Enhancing Initial Communication and Responsiveness of Learners with Multiple Disabilities

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to review pertinent issues addressed in the literature relating to communication of learners who have multiple disabilities, identify progress made in communication research and practice, and propose strategies for partners' interactions with individuals who do not use symbols for communication. This article is particularly directed toward learners who communicate in a preintentional or emerging intentional manner using nonsymbolic expressions. The enhancement of partner skills and the engineering of contexts for enhanced communication are emphasized. Interventions most conducive to establishing an initial communication repertoire and facilitating alert, responsive behavior are presented using the Tri-Focus Framework, which encompasses learner, partner, and environmental context. Discussion of the Tri-Focus Framework synthesizes findings from a diverse extant literature base and suggests a unique, holistic perspective from which one might view intervention for those learners who have multiple disabilities. The framework may offer practitioners new insight into the communicative abilities of learners who have multiple disabilities and do not use symbols for communication.

Intensive interaction in the inclusive classroom: using interactive pedagogy to connect with students who are hardest to reach

“…Siegel-Causey and Bashinski (1997) have stressed that communication should be viewed as a triangular framework: the learner, the partner and the environmental context. Ware (1996) has done much to raise awareness about the importance of a responsive environment to facilitate effective communication.…”

An ecological method for the sampling of nonverbal signalling behaviours of young children with profound and multiple learning disabilities (PMLD)

“…Nonconventional nonsymbolic communicative signals are therefore highly context dependent, and significantly determined by the sender's behavioural and perceptual state [30]. The socially mediated pedagogical approaches are predicated upon the recognition that early interaction and learning take place in a dynamic social context.…”

Educational approaches for maximizing arousal in children with multiple and severe disability: New directions for research and practice in early childhood contexts

“…Reese [12] reported the use of behaviour state assessment in an intervention involving one adult with profound intellectual disability. In contrast, quite a lot of attention has been paid to the communicative and contextual involvement of students with MSD, especially in relation to partner responsivity [13]. In one study, Arthur et al [14] demonstrated that a systematic programme of partner training in communication support improved the skills and knowledge of participants in relation to their interactions with students with MSD.…”