Technology for Sensory Impairments (Visual)

Reading the Microsoft Accesibility article titled Guide for Individuals with Vision Impairments was personally the most useful to me. When thinking of strategies to implement into the classroom, this article gave many examples of resources available that I was unaware of.

For example, when accommodating a student who has low-vision, there are many tools that can be altered to benefit this particular students. First off, if you go into 'Settings' on Microsoft you can change the size of the text to help the student read it more easily. You can also change the contrast of the colors on the page, which is beneficial to all visual impairment students whether high and low because each color combination can be unique to the learner. Not all visual impairment learners are the same, like many disabilities there are different levels of impairment and therefore there is no universal tool, but rather different settings and options to mess around with until it suits the need of each individual. Being able to magnify text is also beneficial if you do not want to change the size of the text on the page in its entirety. You can also zoom in and out on particular webpages to view text easier. Changing the contrast of the page can also help functionality for learners who are colorblind. Lastly, for learners with low visual impairments using "Read Mode" can take away all of the distracting text around an article you are reading. This tool I believe is helpful for everyone, much like other Universal Design, because it takes away distractions and allows your eyes to focus only on what you are trying to read.

For students who are completely blind, there are also many tools that allow technology to be accessible. Options such as sound and touch allow a blind student to hear and interact with what is on the screen. Tools like speech recognition are also extremely important for a blind student because it allows the student to be able to type with their voices rather than having to see the keyboard. This allows a whole different sense of freedom and interaction with technology that before was not possible.

Overall, technology has continued to benefit all types of learners whether fully visually impaired or with a low visual impairment. Universal Design has continued to benefit learners of all needs and even learners without impairments. Assistive technology may not be able to remove the impairment but it helps allow full functionality of technology use to these learners.

Gifted and Talented Learners

There are multiple characteristics to help classify a student as a gifted and talented learner with or without a disability. For example, a gifted students without a disability would have the ability to learn basic skills quickly and easily and retain information with less repetition. A gifted student with a disability however would struggle to learn basic skills due to cognitive processing difficulties; need to learn compensatory strategies in order to acquire basic skills and information. Here are some other examples of characteristics of gifted learners. Being able to identify the process will allow the instructor to be able to demonstrate appropriate instruction. Some other strategies to implement for students with special learning disabilities (SLD's) with difficulty in for example composition, oral/written expression and/or a hearing or visual loss could include: using voice-recognition software, spell check, or reteaching these strategies for students who have not yet mastered the editing process.

Schools today have a hard time funding programs for gifted and talented learners in specific, so most of the time the teacher in a general education classroom must learn how to accommodate these learners and best fit their needs in the classroom. There are multiple learning activities to help provide technology solutions to these types of learners.

Having a virtual learning environment (VLE) available to your students is essential in helping to differentiate lessons and curriculum to each individual learners, gifted, learning impaired, or not. By using a VLE the teacher can create creative lesson plans and develop or modify these lessons to fit the needs and interests of the students. Integrating technology into the classroom is important to help implement challenging curriculum content effectively. By having an technology outlet (VLE's) you can ensure that each individual will be allowed an enriched learning experience and advanced study for learners at any level.

Technology and Communication Impairments

The assistive technology made for hearing and communication disorders today is outstanding. When thinking of the strategies I was going to use for students with receptive language difficulties, I began to realize that I didn't know much about the options for technology aids out there for students with these needs. However, upon reading the articles I realized that there are all types of assistive technology ranging from people with severe needs or simple impairments.

I found it interesting to read about HATS (Hearing Assistive Technology Systems); that they could be used for people without hearing aids or cochlear implants. This opened my mind to realize that hearing impairments aren't always so extreme but that they can be minor and are still just as important and impairing. HATS help with students who have trouble hearing from a distance, which most people have trouble hearing from far away anyways let alone a student with hearing loss. Also, background noise was another interesting perspective. Turning up the sound system to a particular decible to help the signal-to-noise ratio seems like a simple and extremely helpful use of technology. Lastly, the acoustics of the room. I had never considered how the sound echoed and bounced of the walls of different surfaces or how that would affect the way that I heard and understood it, but of course that is relevant and alters the way a person with an impairment hears what is being said.

On the other side, are devices that are created for people with hearing, speech, and language disorders. There are ALD's (Assistive Learning Devices), to help people with hearing aids and cochlear implants to amplify the sounds that they want to hear and drown out background noise. There are also AAC's (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) devices, which help people who have speech impairments to be able to facilitate a conversation through a computer program or picture board.

All of these devices should be used in a classroom where there is a student with needs,whether it be minor or more extreme. Using and incorporating this technology is the only fair way to ensure every student is being given an equal chance at success.

Using Technology for Autism

This week's readings opened our eyes to how technology is beneficial to people with autism. Autism is a harder disorder to understand for most simply due to the fact that not only is each person different, but their level of autism varies as well. From high to low on the spectrum, there is a huge  range of people with autism who all require different needs.

What I found to be really intriguing was reading testimonials from parents who have children with autism. One mother talked about how buying her three year old son an iPad was the best decision she ever made because it allowed him to talk with a specific app and openly engage in learning he desired. This really stood out to me because it really made me start to think about how technology can be tailored to each specific learner.

The open-endedness of the use of technology really started to open my mind. For children with autism and all of their special needs and diverse personalities technology seems to be the perfect answer to a question that has been asked over and over. How can we help these students so that everyone can succeed? The answer is simple to me now. Allow each student to use technology in the way that they specifically need it.

In college I worked with autistic children every Friday at the local high school. Immediately what I noticed was how different each of them were from each other. But they all had the same disorder, so how could this be? It showed me that there is not one key to unlock this problem, but rather a different key for each lock.