TRANSCRIPT
Calendars in Action
9/15/25 

>>Rachel: Okay. So what are calendar systems and why do they even matter? So we're not -- today we're not talking about days of the week, months of the year, the weather. This could be an activity within -- that's represented within the calendar system but that's not what we'll be discussing for today. Calendar systems provide predictability. They help a student know what to expect and what is expected of them. They help to build communication because we're always trying to facilitate that communication that leads to conversation. They help develop understanding of time because time is so abstract and calendar systems allow for that concrete representation of time. And then they also provide emotional support. So we all need to know what's going on to feel safe and to feel like we know what's happening in our life. And when we don't know, then we start to feel dysregulated and very anxious. Today we're going to be talking about calendars as communication and learning tools. They help the students anticipate, participate, and reflect on meaningful routines through static forms of communication. Static meaning that they are tangible, concrete, and calendar systems should be referred to throughout the whole day. All right. So where do you start? So there are four things to keep in mind when you are creating a calendar system. So the first one is to determine the modifications to access the instruction. So you and your team need to be asking yourselves has a Learning Media Assessment been conducted using a variety of tools and implementing the family's input to determine the needs of access across different environment. Like, through this assessment, what media was determined to be the most effective for the student and how does that student access the world around them? You also want to ask yourself how does a student receive information the most efficiently. So the second one is to develop a communication system for the student. So again with the assessment, has the team conducted a Communication Matrix or something similar with family input, of course, to determine how and at what level the student is communicating on. And what media does the student use to communicate and does it match the LMA results. Does the student communicate in informal, unconventional ways or formal, conventional ways? Has the team targeted communication skills based on this assessment. The third consideration is design a schedule. So what activities occur during the student's day and the week. And have the student's preferences. Use a likes and dislikes inventory. And what activities is a student most engaged in? That could be educational. It could be functional. It could be play. And please keep in mind that when we're talking about students' play activities, this may not mean what we think play is. It could just mean what the student enjoys doing when they're by themselves. We can't see our screen? Have I not shared? Oh, goodness gracious. I'm so sorry. That's so silly. Okay. Let's do this. Thank you. Goodness. I'm just talking away. Okay. So all of this information is going to be on my handout. So you haven't missed any pertinent information. Okay. So then the last consideration is determining the time-frame. And we're going to be talking a little bit more about that later. Okay. So when we are looking at media, there is a hierarchy of abstraction. It moves from the most concrete form to the most abstract. So typically you would see this chart represented horizontally but for the interest of slide space it's presented from top to bottom. The most concrete would be objects, real objects. Then parts of objects. Then, depending on whether you are a visual or tactile learner, you can look at pictures or tactile symbols. And the most abstract form of representation is print or Braille. When you are looking at building or developing a calendar system, you want to begin with the most concrete objects first or the most concrete symbols, which are objects, first. Because when you act on actual objects, it helps to pair the object with the action and the activity. And then once you start moving away from the most concrete forms of representation, the student is required to have and use higher-level symbolic skills. If you guys have any questions, please just drop them in the chat and we will address them. Okay. Let's look at that second consideration of developing a communication system. So these are the seven levels of expressive communication of that Communication Matrix. There's the pre-intentional behavior, intentional behavior. Unconventional pre-symbolic communication. Conventional pre-symbolic communication, concrete, abstract, all the way to formal language. Pre-symbolic communication -- when we're looking at developing, you know, calendar systems, we're looking at the fourth and the fifth levels of communication. But with that fourth level, the student who is on a pre-symbolic level is not using any symbols right now. Not the slides. There's a handout and all the information from the slides are in the handout. So when we're looking at pre-symbolic communication, that means that the student is not using any symbols for communication. So what we're wanting to do is we're wanting to use real objects to model and build that understanding that objects equal meaning. They have meaning. Objects and symbols have meaning. And there is an APH kit called symbols and meaning kit. And last week we had a Coffee Hour on that topic of the SAM kit. Hopefully, Kaycee, I don't know if you have access to the Coffee Hour, we could drop that into the chat. And so if you need to know more information about students who are working on that pre-symbolic level, then that would be a great Coffee Hour for you to watch. So when we're looking at concrete symbols, if a student is on a concrete