boardmaker and podd alternative access cd

#Boardmaker and podd alternative access cd download

(Upper case could be used by the teacher to model writing but otherwise shouldn’t be needed as the students we would use this with are scribbling).White boxes around the letters, emphasising letter shape.This is the flip chart I use most of all.Click on the tab labelled “writing resources” to access them.

#Boardmaker and podd alternative access cd download

There is a treasure trove of these flip charts available to download at. They are gold – tools that I implement each and every week with a range of emergent writers. My suggestions for use are suggestions only – the variety of students that we work with means that we are always having to be creative and resourceful! Flip Chartsįlip charts were originally developed by the amazing folk at the Centre for Literacy and Disability Studies. This is only a guide – it isn’t a definitive list. We want to make their writing tool something that uses minimal physical and cognitive energy so that they can focus on all the other aspects of writing development.Īnd so, here’s a writing tool suggestion and selection guide.

“To develop writing skills they need to learn to generate an idea, to think about language, think about the words, the spelling, controlling their “pencil”, etc.” The complexity involved in becoming a writer means that we want to help each student to find the simplest writing tool for them. Think about my description at the beginning of this blog post of the different skills that students need to develop as writers. All the other goals simply use language like “create texts.” In the first year of school there is one handwriting goal and also one computer/keyboard writing goal. Instead Australian Curriculum recognises that students need to develop a number of skills in the area of writing and that ANY writing tool can be used to do this. In the current version, handwriting is given very little attention at all. This year, I am going to stop myself using the phrase “alternative pencils” and simply call each and every option a writing tool.įor those of you in Australia, in the previous version of the Australian Curriculum we were encouraged to ensure that students wrote as much with technology as they did with a pen or pencil. The world of writing is changing – and we have to change how we view it. This means that the most important tool for the current generation of students to learn to write with is a keyboard. But – if I needed to I could easily turn these into electronic lists too. Will they write a letter – and if they do will they handwrite it or type it? Are they far more likely to simply send a text message or an email? Will they be on social media? Will they play online games and join online forums? Will they comment on YouTube videos? How many of those tasks are able to be completed with handwriting? The only thing I regularly use handwriting for is a couple of lists on my fridge that I want other family members to also see. In fact, we use multiple writing tools each day and handwriting is a minimal part of that mix.įor the students who are in schools right now, think about how they are going to write when they leave school. When I first started working with assistive technology nearly 30 years ago, on-screen keyboards were something we used with a very small number of clients – but today most of us use them every day on phones and tablets. But the reality is that all of us use “alternative pencils” all the time.

For years we have been talking about using “alternative pencils” with students who cannot manage the motoric demands of a traditional pencil. The world of writing is changing – and it needs to change for the students we work with.

At no point today did I actually pick up a pencil and do some handwriting. This writing was done using my phone and an onscreen keyboard. I have also sent text messages, Messenger messages and added an appointment to my diary. All of this writing was done on a computer with a keyboard. I’ve sent 13 emails, I made comments on a document someone sent me, I sent a Skype message and I’m writing this blog post. This is despite that fact that today I have done lots of writing. Sometimes students are held back from writing instruction until they have developed these motor based skills, as if they are critical to writing success.īUT in a typical day, for me, I don’t use any of these skills to write at all.

Learning to write includes learning to hold a pencil, make strokes, move it across a page, master letter shapes, etc. To develop writing skills they need to learn to generate an idea, to think about language, think about the words, the spelling, controlling their “pencil”, etc.įor many people, the act of learning to “write” is firmly enshrined in the concept of learning to handwrite. For many of the students I work with, some of whom have complex communication needs and/or relatively limited experiences of generating language, writing presents many challenges.