Assistive Technology Again and Again

I've talked some about technology to assist individuals with disabilities and limitations from a strictly technological perspective, but through some of my site jumping I found some fun stuff. One of the sites that I ran into, then re-ran into, because at first I was like, "not going to work", but then my little light bulb flickered on. I went around in all of my classes a few days ago asking people about what they thought about a dog being a form of technology, most told me that I was an idiot. When people think of the word technology, they assume electronic. Through my research I've discovered that the word is not limited its electronic counterpart. I looked at it from a different perspective entirely. Take an example from my last post: the screen-reading program, perfect because the assistive portion of this technology isn't the program itself, it's the (product) voice that reads the screen and allows for someone with a visual impairment to "see" what is on the screen. What if one looks at a dog with a special holster. Is it a dog, or is the product of a specialized program that trains the animal to act as the eyes of someone who cannot see. Assistive Technology is an ever-evolving aspect of technology, and especially one that I feel educators must understand, if not master, and I hope that some of the information and insight that I found and provided can help open the eyes of some of the future and present educators that find themselves unable to "see" the big picture and "visualize" where technology is taking our classrooms.

Assistive Technology Cont'd

Today, I had a chance to experience first-hand the hardships of an individual with visual disabilities by trying to send an email to my professor with the computer monitor turned off. WOW. It was extremely difficult, and I would not have been able to do it without having partially memorized the steps that lead me to my email page, etc. Assistive Technologies provided me with a means to do this, however without practice its near impossible, with the implementation of a program that reads all of the text that is on a given page aloud. The screen-reading program can read webpages, word documents, desktops, virtually anything that pops up on a computer screen. There are various programs that can do this, but the two largest programs are JAWS and Kurzwell. The programs are not cheap, but in many cases funding can be provided through a number of different ways. I find it a very hard category to investigate, because everything is so interesting to me as a prospective special education teacher, everything is so inventive and in many ways more creative that any Da Vinci construction.

Technology In The Classroom

A lot of teachers state that they use technology in the classroom, the majority of these teachers think that using Microsoft Powerpoint makes them technologically proficient in the classroom. I'm not saying that this isn't true, rather I would like to point out that technology is a very, very broad concept. In essence, a chair with wheels is a form of technology, rolly chairs didn't exist in the days of the cavemen, but what else can fall into this category of overlooked forms of technology that teachers must become efficient with? I feel that there is a whole category of technological tools that the majority of teachers in classrooms today either overlook or unfamiliar with, and this category of technological devices is called Assistive Technology. Assistive Technology includes any form of technology that assists an individual in completing a task that would otherwise have been difficult if not impossible without its presense. Some would like to believe that assistive technology is limited to individuals with disabilities, I would like to disagree. Take for example, the multiplication of the numbers 1895473.385747 and 2222222.8973463948372827494, then divide that product by pi. Good luck, without the assistance of a calculator. Granted that the calculator you may use may be some generic computing device, or it may be modified with a bigger screen to incorporate larger numbers that may be easier to read with my poor vision. Assistive technology is a huge domain of technology that is metamorphic and often overlooked.

Google Docs

Two words: Google Documents. Put them together and BOOM... the possibilites are endless. I enjoyed getting reaquainted with the usefulness of GoogleDocs. The ability to write a document, then share it electronically with someone that can edit it is mind-boggling. My various groups in this class and other college level courses have used this tool time and time again. It's absolutely amazing. It helps save time, paper, and miscommunications. I know that if something as simple as this can be so helpful in school, that it's going to be a very useful implementation in school. If I can use is this effectively as a student, I can't imagine the impact that it's going to have if I can get my fellow teachers using it collaboratively.

Portaportal Assignment

I enjoyed the Portaportal Assignment. I think that it allowed for me to see the usefullness of the concept of having a virtual library. Portaportal provides me as a teacher a means to share my library of knowledge with my peers and students. Instead of telling my fellow teachers how to make a certain lesson plan, I can let them access my portaportal which has various links to websites that have lesson plan templates or websites that have links to hundreds of copyright friendly, free lesson plans online. I can't see myself utilizing this device right now, I don't have the time or the patience to share all of my resources with future competitors, but in the future I think that my time will be well invested in creating a community pool of resources. What could make a team of educators more effective than a program that allows them to share all of the wonderful sources that the internet provides.

New Tech Stuff

This week we learned in class how to create film clips using Windows Movie Maker. Some people are going to enjoy this project, while others are going to feel as though it is a chore. I'm probably going to ride the fence on this one. I see the benefits of knowing how to do it. It will allow me and my class to make fun videos to show off to parents on parent visitation night or open house. It will also provide me with the knowledge necessary to help my future students make their own movies to do projects or to develop the skills to teach others these skills. On the other hand, it's going to be difficult to familiarize myself with the program, after playing with the software for a couple hours now I'm exhausted and frustrated. Welcome to the 21st Century classroom experience, right?

What's New

I've been teaching myself Braille lately, and it made me realize that alot of classrooms are not exactly friendly to individuals with visually impairments. Technology usually takes the form of a computer in the classroom, or stuff presented to students electronically, but I very rarely see a classroom that utilizes Braille. I don't see Braille lettering labeling anything in a classroom, or a special drawer in a classroom where a teacher keeps a Braille keyboard, a subscription code for a screenreading program ready to install on a classroom computer, or anything of that nature. It always seems that if there is a student that is visually impaired in a general education classroom, they have to go somewhere else to play on a computer, or complete a homework assignment. We learn all of these things that we can utilize technology for, but very few people look further into how we are going to need to adapt these new tools for individuals with disabilities in our classrooms.