Upcoming Events

Diagnostic Center North: Telling Stories in School with Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) In Person

SCOE: 5340 Skylane Boulevard, Santa Rosa, CA 95403

April 25th, 2025 - 9:00 am

Presenter(s)

Intended Audience

  • Speech-language pathologists
  • Special education teachers

Narrative skills are essential to both social and academic development, but these important skills are often overlooked for students who require augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), particularly when students are at the beginning stages of language development and device use. How can we support the development of these crucial skills in storytellers who use AAC? This session examines the importance and assessment of narrative skills for these students. Finally, we explore evidence-based interventions to support the telling of both personal and fictional narratives from the beginning levels of storytelling to development of episodic stories.

Participants Will

  • Describe the importance of narrative skills for the social and academic development of AAC users
  • Evaluate students' current level of narrative skills
  • Develop intervention plans to increase students' narrative skills

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Telling Stories in School with Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) In Person

SCOE: 5340 Skylane Boulevard, Santa Rosa, CA 95403

April 25th, 2025 - 9:00 am

Date:  4/25/25
Time:  9:00 - 12:00
Format:  In-Person
Location: Sonoma County Office of Education
5340 Skylane Blvd, Santa Rosa, CA 95403
 

Presenter(s)

Intended Audience

  • Speech-language pathologists
  • Special education teachers

Narrative skills are essential to both social and academic development, but these important skills are often overlooked for students who require augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), particularly when students are at the beginning stages of language development and device use. How can we support the development of these crucial skills in storytellers who use AAC? This session examines the importance and assessment of narrative skills for these students. Finally, we explore evidence-based interventions to support the telling of both personal and fictional narratives from the beginning levels of storytelling to development of episodic stories.

Participants Will

  • Describe the importance of narrative skills for the social and academic development of AAC users
  • Evaluate students' current level of narrative skills
  • Develop intervention plans to increase students' narrative skills

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Diagnostic Center North: Social Communication in School-Age Students- Part 2 of 2

Virtual

April 29th, 2025 - 12:30 pm

Presenter(s)

Intended Audience

  • Speech-language pathologists
  • Administrators
  • Special education teachers
  • School psychologists

Sessions

  • IN014: In-Person (3 hours)
  • IN032: Virtual session 1 of 2 (1.5 hours)
  • IN033: Virtual session 2 of 2 (1.5 hours)

George is having a hard time making friends. In conversations, he sometimes interrupts or changes the topic abruptly. He doesn't pick up on nonverbal cues and often misinterprets his classmates' intentions or feelings. In the classroom, he struggles to follow rules. He always seems to be in trouble. His classmates sometimes tease him. As part of an interprofessional team we are often asked to evaluate and intervene with students who, like George, struggle with social communication. This training will address what social communication is, how we assess it and evidence-based strategies for intervening. The training will focus on students who are in late elementary through high school.

Participants Will

  • Define social communication and its disorders
  • Describe assessment strategies for students' social communication
  • Explain how to implement evidence-based interventions for students who struggle with social communication
  • Work as part of an interprofessional team to address social communication

A Certificate of Completion is available for virtual trainings, in-person trainings, Special Training Opportunities and Technical Assistance Projects. This may be used to document professional development hours or applied towards the credential requirements for Education Specialist Level II non-university activities.

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Diagnostic Center North: It’s Not Chemistry, it’s the Communication Matrix! Understanding the Tool and Interpreting Results

Virtual

April 30th, 2025 - 2:30 pm

Participants Will

  • Learn about the foundations and structure of the Communication Matrix
  • Review early means, functions, and developmental levels of communication, and learn how they are mapped on a Communication Matrix profile
  • Learn how to administer the Communication Matrix as an assessment tool
  • Learn how to interpret Communication Matrix results in order to plan goals and monitor progress

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Afterschool Special Series: Q & A Forum

Virtual

May 7th, 2025 - 3:30 pm

Welcome to the final session of our virtual training series! Throughout this journey, Sheri Roberge, aka ‘Ace of SEIS,’ and John Fischer, aka ‘FAPE Guy,’ have walked you through creating effective, legal, and error-free IEPs, one page at a time. Now, it's time to wrap things up with a Q&A session—no specific page to cover, just a chance for you to ask all your burning questions! This is the last training in the series, so let's make it a great one!

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DTUG

SCOE: 5340 Skylane Boulevard, Santa Rosa, CA 95403 or Virtual

May 21st, 2025 - 9:00 am

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DTUG

SCOE: 5340 Skylane Boulevard, Santa Rosa, CA 95403 or Virtual

June 17th, 2025 - 9:00 am

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