iPad

My friend Nicole & I were taking last week about iPads and how it's in the news everywhere these days how well they help kids with Autism. She was saying how we need to get the school to buy them for the kids. There are apps that can help kids on all ends of the spectrum get through their day socially and academically. Plus an iPad is a socially acceptable piece of technology. Mitchell carries his Dynavox everywhere at school but the verbal children don't have devices. This started me thinking of the way Mitchell uses our iPad at home. The day we recorded Mitchell using our iPad to learn words then typing them on his Dynavox, we had just watched a news segment on a tablet and it's many uses. In the segment though, all the parents could say about it was how their son will read books on it instead of real booms and play games instead of other video games, Really ? That's why it's so great? My son uses the iPad for apps that teach him things and he does this without prompting. He incorporates the iPad with his Dynavox, learning things most 5 year olds don't know how to teach themselves to do. Tonight Mitchell sat in his favorite chair with his Dynavox and began typing the words from the same flash card app as before except Grace had the iPad so he was doing it by memory. Coffee, duck, egg, frog, giraffe, hat, ice cream, jam , koala. He didn't just memorize these words, if you ask him anytime how to spell nurse or orange he can type it. How is it the school has not tapped I to this? Without the iPad & Dynavox we wouldn't have any idea Mitchell could read or spell. This week, I had emailed Mitchell's intensive teacher to let her know that tracing lines confuse him and he just needs a prompt to write his name or any other word or number. Then I also told her he can read/write most color words and many other site words. She seemed to be aware of this but now she knows I am aware of what they are doing/not doing at school. Mitchell is pretty good at writing, but needs reminders on his grip. But give him a keyboard and he sails through. I know other children in his class who don't write well either, having a portable computer would allow them to show what they too have learned. I am glad Nicole brought this up and maybe we can get the ball rolling with school. I wonder if the school knows what is in store for them when us moms get together and brainstorm?