Staying Current with Assistive Technology Solutions
- Continually explore what AT solutions are being used with success for students with specific learning disabilities.
- Learn from the students who already use AT. Asking these students about what works well for their specific difficulties can assist practitioners develop a toolbox of strategies.
- Become connected to organisations that research and recommend Assistive Technology particular to alleviating educational barriers for students with specific learning disabilities.
- Become expert users of the mainstream AT solutions for PC and Mobile devices (voice to text, text to speech, closed captioning options and graphic organisers).
- Connect to social AT forums – Facebook and Twitter.
- Forge a professional relationship with the organisations ICT department to encourage an AT specialist role or focus within the ICT team.
- Begin to seek options that are universal in design i.e. are not specific to the needs of one student. For example asking lecturers to wear a lapel microphone and to upload audio lectures to the student LMS provides a resource for all students but will especially benefit students who have difficulties taking or reading notes. These options are also often the most affordable.
- Keep Assistive Technology as a standing agenda item on formal network meetings to enable collegial sharing and professional development.
- ADCET has further information on Inclusive Technology - Specific Learning Disability
- Sign up to the ADCET e-newsletter
Some Additional Resources
The links below are just a few websites where a range of AT options are provided that focus on eliminating or reducing the impact of barriers in education, for students with Specific Learning Disabilities: