Choose Your Words Wisely

Imagine for a moment that you can't always speak, or at least, not as easily as other people can.  You learn to stay quiet, not speaking unless you have to, conserving energy in case you need to speak about something important, or talk to someone whose presence in your life you value.  You become so good at weighing your words carefully and only saying the important ones out loud that no one suspects you're constantly struggling to make speech work; they assume you're just shy, and you let them believe that, because shyness is an acceptable excuse for your silence - Autism, the real reason spoken words don't always work for you, isn't.

Now imagine that you find a device that can speak for you, allowing you to store common words and phrases for easy access.  Here's the catch: you can only store 1,200 individual words and/or phrases within the device.  Of course, you can type out any words you want - even words that aren't stored in the device - and have them spoken aloud, but a keyboard isn't always handy, and typing on the screen of the device itself is slow and cumbersome.  Which words and phrases do you choose?  How do you sort them?

I can't think of a single person for whom that sort of task would be easy, and I imagine that more than a few people would contemplate quitting, or else putting forth as little effort as possible, after a few short hours trying to complete the task.  I myself, having been faced with just such a situation, have contemplated how easy it would be to just give up on multiple occasions.  If it weren't for the knowledge that I am literally giving myself a secondary voice - one that will be far more reliable than my natural one - I would likely have given up by now.

My advice to anyone who is in the process of setting up an AAC device/app, be it for yourself, a friend, family member, or client, is as follows:

1.  Take your time
I know you're eager to be finished with the whole process of choosing words and finding locations for them, but it is much easier to set up the the app properly the first time than to realize there is a problem with the layout after it is finalized and you and/or the AAC device user have already grown accustomed to it.  A big part of the reason AAC devices work so well once the people using them have gotten used to the button placement is because of motor planning.  People learn where to place their fingers on the screen of an AAC device in the same way people learn the layout of their keyboards.  Moving words and phrases after setting the device up and using it increases the potential number of miss-hits/errors and slows down the process of learning to use the device.

2.  Use core vocabulary
Even if you or the person you are programming the AAC device for are planning to use pre-stored phrases to communicate it is always good to have some core vocabulary available to allow for the formation of novel utterances (phrases that aren't planned out ahead of time).  If, like me, you are working with an app that allows you to create different categories to store your words and phrases in then decide on a number of buttons in each category that you will devote to core vocabulary; fringe vocabulary can be included as well, but it should not take up the majority of the space set aside for individual words.

3.  Use a computer
If you have a computer or laptop of any sort I strongly advise you to use that to plan out the locations of words and phrases in your AAC app.  It's much easier to type out and revise your layout in some sort of word document than it is to do it directly within the app/device.  You can also print out the document when you're finished programming the device so if anything goes wrong and you need the device rebooted or replaced you can easily input the exact same vocabulary you had before without needing to guess at where a certain word or phrase was once stored.

4.  Make corrections
Your first attempt at planning the layout for an AAC category is highly unlikely to be perfect, and that's okay.  You may need to completely rewrite entire categories because you realized they just aren't laid out right; I've done that multiple times, in fact, I only have one category that I am certain I don't need to revise at the moment.  You may also discover a pronunciation error when you're testing your words and phrases (please remember to test your words and phrases before inputting them) and if your app/device doesn't have a feature that enables pronunciation corrections you'll need to rewrite any phrase containing the mispronounced word.

5.  Choose your words wisely
I can't stress this enough: you are choosing what vocabulary you or the person who will be using the device you're programming will be able to access most easily.  The words you choose can determine the level of success the person using the AAC device will have at communicating.

I know this phase of AAC usage isn't easy or fun, but you can get through it, and if you succeed at this step of the process you'll be setting yourself up for future success.

Good luck!