symbol level, this is where we can use objects, pictures, tactile symbols to have communicative exchanges. This is where students have that symbolic understanding that this object means something. And they start to communicate using those objects. But if your student is at a level before this, we shouldn't be using any forms of abstract -- we shouldn't be using any abstract forms like tactile symbols, pictures. Because if we jump too far ahead too quickly, we run the risk of plateauing our student's development. And of course we don't want to do that. So I want to show you really quickly this resource. And this is from the Washington Department of Education. And we have a Communication Matrix, which is so great because it helps you figure out, as a team, how the student is communicating and what level the student's at. And then also what specific skills, what specific communication skills can we target to help that student get to that next level of expressive communication. So the West Virginia Department of Education came up with like what is called beyond the matrix. So for every single level of that expressive communication, there's a whole plethora of strategies, videos, tools, all of these things that you can use to help your student where they're at and to help them build those skills to get to where that next level. Okay. Let me go back. Does anybody have any questions about that so far? Okay. We'll keep going then. Okay. So that third consideration is developing a schedule for the day. And those scheduled activities equal routines. What exactly is a routine? So those routines mean that they are very instructed activities. They have a very clear beginning, middle, and end. They're carried out the same exact way every single time you do it, unless the student's needs change or something needs to be tweaked. But first and foremost, they have to be consistent. It can't be we do these routines when we have time or when we remember. They have to be consistent and they have to be carried out with integrity. All right. So when we are developing our routines and we want to find an object that is most meaningful for the child to connect to that routine, we have some symbol guiding questions to look at. So these are questions that the team wants to ask themselves, you know, as they're coming up with symbols for the routines. So what are the events that happen? What are some events that happen multiple times a day? This is when you're developing a routine. Okay. What kind of routine are we going to create for the student within their day. First question: What are the routines that happen every single day and multiple times a day. Those are the ones that you're going to want to target first because they're going to have more opportunities to practice them. And then within that routine: What are the steps that are involved in that process? Okay? Because for every activity that you do, there's a step. There's a sequence of steps. And then which steps does the student complete independently? Maybe there might be an activity that you and your student do and they know one of the steps but they don't know any of the others and you have to give more support for that. That's okay because it gives you a starting point to be able to work towards more independence and more steps of the activity. And then, likewise, what do they actively participate in or what do they show anticipation for? When a student shows anticipation for something, maybe they move towards that area, maybe they are starting to act on the object appropriately, that shows they know what they're supposed to do with it. So what parts of the sequence does the student anticipate and can we continue to perform the activity multiple times so that way they anticipate more steps. If you find that you're developing routines and the student may seem disinterested in the activities that are scheduled, try to take a step back a little bit and look at the activities that may be more meaningful to the student. So using that likes and dislikes inventory, what is an element or a like that they have that you can develop a routine around that like? It could be very small. But what is something that they like? And go from there. Because you'll have more buy-in if you are starting with something that students really enjoy. Okay. So this is where I want you guys to help come up with some ideas. In your mind and in your classrooms, what are those -- what are some of the those activities that happen multiple times a day? Bathroom breaks. Absolutely. That happens a lot. Lunch, snack. Absolutely. Tube feeding/flushes. Recess. You have multiple recesss? That's awesome! Beads and sensory time. I love this. Let's start with those routines that happen multiple times in a day because that's where we're going to get the most opportunity. Okay. All right. So let's continue with our symbol guiding questions. So keep that in mind because we're going to be using that in a little bit. When you're thinking about those routines that happen multiple times a day, what are the steps that are used within or what are the items that are used within this routine? So the steps, what are those items and what are the items that you use in those steps? And which of those items does the student actually touch/manipulate? You're not going to want to choose an object to represent an activity if the student doesn't really have any interaction with it yet. Okay? And then which of these items is the student responsible for putting away and retrieving? We like to talk about our students are very familiar with the Braille fairy where things just kind of fall out of the sky and they just appear out of nowhere. And so that's because we are such helpful people and we want to go and retrieve all the items and set everything up for our student. They don't know where they come