Presenters: Rose Sevcik and MaryAnn Romski

Communication is the essence of what we are about as people. A young child’s receptive and expressive language development provides the foundation for being able to communicate across the lifespan. AAC provides a route for children with a range of disabilities to do so. Even though the role AAC plays in early intervention has matured substantially over the last few decades, in a 30-year review of the AAC early intervention literature, we reported that there has been an increase in studies with preschool children and to a lesser extent with children in the birth to three age group (Romski, Sevcik, Barton-Hulsey, & Whitmore, 2015; Sevcik & Romski, 2016). Our experience is that there are myths that hinder AAC use in early intervention. In this presentation, we will share our experiences ensuring that AAC is included in early intervention services and supports. We present two main challenges: 1) providing practitioners and families with AAC language intervention strategies that can support beginning communication and 2) discrediting the myths surrounding beginning AAC services and supports with very young children. First, we will present an evidence-based early language comprehension and production framework and interventions to facilitate the communication development for young children who may use AAC either temporarily or permanently from early in life, using illustrations from our own clinical research studies to highlight the use of these intervention strategies with young children (Romski et al., 2010; Romski et al., 2025). Second, we will discuss the myths that hinder AAC use in early intervention and offer solutions to refute these myths and change attitudes. We must be actively solutions-oriented to debunk these myths to ensure that all children have early access to communication.

Learning Outcomes

As a result of this activity, the participant will be able to:

1) List at least two myths about AAC use in early intervention

2) Describe the role of comprehension in language development

3) List two strategies to refute myths about AAC use in early intervention