Introduction
This paper dives into the inclusive education philosophy primarily revolving around a learner group comprising children with an unusual condition from a developmental disability, autism, and the weakness of taking instructions and storing information. Through an analysis and a comparison of three specific teaching interventions: support for a learner with dyslexia reading disorders, a supple to a learner with spelling and autism, and support for a learner who has difficulty in following instructions or retention of info, it intends to provide a clear picture of the effectiveness of these adaptations. The evaluation is then extended to include any adjustments to the current teaching methods, such as applying the research findings and evidence-based practices, but also to be realistic and acknowledge that any changes may encounter problems. The analysis of my experience in this reflective practice makes it clear that the application of individualized learning tools, in this case, is greatly important in creating digital competencies for learners with additional educational features. The following analysis is also a part of the general discussion that deals with improving educational results in the undeniably particular group of learners with additional educational needs.
Identifying Learning Needs and Inclusion Issues
I understood how a person’s experience with reading plays a vital role in their participation in virtually deployed content, navigating software interfaces, and understanding written instructions in digital formats. My strategy had multimedia educational materials, for example, videos and sound support, for different groups of students with reading difficulties to benefit. Understanding an impediment to autonomy through a reading challenge for a student, I seriously considered creating a learning environment that provided a support system. These included talking through software when new things would be encountered and adding visual cues. Verbal instructions were included. My contemplation on the essence of this methodology once again highlights the vital role of flexibility and adaptability in teaching methods aimed at meeting students’ various learning needsents. At the same time, it points out the necessity to seek and adapt the latest and innovative solutions that make learning possible regardless of reading problems.
ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) gave me tasks that I had to overcome in the process of mastering tech competence within the Writing and Spelling class. The ASD sufferers found it hard to write down their ideas even though these were reflecting their thoughts; this affected the learners to a certain extent, using text production and communicative tools such as multimedia. To cater to students’ diverse learning styles, I supported those who preferred alternative ways of expressing themselves, like speech-to-text software and visual storyboarding tools, which enabled them to convey their ideas regardless of the huddle faced by the traditional writing style. Furthermore, activities with more structure in which participants could see the sequence of the steps and were led with clear, visual instructions helped organize thoughts and reduce what is often associated with complex language structures, such as feeling overwhelmed. One of my goals was to remove both stress from writing assignments and to give a new tool for personal expression to the students with ASD who are often timid about using digital technology. The interrelatedness of this experience demonstrated that personalized learning approaches are the key players in the influence of educational inequality and effectiveness.
A new problem was created as daily tasks demand the students to comprehend the given instructions or retain information. This challenge was overcome by carefully considering the needs of students and devising thoughtful strategies to aid the study process. This problem had a significant effect on digital communication due to problems of following sequential tasks, remembering steps in operation, and the usage of digital tools in the right way. To overcome these obstacles, I developed an organized approach that allowed digital tasks to be split into smaller, more easily graspable parts; time was booked for immediate feedback and practice. Thirdly, using visual aids and checklists as tools achieved the desire to provide a clear structure for tasks, which enhanced students’ ability to follow instruction. Additionally, student collaboration and peer support became crucial to these learners’ experience. The opportunities from this type of learning enabled students to work together and connect, creating a community and a feeling of mutual aid. The reflection of these approaches suggests the persistence of the need to improve and the implementation of new pedagogy techniques that support all types of learners, especially the ones who find traditional learning styles rather challenging.
Series of Lessons and Accommodations
Lesson Plan 1: Introduction to Digital Tools
The consideration of acquainting students with simple digital appliances and interfaces can be a central philosophy of the strategy for teachers who would have intended to help all individuals with learning disabilities and those who are not good in computing (Summey, 2013). To do this, I modified my lesson plans to incorporate facilitators that cater education to a wide variety of diverse learners and challenges. For students for whom reading was challenging, I incorporated visuals, watched videos, and used text-to-speech software as my primary means of delivery. Such an approach was conceptually built to penetrate textual obstacles and educate the audience through alternative sensory means. By combining visual aids for information and using audio materials for reading a lesson, I was trying to make one with a classroom in which no icon of accessibility for anybody would ever be broken.
