Fun Communication

I really need to spend some time on getting a bunch of "everyday" boards complete but I am just having too much fun with this program. After seeing how much Junior loved being able to tell grandma about his car wash experience I realized that sometimes you just want to talk about the fun stuff. When I got the ipad it was about allowing him to tell me what he wants, needs, if and where he hurts, etc. but I hadn't thought about this other side of things. Allowing him to not just say he likes tv or even a specific show but to tell someone about that show or to share about his latest outing. I do have to program it in but it only takes me about 2-5 minutes to do a full board.

Here are a few of the fun, conversational boards Junior was using today. One board is just labeled "Today I" so I can change it out daily and allow him to share about that days activities with others.
Wouldn't this be neat for a child attending school. The teacher could change up the board daily so a nonverbal child could tell his family what he did that day in school or the opposite way(the child could share with his teacher what he did over the weekend).

This is Junior talking about his trip to the grocery store yeseterday. There are actually a few more symbols but I didn't get a pic of them. Junior's favorite tv program at the moment is Dirty Jobs. So I asked if he would like to be able to tell grandma about his show next time he talked to her. He thought that was great so here he is talking about his favorite show. He loved saying it was stinky(which is what he is showing me in the picture).
He thought this was the greatest.
Now for a few of his everyday boards that I have been working on.
This is his "home page" with the main categorys.
If he chooses the upset symbol he goes to this page.
If he does not want any of these Junior will ignore the board and I scroll down the page to the next four choices in the "upset" category. I am sure I will come up with more to add but these are the most common reasons Junior gets upset.
In the first set of four symbols in the "upset" category there is a symbol that says "I hurt". If Junior chooses this one he automatically gets this board. (this is just the first 4, we can scroll down through several more body parts)
I realized that to just use the header "I want" for a category was way too broad and it would take me far too long to get the symbols he needed. So we separated it into different "wants"(in case it is unclear that last one with the question mark is so he can choose which chair he wants to sit in).
I haven't gotten these complete but here is the start of the arts and crafts choices for him.
If he chooses paint he goes to this board automatically to choose what type of painting he wants. I have several more to add but this gives you the idea. I need to get a picture of his bubble wrap painting to switch out with the bottle of bubbles symbol(I want to change out a bunch of the symbols on these boards with real pics in the future).

I know this probably shared way more then you wanted to hear or see but for me this blog is a way to journal our journey. To keep track of Junior's communication adventures.

Some relaxing ipad time. Junior was listening to the Toy Story 3 read along and then the Shrek 4 read along.