My Crazy Idea

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My Crazy Idea

• Web2.0 and student-centered learning for Students
  with Significant Cognitive Disabilities

2
Who Am I?

• Patrick Black
• pblack00_at_gmail.com
• http//teachingall.blogspot.com
• Twitter _at_teachntech00
• ATIA2009
• Full presentation available at
• http//prezi.com/2m4fcv7ml2xi/

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Experience

• Nine years teaching experience
• Students with Autism, Multiple Disabilites,
  Students with Significant Cognitive Disabilities
• Trained in Visual Supports - Heartland TEACCH

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Current Placement

• Currently I teach at Mt. Prospect SD 57
• Fairview Elementary
• 2nd 3rd grade students
• Classroom of students with significant cognitive
  disabilities
• Both verbal and non-verbal students in the class
• Many different ability levels

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Where did this start for me?

• Council for Exceptional Children Conference
• Dr. Diane Browder
• Teaching Language Arts, Math, and Science to
  Students with Significant Cognitive Disabilities
• NCLB
• Understanding that students with significant
  cognitive disabilities are required to have
  access to the general education curriculum

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My PLN

• Personal Learning Network
• Listserv (i.e. QIAT, Boardmaker Yahoo Group)
• Twitter
• Blogs
• Social Bookmarking (i.e. Diigo, Delicious)

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PLN - Listserv

• QIAT
• Quality Indicators for Assistive Technology
• http//natri.uky.edu/assoc_projects/qiat/
• Boardmaker Yahoo Group
• http//groups.yahoo.com/group/boardmaker
• Group of professionals and parents all working
  together to make accessible curriculum materials

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PLN - Twitter

• http//twitter.com
• Instant collaboration
• Global reach
• Learning community
• A conversation

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PLN - Blogs

• Teaching All Students
• http//teachingall.blogspot.com
• All Together We Can
• http//alltogether.com
• Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs
• http//teachinglearnerswithmultipleneeds.blogspot.
  com
• Free Resources From the Net for (Special)
  Education
• http//paulhami.edublogs.org

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PLN Social Bookmarking

• Diigo
• http//diigo.com
• Social bookmarking tool
• Link sharing
• Tagging
• Collaboration tools
• Classroom accounts
• Delicious
• http//delicious.com
• Social bookmarking tool

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My Crazy Idea

• Was interested in getting students more involved
• Saw 1st Grade reports on Animals
• And my next thought was My kids could do this!

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Research Project

• Students I teach are mostly non-verbal
• This needed to be their project
• Needed a way to get students involved in the
  research
• Non-verbal communication boards

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Research Project

• Student lead project
• Topics picked by student
• Non-verbal communication board
• Allowed students to participate in reading above
  their level
• Students given ownership of project

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Research Project

• Research materials provided to students
• Diigo.com - http//groups.diigo.com/fairviewsoar/b
  ookmark
• Diigo allows you to create a group
• All links shared with students
• Could sort by tag (animal, desert, etc)
• Books
• Materials were read to students
• Allowed to pick whether it was a fact about their
  animal and whether they liked it

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Research Project

• All facts that students liked were written down
• First students were asked if it was a fact about
  their animal
• Then, they indicated whether they liked it or not
• Once students had done some research, they were
  asked to use the liked facts to complete a
  worksheet about their animal
• If they did not have the fact to answer a
  question, they had to go back and do more
  research

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Research Project presentation resources

• Tar Heel Reader
• http//tarheelreader.org
• Students can write publish their own books
• Easy interface
• Very accessible
• VoiceThread
• http//voicethread.com
• Create student narrated slideshows
• Used single switch devices to allow students to
  say the narration

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Research Project - VoiceThread

• Once students had completed the worksheet, I used
  their answers to make sentences.
• These sentences were read to students, and they
  picked 5 to create a simple presentation
• Student read or used a simple switch to record
  their presentation into VoiceThread

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Research Project Tar Heel Reader

• Using Tar Heel Reader, students wrote books about
  the desert
• This was a group activity to help students
  remember the facts they had learned about the
  desert
• As well as what animals were in the desert

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Preparing to present to our peers.
Bulletin board of our animals
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My Crazy Idea

• VoiceThread Presentations
• Jenna - http//voicethread.com/share/436265/
• Eugene - http//voicethread.com/share/435125/
• Tar Heel Reader Books
• http//www.diigo.com/list/teachntech/desertanimalb
  ooks

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Conclusions - Positives

• Students enjoyed the process
• Really got into their animal
• They learned quite a lot about the desert
• Given sentences about their animal and
  distractors
• Students were able to pick the sentence about
  their animal at about 80 accuracy
• Empowered the students to create create a
  presentation that was theirs!

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Conclusions Changes

• Expand to other topics
• Was a great idea for science, possible uses with
  social science
• Not sure if students learned about the other
  animals in the project
• I know they learned about their animal, but not
  about animals other students researched
• Allowing students more opportunity to pick/edit
  photos used in presentations
• Possible use of Glogster.com to present too

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My Crazy Idea

• Thank You for attending
• Please email me questions
• pblack00_at_gmail.com
• Check out my blog
• http//teachingall.blogspot.com
• Follow Me on Twitter
• _at_teachntech00
• Full presentation available at
• http//prezi.com/2m4fcv7ml2xi/

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Thank You!
Thank you for attending this session at ATIA 2009
Chicago! Watch for us in Orlando this
January! Please help us improve the quality of
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