Augmentative and alternative communication (aac) reading system

An augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) system comprising:

• a user interface module configured to control rendering of visual data on a display, output of audio data and receiving user inputs;
• a symbol display controller configured to control allocation of symbols to symbol positions for rendering and display in an AAC layout by the user interface module, and access a symbol library storing data a plurality symbol records each symbol record including a unique symbol identifier and being associated with a symbol graphic file for the symbol;
• and
• memory storing dictionary data and book data for at least one book,
• the dictionary data storing:
• a set of a plurality of word records, each word record being associated with a word and comprising a word identifier unique within the dictionary, the word text, a symbol identifier for the word, and sound data to enable audible reproduction of the word via the user interface, the set of word records including a record for each one of all words occurring in the text of the at least one book,
• one or more display data structures, each display data structure comprising a display data structure identifier, a data record defining a set of lexical elements and an order for display of the lexical elements in n display positions, each one of the n display positions being allocated to a respective one of the lexical elements, each lexical element comprises a set of up to m semantically related words, where each of the up to m words is a word variant associated with a different one of m word categories, each word variant being associated with a symbol conveying meaning for the word variant, each word of a book occurring within a display data structure for the book, and, for each book, the book data comprises book text data encoded to reference word identifiers for each word of text of the book, sequence data for the book, and identifiers of display data structures for all words in text of the book;
• wherein the symbol display controller is configured to for each word, determine a display data structure including the word and identify symbols to populate the n symbol display position based on word category based on sequence data for the book and received user input, such that the symbols displayed will correspond to at least the symbol required for the user to select via the user interface for audio output based on reading sequence of the book.