whaT IS FORTLANDIA?

Fortlandia is an annual event at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center in Austin, TX . The center is dedicated to the conservation of native plants. Each year, a handful of forts are built outdoors in the Family Garden.

what is the design concept?

Words

One wall features picture symbols arranged in the form of an Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) board. These symbols correspond to core words and birdhouse “fringe” vocabulary. Core words account for 75-80% of the words we say every day while fringe vocabulary consists of low frequency words related to the specific environment. Gain access to a voice output AAC board by visiting Fortlandia!

Birds

The exterior walls of the fort feature a native Texas bird for every sound in the phonemic alphabet with corresponding American Sign Language and Braille. Various bird songs are displayed on the inside. Can you match the songs to a Texas bird? See below for the answers.

what is the hardest part of designing a fort?

Pediatric speech language pathologists constantly design language-rich environments to motivate kids. We want our fort to showcase the pretend play component of communication development. The challenge of this design was how to represent this within a static structure, so that children can interact intuitively, and have some fun. We hope that our fort sparks the imagination!

featured mnemonic bird songs

The following are bird song mnemonic devices indented to assist in remembering and identifying bird songs.