from. They don't know where things are stored or located. So as you are building routines and as you are consistently doing these different activities, start working in having the student go and retrieve those items for you -- with you so that way they know where it is. And it just gives them a sense of more independence. Like, they have more information to work from. And that's what we're always wanting. We're always shooting for that next level of independence for our student. Okay. So let's practice. Okay. So a few of you wrote some different things like tube feedings, snack time. Like, this is around mealtime and that is something we talk about a lot is different meals. We at least at school have at least two times. And maybe even a third, if you have a snack time routine as well. So when we're thinking about what symbol can we use to distinguish, you know, or to denote meal times? So some questions that the team could ask themselves is: How does the student eat? Some of you talked about different things. Tube feedings, flushes, that's a different way of eating than eating with a spoon. So how does the student eat? And what physical objects does the student have actual contact with during mealtime? And if they don't have any, you know, if they're tube fed and they don't have any contact with any of their mealtime items or objects, what could we build a routine around them being more a part of that process. Are there multiple same items? Is it easy to replace? If there is an antique object you're using, great grandma's spoon, and it gets lost, that is going to be irreplaceable and if the student only understands mealtimes because of that spoon, that's going to be a really hard one. So what are some other objects that you could use that would be similar and would be easy to replace? Just a regular spoon. Maybe you could look at that. Is the family using something similar at home? Could you borrow something or could the school purchase the same item? And then how does the student know that the mealtime is over? So this is part of not necessarily connecting an object to the activity but how does the student know that the mealtime is complete. Okay. All right. So here are some -- yeah. So here are some ideas, some examples of things for students that they could use. They could use a bottle, if they are bottle-fed. They could use a plate or a bowl that is special to mealtimes. Feeding tubes, the syringes, the pouches. It could be like the whole cap or the whole bottle or carton of a nutritional drink. It could be a spoon or a blender. Maybe a student really, from their likes and dislikes inventory, they really love vibration. They love the feel of a vibration. They love the sound of a vibration. And so we're incorporating that like into blended meals that many of our students need to have. Are there any examples that weren't mentioned here that some of you have used as object symbols for mealtimes? Ooh, a napkin. A bib/smock. Apron. Placemat. Never used a placemat. Sorry about that. Hold on one second. Sorry about that. Okay. So we're going to have an example of student 1 and student 2. Student 1 is tube fed and uses this particular carton of milk for their nutritional drink. And student 2 is the student that really loves that vibration and has to have blended meals. I'm going to stop share for just a second. While I set this up. And if you guys have any comments right now, that would be great. You could throw them in the chat. Let me get this all set up. Oh, yay. It did do it. Here is student number 1 and student number 1 is using this particular nutritional drink. Okay. So the question that we wanted to ask ourselves is -- so here are the items. One of the questions is what are the items? We're looking at the bottle. There's a syringe. There's a tubing. There's a measured cup. There's another cup for perhaps water. When I had a student who was tube fed, this was the sequence of events usually was we would open up the container that had the nutritional food. We would pour it into a measuring cup so that way we could measure the CCs and document how much they were eating. We would hook up to the tube to the port and after that was done, we would get a cup of water and we would flush it with a syringe. So how we would do this, how we would set up the Calendar Box, is we would put in the carton, that measure cup, then the tubing. The water and then the syringe. Okay? And so you have your entire activity set up. So the first thing that you're going to do is you're going to review the whole thing. So you're going to be talking about what you're doing and you're going to kind of use the vocabulary that you use whenever you're actually acting on the object. So for instance you'll say, okay -- and using their hand -- hand under hand guiding. We're going to take our carton. We're going to twist it open. Twist, twist, twist, twist, twist. And then we're going to get our cup and then we're going to pour it into the cup. What's next? We're going to hook up our tube and then we're going to get the water and flush it all down. And then you go back to the beginning. Let's get our cup. Let's get our carton. Our milk or whatever. And then we go here again, oh, this is empty. What's next? We get that cup out. Let's get that cup. Okay. Let's twist open that carton and then we're going to pour it into the cup. Okay. And the milk is finished. Okay. What's next? Nothing's here. Nothing's here. Let's get our tubing. Let's lift up that shirt. We're going to take our milk and we're going to pour it into the tube. And then you do that until it's all done and this is finished. And then you say, okay. What's next? Empty, empty, empty. And let's get the cup of water. Here we go. And our syringe. And let's get all that water and put it in the tube. That is finished. The cup is finished. Let's unhook the tube and the tube is finished. Let's check to see. Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing. We're all finished. Okay? Let's look at -- does anybody have any comments about this example of a student who is tube fed? And you may not do this with your student yet. But it absolutely could be incorporated because a student has to get tube fed multiple times a day. So wouldn't it be so amazing if we incorporated their participation into it and help them become more independent in their feeding? They may not be able to do all the steps on their own, and that's okay. That's not what we're going for. We are trying to do as much independently as they possibly can. And believe that they can do it. Okay. So now let's look at our student number 2. Okay. And so this student's parents -- we got parent input and they really want their student to play more of a role in creating their meals. So we've got the blender. We've got some food from -- materials that we're using. The food from home. We've got some stock to make sure that the consistency is right. We've got a plate. We've got a spoon. And so we're going to put the blender in there because then we're going to put the food from home in it. And then use the stock to make the consistency right. We've got our lipped plate and we've got our spoon. So, again, you're going to review all of the different steps. And so bringing in that vocabulary. You're going to pull the blender out and vibrate the student. Like, you know, kind of shake and make the noise because my students would always giggle and laugh whenever we would do that. Because it has to be fun. And you learn more when you're having fun. And then we're like, ooh, what did you bring from home? It looks like some noodles. That looks delicious. Different things that the student really enjoys. Like do they like sing-songy? Do they like some tactile vibration or imitation of what you guys are doing? We're going to pour in the stock, pour in the plate and eat it with the spoon. We're going to dump this in there. And then just finish it as you are done. And once you finish it, you're going to go back to see that there are empty places in the carton. When you do this, it helps to show -- like this is a physical representation of the passage of time. Because these things are physically disappearing from the Calendar Box as you are manipulating each different thing. So you're going to pour this in there. Pour. Okay. That's all done. All done. All done. What's next? Oh, let's get out our plates. Let's put our food on to the plate. Okay. That's done. And what is next? What do we need? We need our spoon. And everything is done. Sometimes what you can do is like once everything is complete and you've done everything, you have your finished basket and you kind of go back through. And it doesn't have to be in order. It doesn't have to be in order. You're really just talking about the vocabulary and the different things, the actions that were associated with the object. So you can take this and you're like, oh, remember we took the stock and we poured it in because it was too thick? Can't have it too thick. You know, things like that. You can just talk about the different items. Not necessarily in order, but just talk about them. Okay. Now I'm going to stop share again. Please drop your comments or questions or, you know, anything that you have right now with those two different examples. 

>>Kaycee: This is Kaycee. While everyone is talking, there's lots of love for your graphics. Everyone loved it. 

>>Rachel: I was having so much fun, I was giggling. When I'm doing that and you pour, pour, pour. Actually, that's what I actually said whenever I was working with students. 

>>Kaycee: I love it. 

>>Rachel: Okay. All right. Let's move on to the next thing. Oh, gosh. Okay. We're going to get to that, Shannon. And if I haven't covered it by the end, I need you to chime back in again, okay? We're going to go into that. All right. Let me go back and share. Okay. So now we're down to that fourth consideration when you're developing a calendar system, and that's looking at the different time-frames. So there are five different time-frames, probably a combination of those could make it even more. But there is the anticipation calendar. The daily calendar. The weekly, monthly, and annual. The weekly, monthly, annual can just all be clumped together as expanded calendars. And so but for today we're really going to be focusing on the anticipation and the daily. You know, with the calendar systems they grow with the student. So it starts very simply, you know, with one symbol and one activity. And then they gradually expand to include multiple days or weeks. It starts off very simple. All right. So that fourth element we were talking about consideration is choosing the right time-frame. In the back of the calendars book -- I'm going to show that to you so you guys can scan it. In the back of this Calendars book, that guide for selecting time-frames is located there. We are in the process of revising this Calendars book but this book is gold. Keep on using it and if you haven't seen this book, go to your nearest teacher for the visually impaired and I know they're going to have it. And if they don't have it, then you have the link to be able to purchase it. But don't purchase it because we're going to be coming up with a newly-revised one. Okay. So let me go back. Okay. So let's go back to -- sorry. Did everybody get the -- if you didn't get to scan the QR code, I put the link in the handout for you to be able to click on as well. So all the links to everything I'm discussing today will be in the handout. So we're looking at guide to selecting time-frames for calendar systems. Oh, yay! Usually it goes down to the bottom. It might still. Okay. All right. Yep. See? Why does it do this? Who knows? Okay. We