Assistive Technology

In my first artifact proposal, I had my students watching "Romeo and Juliet" from 1997 after reading the play, then watching "West Side Story" so they could compare and contrast the two movies and plays, while trying to find themes in each. In between each act of "Romeo and Juliet" I had students fill out at worksheet at the end so that they would have to pay attention. A test would also be given at the end of the section.

The student I chose to look at, Jasmine, has mild dyslexia and has trouble reading and writing her assignments. What I could do to help Jasmine is first find a digital copy of "Romeo and Juliet", the written play, and upload the text into something like Kurzweil 3000 so that when she struggles to read, she could have the play read to her while she reads along. For each of the worksheets I would give out, I'd send Jasmine home with a copy of "Romeo and Juliet," the film, and upload the worksheets in Kurzweil so that she could either use time in class at a computer or at home to finish the worksheets. If Jasmine does not have a computer, I could call somebody from the Patins project, for instance, who would be willing to provide a computer so that Jasmine's needs are fulfilled.

3 E's: Lesson Plan

In this lesson plan, To Kill a Mockingbird is used to help students understand perspec tives of narrations in text. The objectives of the lesson plan are to define point of view and understand the importance that it plays in writing and write a story in someone else’s point of view. There is a handout that is available to give to students, and the lesson consists of two sessions with extensions. The quotation from Mockingbird is presented the first day and students discuss what the quote means; “You never reall understand a person until you consider things from his point of view…until you climb into his skin and walk around in it” (Harper 36). The second half includes studentswriting narratives about the owners of shoes and creating their own story of walking in someone else’s shoes in their notebooks. To enhance this activity, you could have students create a story book using Microsoft Word or a storybook program like Storybook Weaver. Powerpoint could work in this situation as well. To make it more effective for everybody, students could present their books by overhead projection to the rest of the class, which allows them to have not only the technology incorporated, but also skills in speaking in front of groups.
Lesson Plan: http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=265
This is for Standard 3 in English/Language Arts grade 9: READING: Comprehension and Analysis of Literary Text.