Group items tagged

"This website is intended to provide information about the provision of assistive technology (commonly referred to as "AT") in the K-12 school setting, to Illinois educators and parents. The determination of a student's need for AT, selection of the appropriate AT, implementation of AT services and ongoing support for a student using AT is an critical process requiring many individuals, including a wide variety of school professionals as well as the student and their parents or guardians, to work together to determine how the student can best meet his or her educational objectives."

"This website is intended to provide information about the provision of assistive technology (commonly referred to as "AT") in the K-12 school setting, to Illinois educators and parents.  The determination of a student's need for AT, selection of the appropriate AT, implementation of AT services and ongoing support for a student using AT is an critical process requiring many individuals, including a wide variety of school professionals as well as the student and their parents or guardians, to work together to determine how the student can best meet his or her educational objectives."

"iWordQ US (English) is an easy-to-use writing and reading application to assist struggling writers and readers. In Writing mode, a simple text editor is used for writing with the support of word prediction, abbreviation-expansion and speech feedback features. Spell-check and dictionary access is included. Use speech recognition with an iPad 3. In Reading mode, text is shown in a more visually pleasing manner to improve readability. This is used for proofreading, reading to learn, silent reading, reading aloud, and casual reading/listening. A novel text chunking method (patent-pending) can be selected to enhance comprehension and readability of text to allow you to focus on one text chunk at a time"

"The ICATER ToolKit highlights two particular projects, Weekly AT App Reviews and AT Tips of the Day. In the Weekly App Reviews Section, users will be able to view short, concise webinars of apps that can be used to help students with disabilities. In the AT Tip of the Day section, users will see short nuggets of information on AT in education that can easily be implemented by teachers for each day of the school year."

"Creative Book Builder is a fantastic app that allows students to create books in epub format, which can then be exported to iBooks and shared with others. There are a variety of instructional uses for this app, from using it as a publishing tool for project-based learning to a summative assessment at the end of a unit.  Students can embed images, audio files, video files, and write text.  The advantage of an epub document over a PDF document is that all of the media will be preserved and available for readers to interact with when the final product is published.   Depending on how you use Creative Book Builder with students, this app can help students complete tasks that align with every level of the revised Bloom's Taxonomy.  Explore the different ways this app can be used at each level of Bloom's Taxonomy."

Gayl Bowser's blog We'll talk about implementation planning in the fall as well as other aspects of starting a school year with assistive technology. In the winter we will focus on functional use of AT and the development of new AT skills. In the spring, we will begin planning for transitions and summer use of AT outside of the school setting. We will share resources, ideas and strategies. This is an invitation for you to have a dialog with me. I am hoping that you and I can share our experiences and ideas about supporting assistive technology services throughout the school "seasons".

"Speakbook is an easy to use, easy to learn, communication tool for people who can't speak and can't use their hands.  With Speakbook you can talk using only your eyes. Find out where to get a Speakbook, or download the PDF for FREE here and have it printed cheaply at your local copy shop - or print it yourself at home."

"The use of Participatory Action Research (PAR) during the project ensures that TATE SIP is informed by stakeholder input throughout the development and evaluation phases. Outcome measures will include evaluation of device use (device skill acquisition), device usability (skills used in targeted environments), functional performance (activities of daily living affected by device use), quality of life (subjective well-being) and social participation (community integration). To ensure the TATE SIP reaches its intended audiences-survivors of TBI and the individuals who will train them to use ATC-we are working with a national group of researchers, practitioners, consumers, and advocacy organizations to support recruitment and dissemination activities. Presentation Training Assistive Technology Post-ABI Project Updates Training Assistive Technology in the Environment (TATE) Project Update 02/28/2012 Project Update 04/11/2011 Project Update 07/09/2012 Project Update 08/26/2011 Project Update 10/24/2012 Project Update 11/05/2012 Projects Access to Services Transition Web Problem Solving Strategies Oregon Traumatic Brain Injury Educational Consulting Team Building Capacity STEP TBI Web-Based Family Support Training Assistive Technology in the Environment (TATE) News & Events Cory's Corner: A Personal Perspective The seventh issue of Cory's Corner explores the dynamics of ... May 2013 TBI Team Training Effective Tools and Strategies for Behavior Management when a Student ... "

"This book aims to supply a few ideas and activities that could be useful for a youngster who uses AAC, by: Providing a reason to make sure that the Talker is always out of its bag, charged up, and on the table/wheelchair mount ready for daily use; Filling up some of those gaps in the school day with constructive and fun activities Helping the youngster to learn and practise - in other words, use - his or her Talker to enjoy interactions with others and build up useful social and communicative experiences."

"Large numbers of consumers, parents, teachers, therapists and AT professionals  purchase mobile and handheld devices and downloading various apps to be used as assistive technology and educational software for people with disabilities. The ability to test and review every app that can be used in this manner is nearly impossible. To aid Maine consumers and AT professionals who may be interested in knowing more about what's out there, we have assembled this resource."

