Today we had a speaker from BCEdAccess present on accessibility in education. 

I had never heard of hearing assistive FM speakers before, but I can now see how they could be helpful if a student is comfortable wearing one. I found a nice explanation on this website. That kind of tool may be less preferred in a high school when students are slightly more worried about their image than they were in elementary school. I like the comment to encourage all students to try supportive tools, so it becomes a classroom goal of bettering their experience, and not just one student. I now wonder how many students don’t attend regular public schools due to a disability that could fairly easily be accommodated for, such as someone who is deaf or hard of hearing. I would like to think there are none, but I have a feeling there are a few. 

From hearing about the parent’s comments about lack of support for technology use, I was thinking about how to relay that kind of information to parents whenever I expect students to use technology at home, so the parents can help if needed. Possibly I could send out a short blurb right after the class. This encourages me to ask parents and students on the first day/week of school to let me know of possible supports that could help them, in regards to educational, physical, cultural, and identity needs. I could include some examples in that email, since many parents or students may not have been encouraged to pursue such things. Such examples could be speech to text, mural for making flowcharts, zoom for watching a class if they need to stay home or for recording videos for assignments rather than writing, a different style of desk or chair or keyboard to use while using laptops. Including a picture of the class may be helpful, too. Similarly, they could help guide classroom management, such as a scent free space, no loud music, a slightly dimmed light, or stretch breaks every 20-30 min. A thing a have become more aware of in the past few years is how inaccessible certain spaces and classrooms are. High desks, thin walkways, or thin chairs can be very challenging for some.

I tried out the screen narrator and it was a bit challenging to imagine using it all of the time. The voices that I set were kind of annoying. It was hard to tell what area of the screen it was reading and where it would read next if the screen layout was not plain. I am curious to hear from people with vision impairments what they use or how they find such services. I was surprised when a classmate said they use it a lot. I will reach out to them to see how they use it. Likewise, I was surprised when a different classmate said they disliked speech to text, since I use it a lot. I even used it to write much of my posts. Many of my bosses use speech to text while they are thinking of things to do or while texting people. I personally think it is a useful tool to help get ideas out quickly, especially while brainstorming.