This book describes communication strategies for people with severe disabilities who are nonverbal or minimally verbal. It examines the major assessment and intervention strategies that have been developed to enable expressive and receptive communication. In addition, the book explores contemporary research focused on teaching nonverbal and minimally verbal persons to use a range of communication strategies for expressive and receptive communication. It addresses the advantages and disadvantages of each communication strategy, selecting curriculum for communication intervention programs, and assessing the communication needs of individuals with severe disabilities who are nonverbal or minimally verbal.

Key areas of coverage include:

• Assessing communication strengths and areas of intervention need.
• Developing communication intervention curricula.
• Prelinguistic intervention.
• Natural gestures and manual signing strategies.
• Aided augmentative and alternative communication strategies, including tangible symbols, picture-based systems, speech-generating devices, and assistive technology solutions for individuals with sensory-motor impairment.
• Visual strategies to enhance receptive communication.
  Communication Strategies for People with Severe Disabilities is an invaluable resource for clinicians, therapists, and other professionals as well as researchers, professors, and graduate students in the interrelated fields of clinical child and school psychology, developmental psychology, child and adolescent psychiatry, clinical social work, applied behavior analysis, augmentative and alternative communication, special education, and speech-language pathology.

Autorentext

Jeff Sigafoos, Ph.D., is a professor in the School of Education at Victoria University of Wellington. He undertakes research on the application of systematic instructional procedures for teaching adaptive skills to students and adults with severe disabilities. He has published widely on teaching communication skills to nonverbal individuals with developmental disabilities.

Giulio E. Lancioni, Ph.D., is the director of the Lega F. D'Oro Research Center, Osimo (AN), Italy. He specializes in the use of assistive technology interventions to enhance the adaptive behavior functioning of people with severe, profound, and multiple disabilities.

Mark F. O'Reilly, Ph.D., is the Melissa Elizabeth Stuart Centennial Professor in the Department of Special Education at The University of Texas at Austin. His research focuses on teaching adaptive skills to individuals with severe disabilities and on the assessment and treatment of challenging behavior of individuals with autism and other developmental disabilities.