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SPECIFIC FEATURES OF ALTERNATIVE COMMUNICATION WITH CHILDREN WITH SENSORY DISORDERS AND MULTIPLE DISABILITIES

The article is focused on the communication with children with special educational needs. The main topic is alternative communication with children with sensory disorders and multiple disabilities. It explores the phenomenon of communication, citing current definitions developed by a number of authors, which place the emphasis on different aspects of this complex and multilayered process, with a special focus on alternative communication with the groups of special needs children mentioned in the title.The issue is investigated from a special pedagogical and from a social perspective.The author is especially interested in the exploration of the multiple strata of communication (the universal, functional and specific levels). Apart from the different forms, contents, methods and means of communication (the last of which is most commonly discussed in Bulgaria), the article is focused primarily on the important methodological issues related to this topic.One of these basic questions of methodology is the attempt not to place at the center of this process its bi-directional nature, its algorithm or code (sign language, Braille writing system, etc.), but instead to focus on the personalities of those involved in the interaction, their initiative, relationship and goals manifested in different communication situations (mutual influence, emancipation and therapy). Particular emphasis is given to therapy, i.e. the way of influencing the communication behavior of children with sensory disorders and multiple disabilities. It is not viewed as a unilateral process (stimulus-response), but as an interactive one, based on mutual influence. The relationship between the communicators is of utmost significance.Communication is characterized by a number of specific features. Those can mostly be found in the specificity of the communication situations (for example the interactive situations in the following pairs of communicators: deaf – hard of hearing; deaf – deaf; deaf-blind – deaf, etc.), in the presence of an intermediary (for example a sign language interpreter) and above all in the personalities of the communicators. They change the quality of communication. It is for this reason, and not just because of the different means of communication, that this interaction is defined as “alternative”, or more precisely, it is an alternative to the communication of children without disabilities.Based on the analyzed information, the author formulates a number of inferences and recommendations. The main conclusion is the following:When discussing alternative communication with children with special educational needs, the focus should shift from the specific means of communication towards the equally socially important quality of the complex process of communication, which is centered on the personality of the handicapped child.