Fourth Class

I was exposed to many new apps that I can use with a variety of learners during our fourth class. The nights first presentation, “New Apps for Learning Disabilities,” presented by Keisha and Donalda provided great information on three apps that can be used when working with students with learning disabilities. I found the Paperport Notes app and the Book Creator App of particular interest. As noted in their presentation, Paperport Notes is a great app to use with students at any stage of their educational career. This is a valuable app that can be used in early elementary schools all the way through the education system to university classes. One of the things I like most about this app is that it helps create a method of sharing documents between teachers and students. I can definitely see this app being of great use in the high school setting. Another great app discussed in this presentation was Book Creator. This app allows students to create ebooks using text, graphics, and audio. As noted in the presentation, the Book Creator app can also be a useful tool when creating digital portfolios. This app also makes fully accessible ebooks, which can be useful when teaching students with learning disabilities. 

The second presentation delivered by Mary, Courtney, and Amy entitled, “Top Free Apps in Special Education,” used a great infographic to display their school survey information. This infographic was a great introduction to the Canva website, where teachers and students can easily design graphic displays that can be used to summarise information or student learning. The presentation also used a graphic organiser to display and summarise the apps discussed in their presentation, breaking them down into appropriate grade levels and subject use. One app I found particularly interesting was the Science 360 app and how the presenters suggested that it could be added to creating a universal design for learning environment in the classroom.

Jeremy, Clarissa, Joseph, and Michelle’s presentation, “Learning about Apps to Support Students with Learning Disabilities,” discussed many apps that I am interested in trying in my own teaching practice. As an iPad and IPhone user, I occasionally find it difficult to view certain websites, such as Starfall without being asked to visit the Apple App Store. From this presentation, I have learned about the web browser, Puffin, which allows you to view information and interact with it on websites such as Starfall. I have since downloaded this app and use it regularly and have shared it with fellow teachers.

The fifth presentation on night four of our class was presented by Victor, Janice, and Sheri and was on the topic of executive functioning. This presentation covered many apps that I can be used by teachers and students to help create an organised learning and working environment. What made this presentation interesting is that it covered apps that could be used for emotional control that would be relevant for teachers working with students with Autism and ADHD. I really found the idea behind the Shredder app interesting. This could be an interesting tool to get students thoughts down and clear them once they have sorted them out.

The last presentation entitled, “Exciting New Apps for LD,” by Dawn shared a powerful video about a student with dyslexia. The video shared a firsthand experience of a student’s journey through the education system with a learning disability and how she felt about learning outside of the regular classroom. Along with the apps highlighted in this presentation, I learned that there is a Simple English setting in Wikipedia under the language options. This may prove to be beneficial when working with my students in the future when searching for preliminary information that can be used when developing ideas for projects and class assignments.

Overall, from the presentations, I took away many new apps that can be used in a variety of settings in the school system, especially as a teacher working with students with learning disabilities. I look forward to trying to implement some of the apps and ideas presented in my own classroom practice to help my students become comfortable when taking part in the learning process.