Example 2: Autistic Student requiring literacy support

Student

Riley, aged six, verified ORS Very High.

Non-verbal student diagnosed with Autism and uses an iPad with TouchChat to communicate.

During writing, Riley is passive and doesn’t engage. He's unable to hold a pencil and needs adult support to trace over letters or manipulate objects.

Riley enjoys looking at books and listening to stories; he turns pages and appears to scan the text in the correct direction; he'll look at picture when adult comments on it.

Environment

In a class of 25 students; with additional support:

  • specialist teacher, one day a week
  • teacher aide support in class – 17 hours
  • Ministry of Education learning support specialists.

Adapted program catering for his needs including sensory breaks.

Buddy program in place – older students come to play; do puzzles etc.; read books with them.

Current technology available in class – teacher’s laptop; five iPads; one desktop computer; interactive whiteboard.

Has access to technology daily with adult’s support. Usually used as a reward or completes literacy activities with TA; various educational apps on iPads used to consolidate learning tasks.

Task

Learning goals that assistive technology may support. Riley will:

  • engage in writing tasks
  • produce legible written work
  • increase independence in producing written work.

Tools

Hardware needs to be:

  • portable and robust
  • direct touch access
  • storage for photos and videos
  • access to online class portfolio 
  • access to camera for photos and videos to personalize program
  • easy to operate.

Software needs to:

  • support development of literacy skills
  • have text to speech
  • support predictive spelling
  • support writing with pictures
  • provide the ability to share his work with others
  • have mind-mapping
  • be fun and easy to use

Assistive technology chosen to trial

Trial 1

iPad and literacy support apps: sentence building, book creating, flashcards.

Trial 2

Touchscreen laptop with Clicker software.

Notes

After a three-week trial using an iPad with Clicker Sentences, the team decided against the iPad as they found he showed more literacy skills than originally assessed and required multiple tools to progress his literacy.  After an additional four-week trial with a touchscreen laptop and Clicker, there was enough evidence of success to complete the assistive technology application.

Progress after six months

Riley is now able to create simple sentences by typing words, using predictive spelling when he needs to and accessing the Word Bank that he and his teacher have brainstormed with his Touch Chat based on a picture prompt.

He enjoys using the pictures that come with the words as he types.

He listens to his sentences using the read back function and looks to his teacher with a smile when he's happy with it. 

He's continuing to show more literacy and language skills with his communication device and it's evidenced in his use of Clicker 7 when writing.

Last reviewed: Has this been useful? Give us your feedback