need to meet our students where we are. So some students are only going to be able to distinguish between now and later. While others are going to be able to think, you know, further ahead in terms of weeks or months. But we have to begin where the students are. So for each time-frame, there are bolded key characteristics. Okay? And so in order to move on to the next time-frame, the student has to be able to hit each one of these key characteristics. There are characteristics that are not bolded that can help the educational teams and families decide where the student is at in the time-frame. So when we're looking at this, we don't have to jump from one to the next. We're building. An anticipation calendar can start off with just one and then build. I'm going to show you pictures of that here in just a second. But calendar systems are very individualized. So it's not a one size fits all. Even if you have two students that are working within the same time-frame, they're going to have two separate and distinct calendar systems. We can't share. We're not sharing calendar systems. They have to be very, very distinct because all of our students have very unique needs that is pertinent to their own likes, dislikes, and things like that. So if the student, you know, has met all the criteria for the anticipation calendar, you can start looking at moving towards a daily calendar. So all the events throughout the day. This time-frame has nine key characteristics. So you will see that -- you will notice that it's going to have -- that you're going to be here for quite sometime, which is why we are really focusing only on anticipation and daily. So the team is going to periodically need to recheck and assess how the student is utilizing their calendar system. And if there seems to be a mismatch, to adjust accordingly. So we're going to go back to this. Okay. Does anybody have any questions about time-frame and choosing the time-frame? Okay. We're going to move on. 

>>Kaycee: Rachel, this is Kaycee. We had a come in about who makes the choice about what is the correct time-frame? Is it the parent? Is it the teacher? Is it the team? Who is making the choice based on that guide? 

>>Rachel: When we're looking at the school, I would say the entire educational team, which includes the family. Because I feel like -- and we're going to be talking about this later. I'm a big proponent of there has to be a home and a school connection, right? So whatever the school is using, home should be using it too because we have to maximize the opportunities for the student. So, you know, as the educational team is kind of looking at how to set up the school, it's really important to get that parent input to say what does it look like in your house whenever you guys are setting up routines? Does it look like this? Are you guys utilizing a system? And trying to build that way. I would say yes to everybody collaborating on that decision. Typically, the school starts it because they're trying to set up the daily schedule for school. But this very easily gets transferred into home as well. I've created numerous calendar systems or helped families create numerous calendar systems for the home setting as well. So I think the more people who are collaborating, the better. That's my philosophy, for sure. Okay. So now we are talking about an anticipation calendar. That's considered to be the entry-level calendar. It's also a great way to introduce activities in isolation. Because you're pairing the object with a spoken word, maybe the sign, and/or the action. And so this ensures that you have mutual focus on one object and that one object is associated with this action and with the spoken or signed word. And then on the screen there are two pictures. There is -- when you're looking at characteristics of an anticipation calendar system, you want to have two different containers. So a now basket and a finished basket. So when you are considering what to choose for those different things, you want to take into consideration the shape of the different -- they have to be two totally different containers. So you want to consider the shape of it, the texture, the material that it's made out of., and if your student has access to functional vision, the color of it. On the screen we have a round, green wicker basket that is showing the now. And then we have a black, plastic, rectangular basket. And so those are two very distinct baskets. They feel different. They weigh differently. And if you have access to it, they have two different colors. When you are looking at that time-frame, that guide to selecting a time-frame, if your student is not even at one of those key characteristics, then maybe your student isn't quite ready for a calendar system yet. That is okay. Then the emphasis needs to be placed on developing participation in routines and engaging and resonance activities. Like, from the van Dijk methodology. That just means the focus is being present with one another and building a relationship with one another. So you can offer the student an object. But really, what you're doing with that object, is you're not expecting the student to act on it because at this level they're at the pre-symbolic level. You are showing them. You are modeling for them how to interact with this object and exploring that object together. So some resonance activities could include like rocking back and forth or side to side. And so you're working on those signal-level cues, like requesting and rejecting. Say you have a student in your lap and you're rocking, you're being present, you're building a relationship and you're rocking back and forth and you're singing a song and you stop. And you are waiting for that student, for any indication. It may be a vocalization. Uh. It may be the tiniest movement. Whatever that is, you take that as