Communication+Board


 * Communication Board for Student with High-Functioning Level Autism/ADD**

While participating in the Tech Club lessons I noticed that there really weren't any students that had severe communication problems as most of the students within the two classes were labeled with ADD. While observing both of the classes I recognized that behavior problems with individual students were the most common disruptions in the classroom. I particularly became interested in a 4th grade student named Nina from Mr. Quarles class. Nina has an African American background and her learning disability is based around her lack of attention or being easily unfocused. Mr. Quarles' assistant explained that Nina should probably be categorized as a high functioning level autistic, but Nina has not taken the test that would determine whether or not her disability is linked with autism. I explain more about Nina on my Technology Screening Project page.

I decided to create a type of communication board that would help a variety of students in the class stay focused on the goal of completing their assignments. Giving the students short goals along the path of completing an entire assignment would greatly benefit them and their success should reflect in their academic growth. I noticed that the students in Mr. Quarles class had been focusing a lot on writing and the structure of writing pieces such as 5 paragraph essays, especially for the writing portion of the FCAT. With Nina's tendencies to look away and lose focus immediately after she hears some type of noise around her, I decided to direct the purpose of my communication board to help Nina stay connected with her writing and complete her essay with aid of my communication board.

I went out and found a Playskool toy for little children that has different buttons/switches (a device rather) that when used causes a little animal to pop up. This toy seemed perfect because Nina loves to manipulate objects in her hands or to touch things around her; she is very kinesthetic. The toy also had 5 buttons and the matching numbers 1 through 5, which was perfect to match a 5 paragraph essay format!



I first wanted to cover the little pictures of the animals between the buttons and the hatches (the squares where the animal would pop up) because I felt that dealing with the later elementary students, they would want to use something a little bit more mature looking than having a board with little jungle animals on it. I decided to print out labels that said "Paragraph 1," "Paragraph 2," and so on, to cover each picture. I also decided to print out each label with a background color corresponding to the particular button it would be matched with; this would make it very easy for the student to understand that Paragraph 1 matches the blue device and the blue hatch that says "1" because the label for Paragraph 1 is blue. I made sure that the text on the label was easy to read and that the labels colors did not affect the readability of the text. I then decided to conceal the animals that popped out of the hatches by covering them in blue masking tape; this goes back to the maturity level of the student. I could have just removed the pieces, but I wanted to leave them in just in case I wanted to use this approach with a younger child that would appreciate the little animals. I printed out different messages to match the paragraphs and then installed them into the hatches. I wanted Nina to be encouraged when she pressed each of the buttons and to want to raise all of the hatches by finishing her essay.

After I put it all together and made sure that everything ran smoothly, I realized that it might not be rewarding enough for a student just to activate each device and have a message pop up out of each hatch. I wanted to give it something more! I decided to unscrew and take apart the toy to see how I could install something that would add more to the experience of completing a paragraph in an essay. I found that there was just enough room to attach a bell to the bottom of each of the hatches so that when the hatch flies open the student will hear a little ringing as well as a pop from the springing-open of the hatch.



I had Nina experiment with the communication board to make sure that she understood how to activate each of the 5 devices and also to make sure that she was not shocked to see the hatch spring open when she pressed a device. I talk to her and she understood that she has to focus on her work if she wants to complete everything. I explained to her that this board would be hers to work with during the class' writing time so that she could focus on raising each one of the 5 hatches. I reminded her of what each paragraph should include and that only after writing a well-constructed paragraph could she press the matching button for the paragraph she just finished (I also told Nina that she could still come back to the paragraph and make changes to it even after she pushes the button). I made sure that Nina understood that when she was completely done with her essay she could press the green switch for hatch number 5 because that hatches states "Finished Paragraph 5. Essay is done!!"



As Nina worked on her essay during writing time, I was amazed at how focused she was! Nina still would look around the room at things or people when she heard noise, but I think it was more because she was trying to think of what she could write about than simply being distracted from her train of thought. I could feel how she looked forward to pushing a device to make each hatch spring up when she was finished with a paragraph. The device itself was not a distraction as I originally thought that there was a possibility that Nina would be more intrigued with the toy's appearance and setup than its functional purpose. Knowing now that the device works for Nina's attention problems, I feel that this same tool can be used to help her in other areas and can be arranged to focus on more general goals; for example, each hatch could be labeled with a different subject (Math, Science, English, etc.) and Nina could activate each one once she finishes her tasks for each subject area. I believe this tool is very appropriate because it can be adapted to suit a variety of topics or tasks anywhere from asking pre-designed questions to a type of checklist for morning activities each day.