In My Language

A definition for "presumed competence," is

“Assume that a child has intellectual ability, provide opportunities to be exposed to learning, assume the child wants to learn and assert him or herself in the world.”

This video called, In My Language," shows how Amanda Baggs 

with the use of Assistive Technology,  can explain to the audience how she communicates and interacts with her environment. This technology helps us understand her communication style and it certainly provided her with a means of communication that we could understand. I think we are probably more excited about it then Amanda is because we now have a means to communicate with her and vice versa. But it seems that in this video she is basically just using it to explain to us her communication style and how if differs from ours. She says that just because it is different it is no less important. If we apply the term, presumed competence to Amanda, then Amanda is intelligent and learning all the time but just not in our so called, "traditional style." So it makes me ask the question, as caregivers, parents and teachers, are we really providing the right kinds of learning opportunities to our autistic students. Is it just our idea of learning that we are trying to pass on? This video makes you think about presumed competence and what it really means to different individuals and how it should be applied. This does not diminish the benefits of assistive technology to help students such as Amanda but it does raise some other issues.
 
 During class tonight we were shown a variety of apps to use with students to provide them with opportunities to "show what they know." I was really excited about the app called "siri." I have been trying out a few speech to text app(dragon dictation, paperport notes) for several students I work with and have not been satisfied with the results. When I heard about SIRI I went into school the next day and downloaded it on an Ipad three.The good news. It worked great! The bad news. We only have one IPAD three in our school and siri requires wifi, which is very poor in our school. But the students who tried it out were very pleased with it and eventually we will get more Ipad 3's and hopefully our wifi will improve!
What resonated with me during class was a remark made by a teacher in a video we watched on how providing students with assistive technology had made such a difference in their participation and confidence levels. They can finally show,"how smart they really are!" That remark made me more determined to be an advocate for my students with the promotion of assistive technology in the classrooms so they can "show what they know!"