Laying the Groundwork for Interactive Video Activities for Students with Special Needs: Community Places Road Trip

Followers of this blog know that I've been experimenting with videos set to calming music for teachers to use with students who have significant special needs, including severe autism.  


One of the schools I serve as a school psychologist has interactive whiteboards (IWBs) in every classroom, including the room that I use with students.   Since most of our IWBs are new SMARTboards that provide good screen resolution and a decent sound system,  I use high-definition video for my projects.


Many of the students are learning about the community- community places, community and safety/road signs, community workers, community helpers, and so forth.    On a recent weekend afternoon, I went for a ride with my husband in his convertible car, with the top down, around part of the countryside of Union County, NC, and then up and down the main drag, I-74, between Indian Trail and Monroe.   I was able to capture just about every sign we passed.   I edited the video to about 12 minutes.  I used more upbeat music for this video, selected from the collection in iMovie.   


The video, as it stands, can be used on an IWB, and stopped at any point for a discussion about the scene.  I was amazed that the students paid attention to the entire clip.  They especially enjoyed it when I stopped the video at a scene of about a dozen shiny new trucks - we counted all of the trucks.  This particular class has a field trip planned to visit Target soon, so we stopped the clip to look at Target.

My plan is to transform this video (or a similar clip) into an interactive video, and create hot spots that students can touch to obtain additional information or activities that tie into various scenes.

For now, "low tech" activities will be OK. One idea I had was to provide the students pictures of the various signs in the video, and have them go on a virtual treasure hunt.  One student could be in control of the video and stop it when requested by another student who "spies" the sign.

Wolfe awarded LEED® Green Building Certification (slightly off-topic)

Only five new schools in North Carolina have been awarded LEED® certification, and Wolfe School (a program for students who have severe/multiple disabilities), in the Union County Public Schools district, is one of them. According to information from the UCPS website, "LEED® is a registered trademark of the United States Green Building Council (USGBC). It stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design and is a nationally accepted benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings."

LEED®-certified schools minimize student exposure to volatile organic compounds (VOC's) and artificial lighting. Both are thought to trigger sensitivities in people who are medically fragile or have more complex disabilities, such as severe autism.

I spend half of my working hours at Wolfe, and I'm impressed by the the positive outcome on the school's environment. The air is fresh and clean, and I've noticed that I have no allergy symptoms when I'm there.

Link: Curriculum Planning for All Learners, by Grace Meo

Take the time to read the article, Curriculum Planning for All Learners, written by Grace Meo, an advocate of Universal Design for Learning (UDL). This article provides a good framework for implementing UDL at the high school level by the use of a PAL (Planning for All Learners) team. The author looks at ways that the PAL process can be applied to support vocabulary and reading comprehension, which is important, given the high numbers of students at the high school level who struggle with reading.

Be sure to scroll down to the Appendix section of the article, where you'll find a variety of references, resources, and links. If you work at the high school level, consider sharing the article with your colleagues.

Here is the abstract from the article:

"The universal design for learning (UDL) principles provide a blueprint for designing a curriculum that addresses the diverse needs of all learners. The author provides an overview of UDL, connections to curriculum planning, and practical techniques that guide general and special education teachers in planning and implementing curriculum, using the planning for all learners (PAL) procedures. PAL is a 4-step process for designing and implementing a curriculum (goals, methods, materials, and assessments) that is accessible and effective for all learners. In this article, the author focuses on high school social studies content with a goal of supporting all students' understanding of the content by bringing together principles of UDL, the PAL process, and research-based reading comprehension strategies. KEYWORDS: accessibility, curriculum planning and instruction, reading comprehension, secondary school, universal design for learning"