Group items tagged

"Graham's review of the research doesn't resolve the age-old debate of whether students learn writing best naturally -  just by doing it - or through explicit writing instruction. But there are effective practices where the research is unequivocal. Distressingly, many teachers aren't using them. "We have confirmation of things we know that work, but are not applied in the classroom," said Graham."

Most students with autism hate to write. Even simple writing assignments require skills in language, organization, sensory, and visual motor areas. I Hate to Write is a new book from autism consultants Kathy Oehler and Cheryl Boucher that helps teachers look at the writing process through the eyes of a student with autism. By focusing on the four aspects of writing that are most problematic for students with ASD - language, organization, sensory, and visual motor skills - teachers will learn new ways to help students with ASD become happy, successful writers.

"he two newest additions to our Read&Write family, Read&Write for iPad and Read&Write for Android are easy-to-use alternative keyboards with integrated features to help with writing content for emails, social media and even interacting with online forms. They're great for anyone who needs a little support with their reading and writing."

"What does writing for students with significant disabilities look like? How can we engage them in the process of writing? It is important not to mistake tasks that develop matching, memorizing, copying or fine motor skills with the learning process of writing. Students with disabilities need to experience the same processes as those without when developing writing. They need to scribble and explore and progress from being emergent to conventional writers."

"The Read&Write GOLD training series walks learners through all of the features found on the Read&Write GOLD toolbar, including features for reading, writing and self-editing, study skills, and research.",  said Jon Blissenbach, Atomic Learning's VP of Product Business Development. "Our partnership with Texthelp allows us to offer this comprehensive training collection for learners with special needs." Videos are available for both the PC and Mac versions of Read&Write GOLD.  Each online training collection includes 2-3 minute videos for each of the features of this powerful assistive technology software, giving learners with special needs the opportunity to achieve and succeed in their learning goals

"Write About This is a visual writing prompt & creation platform perfect for classrooms and families! With endless ways to respond and the ability to craft custom photo prompts, it will kick-start any writing activity. 125 categorized images & 375 text+voice prompts included! "

The National Writing Project's 30 Ideas for Teaching Writing offers successful strategies contributed by experienced writing project teachers.

"Write or Die is a web application that encourages writing by punishing the tendency to avoid writing. Start typing in the box. As long as you keep typing, you're fine, but once you stop typing, you have a grace period of a certain number of seconds and then there are consequences."

"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"

"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."

"Lists for Writers is a great addition to any writer's toolbox. Helpful to both novice and expert writers alike, this app delivers list after list of prompts and ideas for your brainstorming sessions: names, character traits, plot lines, occupations, obsessions, action verbs, and much more! Whether you are working on a creative writing project, a short story, an essay assignment, National Novel Writing Month / NaNoWriMo, or your next fiction book, this app helps get it done."

"Easy Spelling Aid is simple to use, extremely responsive and importantly, when writing, delivers instant results. Just say a word or phrase into the app and view the results in upper and lower case letters, atop writing lines to assist with writing."

"I created WriteRoom as an alternative to Microsoft Word. WriteRoom's full screen writing environment gets your computer out of the way so that you can focus on your work. The result is a subtle clearing of the mind that I think helps you write better. Simply get words on the page WriteRoom won't do page layout or insert tables and graphs. WriteRoom's focus is just to help you get words on the page. Stay focused with WriteRoom's distraction free environment. Stay on track with word count. Stay safe with autosave."

"Welcome to the Infinitec Writing Series Today's workshop will provide an overview and hands-on practice with various tools that can help support students in the writing process. This workshop wiki serves as a guide for today's activities and provides additional resources that will supplement today's content."

Karen Erickson's observation forms for visiting their model classrooms. "# Read about some of the key activities that will be observed in the classrooms: * Shared Reading * Self-Selected Reading * Self-Selected Writing # Download the three guided observation forms for the above activities. Visitors will need to bring these forms to the visit. Visitors will use these forms to guide their observation of shared reading, self-selected reading and self-selected writing. The forms are organized by the key components and steps of the lessons with places to take notes, as well as places to jot down questions for the teacher. In order to make the time as productive as possible, these completed forms will be used to structure the discussion with the teacher /after/ the lesson. When the school visit is over, the observation forms can be a valuable lesson planner for visitors who want to implement these activities in their own classrooms. * Shared Reading Guided Observation Form * Self-Selected Reading Guided Observation Form * Self-Selected Writing Guided Observation Form"

Writing with the iPad presentation notes

"Learn about assistive technology for people with reading disabilities, low vision, blindness and other disabilities that make reading, writing and other tasks difficult. Written by someone who uses assistive technology to read and write."

"Check the boxes next to the accommodations that best match the student's needs. Then click the "See how Read&Write GOLD can help" button to create the student's personalized Read&Write GOLD user guide."

"Writer is the coolest, fastest, distraction-free writing tool around. No fonts, no bold, no italics-just you and your words. - Fast and distraction-free - Saves your writing automatically - Choose any foreground/background color - Custom fonts and line spacing"

"This easy-to-use reading and writing App runs directly on the iPad with no Wi-Fi or 3G access necessary. It includes powerful support features that benefit struggling readers and writers of all ages, especially those with dyslexia, dysgraphia, or other learning difficulties. iReadWrite is an affordable all-in-one solution for anyone looking for reading and writing support as they work on their iPad! "