Universally Designed

Ups and Downs of the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS)

Jason Carroll — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 16:05:30 +0000

One of the most well known methods for working with students who are non-verbal is the Picture Exchange Communication System, or PECS. According to the PECS website, “PECS was developed in 1985 as a unique augmentative/alternative communication intervention package for individuals with autism spectrum disorder and related developmental disabilities.” As the name suggest, PECS begins by having students exchange pictures to request a desired item from a communication partner.

Recently a meta-analysis was conducted by Flippin, Reszka and Watson (see full citation below) to examine the effectiveness of PECS for students with autism spectrum disorders. Overall they found that “ Results indicated that PECS is a promising but not yet established evidence-based intervention for facilitating communication in children with ASD ages 1–11 years.” Specifically, here are a few things I took away from the article:

The publication mentions several reports that suggest that PECS has increased functional communication in students with ASD in a relatively short time period. While this is good to note, the article makes the point that while positive, these reports lack evidence.
There are enough articles mentioned throughout the publication that will keep any researcher busy for some time, but the most common outcome from referenced studies was the success in increasing students’ ability to request items. While this is far from what one would consider to be proficient communication skills, it is never the less a positive result that data clearly indicates is capable with PECS.
Some studies referenced did demonstrate an increase in communication. Some of these were said to have treatment fidelity (meaning that it was clearly demonstrated that PECS was implemented correctly) while others did not.
Data is limited for the maintenance phase (ability to continue effectively using PECS after training) and the generalization phase (using PECS effectively in other settings).

Anyone using PECS or working with students with ASD and communication delays should read this article. It is titled “Effectiveness of the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) on Communication and Speech for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders: A Meta-Analysis” by Flippin, Reszka and Watson in the American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, May 2010.

It is important that classroom teachers as well as AT specialists and other related service providers are familiar with what the research says. While this article demonstrates the effectiveness of PECS for requesting items, it gives concern for having expectations past this, or for assuming that a student will maintain progress once training stops.

Staying up to Date

Jason Carroll — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 18:21:43 +0000

The most common question I am asked when I speak at a local or national conference is “How do you stay up to date with all of this stuff?” While it would be nice to be able to say that I travel the world going from classroom to classroom and lab to lab to find only the best products and practices, it really is much simpler than that. There are two primary ways I stay up to date:

Conferences
There are 3 or 4 national conferences dedicated to Assistive Technology that I try to attend at least two of each year. They are:

ATIA Orlando and ATIA Chicago (January and October)
Closing the Gap (October in Minneapolis)
CSUN (March in California)

In addition, there are tons of state and regional conferences available all over the United States that are great ways to network and learn about new products and strategies. This year, I will have the opportunity to visit Australia to speak at Spectronics’ Inclusive Learning Technologies Conference, which looks to be a great time and learning experience. So in short, there is no shortage of opportunities to learn and network in this area.

Blogs
Traveling to one conference, much less multiple conferences isn’t easy for most folks. And even if you do get the opportunity to attend one, you can never get around to every session available. Because of this, I use blogs and news feeds from several sites to stay up to date. If you aren’t familiar with a feed reader, now is the time to learn. A feed reader basically takes any frequently updated content with an rss feed (think news sites and blogs) and puts them all in one place for you. This way you don’t have to visit 10 or 20 different sites each time you want to see what’s new.

I personally use Google Reader and check it at least once a week. It is a great way to pass time when flights are delayed or I am waiting somewhere. I will typically have over a thousand items I can look through when I check it. Not that I’ll ever have time to review everything, but it is always nice to just skim through and see what sticks out. I can also sort it by date, topic, etc… If you do decide to start using a feed reader, be sure to subscribe to this blog!

Bonus
I also like to read through the QIAT Listserv. You can sign up at QIAT.org. Note that is a very active listserv so you may want to setup the emails to go into a folder until you have time to read them. I am also becoming more and more of a twitter fan. If you follow the right people you can learn about tons of useful sites and products in no time. Follow me at twitter.com/jkcarroll.

This may be a longer answer than those asking the question wanted, but hopefully it helps!

