they want to talk about ways we can get her to use Evie more at school because they didn't think it was frequent enough.  I guess the note did take the wind a bit out of my sails for a moment before I realized the likely cause is musical therapists rather than Emma's ability to use her device.  I know how far she has come in using Evie in the last 6 months.  But still......comments like that might make me waiver for a moment.

I immediately recommitted to noticing how she used the device over her 3 days off - Friday, Sat., Sun.

On Friday - immediately after breakfast finished up and she finished on the potty - I asked Emma what she wanted to do.  She told me 3x she wanted to "eat".  This really confused me since she had just eaten her typical quantity of breakfast and I wanted to get on with the day.  Our method to using Evie is to reinforce Emma's request by giving her what she asks for when possible and since we didn't have much planned I went ahead and brought out some more food for her to eat.  She happily gobbled it all down.  My mind was blown!  I mean, I thought for sure she was done eating and ready for fun and she asked to eat by mistake.  No mistake, she wanted more to eat and I'm so glad I listened.  Then she asked for a drink and downed an entire cup.

Watching the crowds at the competition

Ummm....I guess I can't always read her mind.  Good thing we have Evie!  She then asked to "go" "outside" "in" "bike".  So she went for a bike ride and loved every minute of it.  She also used the device as she would typically for the rest of the day.

On Saturday we visited my Aunt at a nursing home and while in the halls she used Evie a few times.  The halls were very busy and it surprised me to hear her talk - and unprompted at that!  She only said a couple of things but they were appropriate and it is very good progress for her to use it in public.  

Sunday was busy and Emma didn't have as much access to Evie as she typically would.  Some days are like that - the fact is life is life.  Raising Emma is a marathon not a sprint and one day without a lot of access isn't life changing yet.  She isn't a consistent enough user of Evie yet to make her miss it and we are still able to use her Yes/No answers and her eye gaze to communicate effectively.  The simple fact is that some of the low tech communication methods are just as important as the high tech method because they allow us to communicate regardless of the environment or situation.  I believe not having access to Evie at all times will be a big issue at some point in the future and I am ever hopeful that will happen sooner rather than later.  Once that happens we will try our best to not let her go a good portion of a day without her device.

Emma's use of Evie is getting both more frequent and accurate indeed.  She uses it - unprompted - more and more at home.  I know she will eventually transfer this skill to school like she does all her other skills.  I'm more than willing to wait.