Last week I was in Louisville, Kentucky for the 2009 Association of Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) International Convention. AECT is "a professional association of thousands of educators and others whose activities are directed toward improving instruction through technology. "¹ This year's conference was titled "Integrative Approaches: Meeting Challenges." My highlights were:

• Hanging out for the week and attending the conference with Julie, my best friend from the University of Hawaii (UH).
• Getting together with Ellen, Peter, Betsy, Curtis, Rachel, Ari, and Kim, UH professors and grad students.
• Attending sessions on: engaging, effective, and efficient instruction (Merrill); technology literacy (Davies); learning through inquiry (Goodyear); US ed tech programs (Ku et al); structuring online instruction (Zydney & Byk); open courseware (OCW) (Parker); and cross-cultural instructional design (Tracey & Unger).
• Supporting my colleagues at their presentations on: synchronous online professional development (Leong & Eichelberger); and social networking (Hoffman).
• Volunteering at the convention and meeting other volunteers.
• Meeting other graduate students and finding out about their programs.
• Learning about Louisville. Especially the visits to Churchill Downs, the Muhammad Ali Center, the Louisville Slugger Museum, and the neighborhoods wtih old Victorian houses.

It was a good week. The next conference I go to I'll have to present some of my research :-)

----------

(1) AECT (2009). www.aect.org

Universal Design for Learning

Adam has trouble seeing the words on the page so converting text to audio helps him "read" his assignments. Beth has trouble comprehending print materials, a combination of visual tracking and audio help her. Charlie has trouble decoding words, a readily available dictionary helps him. Packaged together in one piece of software such as Kurzweil 3000, multiple assistive technologies meet the needs of a variety of students.

A classroom of 25 students has 25 different ways of processing information and learning. Presenting information in different ways and using different teaching techniques address the various student needs present in a classroom. Technology can greatly aide this endeavor.

A month ago (has it really been so long?) I wrote a post about Universal Design (UD), an architectural principal which seeks to create accessibility through design. The Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) has identified a similar design principal for education, Universal Design for Learning (UDL). UDL has three principles¹:

• Multiple means of representation to give learners various ways of acquiring information and knowledge
• Multiple means of action and expression to provide learners alternatives for demonstrating what they know, and
• Multiple means of engagement to tap into learners' interests, challenge them appropriately, and motivate them to learn

By varying how information is presented, students motivated and learning assessed, more students will have access to learning. By using the principles of UDL, these variations will be built into lessons. It's a good combination.

----------

(1) CAST. (n.d.) http://www.cast.org/research/udl/index.html

Of Mice and Men

"The best-laid schemes o' mice an 'men

Gang aft agley" - Robert Burns

I planned to post to my 699 Blog three to five times a week. Nearly two weeks have gone by since I last posted. So sorry, mice and men.

I have added a cool widget to my blog. Odiogo makes a tool that automatically converts blogs to webcasts. The widget will read the post within the blog or make it available for subscription. For computer users with print disabilities, audio could be helpful for accessing blog content.

Universal Design

Suppose that accessibility issues were not addressed as afterthoughts in the production process of new products but were included within the design phase. And then suppose that these products proved advantageous not only to people with disabilities but to all people. This is universal design. "The intent of universal design is to simplify life for everyone by making products, communications, and the built environment more usable by as many people as possible at little or no extra cost. Universal design benefits people of all ages and abilities", according to The Center for Universal Design at North Carolina State University in Raleigh.¹

Curb cuts are perhaps the most widely adopted and well known universal design feature. Designed to make sidewalks more accessible to people who use wheelchairs and those with other mobility impairments, curb cuts have benefited bikers, people pushing baby carriages, deliverymen, skateboarders, people pulling grocery carts, and everyone at one time or another. Universal design products range from kitchen tools, to appliances, to entire homes.

The Center for Universal Design has established seven Principles of Universal Design²:

PRINCIPLE ONE: Equitable Use
The design is useful and marketable to people with diverse abilities.

PRINCIPLE TWO: Flexibility in Use
The design accommodates a wide range of individual preferences and abilities.

PRINCIPLE THREE: Simple and Intuitive Use
Use of the design is easy to understand, regardless of the user's experience, knowledge, language skills, or current concentration level.

PRINCIPLE FOUR: Perceptible Information
The design communicates necessary information effectively to the user, regardless of ambient conditions or the user's sensory abilities.

PRINCIPLE FIVE: Tolerance for Error
The design minimizes hazards and the adverse consequences of accidental or unintended actions.

PRINCIPLE SIX: Low Physical Effort
The design can be used efficiently and comfortably and with a minimum of fatigue.

PRINCIPLE SEVEN: Size and Space for Approach and Use
Appropriate size and space is provided for approach, reach, manipulation, and use regardless of user's body size, posture, or mobility.

As universal design features are incorporated into more products and structures, the need for assistive technology should decrease. Why? Because the accessibility is built into the product or structure as part of the design; exceptional equipment is not needed by some people with disabilities.

----------

(1) http://www.design.ncsu.edu/cud/about_ud/about_ud.htm

(2) The Center for Universal Design (1997). The Principles of Universal Design, Version 2.0. Raleigh, NC: North Carolina State University.

A Brief Introduction to Disabilities

Assistive technology is used to compensate for the loss of a normal human functioning. Understanding which impairments affect functional losses is the beginning of designing, producing, and selecting for service assistive technology.

The Trace Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison works to make computers accessible to people with all types of disabilities. As part of their process, Trace has written "A Brief Introduction to Disabilities"¹. The document gives a brief introduction to visual impairments, hearing impairments, physical impairments, cognitive/language impairments, seizure disorders, and multiple impairments, listing some specific barriers to accessibility that people with these disabilities encounter.