Apps from TechSmith

Jason Carroll — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 17:30:49 +0000

I use TechSmith programs often. You may not be familiar with the company, but I bet that you have heard of some of the products they offer such as:

Camtasia – Create high quality screen videos in many different formats
Jing – Free site that allows you to create screen videos and images to share
SnagIt – Advanced Screen Capturing Software
Screencast.com – Site that allows you to upload and store videos, documents and more from any platform. Limited storage is free, reasonable prices for upgrades.

In addition to these products, TechSmith, like most other companies, are now getting into the app market. I’ve enjoyed messing around with two of their apps and thought you may as well. Specifically, the two apps I’ve viewed are:

ScreenChomp – ScreenChomp allows you to create quick and easy video tutorials on your iPad. It consists of a whiteboard, markers and several editing features. You can create a tutorial and upload for others to view online in minutes. And it’s free!

Coach’s Eye – This one is obviously geared for coaches who want to video players, then review the video in slow motion and add audio and drawn comments. However, this same app could be used for tons of educational purposes such as professional development feedback, video self modeling, student projects and more. This app is for the iPhone or iPod Touch. Cost is $4.99 in the app store at the time of this writing.

Interactive Timelines

Jason Carroll — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 17:30:48 +0000

The use of graphic organizers in classrooms have been shown to be an effective practice for some time now. Graphic organizers can be anything from a Venn diagram or KWL chart to an interactive web based support. These types of supports help students make previously invisible connections visible. Now before you get too excited, there isn’t any evidence that I am aware of that says if you walk into a classroom, hand out a “graphic organizer” worksheet and walk away that you will see a bump in achievement. The goal here is to increase engagement, not bore kids to death.

So keeping engagement in mind, there is a particular type of graphic organizer that you may find beneficial: Time-lines. Commonplace in many classrooms, time lines are created to show events, outline a story, develop a family tree and much more. While this can all be done with paper and pencil or arts and crafts, web based software now allows students to not only add much more information to time lines, but also collaborate on them with other students, embed in blogs and forward out to others.

A few sites to check out that allow you to develop these types of time lines for free include:

As with most web based software, you can create a limited number of items for free with these sites, then opt to pay for premium features. Consider creating a time line to use for teaching content to your students, or allowing your students to demonstrate their knowledge of content.

Learning Styles

Jason Carroll — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 17:30:48 +0000

Are you a visual learner? If not, maybe you are more auditory or kinesthetic? If you are not sure, don’t worry because there is no shortage of websites or preference assessments you can purchase that will help you determine what type of learner you are.

I bring this up because learning style preference assessments are nothing new. I remember when I first started in the field of Universal Design for Learning these were common amenities used to help determine the best way to present information to your students. I recently just deleted a post on this blog from a couple years ago that listed free preference assessments you could find online.

Here’s the problem… According to a recent literature review published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest, “there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning styles assessments into general education practice.”

This will come as a shocker to many of you. It did for me. But this is a great example of what happens in classrooms everyday. We continue to do things others have done because we assume it works or because it is what we did when we were in school. You will probably want to take the time to read through this article yourself. It is simply titled “Learning Styles, Concepts and Evidence” by Pashler, et. al. A couple of the main takeaways for me include:

There are tons of studies that reference learning styles, however, “very few have included methodology capable of testing the validity of learning styles.” So even it you read something discussing how important learning styles are, it wasn’t likely from a strongly run study.

They are quick to mention the difference between preference and disability. Most learning styles assessments involve preferences, where students say they prefer one method over the other. This is different than using visual or auditory supports with students because of a disability.

I hope you give the article a read. Whether you agree with it or not, it has been a great discussion point at sessions I present because it forces folks to really think about why they are doing what they are doing in schools and classrooms.

AT vs IT (Instructional Technology)

Jason Carroll — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 17:35:54 +0000

Definitions are funny things sometimes. For example, if there is a student with a disability in my classroom and she receives an iPod Touch to help with basic study and time management skills, she has assistive technology. However, if everyone in the class has an iPod Touch it is instructional technology. That just seems odd…

I work quite a bit in co-taught classrooms that have a mixture of students with and without disabilities. What’s interesting is that if I can introduce a new technology to these students, such as iPods or a Smartboard, all kids benefit. A student with a disability may use it to increase communication while a student on the advanced placement track may use it to move onto more advanced content.

