Assistive Technology: Access to Learning & Leisure: Day Seven (Thursday July 14th)

Alternate Access for students with low incidence disabilities (highest needs)

Video on Switch Access:
The video talks about the importance of support system and knowing that someone is on the other end of the phone if needed (therapists). Here we are, likely a few decades later and I find that this is quite far from reality in our board. There is a strict process to go through to get a referral into the board for OT or other supports and even then there is no guarantee that you will see them over the duration of the school year. If you do see them, you are lucky to see them once. I do realize that this is not the case for all school boards, however as a whole, I feel that we are moving in the wrong direction when it comes to strong support systems for our students.

Looking at the technology that Joy is using in the film, she is a student who would greatly benefit today from the use of an iPad with AAC apps to aid with communication.

One of the things that stood out for me in this video is that they said that they know that the alternate access for students is working when they are being included by other students outside of the school setting (ie. being invited to birthday parties, etc...)

I did find much of the video to be dated, especially in the way the students with disabilities were treated and referred to. We have come along way, not just in respect to technology, and it's important that that is remembered when we are in our own school settings to ensure that there is not a regression there as well. Presumed competency should always be where one starts and that wasn't what we were seeing in this video.

Centres: We got to explore centres that used a variety of switches and eye gaze.

#1. Powerlink/switches: This enables a person to turn a device on/off, on with a timer shutting it off, or the switch must be held down in order for the device to stay on.

10 ways to use the Power Link

fan

television

air conditioner

timers

bells

anything in kitchen (kettle, popcorn maker)

light

disco ball

heater

lamp

heat pad

vibrating massage pad

spinner

#2. On-screen Keyboard PC:

Options using the on-screen keyboard are having to click the actual letters or hover over the letters. There is also the scanner keyboard which highlights the on-screen keyboard and allows you to go through the keyboard row by row to select your letters. This option would be extremely long and slow to create even a short message.

#3. iPad and Switch Access via Bluetooth: Trying curling on this was a lot of fun! Though figuring out how to use it with two players was a bit more of a challenge.

AT and Me - excellent resource for Switch Access Apps

#4. Eye Gaze - Once calibrated, eye gaze is quite easy to use (for the activity that we were trying it on at least!). The calibration takes a few extra minutes to do but worth the time as it makes the program much more efficient for the user.

Activity ideas using this technology

AAC

music creation

typing using on-screen keyboard

math

educational games

reading

assessments

online research

social media/leisure activities

#5. Alternate keyboard for Chromebook:
The portability of the keyboard is not great. If it were stationary, it would be better but having to transport from location to location it is not good.
The keyboard offers the student greater contrast by having yellow keys with black writing as well as more easily visible read writing with larger letters/numbers and symbols.