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Technology to Help with Learning Disabilities?
GotSanity asks: "I have a little brother who is now 18 and still can not read or do basic math. At an early age he was diagnosed with a level 10 mental handicap. I am curious as to what technology is available to help teach him to read. The major problems with most educational software I have found is that they both cater to younger minds (even though he has a learning disability he still is involved with everyday teenager activities like video games and music) and are often far to expensive for a working class family. I originally got him a copy of Typing of the Dead, and through it he has been learning to read and spell better. What novel education ideas can the Slashdot community suggest?"
My aunt was a teacher in special education, and I had the opportunity to help out on a few occasions. From talking to her and just interacting with the kids, hands-on learning and human interaction seem to be the best way for many of these kids to learn. Imitation and being able to see the concepts in their hands is probably a far better means of education than just a computer. However, I don't doubt that computer programs coupled with perhaps some sort of hardware controller and a human guide would be beneficial. Good luck to anyone who is helping anyone out with disabilities. Just being there to help works wonders on its own.
From my experience, educational software is usually laughably simple, especially given the price. If you don't totally suck at teh programming, try writing some of your own tools for him and then work with him to refine them and target them towards his specific issues. It doesn't take a rocket scientist. Get a copy of perl/tk or something and start hacking.
-73, de n1ywb
www.n1ywb.com
What is a level 10 mental handicap?
Don't take life so seriously. No one makes it out alive.
Maybe FFX and FFX-2. Lots of spoken dialog with captions. Actually any TV that can show CC without having mute on might be good to try. I really don't know what else to tell you. Maybe looking into some adult reading eductation programs in your local area to see if they have any tips.
Video-game related material actually can help. My partner had problems breathing when she was born and suffered motor control damage in her brain (which led her to be epileptic ever since). While mentally she has always been rather intelligent, she was phyiscally slow, which led many of her classmates to assume that she was retarded; they picked on her a lot for it.
:) ).
Based on advice, her parents encouraged her to play video games - especially Tetris - to help increase her coordination. Whether or not it was the cause, today she is about as coordinated as your average person (and can beat my socks off at Tetris, to boot!
"That's Nietzsche. He killed my father." -- Jesus, "Jesus Christ Supercop"
My niece was having a hard time learning her times tables, so I played 7-27 with her. The players closest to 7 and 27 split the pot. Each person gets one card, there's a round of betting, then every decides if they want another card, and the betting (we used almonds) continues after each round until no one wants another card. A little competition, and the lure of winning, fear of losing money tends to motivate.
When I was in elementary school, a test that they administered at school determined that I was typing around 800 words per minute.
Of course, that was largely because I figured out that, assuming that the final message you entered was correct, the algorithm counted the number of times you pressed the space bar. So, you just had to simply hold down the space bar, delete the line, hold down the space bar, etc, and then after several tries type in the correct message.
"That's Nietzsche. He killed my father." -- Jesus, "Jesus Christ Supercop"
I have Attention Deficit Disorder. Over many years, I have learned how to control it with little to no medication. I struggled horribly in school because among other things I simply could not remember to bring my homework home with me. By the time I got to High School, my disorder had been diagnosed and after trying several medications we were able to find one that worked.
What would have helped *me* more than anything (aside from an earlier diagnosis) would have been a few very simple process changes. If I had been given a set of books to keep at home, and had a list of upcoming assignments been sent to my house, things would have been *much* easier for me.
Again if we can stop thinking about technology and medication as our magic solutions we might be able to help people learn more and over time be better able to manage their disorders. Note that there is a place for both computers and medication, but these need to be secondary to process and an attempt help the individual discover how to best manage the disorder.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Friedrich Froebel, who was mentally challenged, founded the idea of the kindergarten. He used sandpaper blocks for each letter so that children could have a tactile feel for them and use other sensory modalities to reinforce memory of them. The Montessori teaching methods use similar approaches to Froebel's (see http://www.montessori.edu/). Repetition until mastery is what is needed. For your brother that may take a long time but wont it be great if he succeeds?
A negative side, effect, though, is that his first words were all registered trademarks. (Really! He'd point to my phone and say 'Motorola').
