Meeting #5

Technology Focus GroupMeeting #5 : 

Technology Focus GroupMeeting #5 May 19th, 2009

A few useful links : 

A few useful links Autism Internet Modules-The Ohio Center for Autism and Low Incidence is developing a series of autism modules. These modules would be great for parents, professional development, etc. Geneva Centre-Another site that offers modules for autism.

Boardmaker PECS sites : 

Boardmaker PECS sites Do2Learn Activity Exchange Geneva Centre

Cartooning and social skills : 

Cartooning and social skills Comic Life-You can register free for 30 days. I’m looking into purchasing a registration. Comic strip creator-You can create an account for free (sek322=username jacobal1=password)

Cartooning and emotions : 

Cartooning and emotions Carol Gray’s book Comic Strip Conversations states “Experience with Comic Strip Conversations indicates they ay be an effective tool for parents and professionals working with students with autism and other developmental disabilities.” www.thegraycenter.org Gray, Carol. Comic strip conversations. (1994). Future Horizons, Inc.

Adaptive Mice : 

Adaptive Mice These might be useful when it comes to teaching students how to use the right and left clickers. We have some on order! Colorful keyboards might also be useful for teaching students how to type.

The Transporters-Debbie P. : 

The Transporters-Debbie P. Clip from DVD The Transporters is an educational DVD program developed through funding from the British government, by Simon Baron-Cohen and his team at the Autism Research Centre at the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom in collaboration with Culture Online and Catalyst Pictures. The DVD uses animated vehicles, each with the face of a highly expressive actor on it, to teach autistic children how to better read faces and emotions. The team addressed the characteristic of children on the ASD spectrum having difficulty looking at people and reading the social messages and emotions communicated through facial expression. There are a series of 15 episodes lasting 5 minutes each. Following the episodes, there is the option to take a “quiz,” in which the user is asked to identify the character’s facial expression. The American version became available for purchase in the United States in January 2009. The Transporters is similar to Thomas the Train Engine, as they imposed faces onto the front of vehicles. Unlike Thomas, these facial expressions change and react in response to the story’s narration. The emotions represented are: happy, sad, angry, afraid, excited, disgusted, surprised, tired, unfriendly, kind, sorry, proud, jealous, joking and ashamed.

Slide 8: 

Research Group: Children ages 4 to 8 years old High functioning ASD ( referred as Asperger syndrome) children with typically developing children Compared identified ASD children who watched the DVD for 15 minutes every weekday for 1 month to ASD children who did not watch the DVD and typically developing children who watched the DVD Comparisons of children were matched for age and verbal IQ Classroom Results: Tried with all 8 of my students. All like (will watch), one especially enjoys (chooses this program over others, smiles when he sees/hears it, sometimes skips over to computer) This student (AJ) uses the program daily, 5-15 minutes Best to sit with student when taking quiz Some improvement in eye contact (more frequently at or above 80%, but not yet moved on to next step), increased verbalization-especially in commenting how he is feeling (No, I’m sad; I’m happy today) Another Summit classroom’s students were afraid of the program and cried.

June Presenters : 

June Presenters Laura Bell-Chopra Peg Barkley Lindalee Mariotti Melissa Ryan

The next meeting is June 11th : 

The next meeting is June 11th Please bring a dessert to share with the group. Surveys will be filled out. Brainstorming will occur for the future.