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Assistive Technology ideas make a
Assistive Technology (AT) has never been so widespread and mainstream and can help all our students with reading, writing, organisation and much more - in short it supports inclusion.
BIG difference
Reading, in particular, can be one of the biggest challenges for students (or in Education). It takes time to both acculturate to, and comprehend academic writing styles, and use these in written assignments.
How can we create awareness about AT with freely available tools, so students can use it and benefit from it so they can build it into their day-to-day culture?
So a challenge is, how can we advocate simple AT, in a small way, to support reading and begin the empowering AT journey for students?
‘Google Lens’ App for Smart Phones
‘Immersive Reader’ - Edge Browser The Edge Browser, for laptops/desktops, has an inbuilt tool called Immersive Reader that can read out text in a website. It not only reads it but gives you other options to help the readability of text.
This free app can photograph printed text like books, articles and magazines in your Library and then read the text aloud. This means you can listen to the text with your headphones.
bit.ly/ATHiveLens
bit.ly/ATHiveEdge
Call to Action:
Small ways we can advocate AT:
We can all raise Assistive Technology awareness to inform students about these two small free AT Tools that support the challenge of reading and promote academic success-How?
Teaching Staff: Signpost Students to AT in your assignment briefs like the ‘AT Hive’ AT Resource in AHEAD? Embed AT in Orientation information... Librarians/ Careers/ Student Union: Posters / Leaflets / Social Media / Workshops or Information sessions about these reading tools? How can you guide students to simple AT?
Assistive Technology is everywhere so explore www.ahead.ie/athive to find AT possibilities.
Trevor Boland Trevor.Boland@ahead.ie Twitter @BolandTrevor AT Resource www.ahead.ie/athive 7