Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs

Animated Christmas

2009-12-07T00:57:00.000-05:00

Animated Christmas is a good resource with many things to explore. In particular your students may want to look at the interactive animated storybook, Fir Tree.

Might be a nice addition to a multicultural winter celebration unit.

Winter Celebrations Around the World

2009-12-06T19:23:00.001-05:00

Although my class is studying Charles Dickens this month here are some links for those of you doing unit on multicultural winter holidays, be it part of the Unique extra lesson or not.

Los Posadas

Soyaluna

The History of Soyaluna - Hopi Calling Back the Sun

Hannukah

Kwanzaa

DongZhi

DongZhi - Chinese Winter Festival

Lohri

Lohri Bonfire Festival - Hindu/Indian Winter Celebration

Trabasack: Lap Tray, Bag and Mount All-In-One!

2009-12-04T21:13:00.002-05:00

this is taken from Barrie at One Switch Blog.

The Trabasack is a fantastic UK designed product that is a bag and lap-tray all in one. The Trabasack Curve as pictured has a Velcro surface making it ideal for many switch users when away from home. Comes also in a rectangular shape in a medium and mini size, with and without being Velcro accepting. The wheelchair version has special strap designs for wheelchair attachment. The trim comes in different colors too. Buy direct from Trabasack or the USA vendor Windsor Direct.

Splatz Switch Holder

2009-12-03T22:29:00.000-05:00

via from CALL Scotland Blog by Robert Stewart

The Splatz Switch Holder is a washable, non-slip switch holder for 2.5 inch round switches (Jelly Bean, Buddy Button) with a hole to thread the cord through. They come in the four colors shown from QED for £15.

Wordless Wednesday - Multi-Sensory Icons for A Christmas Carol

2009-12-02T21:34:00.002-05:00

As I've mentioned we are doing a unit on A Christmas Carol. These are the characters in Pete Well's adapted sensory story version of A Christmas Carol. Our first lesson for the unit the students were shown the characters and each picked one to adapt into a multi-sensory icon, using Pete Well's suggestions and their own ideas. Today we used the multi-sensory icons as props in our first viewing/telling of A Christmas Carol.

(Note the large characters were used as puppets and the small symbols as switch labels. The red cards have cinnamon glued to them.)

New Activities at Help Kidz Learn

2009-11-30T20:00:00.000-05:00

Help Kidz Learn has three new activities up. Plus they have moved their Advent Calendar back to the front of the line up for the season. The Advent Calendar is a good add-on to a morning meeting routine on a "Big Screen".

All three of the new games are designed to teach waiting to press the switch until a visual/auditory cue occurs. These games are all great to teach "switch happy" users to slow down, look and listen before pressing their switch.

Coconut Shy is a switch game where you wait until a ball appears to "throw" it at the coconuts atop the sticks, no need to aim. This game is create to teach students to wait to press their switch, in this case to wait for the auditory and visual cue that the ball has appeared.

Gophers Down a Drain Pipe is a similar game, in that it also teaches waiting. In this case the student must wait for the Gopher to slide down the inside of the pipe and appear to whack it with a newspaper! In both Coconut Shy and Gophers the teacher can set how long until the "reveal".

Mystery Egg is probably the simplest of the new games, students need only wait until the mystery egg pops onto the screen to press their switch and crack it open to revel a dancing character (in a way this one brought back some unwelcome flashbacks of "Teen Tunes" from the 1990's for me - I think my student will need to use headphone with this one!).

Google Wave Invite Give-away!

2009-11-29T13:47:00.000-05:00

I have 8 Google Wave Invites to give away. Comment with your e-mail address and I will send one to you. First come, first served, when they are gone they are gone.

Recordable Storybook

2009-11-29T13:28:00.000-05:00

Hallmark is now offering 'Twas the Night Before Christmas, All the Ways I Love You and Bright and Beautiful in their new Recordable Storybook format.

These books allow a parent, grandparent or other to record themselves reading the story and have that recording played back automatically as the pages of the book are turned. A flip of a switch "locks" the recording in even if the batteries die. A very cool idea when used in the way intended, but possibly even cooler if you start thinking about it as an AT adaptable.

You could print out a social story on full page labels, stick over the pictures and record the text. You could do the same with the steps of a routine such as a life skills routine or vocational task and the book will automatically play the next step when you turn the page.

Hallmark's recordable storybooks retail for $29.99.

"A Christmas Carol" Theme Unit

2009-11-28T23:03:00.001-05:00

This blog entry is a work in progress, feel free to comment to contribute!

For the month of December (as there is not a full Unique Curriculum Unit and I am missing creating my own units) my class will be doing a unit on "A Christmas Carol". We will be working from Pete's Sensory Story version and most of our activities will stem from that simple retelling. Here are some of the resources we will use.

