The TC Techies interpretation of the MacArthur and Edyburn Article’s was extremely insightful and examined the benefits and drawbacks of assistive technology and compensatory assistive technology vs. remediation.
In general the group agreed as Kimberly Simon pointed out, “there is merit in using assistive technology even in situations where it is being used as compensation. Any disagreements with in the group came up regarding how often the technology should be used, and whether it was truly beneficial when many students were not learning their target skills.
The majority of the group believed that there should not be a greater emphasis on either assitive technology as compensation or remediation. Rather, most members pointed out the benefits and weaknesses of both approaches, and for the most part, concluded that a mixture of both would be the most effective approach.
I have also included some interesting thoughts that I thought I should share.
Marielle wrote that “maybe remediation will be more effective for a student with a learning disability; the student may not need a certain technology to get by in school, that it is not their only way to function in a classroom. Rather, interventions with remediation will work better; by using alternative teaching strategies”.
And Kristen Schwarz added, “Technology…should be used to reinforce regular instruction. These computer technologies can help children practice skills that they learn in the classroom, but I do not think that they should be used to teach actual skills. But, of course, every student is different and if you are at the end of the road with a student (you've tried all other options) then, trying something is better then doing nothing.
Overall, everyone in the group made great points and it was a really interesting discussion.
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Julio -- and all the others Julio summarized:
You generally agreed that a combination of remediation and compensation is usually indicated. Perhaps the main point of the Edyburn article was that no student can do both at full steam. Time spent on remediation is time that can't be spent doing the academics with the compensatory technology. He stressed that the amount of time/effort put into each of those strategies must be deliberately and concretely determined by the team, written down, and adhered to. What the ratio will be is different for every student, but deciding what the appropriate ratio is and planning the student's time accordingly is essential.
ALSO SEE THE COMMENTS I PUT IN JENNY CHOW'S BLOG ON THESE SAME ARTICLES.
P.S. Julio, as Liaison, you were supposed to summarize the OTHER group, the Technos.
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