Communication Issues

Communication can be one of the biggest problems affecting people with a learning disability.  They cover a wide spectrum from fundamental language problems through limited vocabulary to understanding the context in which statements are made.  Most of us know that in the English language (and others) a single word can have radically different meanings depending on the context in which it is used.  This is why the development of computer translation software has been so challenging.  A recent visit to an English-German translation program translated "The sun is shining" into "The sun is polished"!  Now if the best of high IQ software developers are challenged by language, it can easily be seen that some people with a learning disability might struggle!

This area of the site is currently being developed; however, the objective is to have downloadable documents available on the right of this page that are designed to assist the advocate to understand what communication problems are known to exist and how they might be overcome.  This is a vital building block to being able to assess the person's communication skills, in order that the advocacte can plan an approach to communicating with the individual as part of a plan to achieve a high quality outcome to his or her assignment.

Once good communication is established, the problem of comprehension can be assessed and a strategy established to overcome this, if possible.  Comprehension will be assessed on a seperate page accessed from the left navigation menu.

Good luck!