Pete's Sensory Stories - A Christmas Carol
This sensory story version is a slide show with sound effects and simple animations which is activated by switch. Meanwhile the teacher reads from the script which comes with the slideshow while the teacher and aides expose the students to related sensory experiences, like touching a chain or smelling cinnamon. I will also have large TOBI (true object based icons) of the characters which have textures added to them for the students.

Multi-Media
Audio Retellings
Our classroom iPod will also be loaded with a couple of audio versions of the story.

Storynory "A Christmas Carol" free
Wired for Books "A Christmas Carol" free

Videos

About.com's listing of A Christmas Carol videos

Academics

Math

patterns of either real cranberries and popcorn in garland (note: this is a CHOKE HAZARD do not use if students may place items in mouth) or symbols/photos of popcorn and cranberries
add and subtract sets to 5, 10 or 20 using chocolate gold coins (or symbols of them)

History

learn about Charles Dickens in this animation
learn about the 1800s (Victorian times)
learn about Christmas in England

Life Skills

using Victorian Paper Dolls practice dressing for the weather and compare and contrast clothes now vs. then

Arts and Crafts

cranberry and popcorn garland (note: this is a CHOKE HAZARD do not use if students may place items in mouth) or make other dried fruit garland (in the Victorian era all sorts of dried fruit were used)
make Christmas Crackers (video directions)

Sensory

bin of cranberries and popcorn (note: this is a CHOKE HAZARD do not use if students may place items in mouth)

Vocational

shop for and package hygiene items into kits to give to a homeless shelter (Dickens was the benefactor of a shelter for women)

Cooking

Community Based Instruction

See a local production of A Christmas Carol
See the movie version of A Christmas Carol
Bring donations to a charity in the community

CC Bingo

2010 Calendars from Mayer-Johnson

2009-11-28T20:13:00.000-05:00

Calendars for 2010 are now available for use with the Boardmaker family of software from Adapted Learning. Log in and click here. (Adapted Learning is the sharing community for the Boardmaker software series.)

Thank You

2009-11-26T19:46:00.000-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you!

And a special thank you to my new friends and colleagues as well as the parents and students at my new job! I feel blessed every day to be working with such wonderful people and to have the privilege of teaching such fantastic students.

As we enter the busy rush of the holiday season may we all find peace, joy and contentment.

Healing Hiatus

2009-11-19T20:45:00.001-05:00

Long Version of Story:
In what has to be one of the most bizarre things to happen to me yet last night I was mauled in the left hand (at the base of my thumb mostly) by this neighborhood stray cat I pet frequently. If you have never been bitten, forget mauled, by an animal let me give some news, it hurts.

I drove myself, in my pjs (since I had run down to put out the trash in my pjs) to the ER with my hand wrapped in some blood soaked gauze. Treatment started with a wash of the bites (there are about eleven of them) and a hand soak in a betadine solution. Since the feline in question was both unknown to me and whereabouts unknown I was treated immediately for both possible bacterial infections and rabies. Yup, rabies. Forget what you learned on Different Strokes, the injections were not in my stomach. Ten injections of Rabies Immunoglobin were given into my backside, thighs, upper arms and into the wounds. Then the first of five rabies vaccines was given DIRECTLY INTO THE WOUNDS, that would be along my thumb joint. The vaccine is about the thickness of corn syrup and it was took multiple "sticks" to get it all into the swollen and unyielding joint area. Then I was given a tetanus shot. I also had two IV drips of anti-biotics. Nausea inducing anti-biotics. Finally I was bandaged, given the dates for my future returns to the ER for more rabies vaccinations, and told that at my third visit I will be sent to see a surgeon if I am still unable move my thumb. My good hand full of prescriptions and a note to return to work I headed home, it was about 3:30 AM.

Touch typing is impossible, so I have done this via one handed hunt and peck. I am exhausted from the medications and nauseous from the anti-biotics. Thus,

Short Verion of the Story:

I am taking a blog hiatus to recover. I plan to return either after Thanksgiving or after my last rabies vaccine injection (12/17) when ever I feel the closest to "myself" again.

Kate

I am this many! Happy Blog Birthday!

2009-11-19T00:01:00.004-05:00

Today marks the third birthday of Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs! Whoo-whooo!

What started out as a way for this special education teacher to give back (and keep busy during recovery from ankle surgery) has turned into something much, much bigger. Approaching 1,000 posts, 130+ Google foll0wers, an average 850-1000 visitors a day, nearly 500 Google Reader subscribers (and who knows how many other RSS readers) and about 500,000 visits total since inception. Wow! Who knew?

There is also now an active TLWMSN Ning (online discussion group) and a Facebook Group.

If this blog has helped you this is your time to come out of the woodwork. Please comment and leave some blog birthday wishes!

