Blog Post #8: Assistive Technology, Accessibility, and Digital Tools
Accessibility and Digital Tools
image source: hope-haven.org
Assistive Technology
Assistive technology allows the curriculum to become accessible for students with disabilities. There are different levels of assistive technology ranging from low/no tech to high-tech. As a special education teacher, I have used many of these tools to provide accessibility to my students. From the low/no-tech category, I most often use highlighters, color coding, read to out loud, and proof readers. In the mid-tech level, my students have access to word prediction, text to speech, speech to text, organizers, and e-books. The high-tech tools I use in class are computers and tablets. Although I have a lot of experience with many of these assistive technology tools, I still wonder what other resources are out there that I'm missing. I decided to explore the Google Tools for Special Needs article by Eric Curts to get a few more ideas. Many of my students who benefit from assistive technology use a Chromebook daily, so I thought this would be a great place to start.
image source: seymoureci.wordpress.com
Google Tools for Special Needs
Eric Curts's article lists tools that are created by Google and built directly into their products, while other tools are apps, extensions, etc. Some of the apps and extensions that are created by Google are text-to-speech features. These include Read & Write for Google, SpeakIt!, and Announcify. Text-to-speech is helpful for students that struggle with written expression. I have found it to be successful when helping students become more independent in their writing. Curts also mentions some speech-to-text apps that allow people to dictate directly into a document. A new tool I discovered from this article is SummarizeThis. This tool allows users to copy and paste information into the app and receive a summary with only the most important parts of the text. Some of the tools listed that I already use are Newsela and CC (closed captions) in YouTube videos. From personal experience, I love using Newsela because teachers have access to the same article at multiple lexile levels. I have used this several times with my students to make the same text accessible to multiple people.
Artifact: Chromebook Accessibility Features
I chose to explore the accessibility features of a Chromebook. Below, you can see an infographic I created as a tool to help my students understand these features on their Chromebooks. Most of the features listed are built-in features. In my class, many of my students who benefit from these accessibility features are provided with a Chromebook. I decided it would be helpful for me to explore the other built-in features, as well as some of the extensions and apps that are compatible with Chrome.
One of the features I really liked was the "highlight cursor text." Although it seems simple, many of my students struggle to find the mouse cursor or the text insertion point. I've already been using speech to text and text to speech features with my students. However, I feel that I can take more advantage of the "select to speak" feature, which will read highlighted words on the screen. I never thought about why an on screen keyboard would be useful until researching these features. I realized that some people have difficulty typing on a standard keyboard and may need to use a mouse or joystick to select keys. Overall, the Chromebook has a variety of good built-in features. It also has a great selection of extensions to provide accommodations to students.
infographic created by Kate Stanley using venngage
Reflection
As a special education teacher, I feel that I've been doing a good job at incorporating assistive technology into my classroom. I am almost always using some sort of assistive tech, especially during reading and writing. I didn't know that the Chromebook had accessibility features built-in, and I can do better when researching what features are already included in certain types of computers and tablets. I will definitely be using some of these Chromebook features with my students in the future.
Sources
Curts, E. (n.d.). Google tools for special needs*. Google Docs. Retrieved October 5, 2021, from https://docs.google.com/document/d/1J2Lve_Ta8t22UDFvAlG5mW8WLxXP0BIMwabWJk7FhI8/edit.
Google. (n.d.). Chromebook accessibility | google for education. Google. Retrieved October 5, 2021, from https://edu.google.com/intl/ALL_us/why-google/accessibility/chromebooks-accessibility/.
The amount of accessibility features that are included in many of the products our students use daily is amazing. These not only level the playing field for those that need additional support but there are students that are unidentified that can benefit as well.
ReplyDeleteHello Kate!
ReplyDeleteYour post was incredibly helpful to me. For my artifact, research, and post, I decided to go with the Twitter option because I am loving Twitter, but I almosttt went the exact route you did, making a visual specifically about Chromebook accessibility features. My students also use Chromebooks daily, not necessarily always in my class, but in at least one other or more classes throughout their school day. I need to be better about knowing all the different Chromebook accessibility features MYSELF so that I can implement them with students that will benefit from them. Your image is a great resource on helping me learn the incredible features. I saved it to my desktop, I hope that's okay! :)
I’m glad it was helpful for you! And yes, you’re welcome to use it! -Kate
DeleteGoogle has so many great assistive tools! I remember taking a technology class in college and one day we spent a good amount of time going through these tools and learning about them. It's great for students to have these features on their devices to be ready to use!
ReplyDeleteI will fully admit I went looking for a Special Ed teacher's blog post to read and I found yours! This is fantastic. I really liked the image of some of the Chromebook features that are already available to students. Like you, I didn't know about many of these and our school is 1:1 with Chromebooks! Engagement in a text has been a big issue for students this year since they didn't have to have the same level of rigor and stamina last year while learning from home. I think a number of the accessibility features you highlight could also be used to increase student engagement by all students! This is a great post.
ReplyDeleteI agree! I can’t wait to introduce these to my students.
DeleteKate,
ReplyDeleteRead and Write for Google has became a discovery for me this week! I really like this extension and it is indeed super helpful for both teachers and students. I downloaded it right away and I am already benefiting from it! Newsela is also great and something you can use with English Learners! So many great features that are time savers for so many educators!