One of the major benefits of using technology in the classroom is the ability to differentiate instruction to meet the needs of every student in every lesson. Just as every student grows and develops at different rates, they learn in different ways and at different speeds. Technology makes it possible to pace lessons appropriately for each student's learning level and can be used to promote learning in the multiple intelligences. Below you will find website suggestions that address the different learning styles in your classroom with the help of technology:

"AnswerGarden is a minimalistic feedback tool. Use it in the classroom as an educational tool or at work as a creative brainstorming tool. Or you can embed it on your website or blog to use it as a poll or guestbook. How does AnswerGarden work? You create an AnswerGarden by entering a topic on the Create New AnswerGarden-page. Then you'll be redirected to your newly created AnswerGarden. Since no-one has posted an answer yet, your AnswerGarden will still be empty. The next step is to share your AnswerGarden. Use it live in the classroom, at a meeting or a conference."

"JASPER (Joint Attention Symbolic Play Engagement Regulation) is a treatment approach based on a combination of developmental and behavioral principles developed by Dr. Connie Kasari at the Center for Autism Research and Treatment, at University of California, Los Angeles. This intervention model targets the foundations of social-communication (joint attention, imitation, play), uses naturalistic strategies to increase the rate and complexity of social-communication, and includes parents and teachers as implementers of the intervention to promote generalization across settings and activities and to ensure maintenance over time. Dr. Kasari and her colleagues have tested this approach in a series of target and modularized research studies. In the first randomized controlled trial, 58 preschool children with autism were recruited from an early intervention program based on applied behavior analysis, and were taught joint attention and play skills. This study showed promising evidence that a child-centered treatment focused on early social-communication deficits of joint attention and play could lead to improvements in these core deficits while also increasing the child's use of language (Kasari et al, 2006, 2008, 2012) over a 5 year span. Researchers are continuing to test the use of JASPER with children of various ages (infants to school-aged) and across various settings (clinic, home and schools)."

Available for download, the booklet and DVD 'GETTING STARTED!!! Using Visual Systems to Promote Communication'. These resources were produced with funding received by School for Parents from the Non Government Centre Support for Non School Organisations of Western Australia. The booklet has been written for parents and discusses a range of visual systems they can use at home to develop their child's communication skills. Along with the booklet is a DVD which demonstrates the use of the visual systems discussed in the booklet. Although this resource is for parents it will also be useful for early childhood educators, child care staff, teachers, therapists etc.

Thinking Blocks was developed by Colleen King in 2003 to help students who were struggling with math word problems. Before creating Thinking Blocks, Colleen was using problem sets from Singapore Math texts in a course for accelerated students at a math enrichment center. The model drawing approach in these texts gave upper elementary students a path to more advanced concepts and algebraic reasoning. Colleen sought a more flexible solution for struggling learners and designed a model drawing application called Blocks. The first group of students to test the program often made comments about how smart they were when using Blocks and how Blocks made "their brains work better". Colleen observed students who were reasoning, understanding, and problem solving. Her students were using thinking Blocks. Today Colleen uses Thinking Blocks and, more generally, the Singapore model drawing approach with students who have very diverse mathematical backgrounds. While the concept of modeling word problems is most closely associated with Singapore Math, Colleen has found it to be compatible with all elementary math programs."

"iWordQ US (English) is an easy-to-use writing and reading application to assist struggling writers and readers. In Writing mode, a simple text editor is used for writing with the support of word prediction, abbreviation-expansion and speech feedback features. Spell-check and dictionary access is included. Use speech recognition with an iPad 3, 4, mini."

"MyTalkTools Mobile Lite is a fully-functional version of MyTalk Mobile with 20 cell capacity, using one or two boards. Using the 20 cell capability offered by MyTalk Mobile Lite, users can gain comfort with the MyTalk Mobile Lite and MyTalk Workspace, our online (authoring) board building tool. Using MyTalk Mobile Lite, experience the ultimate in customizable communications. If you find that MyTalk Mobile Lite provides the right solutions, but you would like the increased capacity of 32,000 cells, consider MyTalk Mobile. MyTalk offers ease of use and time-savings in a portable, effective, and cool communication tool. MyTalk helps people communicate in a whole new way. "

"This comprehensive resource provides detailed information and a range of templates to support the production and use of Pragmatic Organisation Dynamic Display (PODD) communication books. This resource provides practitioners with templates and guidelines to develop an appropriate communication book and also describes comprehensive strategies to enable the use of the system in the child`s daily life - at home, at school and in the community. "

"Accessing Curriculum Through Technology Tools (ACTTT) developed and evaluated an integrated technology tool curriculum to support learning standards and provide access to the general early elementary curriculum. The ACTTT model was developed and tested in kindergarten, first, and second grade classrooms at Westview Elementary School, Lincoln Elementary School, and Eastview Elementary School in Canton, Illinois. Participants included children with typical development, children with disabilities, and children at risk for learning failure. Among the technology tools used in the curriculum were the Internet; computers, digital cameras, digital microscopes, video, printers, scanners, and switches; and software used for writing, graphing, mapping, authoring, graphics, and concept development."

Quick Artic is a free IPhone application for Speech Language Pathologists which contains 566 images tagged with titles and categorized by "phonemes". This easy to use application features a scoring utility which keeps track of the correct and incorrect answers. Quick Artic automatically calculates the score.The application includes ten most common phonemes in all positions of words. It can be used in therapy or for quick articulation screening. To activate the application Speech Language Pathologists must register at Virtual Speech Center Inc. website at: https://www.virtualspeechcenter.com/register.aspx