I apologize to all of you in the group. I have been away from CafeMom for quite awhile but hope to start posting new useful (hopefully) information again soon. I have to go into school this afternoon so my son can participate in his class party. Since he is usually home int eh afternoon for homeschool, his aide in the morning has other children she works with in the afternoon. Si I am the aide for him this afternoon. The PTO gave our teachers and aides some time this morning form 8:30 to 10:30 and planned to show a movie for the kids...which my kid would NEVER sit through, so my husband when in this morning to help with our son...what a guy.
We are exploring the use of the Cyrano Communicator, but the aide and class teacher have not been given guidance on how to teach our son to use it in the classroom. They basically have just seen what he would do with it on his won with no instruction. I have been programming it using our oldest son's voice and putting in pictures of his actually school and our home etc. So far he has not increased his communication beyond what he would already communicate with sign or gestures. I am hoping to spend a bit more time over break teaching him to navigate it by asking him questions that he has to answer with the device. He responds well to this technique if I put the question in writing.
Still, I think the device has a lot of potential. You have to have a fair amount of fine motor control to navigate this PDA sized device but you wouldn't necessarily have to use the stylus and could use your pointer finger to select buttons. The screen can be made to one button, 6 buttons (what most of our screens have) or more. Each screen can be programed differently and you can really customize it to be exactly what you want. We chose not to include things like Hi and Bye that he can say...and we want him to use his voice whenever possible. Likewise we are not putting a yes or no button on the device because he will indicate yes or no with nodding or shaking his head.
Anyway, I hope we haven't seen the last of the usefulness of this group and I hope I can encourage some new activity and new members when I get my own sorry behind back in gear -LOL!
Merry Christmas! Blessings! ~Ronda
We are exploring the use of the Cyrano Communicator, but the aide and class teacher have not been given guidance on how to teach our son to use it in the classroom. They basically have just seen what he would do with it on his won with no instruction. I have been programming it using our oldest son's voice and putting in pictures of his actually school and our home etc. So far he has not increased his communication beyond what he would already communicate with sign or gestures. I am hoping to spend a bit more time over break teaching him to navigate it by asking him questions that he has to answer with the device. He responds well to this technique if I put the question in writing.
Still, I think the device has a lot of potential. You have to have a fair amount of fine motor control to navigate this PDA sized device but you wouldn't necessarily have to use the stylus and could use your pointer finger to select buttons. The screen can be made to one button, 6 buttons (what most of our screens have) or more. Each screen can be programed differently and you can really customize it to be exactly what you want. We chose not to include things like Hi and Bye that he can say...and we want him to use his voice whenever possible. Likewise we are not putting a yes or no button on the device because he will indicate yes or no with nodding or shaking his head.
Anyway, I hope we haven't seen the last of the usefulness of this group and I hope I can encourage some new activity and new members when I get my own sorry behind back in gear -LOL!
Merry Christmas! Blessings! ~Ronda
Posted by
on Dec. 21, 2007 at 9:39 AM
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New Vontage and school wants us to sign a waiver
- goodasitgets
on Dec. 21, 2007 at 9:39 AM