Why we should consider mainstream tech before specialized tech when helping students access learning
The Idea: A lot of Assistive Technology for students that was designed for specialized purposes is now becoming mainstream. This means it is easier to afford, acquire, integrate into existing systems and transfer to out-of-school contexts. This leads to longer-term gains and more empowered learners. For this reason, it is ideal for educators to first check if mainstream tech solutions meet their needs before choosing more specialized options.
While working with teams to support inclusive education in schools over the last 7 years, we spent some time exploring assistive technology and accommodations to provide access to learners with specific needs like reading or writing difficulties. I had a major ‘aha’ moment along the way. Here it is in brief:
The Challenge
Many learners may need supports to learn optimally. For example let’s look at reading accommodations. The font in a textbook might be too light or small for a few students to read. So traditionally, we needed to find ways to enlarge and reprint for them. Or students with reading difficulties often needed to be supported with readers to decode text. This could mean having a person support by reading aloud for a student. During this time several innovative but specialized tools were invented to help students with specific learning difficulties access learning. For example the c-pen was invented to help to access text beyond the classroom, which compared to other tools provided students with much more independence in reading.
But because assistive technology was designed for highly specialized users in special education it brought
along with it several limitations:
Availability: First accessing it was hard. We often found that the tech was invented but not even available in India.
Affordability: Secondly, even if we found a way to acquire it, it was extremely expensive for a school or parents. Funding is often a challenge for inclusive education initiatives/ schools.
Integration: The small user base meant that improvements to the design were slow and often did not integrate well across settings.
Transferability: Many of these tools were not practical to transfer to or use functionally in out-of-classroom settings
The 21st Century Change
Now, because these are mainstream they tend to be much more affordable and accessible. They also integrate well into everyday devices like your cell phone or your laptop, which makes them usable functionally in a much wider range of situations. You carry your cell phone around almost everywhere anyway which makes a text to speech tool on that much more transferable than carrying around a specialized device like a c-pen everywhere. (Update: One month after I wrote this blog, Apple released the text scanner feature in iOS15! This pretty much means the function of the c-pen is on its way to becoming mainstream tech too. Woohoo!)
A Call To Explore
I write this to encourage special educators / inclusive educators (for those who are not already!) to look beyond the specialized tools available to them and first look for mainstream tools to support learners. This will help you empower your learners with tools that are transferable to many contexts and with long-lasting impact. I am not an expert in assistive technology and while several specialized tools may still not be replaceable, I am sure that mainstream tech may serve a range of accommodation needs beyond just reading like supporting organization, executive function, writing/ expression, handling money, independent travel, picture exchange communication systems etc.
The digital revolution has provided us with an abundance of accessible, affordable, user-friendly tools for us to achieve our dream of ‘Learning for ALL’. And the offerings will just keep getting better. It is up to us to re-evaluate our approaches, recognize this opportunity and leverage the wonders of the digital world to enable student learning.
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