Having said this, it is important to realize that just because you put technology in a classroom that achievement doesn’t automatically increase. I’ve yet to find a device that makes a person smarter, but I’ve found plenty that makes instruction more efficient and engaging. For real change to occur, in addition to the technology, you need a teacher with an open mind that is willing to experiment and that will take the time to learn what works and what doesn’t.

My Social Media Plan

Jason Carroll — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 21:42:27 +0000

This plan will probably fail miserably, but my goal is to drastically increase my usage of social media for finding and disseminating resources in 2012. I try to provide resources related to Assistive and Instructional Technology (and just plain old best practices) weekly (starting in January) through this blog, and now will attempt to do so in 140 characters or less through twitter. Ideally I will tweet a resource a day (or at least week day) startin in January. These resources will include blog posts, product reviews, websites, other twitter users to follow and more.

I plan to use Google+ for this as well since it has some great features, but I’m still trying to work through a few privacy issues with it. In the mean time, you can find me on twitter at twitter.com/jkcarroll.

Updated Posts beginning in January

Jason Carroll — Sun, 04 Dec 2011 20:26:58 +0000

I apologize to those of you who take time to visit this blog from time to time and have found no new information. I have turned into a road warrior lately and have had the opportunity to be working in locations from Alaska to Spain. I realize the importance in keeping an up to date blog with fresh ideas and information however and will resume weekly posts (at a minimum) beginning in January. I look forward to connecting with everyone in the near future.

- Jason C.

AAC Training Now Available!

Jason Carroll — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 13:55:46 +0000

If you haven’t had a chance to look at CKSEC’s online training center, you should do so now. It contains several trainings available to member districts. The link to view it is www.cksec.org/pdms. You must create an account to access the courses (don’t worry, we won’t spam you… just necessary so we know how many people are actually using it). Many courses require a separate enrollment key, but the newest addition, Introduction to Augmentative and Alternative Communication, does not.

So try it out today. As always, I appreciate any feedback, so feel free to email me directly or comment on this post with your thoughts.

How Computer Viruses Spread

Jason Carroll — Fri, 27 May 2011 15:52:39 +0000

In general, this blog is about instructional and assistive technology. However, I have been dealing with an increasingly large number of general technology issues, so I have decided to add a new category to the blog for this type of stuff. Today I want to briefly explain how viruses and malware work, in hopes of helping readers prevent these sort of problems occurring on their computers.

Malware is short for malicious software. There are different types of malware (including viruses) that can cause all sorts of problems on one’s computer. Malware can be contracted in a variety of ways, including:

Simply visiting a website. Some websites are setup with the intent of installing spyware or other infectious software on your computer. Typically these are adult or similar sites, but that doesn’t mean it can’t occur on what appears to be a safe site. Use caution when visiting sites and consider using one of the add ins for your browser that show a check mark next to safe sites.
Installing software from the web. Any free software you download could also contain a virus. Be sure you know what you are downloading.
Being on a network. Unfortunately, just being on a network could infect your computer if someone else’s computer on the network becomes infected. Use caution when joining public networks. Microsoft usually asks if networks are for home, work or public so they can add extra security when needed.
Sharing files. I’ve seen a virus spread through an entire group of people because someone downloaded a file from the internet that contained a virus. When this was transferred via a flash drive to other folkss they also received the virus. Make sure you know the origins of any file you put on your computer
Email. Anytime your bank, ebay or other website that stores financial information asks you to click on a link and sign in, be sure to delete it. You should only access these sites directly from the web address (i.e. www.chase.com) and not through an email link. These type of emails are called phishing.
Websites that don’t look like websites… This happened to my wife yesterday. She clicked on a link to a site from google. She then received a message about a possible virus. The page that popped up look just like the control panel window on her computer. So she clicked to fix the problem thinking it was some built in support on her computer, when actually she was on a webpage set up to look like her computer. When she clicked to fix it… you guessed it, it actually installed the malware. As a general rule, anything on a website that says “click here to fix…” will likely make things worse.

The above are a few of the most common ways malware infect computers. Using some of the practical advice I included above will go a long way in helping you prevent infection.

CLICK HERE TO REMOVE VIRUSES FROM YOUR COMPUTER