The preparation of the course materials was equally as important. Learning with ASD usually involves serious challenges concerning putting thoughts on paper and understanding intricate language structures. Therefore, I adopted activities with detailed instructions and visually appealing step-by-step guides. The other part of my decision was a problem-solving exercise: figuring out a way to enable them to communicate and participate in digital activities completely. Therefore, I encouraged communication via speech-to-text software too. This not only helped them understand the process of digital text-making but also affected the cognitive burden on conventional writing tasks; the level to which they could engage in this process was higher. Through the picking and implementing these technological aids, I deliberately aimed to provide the students with ASD with the chance to explore and express their thoughts within the digital media space successfully, and this action can also boost their digital literacy and communication skills.
Finding tailored ways to meet the requirements and capacities of students who face difficulties in following instructions and conserving information was a goal that took a strategic partnership on lesson plan development and instruction delivery. To accommodate these students, I integrated a series of transmitting tasks that made more robust use of repetitions and hands-on activities, emphasizing instruction retention through reiteration and reinforcement. I believe digital processes should be broken down into smaller tasks, not more complex ones. Consequently, I offered immediate feedback to the students. Therefore, the students could encounter offline corrections in real time. The strategy aimed to deal with building their trust through connecting with digital tools and interfaces. This strategy led to a gradual increase in their self-dependency and skills. Moreover, I quickly noticed that cards with visuals and check boxes became my constant guides on what to do next, which, in turn, facilitated learning as well as task compliance. These accommodations were designed so that I could make the e-learning platform as smooth and friendly as possible, taking into consideration that students would be encountering difficulties by using it.
Lesson Plan 2: Creating Digital Content
The objective of this lesson was to involve learners of different backgrounds in the creation of straightforward digital content, such as online presentations or digital art. I tried to design a lesson plan by incorporating a few accommodations. For students with theoretical difficulties, the instruction was geared towards utilizing many images to depict the information and minimizing the reading content. Due to this, I made sure that the templates I provided had minimum text and largely depended on visual compositions through icons, images, and visual cues. In this manner, I could decrease the cognitive load on the students pretty much, and they were able to finish the imaginative part of the project further. This method, on the other hand, not only immensely ensured how easy it was for the whole content creation process but also empowered students by enabling them to share their knowledge and ideas visually, thus enabling students’ active participation and engagement in the learning activity.
Localization of the tutorial for the class of people with ASD was fundamentally built around supportive teaching techniques focusing on their visual and structured type of activity and recognizing their strengths. Digital artistry and other visual dealings are primary means of expression, which, in one way, reduce the need for tedious writing (Ellis & Loveless, 2013). This is important because some students often have trouble doing such tasks. To contribute to learners` attainment and engagement, I ensured intense routines with active tools used during the lesson. Therefore, an organized, consistent, predictable, and comfortable learning environment was developed in the lesson. The set nature of the structure, where the time ticks, was proven helpful in dealing with stress that might arise out of confusion despite creative freedom. It comforts and supports the autistic student in creative work. The goal was to prompt the students to explore and use digital tools within the scope they found appropriate and meaningful.
Collaborative activities have helped to meet the requirements of the best students who might lack the ability to follow instructions or retain information. I ensured the use of small groups and took advantage of the students’ peer-assisted learning strategies, allowing grouping to be an effective tool for assisting and consolidating the academic procedures that the students were introduced to. This cooperative method not only boosted the remembering of classroom instructions but also resulted in a community bond where the students became a team supporting one another. By being engaged jointly with project completion, such students could communicate, solve problems, and develop their digital skills in practice in a real-world situation, thus adding to their knowledge and skills to prepare them for success in digital content creation. These methods are intended to boost the student’s self-esteem and get them used to using digital devices and ensure that children with individual difficulties can work with digital tools in their own way.
