Emily Powers and I went to the Technology session iPad Accessibility Features and Apps: UDL and Technology with Judy Peacock and Tony Dutra. This session was an update about the UDL (Universal Design of Learning) model.
A little background information was given at the beginning of the session. A group of educators examined general education classrooms and the RTI model to see how to support teachers in their problem solving for struggling students. They looked at ways to support not only the struggling students, but all students within the classroom without barriers. They came up with the UDL model, which can support ALL students throughout the RTI triangle. Their research was based on MRI’s and brain science along with general education experiences. They shared how a brain looks when it is activated by the multiple intelligences that the person/student specialize in. For example, if a person is musical, tapping a finger stimulates their brain in a rhythmic way. Others whom are not musical, tap their finger just to tap and their brain doesn’t have a lot of activity.
Judy and Tony believed that ALL students should benefit from the Universal Design for Learning and you can use iPads for all different types of learners. They recommended that you (as an educator) look at the standards (CCSS) and then make a goal which focuses on what needs to happen to meet that goal. Then think about the feature options that we can use for all students i.e. audio books, alternative keyboards.
For example, if your assignment was to have students read a book and write an essay. You first need to make a decision on which is more important, reading/understanding the text, or is the focus more on the written essay. Once you have your focus, you then can choose features that could be helpful, for example, if the focus was on the essay the students can have the book read to them through the iPad.
To access the most helpful features, you need to go to your Settings on your iPad and click on Accessibility.
These are the different kinds of accommodations such as having your iPad/screen read to you, or change the size of text, having more visuals, contrast between texts or images, volume, animation, font used, etc.
This was my favorite website he shared.
Go to this website and click on the section:
Accessibility in iOS & OS X
and you can find all kinds of guides to help you navigate your devices!
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