physical disability and vision related issues

[Chad Counts]

Greetings, 

I have a student that will qualify for digital books under a physical disability. She has a condition where she is chair/bed bound, fatigues very easily, and has constant migraines that fluctuate with intensity. She is on homebound and is served under an IEP. 

She has mixed results with a text reader and audio books. Due to the severity of her migraines, she has trouble with comprehension. Content needs to be reduced and paragraphs reread for her to comprehend. On certain days, when she stares at a paragraph, presented either on a book, or computer, she experiences the feeling of vertigo and gets disoriented. Does anyone have any suggestions on changing the background color, text color, screen overlays, etc........Are there any vision teachers out there that could help me?

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Chad Counts MAT, NBCT
Assistive Technology Teacher Specialist

Department of Exceptional Children

75 Calhoun St

Charleston, SC 29401

843-937-6611

[Valerie Wilson]

Have you tried materials read by human voice?

Valerie

Valerie Wilson

304-574-3078

Part-time coordinator, WVDE Office of Special Education

 “If people of widely differing characteristics can succeed, then observers have a reasonable basis for increasing their own sense of self-efficacy.” ~ Albert Bandura 

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From: bookshar...@googlegroups.com <bookshar...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chad Counts <chad_...@charleston.k12.sc.us>
Sent: Thursday, November 8, 2018 12:11:54 PM
To: bookshar...@googlegroups.com
Subject: {Bookshare Mentors} physical disability and vision related issues

 

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[Jacqueline Knight]

Have you tried reducing the readability level?  I am thinking Snap & Read by Don Johnston.

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Jacqueline Knight, MA, ATACP

Assistive Technology Specialist

Glendale Unified School District

818 241 3111 ext 1588

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[Chad Counts]

Hi, Jacqueline. I was torn between that as we do have that as an option in our district, but she is highly intelligent and I'm not sure that would suit her needs. If you reduce the readability level, does it condense the passages?

[Schindler, Lore]

Hi Chad,

Is the student using an iPad? If so, have you tried Voice Dream Reader? Although it is digitized text, the voices are pretty good now. There is an option to speed/slow the text read but I don't know of an easy way to have the text repeated. There are gestures built into the app, so double-tapping with two fingers on the screen pauses/reads the text, swiping to the left with two fingers moves it back by the Navigation Unit you've set (at the bottom right of the screen when you're in the book). 

There are also lots of visual settings that you can try with your student:

Font size can make a difference, but also font style--the size can actually look different depending on the style. There are options for background/foreground/reading highlighter that can be adjusted (I've found that that my students will decide what works best for them by trying out the various options). There is a way to increase the space between lines that can help, as well as a way to reduce the number of lines visible on the screen so the student can concentrate on 5, 3, or 1 line at a time, rather than the whole page of text. Note that if the student is reading a textbook with images and you've chosen Rich Text to see the images, the text options are reduced, so you may want to try looking at the Plain Text Visual Settings.

Lastly, the developer of the app is very responsive to suggestions and he has improved this app tremendously over the years. You can not just open Bookshare books, but you can open pdf and other documents, as well as web pages (this can help with pages that are filled with cluttered images, etc.).

Lore

Lore Schindler

Teacher/Technology Coordinator

Visually Impaired Program

LAUSD

Sent from my iPad

[Jacqueline Knight]

What do you mean by condense passages?  What I have seen it do is change the level of the vocabulary, so that instead of saying "stratosphere" it may say layer in the sky (or something like that).  If you are looking for condensed versions then perhaps looking at books by Townsend Press?  

https://www.townsendpress.com/store/k-12/fiction-and-nonfiction

[Chad Counts]

Make the passages a shorter length..... I need something that reduces the amount.

[Sandra Oliver]

I love Bookshare but I also always recommend the district eBooks collections we have via Destiny and also the public library Overdrive Collections for free reading.

Also other than the built-in screen colors and contrast choices you have in Bookshare setting -  there are also overlays available in Read &Write for Google Chrome if you happen to have that toolbar and you might be able to play with the different contrast and masking options

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Sandra Oliver
WATR - WCCUSD

Technology Specialist - Assistive Tech

Google Certified Trainer

Apple Distinguished Educator

office - 510.307.4524
mobile - 510.426.2546
WATR Resources