Notification Verification: Foundations for Success with Supported Typing, August 15, 2015

Thank you. We will let you know when registration for this event opens.

 
Purpose of Program: To properly train and prepare parents and professionals to discover the potential for typing in non-verbal autistic individuals, so when the potential for Facilitated Communications (FC) exists you are able to discover it.

This training program is intended for:

• Parents and non-verbal autistic children who might be trying typing for the first time;
• Parents and typers who have recently started using Facilitated Communications;
• Professionals and aides (and client) who still need basic information;
• Behaviorists and therapists (and client) new to the field of supported typing should also attend this event.

Supported typing is not appropriate for all non-verbal autistic individuals. Saved By Typing cannot tell if FC will work for an individual until we try it and confirm it for ourselves, through a small number of experienced and gifted facilitators in our community, as well as through certified Master Trainers. When our experts confirm a non-verbal autistic person’s independent voice, we celebrate in a big way!

LEARN MORE: PROGRAM CONTENT LISTED BELOW

Date: Saturday, August 15, 2015

Time: 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM

Cost: $100.00 for a student and one family member; $50 for additional family; $100 for therapists

box type lunches will be available onsite (additional cost). Coffee, water and basic beverages will be provided.

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Registration for this event will be available soon! Space is limited to 56 attendees, so check back often.

Note: After the training session concludes, all participants are invited to attend our monthly Celebration of Communication at 4:00 PM in the same location.

Listening Requires Patience

The work of discovering and sustaining a voice involves sacred ground for most of us. Here, the uniqueness of the child becomes amazingly evident, sometimes slowly and over time.

Like any training or discipline, Supported typing is easy to abuse. It is not as simple as holding someone’s hand and waiting for them to move. It is not for novices or those who would charge into another’s life. In fact, it is a space that listens for a voice to come from an unknown dark, cold place of suffering.

To be patient and listen for this with confidence and love is not for those focused on adding capabilities to their lives. It is for the truly sacrificial heart whose task is expressing love in this work. One must become silent to hear that voice. For many of us, these children are like the voice of the Lord.

“As, therefore, the Lord spake to Elijah not by earthquake, nor wind, nor fire, but by the still small voice, so in all probability will he speak to us.” — 1 Kings 19, 11-13.

Program Content

Advanced trainings are not for beginners specifically because the proper groundwork is often not laid for their work. This training is good repetition for anyone, and is critical for anyone wondering if this might work for his or her child. Sometimes, the parent and professional are too filled with thoughts and too limited by blinders to really see and hear what is before them. We know this because we, too, came from that place.

This training is designed to:

• Transform who you are being with your nonverbal child or clients so that when the potential for a typer exists…
  • You are best prepared to discover it.
  • The potential of your relationship changes.
  • The potential of who they are and what is possible for them and their lives can grow.
  • Joy, participation and self-expression can result.
  • Opportunities for wins and celebrations in their lives and yours replace struggles.
  • Where progress was hard to see before, amazement and discovery becomes part of your day.
  • You discover and appreciate the hidden gifts, observations and abilities that only your unique child/client can share; and…
• Put you in a place to discover and learn with dignity and amazement the hidden lives of souls who’ve been fully present in a prison of isolation until you discovered them.

Typing is not for everyone, and there are many ways for communication to occur. Pictures cannot fully replace the distinctions of the written word. We have discovered that many more nonverbals are accomplished readers than we had ever imagined.

Blended into a foundational and necessary process of training that will proceed step-by-step, we include:

1. Processes to help you experience what it is to be your nonverbal person;
2. Insights from the children about autism as it relates to competence;
3. What it is like to come into the world of communication and what they are up against;
4. How FC works; and
5. The Path to Independence

The training program will be conducted by noted Supported Typing expert Laura Poorman, based on the work of Facilitated Communication founder Rosemary Crossley. Typers who have been where new typers are and understand the hurdles they have to cross will also be in attendance, to help new typers take their first keystrokes.

Topics of discussion will include:

(subject to change)

• Introduction: Communicating Without Speech
• Assesment for Facilitated Communication (FC) Training
• How and When: Common Problems Helped by Facilitation / Moving Towards Independence / Literacy
• Structuring Success: Developing Skills in Communication by Spelling
• Literacy – Caught or Taught?
• Do’s and Don’ts for Receivers of Nonspeech Communication
• Getting Physical: Posture and Upper Limb Function
• Reducing Support – Increasing Independence
• Word-finding Problems
• Assessment of People with Severe Communication Impairment
• Who Said That? – When to Verify Communication / Adverserial Testing
• Who Did What and to Whom? – Limitations of Communication Without Speech

Even if they can’t attend the advanced training in April, professionals who go through this introductory course will still benefit from the videos of the April course.