Thanks, Kate Ahern, M.S.Ed., creator and author of the Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs Blog

Wordless Wednesday - Juicing for Key Lime Pie

2009-11-18T04:56:00.000-05:00

The student is accessing a wobble switch at mid-line on her wheelchair tray to activate the Wireless Jelly Bean Switch, which is plugged into the Power Link environmental control unit, which is controlling the power to the juicer. The teacher is pressing the lime onto the juicer. In the end we juiced one cup worth of lime juice!

Time Timer iPod App

2009-11-16T04:49:00.000-05:00

We have a morning routine that goes something like this: the students gather around the projector for morning meeting and one of my wonderful teaching assistants gathers up a behavior chart, a dry eraser maker, and a huge Time Timer. She approaches a student and reminds her of her ability to earn a reward by collecting ten stars. A star is given each time ten minutes passes on the Time Timer without incidence of interrupting/disruption and a bonus star is given for each appropriate AAC device activation. Through our morning meeting I watch the student and the staff quietly interact as they draw dry erase stars on the chart and re-set the Time Timer for ten more minutes.

Ironically, almost, the reward this student earns is use of the classroom iPod touch to listen to music. She uses Flick Tunes to be able to more easily change the song, but in general is just content to have music on.

Won't it be cool this week when I can download the only app I have been waiting for from the iTunes store and have this entire process move to the iPod Touch? The Time Timer App (get it in the iTunes store) is a way to have a Time Timer in your pocket. It is perfect for counting down those difficult transitions (we just used our "old fashioned" Time Timer for this the other day, a student who does not like to leave on Fridays is given a five minute countdown on the Time Timer and then leave school like a pro) on the go.

We will even think about adding one of the many star charts apps (iAchieve, iRewards, Earn It Stars) to our iPod Touch as well, so the entire process from the Time Timer to the stars to the music is in one place - on one iPod.

Power Point Add-On for "Switch Happy" Students

2009-11-15T10:33:00.000-05:00

Barrie over at One Switch has shared this great add-on to make Power Point slide shows a bit more usable for our students. The add on is called 4Pete's Sake in reference to the wonderful sensory stories at Pete's Stuff.

(I am considering having my December Theme Unit be either "Oz-mas" and using Pete's Wizard of Oz and some of Alicia's activities or "Dickens Holiday" and using Pete's "A Christmas Carol).

4Pete's Sake has two modes. The first mode, called Padlock, locks the slide so that the student cannot turn the page until a second switch (or button on the keyboard) is pressed. The second allows the students to move forward and backward withing a slideshow using one switch and a scanning box with arrows on screen.

Padlock seems like a great way to allow students to turn the pages of a story or another kind of slide show for themselves or a group without worries of that "12 switch hits in 6 seconds and the book is over" situation. Back and Forth mode could be a great way to teach beginning scanners. You could even have yes/no on two slides to answers questions. Or a student could have two slides with Red Light/Green Light and run a fun game for friends. The possibilities are endless.

Tips and Tricks Videos

2009-11-14T07:56:00.003-05:00

The Loundon County Public School has an assortment of Tips and Tricks Videos in the AT section which are worth checking out.

Thanks

2009-11-11T20:35:00.003-05:00

As always I want to give public kudos to great customer/technical support. This past Monday I spent some time speaking with Alec at Tobii ATI getting some support for a Mercury. Thanks, Alec.

Dancing with Myself

2009-11-11T18:11:00.001-05:00

Two Ways to Make Nintendo DS an AAC Device

2009-11-10T05:07:00.000-05:00

DS Talker is an older free program by the people who bring us the Sclera Symbol set that runs on a Nintendo DS. Tap to Talk is a newer program for the Nintendo DSi or DS Lite that retails for a subscription of $99.95 a year. Both program are dynamic display.

As it is free you will need to do some work to get the DS Talker working. The program is in German, but the English manual explains in detail how to make it work in English. (Although a techie friend or gamer 17 year old is likely to make it work the fastest.) The program uses the free white on black Sclera Pictos.

Tap To Talk include the software for the DSi or DSLite and a web based application to program boards as well as clipart symbols. Other symbol sets can be used if converted to .bmp format. You can play with the application before you buy it with an online emulator.

Having played with DS Talker and watched the Tap to Talk videos the programs see to run in nearly identical ways.

New AT24 Talker

2009-11-09T04:51:00.000-05:00

Attainment Company has another mid-tech AAC device, the Attainment Talker 24 or AT24.

Running on 2 AA batteries the AT24 can be held in one hand and activated with the thumb, laid on the table or mounted. Each activation area is 3/4 of an inch with (obviously) 24 buttons. The AT24 has only one level and retails at $69.00.

