Jounal 8: Adaptive Technology

Communication:
Augmentive and Alternative Communicataion (AAC) includes all types of communication excluding oral communication that are used to express thoughts, needs, wants, and ideas. (asha.org)

An example of a low tech tool is using gestures within the classroom. In order for this system to be successful, the teacher and all of the students would have to clearly act out and show rather than tell information so that all students would understand, the special needs child would understand the teacher and classmates and vice/versa. This system, if succesful, will be able to eliminate the communication barrier.

An example of a low tech software tool would be the Click-N-Type virtual keyboard. This software is designed for students that may not have the ability to type and a computer keyboard but can use a pointing device or a computer mouse. It is a virtual keyboard that appears on the computer screen and works with any Microsoft Windows from 1995 to Windows 7. This will allow students that may not be able to type to still be able to search the internet and communicate electronically.



An example of a high tech hardware tool would be an iPad. There are several programs on the iPad that are extremely beneficial for classroom use such as Mathboard and Flashcards Deluxe. Mathboard has sources to help students with their math such as a mulitplication table and other visual math tools to help students learn. Also, flashcards deluxe helps students learn their vocabulary in a fun, innovative way. It also pronounces the words so there is no confusion.

An example of a high tech software would be Verbose, a text to speech converter that can read text aloud or save spoken text to mp3 files. This would be a great software for students with vision or reading disabilities. It also works great for students that are audio learners rather than visual learners. There many adjustable options such as pitch, tone, volume, and speed so it can help a large range of students.



Accessibility:
Input device is any machine that feeds data into a computer. So, an input device for special needs users could be a trackball instead of a mouse. It is an input device that is especially helpful for students that have limited fine motor skills, such as the ability to hold a pencil and write or dragging and picking up the mouse.