initiation to continue. You wait and you stop and you wait to see if that student will signal a continuation. Or if they absolutely hate it, then they'll let you know that too. Like, oh, goodness. You did not like that activity. Let's try side to side. Maybe they like side to side better. The goal is that participation and that relationship resonance. Does anybody have any questions about anticipation calendars or how to set that up? Okay. Just to come back to this and just to be clear, each -- there is a symbol or an object symbol for each activity, okay? But then the activity gets broken down into steps for the routine. So on the screen we have a picture of the now green wicker basket with the carton of milk, the nutritional milk. And then below it has an arrow pointing down to the sequence box that has the objects of the steps of the routine in there. The carton of the nutritional milk, the measured cup, the tubing, the water, and the syringe. Okay. So now what we're going to do -- so now when you're started at the now and then the finished. And so now we're building routines. Now the student has more interest in more routines. So now the student is able to hold on to more information. On the screen is a two-slot Calendar Box with a partition plate and a toothbrush, probably mealtime and grooming, and a finished basket next to it. So the now, the then, and the finished. So the student is able to gather more information or holding on to it. The next slide is a four-slot Calendar Box with different objects within that. And then a finished box behind it. Now the student is building even more activities and is able to retain information from different activities. So you're just building, building, building. And then -- okay. So then at this point you, with the collaboration of your sensory team, you have developed more routines. You have established different activities to do. You have all gone through the symbol guiding questions that have been asked for each activity to find the most meaningful object to represent the activity. And now you have an entire daily schedule created with corresponding object symbols. And so this is -- on the screen, this is just an example of, you know, some activities and some objects based on things that I've used with my students in the past and that I've also seen other teachers use. And so it starts with the arrival and then goes through the daily schedule. There's nine activities and then the departure. Okay. So sometimes there are more activities than there are slots in the calendar. We can't have a giant Calendar Box because your student is not going to be able to reach across the whole sequence box. So you'll want to kind of keep it to their arms' reach. So what I have done is I have broken it down into like a daily -- the day portion and the evening or the afternoon portion. On the screen there is a Calendar Box with the different objects that are put into each of the slots. And as you finish, there's the wipes for the bathroom, the sweat bands for PE. A squishy ball for relax time. The Nutribullet for lunch and then bathroom time again. And then for the p.m. there's like a vibrating bouncy ball for social games. Pudding box for snacks time. Wipes for bathroom, bathroom time. And a ring -- this is something like maybe the student participates in pushing the button for the Ring and maybe you can get a copy of something like that to kind of say, okay, we're going home. This is what the student has shown interest in. And then the buckle, which is very common for getting on the bus. Does anybody have any questions about how that is set up? All right. We're going to move on. We talked about the different calendars and why we use calendars. Marybeth asked if there are sequence boxes available in APH? Yes but they are not the wooden boxes but it doesn't matter. It doesn't need to be a wooden box. It could be anything. It could be a bunch of plastic baskets that I've used for a calendar sequence box. It doesn't have to be the wooden ones. But, yes, you can order it off of APH. But we've been talking about calendars. We've been talking about the different kinds of calendars, how you set them up to show like the different parts of your student's day. But calendars are so much more than schedules. They are so much more than schedules. So our students often have complex access and communication needs and they don't have that incidental access to language. They don't have the access to all the nuances of language by observing those conversations through their vision and hearing. But don't stop using the calendar system because the student has memorized their day or because they know what to do when we tell them. We want to allow the student to develop that autonomy and have some control over what is happening in their day. Let them observe it for themselves. Because we don't have people telling us what comes next in our day. We use our calendars to keep our events organized. So if your student has memorized the calendar, expand. Teach them more concepts and vocabulary about time. Talk about the past, what happened in the past. What's about to happen in the future. Maybe you might need to move to a new time-frame. Otherwise, if you're only using it as a checklist, you are missing out on a valuable opportunity to build conversational language. And calendars are vehicles for conversation. So this is a quote from Barbara Miles from a book called Remarkable Conversations. I have the QR code on the screen. The link is also in the handout. And this book is amazing. It really reshapes your entire view of what conversations are with students who are Deafblind. And it's a must-read, I believe. But she has a quote in the book and it says: Whatever language and communicative environment surrounds the Deafblind student must be consciously provided for or brought to