Evaluation and Future Adaptations
Adaptations
Applying in-class volunteer technologies must be the fundamental step toward establishing an appropriate learning environment for handicapped students. For example, using a screen reader can make a massive difference in the perception of someone’s reading because it converts text to audio, which enables a blind person to separate the text as an audio format and, as the result, reads for him or herself. Also, speech recognition could serve as an assistive device for people with a problem in writing, who could mouth other means to convey their thoughts and ideas without the limitations placed by keyboard typing or handwriting. These technologies, however, not only make content accessible but also make students active members in classroom activities, thereby enhancing their self-reliance and confidence to get over the ambiguity. Through the skillful utilization of assistive methods, educators can foster a universal learning environment that demonstrates awareness of the needs and cases of the learners.
Creating individualized learning plans and multimodal delivery by listening to the learner’s needs and preferences is one of the strategies that are implemented to offer customized learning to everyone. Utmost care must be taken in consideration of various students’ fortes, interests, and impediments in order to design learning experiences that are both enticing and educational. Tailored plans enable us to completely change the way we teach, what materials we should use, and what we can test each learner with to respond better to his potential and aspirations, and, to this end, we build a stronger relationship between content and learning achievement. This method not only strides for students’ variability in the classroom but also significantly impacts a learner-centered education, where all students feel cared for and embrace the process of their educational journey. The role of teachers in personalized learning becomes that of empowering learners to fulfill their responsibility of learning on their own, which increases their motivation and success level.
Multimodal information provides the mode to support learning styles. Therefore, students should be instructed in multimodal learning, which is helpful. With the help of the mixture of text, images, and audio tools, educators may provide a more interactive, accessible one that also meets different preferences and abilities(White, 2015). Infographics and other visual aids can demonstrate complicated concepts, and podcasts and recorded lectures are beneficial alternatives if you do not like the traditional way of learning. Therefore, the variety of representation in this approach enables knowledge retention and more understanding and makes learning active and exciting. It affirms that students’ cognition follows diverse patterns, and sometimes educators need to design lessons so that every student has a clue. Eventually, this can help learners stick to the lesson and be deeply involved, leaving them with higher academic success.
Challenges
Catering to the needs of diverse learners by using technology and individualized strategies of instruction will bring another set of challenges to light, including technology access, training, and support for educators, and also keeping the students engaged and motivated. Securing that every student has fair access to needed technological equipment remains a high logistical and financial obstacle, which is also a possible limiting element for inclusive education efforts (Livingstone, 2012). Besides, teachers may come under pressure to attend the specialized courses, learn how to apply adaptive technologies, and change their teaching techniques to suit mentally restricted students, which once again brings professionals to light the need to complete specialized courses. Furthermore, maintaining students’ attention, especially those with related problems, is a continuous challenge for instructors to give their instructional design and delivery varieties, which commit them to constantly innovate and adapt their way according to the student’s interests and motivation.
Conclusion
Designing teaching options to confront the learning habitats of learners with disabilities implies educational inclusiveness, especially regarding digital literacy. Ongoing evaluation of such targeted strategies allows educators to revise and enrich their methods. This facilitates all students to advance through the said learning processes without any difficulties. This technology upon practice teaching of professors and lecturers depends on a delicate balance between the well-planned incorporation of technology, the adoption of varied teaching methods, and the purposes of conducting supportive mechanisms. Therefore, the balanced approach has great importance as it provides an avenue for the diverse learning requirements of all students to be met in an effective way so that every student with special needs can experience success and reach their highest potential in the digital world.
References
Ellis, V., & Loveless, A. (Eds.). (2013). ICT, pedagogy and the curriculum: Subject to change. Routledge.
Livingstone, S. (2012). Critical reflections on the benefits of ICT in education. Oxford review of education, 38(1), 9-24.
Summey, D.C., (2013). Developing Digital Literacies
White, J., (2015). Digital Literacy Skills for FE Teachers. Exeter: Learning Matters.
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