CCS: A New Tool on the Horizon for Assessing Communication Skills

As we continue to celebrate Better Speech and Hearing Month I was excited to see a new screening tool being developed out of the University of Kansas.  The Communications Complexity Scale or CCS is designed to measure the communication development of both children and adults with multiple disabilities including the severe/profound population, vision/hearing impaired and the more severe autism spectrum disorders.   The CCS presents a continuum which includes 11 levels of behavior associated with different stages of communication and incorporates early communication signals such as crying, eye gaze, and gestures to more complex speech using sounds and words.  These is great news for many of our children that we see and serve that we “know” have intellect, reason and other cognitive skill development, but  just don’t have a way to assess, understand or organize their means of communication.  You can find more information on the research study done on the CCS in the American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology (AJSLP). With all the advances in technology in combination with using an assessment tool like the CCS, our students with severe/profound disabilities may have more of a voice at last!