I've started a blog (in the blogger network) about ds1's talker & LAMP...

[saintlyjimjams]

If anyone wants to know anything more about LAMP please just ask - there are some links on the blog as well. Would love to know if anyone else is using LAMP.

There are a few baseline type videos on there at the moment and I'll start videoing him now regularly so you can see how he progresses. He is whizzing with LAMP to be honest - coming out with all sorts of words I didn't know he knew and beginning to tackle quite complex ideas (today he tried to tell me there was a ball behind the trampoline which he wanted me to pick up and put away )

Blog here: A Life Unlimited

You - and he - are so clever and inspirational. Always have been!

Thanks saintly I've been wondering how you and ds/Archie are getting on.
It's so exciting, your blog made me cry a wee bit.
I'm reading about spd, so the surfing stuff really makes sense too.
You should be writing about your experiences in print as well - challenging some of the rubbish that's pedalled about asc's

Thank you both :)

He's decided today that he wants to go surfing in northern Ireland. But then got very upset and anxious because he wants to go surfing in northern Ireland TODAY or TOMORROW. I think he's finally fallen asleep and hopefully will be less anxious tomorrow. It's been one of those very autistic days, iykwim!

Being able to wait until tomorow for something sounds pretty mature to me.
Saintly, can your DS read? Is there a reason why he's using the LAMP system and not typing to talk?

He won't type - we have tried. I have no idea whether he can read or not tbh - he can certainly read some things, (so he'll read an address on google maps that comes up - select the correct one - but cannot write out the whole thing if that makes sense) but I have no idea how much. I also think a lot of his language is 'missing' - he's never thought in sentence AFAIK so typing is difficult. He did type out his name once, and bus, but usually it was very hard for him to stay on task with typing and very very very slow.

LAMP is fast and can give a pretty natural speed of conversation by fluent users (in full sentences as well). He's pretty much refused all other communication aids so his preference for LAMP was a massive surprise (I assumed he'd refuse to use the device when we had it on trial - his response really took me by surprise). It just seems to work for him at the moment. Typing could be a long term goal, although tbh having seen fluent users of LAMP I'm not sure it's that likely to be necessary (unless he develops Lucy Blackman levels of language)- and I can't see him being faster typing than he is with this.

Oh he wasn't willing to wait until tomorrow - he was just livid it won't be until the summer

I will blog about that sometime though - because we did look into typing a lot, and tried various methods. There is quite a bit out there for people who want to give it a go.