Strategy 4 The Art of Waiting

WHAT?

Everyone who uses AAC needs enough time. Caregivers and communication partners need to provide enough time for the person using AAC to:

- claim their turn in the conversation

- process what was said and what they want to say

- compose their message

Provide a wait time (up to 45 seconds) to support people who use AAC to claim more conversation turn and use more words (Mathis, 2010).

WHY?

In AAC intervention, sometimes a pause is more powerful than anything we can do or say. It is more effective than us repeating or rephrasing, because those can interfere with processing. Waiting is also more helpful than a question or a command, because overuse of those can build prompt dependency or learned helplessness (Zangari, 2014).

HOW?

1. Wait for the individual to talk, don’t say a word, and keep looking at them.

2. Show how interested you are (you can arch your body towards the individual).

3. Count in your head to 45. That may feel like a long time, but that’s ok.