My students need one iPad. This one item will help ALL of my classes use technology to enhance their learning. Currently, there is no smartboard or projector in my room so we only use paper materials.
As you all know, middle school students need to be challenged to learn and improve their academic language skills. The students that I teach are speech and/or language impaired. These students have difficulty accomplishing language-related tasks in and out of the classroom. EVERYTHING encompasses and includes language in some way, shape, or form. Most all of my students come from different economic backgrounds with over 80% of them receiving free or reduced lunches. My goal is to prepare my students for success not only in high school but especially for the real life world.
My Project
There are a numerous amount of apps that have been designed for the speech and language impaired. This includes students with Autism Spectrum Disorder, Specific Learning Disability, Down Syndrome, Intellectual Disorder, and many many more!
By obtaining an iPad in the classroom, we will be able to use a new interactive approach to therapy in the classroom and make therapy fun!
This will help make my students more motivated to learn. The App store on an iPad provides language apps such as "Endless Reader," an interactive reading application that reinforces phonological awareness, vocabulary, grammar, and inferential images utilizing cute monsters. Children with Autism especially enjoy this because of the stimulation of the auditory and visual modalities and the words and phrases that are reinforced multiple times. There are also many free speech therapy apps such as "Phonics Studio", which trains children to articulate speech sounds, and "Minimal Pairs" used for children with Phonological Processing disorders. Children with Autism often have social language deficits for which the "Emotions" app is utilized. This app allows children with Autism to identify emotions based on a picture. This can be further expanded by the therapist by having the child explain why the person in the picture is displaying the emotion. There are many other pragmatic apps for free or small costs. Finally, the most versatile app of all is the "Bitsboard" app. Picture images are stored and programmed to be arranged for a variety of purposes including vocabulary, grammar flash cards, social language and much more. These are a few of the many apps available on the Apple iPad that can truly make a difference in the lives of children with Speech/Language Disorders!
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Wahlquist and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
