Don't Leave the IEP Meeting Without It!
Parents and professionals use assistive techology for children and adults with disabilities every day. Sometimes, the assistive technology is so natural that it is used without much planning or thought. However, more complicated problems require careful thought, evaluation, and trail use with children and adults with disabilities. In these situations, assistive technology can be the difference between success and frustration. Parents, professionals, and the person who will use it must work together for assistive technology to be successful. The sheer number of things out there considered assistive technology and the requirements in the 1997 reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) that every IEP committee "consider" the child's need for assistive technology underscore the need to work together to choose appropriate assistive technology for an individual.
Exactly what is Assistive Technology?
It is anything that can help a person with a disability do something they cannot do or can help them do it better than they can without it. Anything? Yes, anything. It is an extension on a light switch that helps a child in a wheelchair. It is a sound system that makes it easier to hear what the teacher is saying. It is a pencil grip that helps a child grasp a pencil. It is software that does something special such as speak the words printed on the screen for someone who cannot read the print.It is a clipboard that holds down a piece of paper to help a child write legibly. It is thousands and thousands of items that help individuals with all sorts of disabilities and challenges. Sometimes it is to think about what assistive technology is not. It is not a person. A person is never assistive technology. It is not a strategy. It is not a method. It is not a shorter assignment. It is not a different location in the classroom. These are all important to consider for a child with a disability, but they are not assistive technology.
Assistive Technology, according to IDEA, is: any item, piece of equipment, or product system, whether acquired commercially off the shelf, modified, or customized, that is used to increase, maintain, or improve functional capabilities of a child with a disability.
It is important to know about assistive technology because it is a powerful tool for people with disabilities, allowing many to do things they could not do without it. Appropriate assistive technology compensates for all types of motor limations, diffculties with vision or hearing, or less obvious problems with reading, writing, or memory. The only thing assistive technology cannot do is help your child to do something that he is not developmentally or cognitively ready to do. For instance someone could program wonderful, appropriate messages in an augmentative communication device, but if your child doesn't understand those messages, doesn't have a desire to use them, or doesn't activate the device, it won't help them communicate. Assistive technology is most appropriate when a child wants to complete a task, tries to do it, but is unsuccessful because of a physical or sensory limitation. This is where assistive technology makes a significant difference.
It is important to discuss all these possibilities as they relate to your child with a disability at the IEP meeting. If you know your child will need assistive technology devices of some kind, then have an assistive technology evaluation done prior to the meeting so that all committee members can discuss the results of the evaluation. Some school systems have people trained to do these evaluations, but many do not. There are other organizations that do them, often at no cost to the family.
Funds Available For Assistive Technology
The Georgia assembly has allocated $2,500,000.00 in lottery funds to assist local school systems in purchasing assistive technology devices, hardware, and software for students with disabilities. These funds may be used to purchase assistive technology to meet individual student needs as specified in the student's IEP, to purchase core classroom assistive technology devices to meet the needs of students within the classroom, or to purchase assistive technology devices for the development of an A.T. assessment kit. The lottery funds may NOT be used to purchase classroom computers and instructional technology such as television and video cassette recorders. Guidelines for utilizing the assistive technology funds were disseminated to special education directors in July 2001. The guidelines are also available on the Educational Technology Services page of the Georgia Department of Education
