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A 30-Year Journey From Skepticism to Acceptance: Reconsidering the Authenticity of Assisted Communication of Nonspeakers
My introduction to assisted communication (AC) for nonspeaking and minimally speaking individuals was in reference to facilitated communication (FC). During July of 1991 at the Autism Society of America's annual conference, I was asked to participate on a panel that was hastily organized to have an...
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Mental Health Care for People Who Use AAC: Rationale and Practice
Introduction: A Speller's POV Therapists are my heroes — they transform problems into paths toward the future you want to build. I was scared to start. My psychiatrist told me that meds alone would not solve my anxiety, and she encouraged me to give therapy a try. Dreams make work, and...
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The Right to Learn: One Nonspeaking Autistic Student’s Case for Educational Access and Dignity
Beginning as a small child, school is where you make friends and learn to process the world around you. Most of modern society is formed on the basis that people have received a formal education. Whether that education be from primary to high school, or onward to a college education, it is presumed...
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What Parents Should Know About ASHA’s Position Statement on Spelling Methodologies
Ninth grade was a turning point for my nonverbal daughter with autism. After years in a life skills classroom, she moved into an academic setting. For the first time, she was studying algebra instead of counting money and writing paragraphs instead of discussing the weather each morning. This...
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Opening the Door: Psychotherapy With Nonspeaking or Unreliably Speaking Autistic Young Adults
This article is about providing psychotherapy services to nonspeaking or unreliably speaking autistic young adults. Going forward the terms "communicators," "typers," or "spellers" are used interchangeably to describe this group. My hope is to encourage parents, professionals, and the wider...
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My Journey to Independent Typing: One Autistic Nonspeaker’s Story
Each autistic nonspeaker I know is trying to become independent with their communication. Of course. Why wouldn't we? If you have something to say, you want to be able to do it without help. Typing seems to be the holy grail for most. Why? Because the sad but true fact is that the...
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Building Community and Advocacy: From Voiceless to SEEN and Heard
I got used to being silent. It was the loneliness and being invisible that was soul crushing. Being able to finally say anything I wanted as a nonspeaking autistic with apraxia was liberating. I have never been able to communicate by using my mouth. When I was a child, I did speak a few...
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Why Message-Passing Tests Are Unethical
Spelling as a method of communication access for non-speakers is rapidly expanding within the Profound Autism community. Thousands of Spellers have gained communication through Spelling to Communicate (S2C), Rapid Prompting Method (RPM), Spellers Method, and other assistive communication methods....
