Doctoral student in Cognitive and Language Sciences publishes e-book

João Canossa Dias, PhD student in Cognition and Language Sciences at the Instituto de Ciências da Saúde (Lisbon), co-authored by Isabel Monteiro and Sara Soares (ESSUA) and Professor Ana Mineiro (ICS-UCP), published the e-book entitled "ToP: Shared Time Program".

The e-book is the guide to the ToP program, an approach that aims to ensure that people with intellectual and/or multi-disability difficulties do not miss opportunities for interpersonal interaction and communication. 

ToP is both an approach and an attitude, focusing on sharing time with the other person. Simple and easy to implement, the program provides opportunities for the user to reflect on how he/she interacts with the person with a disability, what effects the interaction has on him/herself and on the disabled partner, what works best, and how the communicative exchange evolves over time. All to prevent the social isolation to which people with intellectual disabilities and multiple disabilities tend to be most vulnerable.

HOP, the original version of ToP, was developed by Sheridan Forster during her career at Yooralla First Base in St. Albans, Victoria. Sheridan is an Australian speech therapist and researcher interested in interactions between caregivers and adults with profound disabilities and multiple disabilities.

In a context where therapeutic and pedagogical proposals to support people with more severe difficulties are scarce, this is a proposal that focuses on the essential: the relationship with the other and social inclusion.

Read the E-Book here.