In "Thirty-Something Million: Should They Be Exceptions?"² an article highlighting the importance of designing products with disabilities in mind, Vanderheiden lists several statistics about the number and types of disabilities in the United States. One of the interesting point he makes is that as people age they naturally lose functional ability, they become disabled. Vanderheiden displays with well placed graphs to illustrate his point that if one lives long enough then one is likely to need adaptations and assistive technology.

One more point from Thirty-Something Million: as the population ages the learning disabilities, the prevalent disability in the younger years, gives way to mobility, vision, and hearing disabilities as the prevalent category in the older years. Learning disabilities are the top issue that schools have to address. While the least restrictive environment must be maintained for all, learning disabilities are prevalent in the K-12 years.

----------

(1) Vanderheiden, G. C., & Vanderheiden, K. R. (1991). A brief introduction to disabilities. [Online]. In Accessible Design of Consumer Products: Guidelines for the Design of Consumer Products to Increase Their Accessibility to People with Disabilities or Who are Aging (pp. 84). Madison, Wisconsin: Trace Research & Development Center.

(2) Vanderheiden, G. C. (1990). Thirty-something million: Should they be exceptions? [Online]. Human Factors, 32(4), 14.

Low Vision Technology Fair

Today I attended the "Low Vision Technology Fair" at the Beltrone Living Center in Albany, NY. The event, presented by the Northeastern Association of the Blind at Abany (NABA), consisted of program presentations, vendor displays, and vision-related group displays. I was there for about two hours and learned a great deal about assistive technology (AT) for the blind and visually impaired.

I participated in a presentation titled "Independent Mobility & Travel with Vision Loss" given by Harriet Seeley of NABA. Seeley's job is to train those with low or no vision to orient themselves to their environment and travel safely. She displayed a number of devices which could be used in this endeavor, all of them low tech. Canes with red and white markings that indicated visual impairment, both collapsible and those which could also be used for support, were demonstrated. Ice grippers, bright reflective vests, sun/glare glasses, telescopes, sports goggles were also shown. All these devices could be obtained from NABA, free-of-charge to legally blind individuals, and their use would be supported by specialists at the organization. Seeley finished be demonstrating a sighted guide technique whereby a person with sight guides a person with low or no vision. It seems the best mobility aid isn't a device but a friend.

I made my rounds of the exhibitions after the mobility presentation. Only one vendor was displaying handheld magnifiers and low tech optical devices. Five companies represented - ABISee, Eschenbach, Freedom Scientific, Humanware, Magnisight - displayed their electronic magnification devices. Not a surprise, since this was a "tech fair". The companies had hand-held, table, and computer-attachable devices. These had built in cameras which fed the image of text to a display. Some of the larger devices could snap an image of the text, send it to an OCR engine, and then create text-to-speech output. A few of these units could use the cameras to zoom in on distant images, like the blackboard in a classroom. The smaller devices ran about $500 while the larger ones seem to be in the $3000 to $4000 range. When asked Bill Kilroy, the Freedom Science representative, said that high tech readers were becoming more popular than low tech magnifiers.

Ai Squared exhibited their screen reader, ZoomText, at the fair; Freedom Scientific provided a demo disk for their screen reader, JAWS. This technology reads everything on a computer screen as the user navigates using keyboard commands. Ai Squared can be used in conjunction with a special keyboard that has shortcuts to popular commands. My conversation with Bill Kilroy included his thoughts on using JAWS. I said that I had tried screen readers but had trouble following them when I could easily see what was going on the screen. He said that a user had to understand how files are organized and computers operate in general to be able to use one with a screen reader. Then it was all a matter of training.

WMHT's Radio Information Service (RISE) was represented at the fair. Volunteers read newspapers, national magazines, and books of interest over the air. Qualified people with print disabilities can borrow a special radio that picks up the signal. While not considered a new technology, radio has a place as an assistive technology. The telephone too, can be assistive technology. The United Way Northeast Region 2-1-1 connects people with information over the phone.

I learned a great deal at the Low Vision Technology Fair. Thanks NABA!

Local Disability Groups

Having done my last post on assistive technology & accessibility groups, I started thinking about groups that are available in my local area. To search for local disability groups I went old school. Yes, it's an actual phone book! I used the Capital District Area Yellowbook¹ to search for local disability groups. I'm reporting here some of results of my search under the heading which I found them in phone book.

Blind Persons Institutions. Only one listing appeared under this heading: NYS Commission for the Blind & Visually Handicapped.

Disabled Persons Svces. & Organizations. Most of the listings under this heading appear to be residences for people with disabilities. The Capital District DDSO (Developmental Disabilities Services Office; I had to look up the acronym on the web, so much for old school) itself lists ten residences and a number of offices. Non-residential listings include Associations for Retarded Children Inc, Centers for Disability Services, the Center for Independence, the Down Syndrome Aim High Resource Center, the Hansen Disability Management, Parent-To-Parent of New York State Support Services, and Saratoga Bridges.

Health Care Consultants. There were a number of listings under this heading, a number of which appeared to deal more with advisors, providers, or insurers. The Center for Healthy Policy Studies, the Center for the Disabled, and New York State Industries for the Disabled were listed here.

Hearing Impaired Svces. Auxiliary Relay Services was the only listing under this heading.

Support Groups. The only listing was for Overeaters Anonymous.

There was nothing under headings for assistive technology, deaf, mobility, or vision. I located a couple leads in my phone book search but nothing I couldn't have found in a few minutes with a web search. So much for the old school; back to Google.

----------

(1) Yellow Book Sates and Distribution Company. (2009). Yellowbook: Capital District Area, NY.