Reading Reflection #3- "One Size Never Fits All"

Reflection #3

            The article “One size never fits all” illustrates the idea of using applications within the special education classroom setting to help students with various disabilities achieve their Individualized Educational Program (IEP) goals. The article introduces what support teachers would need, the techniques they would use to implement these different forms of technology into the classroom setting, and how these forms of technology are matched with students and curriculum. Since every student has a unique set of individual goals and learning styles of which the teacher has to be aware, the process of implementing these forms of technology has to be thoroughly thought out and well developed. By implementing a technology support plan for students with special needs, educators are seeing those students meet their IEP goals and achieve benchmarks quicker. The developers of the program have tried to connect curricular activities and tasks to various forms of assistive technology and other technology resources. The training and professional development educators need would have to offer various choices in which they could learn the material and various methods to apply these strategies into the classroom. Integration of this technology is done in three tiers due to the individualized attention each student needs and how diverse learning environment is in a special education setting. In the first tier, teachers participate in workshops getting familiar with technology and how to use them to increase learning and help them meet IEP goals and benchmarks. In the second tier, teachers participate in student led conferences and have both students and teachers develop their own e-profile. In this tier, teachers learn in both a face-to-face and online environment to experience learning in an online format as well as become more familiar with what the student experiences. In tier three, although face-to-face interaction continues, most collaboration is done online and utilizes texting and other forms of communication for support. Technology integration in special education settings has had real results. For example, students who may have difficulty expressing their thoughts into words on paper in writing might find it useful to use speech-to-text feature, word prediction, and other supportive tools. Since implementing new technology into the classroom students’ attitudes towards writing have drastically changed and their motivation to write has greatly increased. The advantages to the integration of technology are seen throughout classrooms and the possibilities for different learning experiences are endless.

            As a future Special Education Teacher, I want to use technology as much as possible in the classroom, not only to benefit students’ learning and development, but as a benefit to the teacher as well. I find that technology can help when students don’t want to communicate they are struggling or may not be able to make progress due to their attention span. Applications can help in instruction, assessment, reinforcement of information, and practicing knowledge already obtained. Regardless of students’ needs, there are many different applications and tools that technology has to offer which would help the students and support the learning process. Interactive games and other applications can help increase students’ attention span and their ability to communicate to their teacher where they are struggling. They also help educators assess where students’ ability and skill levels are and what methods of teaching leads to the most progress. I feel that as long as students are engaged, positively interacting with their peers, and learning, that the basic goal of education is achieved. As a substitute teacher, a lot of the issues with behavior management stem from either a lack of engagement or being distracted. If teachers could shift students’ attention towards the lesson and engage them in the classroom and as a result, teach them the information by using technology, then technology has proven successful in contributing to the learning environment. Educators need to find ways in which they can grasp students’ attention without having it be a constant battle between what is distracting them within the class. These issues take away from instructional time and hinder learning from taking place. Overall, I believe as a future educator, technology will play a major role within my classroom, and as time moves forward, more opportunities will open up for technology to contribute to the educational process.

     This article supports implementing technology within a special education setting. Educators should be experts in the various concepts of the ISTE standards for students; however specific standards are necessary for integrating technology within a special education setting. This article illustrates how educators will implement technology, instead of the methods they will use to teach and implement technology. Certain standards need to be addressed in order to move forward with the integration of technology into a special education setting. This article does not address any specific ISTE standards for students. The main standard that is addressed for teachers is “Technology Operations and Concepts.” Teachers need to understand and demonstrate a sound understanding of the concepts, systems, and operations in order to implement and integrate them into the classroom as well as teach these standards to their students. Another concept that needs to be addressed for teachers is “Research and Information Fluency”. Teachers need to apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information to help their students learn the information in the lesson and use a variety of teaching strategies to best fit students’ needs and learning approach. Overall, I believe Special Education Teachers need to develop a firm understanding of different strategies to implement and integrate various forms of technology into curricular tasks and activities to help students achieve the objective of the lesson as well as their goals.       

References

Courduff, J. (2011). One size never fits all. Learning and Leading Through Technology, 38(8), 16-18.