AT Tasks Week 2--Part One

There's a lot to this post, so I organized according to the questions for Module 2

1). In the school I worked in, I think there are a variety of tools that could be helpful for students with disabilities. I particularly think that reading and writing tools are helpful for many students, not just students with disabilities. These include:
-Talking Word Processor (simply the fact that words/sentences can be read back to students especially helps students with learning disabilites
-Reading software (especially those that focus on word recognition skills, phonics, and the sounding-out of words)
-Vision Aids--not expensive but possibly very helpful are magnifying glasses (I also think that computer monitor magnifying aids are useful, too).
-Keyboards--here's where I can really see my school benefit (I really liked one-handed keyboards and enlarged print keyboards)
-Laptops (and increased # of this mobile carts would benefit both special education students and gen. ed students as well)
-SmartBoards--such an awesome tool, really helpful for visual learners.

2) Here's how I think AT could help in each hypothetical situation:
a. Situation--A student with learning disablities, particularly writing, consistently has errors (spelling, mechanics, proofreading) with his papers. Solution--try using the read aloud Word Processor where the student can "hear" his work read back to him. Hopefully, this ability will help him in the editing/revising phase of his papers and he can improve upon his ability to communicate his thoughts clearly.

b. Situation--Student with a vision impairment has trouble seeing the keyboard when typing classroom assignments. Solution--Low budget fix would be the attachment of larger print letter overlays on the existing keyboards. More expensive suggestions might include larger print keyboards such as "Keys-U-See" or perhaps "Bigs Keys Plus" an even larger font printed keyboard for those with vision impairments.

c. Situation--Student with autism as well as dysgraphia struggles with completing written assignments in class. Solution--perhaps consider the accommodation of dictation to another teacher or aide, shortened assignments. Also, allow student to provide verbal responses or use an AlphaSmart to compose written assignments, then connect AlphaSmart to computer for printing capabilities.

For the remainder of this module, I'll break up the activities in the next post.