Do you know what assistive and adaptive technology is? Does it affect your classroom? Now that we have inclusion classrooms, with students with special needs, we need to use assistive and adaptive technology. Assistive technology is any technology used to directly help an individual with a disability in selection, aquisition or use a technology service. Adaptive technology is any hardware or software designed to help a user compensate for areas of disability or impairment. Adaptive technology gives individuals with disabilities the same access to information available to users who are not disabled.
Adaptive technology enhances the vocation, recreation, education and the independence of the user. With adaptive technology, blind and visual impaired students can learn at the at the same pace as the other students. There are essentially five methods of output that can render computers and printed materials accessible for individuals who are blind or visually impaired:
- Screen Reader
- Braille Printer
- reading device
- electronic Braille displays
- text magnification
Students who have learning disabilities generally don't have a hard time accessing standard computer equipment. The availiabity of specialized software and technology has provided a range of products suitable for educational accommodations that support reading, writing, and organizational skills. Here are some examples of computer accommodations for individuals who have learning disabilities:
- Word processors with grammar and spell checkers
- Word processors with ouline and highlighting capabilities
- Phonetic Spelling software which render phonetic spelling into correctly spelled words.
- Speech recognition products can help student dictate assignments and navigate the internet using voice commands
- Enlarged screen displays
- Speech output
- Different types of keyboard, monitor and etc.
- Mouth sticks, head sticks, or other pointing devices
As we teach disable students, I believe for us to be successful we must use assistive and adaptive technology in the classrooms. These student are capable of learning, just not as easy as the others.
Using technology to not only improve our students, but to help ones with disabilities is what it is all about. Their are tons of ways you can use adaptive technologies to help students in need and to make them feel like they are more part of the class. One of the better sites that I have found to purchase this type of equipment on the Internet is from a company called Enablemart. Here is their url if you would like to check them out http://www.enablemart.com/.
ReplyDeleteThe term "assistive technology" has usually been applied to computer hardware and software and electronic devices. However, many AT tools are now available on the Internet (Raskind).
References
Raskind, M. (n.d.). Assistive technology for kids with ld: An overview. Retrieved from http://www.greatschools.org/special-education/assistive-technology/702-assistive-technology-for-kids-with-learning-disabilities-an-overview.gs?page=1