Assistive Technology and the Reading Process

One of the most satisfying and motivating moments in any educator's career is the "click".  That moment when a student, who has been struggling with a concept, is able to maneuver all of the pieces of their learning into place and suddenly can make sense of the over all picture.  The light bulb is illuminated, it pours light over all and everything seems to now be visible.  These are the moments that drive educators to keep working to their top potential.  They are the moments that define our career.  Being able to see growth in our students, both academically and personally, makes everything worth while.  That was the sentiment created while watching our inspirational video with Aidan and Carter for the evening.  It was a powerful visual image of how assistive technology can foster both academic and personal growth in students.  It was evident that the use of switch and eye gaze technology and well as motorized wheelchairs and upright walkers in the video were working effectively in promoting and developing a stronger independence, stamina and endurance in these two boys.  Subsequently, their personal growth, in their confidence and self-esteem shone through.

Being able to provide students with any assistive technology that they may require to achieve their academic goals is an "iceberg" process.  On the surface, it appears that matching a piece of technology to the needing user is relatively straight forward.  Most of the time, the understanding of the underlying conditions that create the need for assistive technology is a much deeper and more complex process.  One that is necessary to correctly identify the most effective tool to accomplish a task.  This became evident when we began

examining the Reading Process.  When completing the task analysis of the sequential steps of how we read, I immediately jumped in with both feet and began recording the process that I was following while reading the provided text.  What I failed to recognize was that I had launched myself clear of shallow waters and had catapulted directly into the deep end of the pool.  I had not stopped to consider all of the minute yet crucial tasks my brain and body had accomplished to render the reading of the text possible, such as controlling the movement of my eyes to the top left corner of the excerpt to commence the reading, my frontal lobes firing the correct messages to affect executive functioning, employing efficient visual processing.  In short, I had not stopped to consider the deep, intricate recesses of the submerged iceberg: I was foraging around on the surface.  

Reading and making sense of reading is all about brain processing. The act of reading and gleaning meaning from text is decidedly complex.  What was impressed on me the deepest was the utmost importance of pinpointing the location in the reading process that is breaking down when a student is struggling to make sense of text.  If the location can be discovered, a plausible explanation of why it is happening can be formulated.  It is in this way that an effective form of assistive technology can be selected to best suit the needs of the students to eliminate the obstacle that is preventing him or her from gathering information via text.

With the overwhelming amount of choice for reading remediation options, it was enormously helpful to have had a demonstration of those apps that have been proven to be effective in helping students in their quest to develop reading skills and overcome reading obstacles.

Speech Tutor

 

 Speech Tutor was an excellent example of an app that is design to help students develop phonetic awareness by demonstrating the optimal position for the lips, tongue and mouth to create a sound.





Bitsboard

The possibilities presented by Bitsboard are numerous!  This app provides a variety of interactive activities to help the user make connections between phonemes and their letter representatives.  As the number of EAL students increases in our classrooms, this app can prove to be a very effective tool in increasing comprehension when linking oral and written English.





Montessori Crossword

Like Bitsboard, Montessori Crossword is an engaging and interesting way for students to explore the relationship between letters and sounds.










In addition to their appealing, engaging nature, these apps are easily accessible to most students in the classroom and affordable.  These components combined make them a powerful and more feasible alternative to expensive software as we progress into the 21st century, especially in a province such as Nova Scotia, which historically has dealt with a down-turned economy and greater restrictions on educational budgeting.

All of the above mentioned apps are available from the iTunes store:
www.apple.com/ca/itunes/