ED 5163 Assistive Technology: Day 2

Apps, WOW! I am really enjoying learning about the apps that are available to better meet the needs of our students. Prizmo is an OCR (Optical Character Recognition) app that allows you to take a picture of text, including bills, whiteboards, business cards and upload it onto iPads, iPhones and iPods within seconds. Once the text is uploaded onto these mobile devices, it can be cropped and edited to enhance the picture. The app can then be played as text to speech. This app would be a great tool for students who experience difficulties with reading. Check out the video below that will walk you through the Primo process.

Prizmo: iPhone/iPod Touch OCR App

I have seen QR codes in many places and I had no idea what they were used for until today. QR (quick response) codes are similar to barcodes since they both provide information. QR codes are able to store more information about a product or topic such as website addresses and text. They are called quick response codes because cell phones and other mobile devices can scan them and provide further details. Instead of having to type a website address, you can scan a QR code using a QR reader on your smart phone and it will bring you directly to the intended website. QR codes can have many uses in the classroom. Some of these uses are: to read books aloud to students, make books, completing surveys, taking students to specific websites without typing the url. I feel I still have a lot to learn about QR codes. I think I may need to attempt to make one in order to better understand the process. I have added the App to my iPhone and I'll be scanning all the QR codes around my house to check them out! Check out the link below for an introduction to QR codes.

http://www.commoncraft.com/video/qr-codes

Reading Analysis

Today we also began to discuss the reading task analysis. To start we read a text entitled Dracula. As we read the passage we were suppose to be thinking about the process we were using in order to read the text. When we were finished, we discussed this with a partner and then we came together and discussed it as a group. I didn't realize how difficult this actually was until we started to discuss it as a group.

A reading analysis is the break down of the reading process. When we break the reading process into steps, we are able to recognize where students experience difficulties and then we are able to identify the supports we need to put in place to meet their learning needs.

The first question we looked at was, 1) Why do we read? I felt pretty comfortable answering this question. For information, for pleasure and to derive meaning. When we looked at the second question, 2) What is the first step in the reading process? I struggled to come up with an answer. After a lot of discussion, we finally zoomed in on something that now seems so evident and simple, students have to attend to the task (be engaged and motivated). There are many factors that can affect a students reading. We need to consider sounds, background noise, nutrition, sleep, self-regulation (staying in their chair), emotions and prior knowledge. The message from discussing the reading task analysis was, if a student is missing a part of this reading process, we need to be able to identify that and support them, possibly with assistive technology. Before we are able to do that, as Barb said "You need to know how really good readers read before you can identify where students are having difficulties." We didn't finish with the reading task analysis, we are going to look at it again during tuesdays class.

From here we started to explore with Inspiration and Kidspiration. We began inputting some of the information from our reading task analysis. I first used these programs at an inservice a couple of years ago and I love using them to do brainstorming activities with my students. The programs are very fun and easy to use.

A quote that I found interesting from todays class was something Barb said. "Our vision wasn’t made for reading, it was made for survival. We are changing the purpose of vision. We are using it for reading." I never really thought about vision in thee terms, but hearing that makes me think how much we take things for granted sometimes.