him. If this is not done, the child will not develop his own natural language or communication mode. So we are talking about explicit teaching of conversations. And we're not just talking about giving a student basic survival vocabulary. Yes, no, eat. We're not talking about that but we're talking about including them in the back and forth exchange of life through conversation. And helping them to develop into creative thinkers and helping them to communicate to the best of their ability. Because conversational interaction precedes language. Not the other way around. So in order to learn how to have a conversation or to know how to have conversations, we have to have the conversations. Okay. So here are the elements of a conversation. We're going to kind of go through these kind of quickly. And as we go through this, think back to the most amazing conversation that you've ever had, like with your best friend, your spouse, your loved one, your partner. Whatever. And I can guarantee that you would be able to pick out each of these elements in that same conversation. So the first one is mutual respect. So when you come into conversation with a student, what expectations are you bringing to that encounter? Do you expect that the student is going to be able to have a conversation? You know, ask yourself do I expect that the student has the sufficient abilities to have a conversation? Because how we come into that space and how we come into that interaction is going to speak volumes of how that interaction is going to go. The second one is emotional comfort. How we are touching our students who are Deafblind is very, very important. And we want to make sure that our hands and our bodies are conveying what our intentions are. If we are trying to show our student how to do something and we're grabbing their hands and showing them how to do that, are we showing them or are we -- is our body and our hands showing them that they can't do it so we are having to grab them to do it? So the hands of our students who are Deafblind is comparable to the eyes of a sighted student. Okay. The third element is physical comfort. How are you positioned? Are you positioned in such a way that opened yourself up to communicate to show that you are open to communication and that you would like to receive their communication? How was the student positioned? And the fourth element is topics of mutual interest. So before we can actually have like a real conversation with a person who is Deafblind or really with anybody, we have to be truly interested in their experiences. So being able to determine what a student is paying attention to is one of the most important skills that we can learn. It's like what are they interested in? And let's comment on what they're interested in. The fifth element is equal participation. When we're having these calendar conversations, it's important to pause often within each of the -- within each conversational interaction and to allow the student who is Deafblind to take a turn. Whether that's verbal or non-verbal. Because we can't have a back and forth exchange if one person is dominating the conversation. And we need to be aware of, like, as teachers and as instructors in the educational system how we rely often on directives and questions. Being bombarded with questions and being bombarded with demands. Like, do we stop and do we wait to see what our student is wanting to share with us. Because if we just rely on the directive and those asking questions, this is going to inhibit that conversation. And the last is comfortable pacing. If we don't control our pacing, it may be impossible for us to receive and interpret the message. And we might miss that opportunity for them to share with us. Okay. And so how do we incorporate conversation into our daily routines? Van Dijk, who is quoted as the godfather of Deafblind education said everyone is entitled to a past, present, and future. But our students are often only in the present. They have no way to talk about the past and no way to anticipate the future. But through calendar systems, we can do that. So we use a calendar system to talk about what's happening right now. What's going to happen. What already happened. You can talk about all sorts of things. And then as itinerant teachers we are all over the place everywhere. We have so many students on the caseload. We're driving across town. How do we role release these daily calendar conversations to other service providers and to the classroom staff because they're the hands on the ground day in and day out. We talked about setting up those routines. We talked about pin pointing what object goes with each activity. And we want to make sure that these are posted that are near the student's calendar area. We want to make sure these are posted so that anybody who comes is able to read those posted routines and be able to carry them out with consistency. Take video of those things, of the routines and calendar conversations. And put all of that information into a shared folder so that anybody on the educational team can access that information. And then share it with the next educational team. And then really always troubleshooting, meeting with each other through Zoom, because everybody is in different places. And discuss progress or troubleshoot some different areas. And don't forget, don't forget to involve families in choosing symbols and activities and share those strategies between home and school. Because like we discussed, when there is that home-school bridge, there are multiple opportunities to be able to practice these skills and our students have a greater chance of being able to anticipate and be an active participant. 

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Here are the resources that I used today. And that is all going to be listed in your handout.