ATMac

This video is about the use of video iPods in a special education classroom which caters for children with intellectual disabilities and language or hearing difficulties such that sign language (ASL) is their primary mode of communication. We hear from the teacher, the classroom’s primary interpreter, and parents and siblings about how useful the iPods have been. At first the teacher was understandably sceptical about how helpful iPods could be for a bunch of non-verbal children, but the range of novel uses for the iPods is fantastic to see.

Some of the things the video iPods were used for:

• Sending verbal or video messages between teachers and parents instead of written messages.
• Recording the kids’ accomplishments in class to show the teachers.
• Recording stories read to the class, showing the book pages and sign interpreter and hearing the audio of the book being read.
• Making videos of sign language vocabulary appropriate to the current curriculum so families could learn to talk to the students about what they had done at school.
• Making video tutorials for specific signs requested by the family.

I’ve probably forgotten a few in there. I was awed by the special education teacher and interpreter and their willingness to try new things and to make the greatest possible use of technology. Good on you!

Who else is using the audio or video abilities of the iPods in classrooms? I’d love to post more stories about this topic.

- Ricky Buchanan, ATMac
(Via More Than Words)