Thanksgiving Activities

2009-11-08T19:23:00.002-05:00

Online Activities Great for Touch Screens of Smart Boards (Some work with two switches on tab and enter)

Dress the Turkey
Turkey Slider Puzzle
18 Thanksgiving Games at Primary Games
Thanksgiving Memory
Thanksgiving Concentration
Play the computer in Thanksgiving Tic Tac Toe
Turkey to Go (very fun and a mouse or tracker trainer to boot!)
Turkey Drop
Thanksgiving Feast

Adapted Learning (Free Boardmaker Activities - Login Before Clicking)

Video of the Day Blog

2009-11-08T19:02:00.004-05:00

Alicia at SMD Teacher has begun her own Video of the Day Blog, as a response to my Kate's Class Video of the Day Blog. I have to say Alicia's blog is fantastic, she involves her students in choosing the video and then posts the favorites, whereas I choose a video the night before to play at the end of Morning Meeting as a transition cue as we move into morning ADLs. Also Alicia does not use video's from YouTube, which will be a great gift to many of you with over zealous security blockers in school.

So check it out!

Two New Products from Mayer-Johnson

2009-11-08T16:17:00.004-05:00

Mayer-Johnson has two new ways to bring the power of Boardmaker Plus.

The Boardmaker Plus Player Subscription allows teachers and therapists (and families) to access the Boardmaker Plus content by through an online membership. Costing $39.00 a year this is an alternative to the Boardmaker Player Disc at $125.00. You can install the subscription version of Boardmaker Plus Player on as many computers as you would like, but only one location can be logged in at a time (unless you buy multiple subscriptions).

This seems like a great solution for school and communities that have great internet access, but for those of us in schools with limited internet access or communities where families may not have a fast internet connection (yes, people still use dial up), I think we are STILL holding out for Boardmaker Player on a Flashdrive. You know what else? It seems to me that if you buy a Boardmaker Plus Player disc it should come free with one online subscription.

The next product is the Mobile Activity Player. This is a portable net book pre-installed with Boardmaker Plus Player either three or six of the Curriculum Companion series of activities. The net book has a touchscreen that rotates so it can be used as a laptop or tablet, and has a nifty handle. It is WiFi enabled (and can connect via wires) so you can download activies via AdaptedLearning.Com. The netbook has an Intel®Atom™ N270 1.6 GHz Processor, 1 GB RAM, and a 60 GB Hard Drive. For connections it has an Ethernet Port, USB Ports, Headphone Jack, Speakers, VGA port, and a 2-in-1 SD/MMC memory card reader. No word on how loud the speakers are (meaning if you could use the device as an AAC device in a loud place). Battery life is 5 hours. If you want to install anything else, such as pre-made board sets you already own you will need to either buy an external DVD or CD-ROM, put everything on a flashdrive to move it over or move things over via the internet. You will need to purchase a switch interface or use one you already have for your switch users - the netbook does not have switch ports.

The Mobile Activity Player retails for $749.00 to $949.00 including Boardmaker Plus Player depending on how many Curriculum Companion activities you choose to have pre-installed. Given that many school can't afford paper, books or the endless supply of H1N1 preventing Purell right now (not to mention teachers/aide having pay freezes, 2% pay cuts and the state of Hawaii having nearly every Friday as a unpaid Furlough day) I don't know how a product just under a thousand dollars is going to sell, but perhaps some (rich) schools/districts/parents can afford a Mobile Activity Player or they will use the illusive "stimulus money" we all hear about and never see in our classrooms.

Coming Soon: Go Talk Express 32

2009-11-07T16:03:00.004-05:00

By now many of use are familiar with the durability and usefulness of the mid-level AAC devices in the Go Talk family from Attainment Company. The Go Talk One and the Button offer a one message option, while the Go Talk 4+, 9+ and 20+ offer a relatively inexpensive five level static display device (with 4, 9 or 20 buttons plus a core vocabulary row). The Go Talk Pocket offers the same with six buttons in a hand held size.

Coming soon (2/15/10) Attainment Company will be offering the Go Talk Express. It will feature everything we are used to the sturdy case and handle, the overlay storage, five levels, volume control, level lock, level delete and it is green.

However it also features switch access and scanning (see below), over 26 minutes of recording, and an "express mode". The express mode is for sentence chaining (or it could be use to pre-train students for minspeak/Unity if you are crafty about it) allowing users to select a series of icons to make a sentence. Express mode does not have to be used, you can use it the same way you do any Go Talk.

It will retail for $599.00. Here is the brochure.

Scanning Capabilities

Visual Cueing— four bright LED pipes surround the message keys
Auditory Cueing— choose between a 1.5 second recorded cue or beeps of varying tones
Scan Pattern— step, linear, or group scanning available
Switch Access— single or double switch access with a switch debounce feature
Number of Messages— scan 4, 8, 16, or 32 messages with a scan levels feature
Scan by row or column
Scan every other message
Choose fast, medium, or slow scanning speed