My brother had a combo of extreem dyslexia and hearing loss which caused a lot of problems in school for him. I was lucky enough to have a teacher who took a special interest in him and learned new teaching techniques in order to help him. He is now in university which is honestly something no one expected when he could not read at all for so long. For him RC car magazines were great, it was something he loved and they offered pictures and diagrams which he could understand even when too frustrated with the text, and encuraged him to keep trying. Technology wise, he swares by dragon dictate now and honestly couldn't get by without it. It gave him a way to write when otherwise his writting made no sense. He has also started using the text-to-speech which comes with windows in order to have dificult text read to him on the computer and with the OCR software that comes with (xp? or the new office? I forget what it came built into....) he is talking about scanning in textbooks to be read to him as well... tedious task, but at least he has more options avalible now to him than he did.
I make the ReadSay PROnounce English system, which uses speech recognition to evaluate and diagnose pronunciation, and help with oral reading. I've been offering it for $499, but I'll give a $100 discount to anyone who says they saw it on Slashdot (the $499 price is to keep distributor partners happy.) I've been selling this since September, and all the existing customers (as few as there are so far) are happy with it. I'm (1) in the process of arranging two comparitive evaluations, which will each take months, and (2) trying to sell it to a big educational software publisher.
Also, don't question what the material is as long as he will read it. This one sank in as I stood aruguing with my three year old over wanting to buy a comic book. Has to have been on of the dumbest fights I ever picked. The point was, he was reading and I should be encouraging that. Yes. He was 3 and reading. Point is, censoring what he reads, with obvious exceptions, could be a mistake and an unnessecary road block to your over all goal.
Hi!
With respect and regard, you don't want a "novel education idea." You really want to focus on your brother's specific features, and try to find successful strategies that other people have used with similar disabilities. That's not a novel approach--and it doesn't involve any more technology than ordering a book or five from a good publisher's web site.
My youngest daughter has Down syndrome--and we've found that kids with Down syndrome learn to read in a radically different way than kids with, for example, ADHD. The strategies that work for the ADHD kids in the class probably won't be successful for Annie--the strategies that work for Annie won't do much for others in the class. That's part of the reason that--despite the best intentions in the world--special ed classes don't do as much for kids with disabilities as they should. They can't be everything to everyone.
Here's where you come in.
You have a major advantage over your brother's teachers: you do not have to be all things to all people. You already are his big brother--and he's your only student. Practically anything you do will succeed--to some extent. What you need to do is identify successful strategies to use with your brother--and learn a lot more about language and learning than you probably ever thought possible. While you learn about his particular disability and how to teach to him, you should also learn a LOT about English. You should learn about the "core" of 8000 Anglo-Saxon words that form the vast bulk of our daily conversation. You should learn the difference between the active and passive voices, the detailed specifics of each of the tenses, and you should learn how to identify reading materials that include the parts of language you want--and do not include the parts you don't. Focus on simple sentences of Anglo-Saxon words in the present tense and the active voice: I eat food. Sandy is my dog. I ride horses. You are my friend. I like you. My brother loves me.
For an example of the kind of thing to avoid, look at any memo that comes home from the administration of your brother's (or your) school.
What you'll need most...
This will come as no surprise, right? The most important thing you'll need is patience. Applaud his successes--give genuine praise for genuine accomplishment. Give encouragement when he has trouble--and be critical when he blows you off. Be "real"--don't be yet another I'm-so-proud-of-you syncophant.
And when he can read--know that you have probably done the most important thing you will do in your life.
There's a lot of books that have been written on learning using NLP, but I've never read any of them so I would recommend googling for that. One big thing about reading and spelling is that it's important to do it visually, not auditorily. I'm sure there are things that can help a whole lot.
As a sidenote, many slashdotters might like NLP. It was created/discovered by a mathematician/computer programmer turned psychologist, and is all about programming your brain. His name is Richard Bandler, I've so far read two of his seminar-based books, "Using Your Brain -- For a Change" and "Frogs Into Princes".
Berto
Have you tried comic books? The language in them is usually pretty simple, and having pictures might help his understanding of the text.