Assistive/Adaptive Technology

To revise a lesson plan that includes a student with a disability I would first need to look at the students IEP to get a better understanding of the certain accommodation the student needs. This student should be considered in all aspects of the lesson plan; with analyzing the learners, modifying the objectives, and selecting the appropriate media, methods, and materials that may include assistive technology.

I thought about how I would modify our lesson for a student with Cerebral Palsy. In the first part with analyzing out learners, I would want to include a notation that indicates we have a student with Cerebral Palsy and that there will be accommodations for that student. I may want to include the information from their IEP that shows the student needs adaptive supports to compensate for his disability.

There should be special accommodations for the student in the area of learning styles. His IEP would state that his personal notes should be supplemented by including notes from his peers, overhead transparency copies, PowerPoint displays and print outs, and any other visual aids.

With our activity we have the students voting using popsicle sticks and create graphs using MS Excel. Our accommodation could be to have the student with Cerebral Palsy use a personal computer to vote by viewing the candidates’ picture on the computer. His computer should have computer adaptive hardware; key guard, adaptive mouse, specialty software with word prediction and mind mapping.

The student would have a non-distracting area where he can go to speak into the computer to complete his assignments. The assessments should be verbal and when that is not possible, the student should be given extra time to complete the activity. The evaluation of whether the revisions were appropriate will depend on the student’s ability to complete his work and the amount of time it takes to complete. In addition to our modifications to the lesson plan, the classroom will need to be modified with wider paths for the wheelchairs and a table that can be raised and lowered. The student’s IEP will be required for successful planning and structure of the classroom layout and lesson.

In newspapers, magazines, and educational articles researchers are beginning to report results of studies comparing the achievement of disabled students in an inclusive class with those in a separate special education class. So far, the students in the inclusive classes seem to be doing a little better, particularly in the social skill area.

Some people are worried that non-disabled students will suffer academically with the inclusion because of the special attention given to disabled students in their classes, but early studies indicate they do not. In fact, there are prospective benefits for non-disabled children such as reducing their fear of others who are very different from themselves.