Since we're talking about assistive technology this week, I thought I would comment on some of the things I've seen students use as well as what I think would be good technology to use.
I think the only assistive technology I've seen used in my classroom is an electronic word processor. A few years ago I had a student who took notes on it because he took forever to take notes by hand. He was a really bright kid, but he just wrote slowly.
Bringing up iPads again (which I'm probably going to do all the time), I spoke with one of the Special Education teachers at my school a couple weeks ago. She teaches English and just got an iPad cart earlier this year. She was telling me how she loves having them in her class because she can now use the iPads for students to have text read to them rather than having to read aloud to the class herself (and then repeat parts if one student falls behind). It frees her up to address each of the students on a more individual level, based on who needs the most help. I use my iPads similarly in math, by having students complete problems on a website that will walk the students through the solving process if they get stuck. It's basically impossible for 35 students to learn everything from me talking at the front of the room and then expect them to instantly understand everything I just covered. With iPads, I can "ignore" the ones who get it and let them work independently, and I can give more attention to those who are struggling with the concepts, or with staying on task!
Some of the resources I've found for assistive technology, in working on my case study are MathTalk and AbleData. These sites allow students to complete math worksheets online and let text be read to them. Sometimes LD students have trouble reading (or focusing while reading) and benefit from hearing the text. AbleData makes calculators that give audible feedback to confirm the buttons that were pressed, so students can verify that they've pressed the series of keys they intended to press.
This is really helpful to me. We don't have iPads in our school, but I have heard similar things from special educators (basically that the iPad is capable of performing the tasks that multiple assistive devices would). Thank you for sharing your links.
ReplyDeleteIs the program that you described using in your class MathTalk? Having a program that walks students through exercises is incredible, but the pricing on MathTalk was very high.
Nah, I use InteractMath.com. It's free and has hundreds of textbooks published by Pearson Education. (But I think they're only high school level and up books.) One thing that I think is nice about the site is that it looks exactly like the website that most every college uses for their math homework. I've helped some friends with their college math classes and noticed the exact same set-up, which I think is good for the kids because they're able to get used to the format while still in high school The students, however, probably hate me because the website can be pretty technical on answer format (e.g. they may ask for an answer as a simplified fraction, and the student types in a decimal answer...then it's going to get marked incorrect even if it is technically equivalent).
ReplyDeleteHi Joe,
ReplyDeleteLove your post. So, you disprove my post. Which is great. You demonstrate that a good teacher can allow students to move at their own pace using a good 1:1 program in the classroom, from IEP students to GT students. I guess the devil is in the training and practice. How long did it take for you to get to that point in your classroom before you could allow students to work alone with ipads and move at their own pace? Do the ipads in your classroom have only math apps and no other distractors loaded on?
I have seen 1:1 programs where the students own the device and carry it from class to class. This sense of ownership makes the program different and students have all types of stuff to distract them loaded onto their devices. Teachers give up and would rather not use the program. I like the program you describe where there is a cart in each classroom and the teacher controls the device: discipline-specific devices within each classroom for each student. This way the teacher knows the devices are up and running and they can be serviced better too.
I always enjoy your posts.
I'd say each school year it takes a few classes to get students comfortable with the apps that they need to use. One issue I always run into is that the website where my students do their work requires Flash player, which does not run on iPads normally. I had to get the county technology office to buy me "Photon" which is a web browser that allows Flash player to run. Sometimes it crashes while the students are working, and then they lose all their work. They freak out, but I tell them to just re-start from the problem they were currently working on and that they need to type out a sentence explaining the crash and how many were correct before it crashed. I'll take them at their word for how many they did (you know, unless I know the kid is obviously lying).
ReplyDeleteThe iPads do have apps for other subjects, but we never use them, and if they're "educational" the kids won't touch them if I don't force them to. I did put some math games on the iPads that I'll let them use if they finish early. I put restrictions on the iPads so they can't delete apps, but I want to be able to run updates. In order to run updates, you have to allow apps to be installed, so I'll occasionally catch a kid playing an app that he just downloaded and he'll get scolded and lose points for the day. If it happens a lot, I don't let them use iPads anymore.
Nice post, Joe. It was pretty insightful. I haven’t had to use any assistive technology in any of my years of teaching. I have seen it mentioned before when I looked over FFT observation reports. I wonder if ipads could help my students and their note taking skills. While I provide all the notes digitally to students, I would still like them to learn the skill and/or write down examples that I use. One of the drawbacks of giving the students the notes is they think once they have them they don’t need to read them or review them. This app looks promising, however it is not free. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/noteshelf-notes-pdf/id392188745?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D8
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