Ms Carmel Ryan:

Fiacre is at the end stage in that he is now able to use iPads, computers and devices. Where he started, where RPM would have started and where we are starting in schools with students who are non-verbal, we would be starting at the beginning. We would be talking about training a tutor or bringing in a tutor. We have one girl in Ireland and a few in England and the US who would come and train teachers. A lot of teachers have done and looked at online training, as have many parents. This is where you would be starting - training teachers and SNAs in a method of assistive technology or RPM. That is where the initial cost would be.

It is relatively inexpensive because much of the time, you are using pencil and paper. I will do a quick demonstration. When we were starting off with Fiacre, and remember that at this stage he was non-verbal, he had lessons in school but not significant exposure to academic lessons. You would be starting with age-appropriate lessons. You would be doing a lesson so let us suppose we were before this committee. I would say to Fiacre, "Are we on the committee on autism or are we on the committee on environment?" Those would be his two choices. Again, you would check that he is listening and understanding. I would ask him whether we were on the committee on autism or the committee on environment. What are we talking about? The answer is "autism". That is just an example of how you would start. It is building tolerance, concentration and a skill. You have to cope with all of the sensory things. The committee can see Fiacre is very tired this morning. There is a lot to take in so he would probably get a lot of the answers wrong this morning. As you go along, you use that for ordinary lessons. If you are doing a lesson in geography, you would have a list of ten questions and give choices with "Yes" or "No" answers. Is it this or that? You would check that the child is listening. You build up a lesson and a lesson plan at the end of it.

Over time, Fiacre would have learned to spell on the letter board. Building up skills, he learns to spell words on the different letter boards. There is a number board on the other side so he can do maths as well. When Fiacre was doing leaving certificate maths, we had another more advanced version of this board where there were percentages, brackets and different symbols, including one for a calculator to which he would point when he wanted to use it. That was what we used for maths.

He built up from words to sentences to writing paragraphs.

He can use the keyboard also.