Services must be available and attainable for students with disabilities. There has to be avenues to facilitate access to services that students with disabilities can use successfully.
This module did a good job pointing out use of assistive technology for those with learning disabilities. It is important to know this because it is our legal and ethical obligation to students to make sure they are given access to appropriate tools for their learning experience.
LMS can sometimes be problematic for students with disabilities. LMS need to have alternative options built into them in order to compensate for what is lacking. For example blind students can't see the screen. Therefore an alternative option is required to be built into the LMS to compensate for their lack of vision.
I learned that LMS courses are not always designed with accommodations in mind and that these courses may be hard (if not impossible) for some students with disabilities to navigate and utilize.
Nancy Tosh
There is a wealth of technology available to assist the disabled students from speech generated devices to alternative input devices.The three used devices are: Dragon naturally speaking, JAWS and KURZwell. Thus, we must make sure our students have access to whatever device they need to enhance their learning.
I am absolutely amazed at all the technology avaiable for disabled persons. By becoming aware of resources and identifying the learner's disability situation, we could offer an educated guidance to pair up the proper assistive technology tools to the students. This will enhance their education as well as making it a more positive experience for the educators.
When using an LMS, what is helpful for some, may be harmfull to others, particularly the disabled. I will study different kinds of AT devices so that I am able to better advise disabled students in the future.
Learning about several of the Assistive Technology Tools that are available was very informative. I hope I can learn about many more and start considering their use in my classes.
Thoughtfulness and planning ahead go a long way to precluding accessibility issues. Understanding what options are available and pairing those options to meet course objects require an effort but necessary to provide learners the best possible experience.
All course materials, LMS, slides, video, etc. must use required tools and/or assistive technology (AT) accessible to students with a variety of disabilities for their learning expierience.
Accesiblity is vital for teaching with students with disabilities. So many different types of technology is available.
What I learnd was the the Job Access With Speech (JAWS) screen reading (text-to-speech) software was developed for computer users with vision loss.
The section was enlightening as I was not aware of many of the tools that are available to learners with special needs. One good point is that putting course documents on the LMS does not mean that these documents are accessible to all learners. This I think what many instructors who are not aware of the accessibility concept missed out.
Assistive technology tools should continue to be provided in educational institutions due to the contribution that they have on the improvement of the learning process for students with disabilities.
I will defintely give my LMS posts a second (and third) look to ensure that the content I put up is accessable. I do hope I have not unintentionally built any educational barriers as I learned to use them mid-semester during our current crisis.
Some of the new soft ware provides students with the ability to adapt to the diverse limitations that prevent them from efficiently and effectively learning new concepts. Different developmental disorders can require an array of assistive technology to further facilitate desirable learning outcomes.
The LMS does not always have material suitable for students with disabilities. It is the institutions responsibility to have proper materials posted with students disabilities in mind.
Do some research and see what AT are out there. The institution may not have a variety since they buy on-demand versus anticipating various disabilities.
Utuilizing LMS does not make it info easily accessible for everyone
learning about the different tools is helpful not only to understand what tools a student may use, but to recommend to students that may need those very tools. I also like the idea of making different accommodations.
