Being truly inclusive – it’s all down to better communication

19 May 2023

As humans, we all have ways of communicating or getting our message across so that others can understand our needs, wants and desires.

The most common way we have of doing this is through speech, but what happens if speaking is difficult or impossible to achieve? Maybe someone is non-verbal?

This World Communication Day, VMCH is celebrating alternative means of communication that help people be understood.

Many people use other means of communication apart from speech. This includes people with cerebral palsy, people with autism, people with intellectual disabilities, people who acquire disability as a result of a stroke or other neurological condition.

The most common form of alternative means of communication or assistive communication is Augmentative Alternative Communication (AAC). AAC is any strategy, method, tool or equipment that can be used to communicate instead of speech.

Augmentative Alternative Communication (AAC) can be broken down into two categories:

Unaided AAC

Unaided AAC is any tool or method that doesn’t need a physical tool or aid. Examples of Unaided AAC include facial expressions, body language, gestures, fingerspelling, or Auslan.

Aided AAC

This includes both Low-Tech and High-Tech ACC.

Low-Tech ACC includes pen and paper, alphabet board and communication book. A communication book contains pictures, symbols and words that an individual can point to communicate. The pictures, symbols and words can be grouped into categories, and can be tailored specifically or individual.

High Tech AAC includes using an app on a computer, tablet, iPad or smart phone that can convert written text to speech.

Speech Generating Software can be used on dedicated devices specifically for speech generation. These type of high-tech AAC are useful for complex forms of communication or messages that an individual wants to convey.

Every day at VMCH we celebrate people who use any form of communication that is comfortable for them and conveys their needs, wants and desires effectively to other people, as well as being understood.

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Acknowledgement of Country

We here at VMCH respectfully acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands on which we gather, and we would like to take a moment to honour the fact that we live on the lands of the oldest civilisation in the world. We acknowledge the stories, traditions and wisdom of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and pay our respects to their elders past, present and emerging.