Thanks, Trish!

What did you learn from Trish that applies to your classroom?

It was amazing to experience Trish's passion for supporting participation, belongingness, and accountability for ALL students. I honestly had that whirr of inspiration in my stomach to make sure that each and every student of mine will have access to their personalized needs. Not that I didn't have this opinion before, but it was eye-opening to understand all of the possibilities of assistive technology. I was heavily involved with my high school special education program and it was honor to make friendships with peers who weren't always in the same classes as me. The special education teachers kind of took me under their wing and I had been reminded of the full value of all their individualized hard work once Trish was speaking about her experiences in the Poudre School District as an occupational therapist. She creates learning environments that expect high standards, are equitable to all, and help achieve potential using tools within themselves and around them. If I can create these atmospheres as well then I know I would be doing my job right.

Why are these resources important for you to know about as a future educator?

Getting exposure to these resources as a teacher candidate is highly important to the success of my classroom, meaning that all my students are feeling empowered, making progress, and feel valuable for themselves and others. But especially listening intently to Trish's presentation, it's easy to see how complex the role of assistive technology can be for a student's life, both personally and academically. So the more I am being informed about AT, the more prepared I'm going to be for my future classroom. It's my students' right to feel that their educator is ready to support them in the ways that they need. My understanding of assistive technology is only going to increase from here, but we've got to start somewhere, right?

How do you access these resources?

Raise your hand if you love the power of Google? Yep, me too...most of the time anyway. Through that massive portal, teachers have created unbelievable resources about assistive technology and special education in general. Usually, it is a lot of information to absorb thought so I definitely recommend asking questions when it's possible. People are my greatest resource. I have been fortunate to meet many leaders in the education system and I try to sponge up all their wisdom, but it's not possible. I can asses more information by asking in-person, over the phone, or by emailing.

How does it relate to other topics we have learned about in class?

I honestly feel that Tracey has done a good job of scaffolding our instruction so that each class builds upon the last which makes this question a little more difficult. Even today, Tracey referred back to the SAMR model from last week because she showed us the difference between merely using technology as a replacement and using technology to transform content into engagement. All while using technology, we must continue to respect digital citizenship. Surprise, surprise, Tracey started with the digital citizenship module to create a foundation of online etiquette.

What is one thing you have researched on your own regarding assistive tech?

Digging further into assistive technology, I found that there are many websites that resemble a trunk of a tree since they give you options or branches of resources to shoot off from. Assistivetechnology.us listed a long line of specific links to explore. Choosing Learning Ally as a place to check out, I learned about all the success stories happening around the country and probably the world from students using assistive technology. The ones about dyslexia caught my attention because I have many people close in my life who would benefit from tools like speech-to-text. Reading the quote from The Yale Center for Dyslexia & Creativity's Dr. Sally Shaywitz, “Dyslexia robs a person of time; accommodations return it," makes my heart warm because that's why I'm studying what I'm studying.