Week #5 CURRENT EVENT Group 5

            The children who populate our classrooms not only come from a variety of cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds, they also enter school with different physical and emotional disabilities and different levels of learning.  Teachers have become responsible to seek out each child’s special needs and design lesson plans to help the child learn.  Technology is assisting by designing more and more programs to help educators address their students’ special needs.

            The Articulation Station Pro is an iPad App designed by a Speech-Language Pathologist to help children with delayed speech development.  https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/articulation-station-pro/id491998279?mt=8

            Delayed speech development is a symptom of many disorders, such as mental retardation, hearing loss, and autism, and it may also be secondary to bilingualism, an increasing challenge in many of our schools.  The Articulation Station Pro helps children  practice all 22 speech sounds in the English language, apply these sounds to words, and not only pronounce the words, but also practice the words in sentences and stories.  At the story level, there are comprehension questions at the end of each story.  The teacher can choose to start at the level appropriate to the student’s ability and with a data tracking capability the student’s progress can be monitored.

            One activity, at the word level uses flashcards. Tap the flashcard and the pronunciation is heard.  The student repeats what he/she hears, and if correct, the teacher pushes the “correct” button and a pleasant sound is heard.  This helps the teacher to keep track of what will need more practice.  If the student is practicing on his/her own, a recording button can be used to record the student’s voice, giving him/her the opportunity to evaluate his/her own pronunciations.  To reinforce learning, the same flashcards can be used in a matching game.

            The Articulation Station Pro was voted the 2012 App of the Year—Apps for Children with Special Needs.  As of this writing, the designer has already added more content and options to the program.  The following video touches on a few of the basic activities of the Articulation Station Pro. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rY3vw3_Nevg