“I am personally excited by this and can foresee real benefits for all who work in our sector and the impact this can have on the children we work with.”
James Winchester, Deputy Head @ Oak Grove College
Are you in the ICT team at a SEND special school in the UK?
Would you like to meet and talk with your peers in other special schools?
Could you help create a common approach to using touchscreen technology and apps in SEND education?
Yes, yes and yes? Please read on…
Show Me CIC is a new, non-profit project aiming to help improve the use of touchscreen technology and apps in the education of children with learning difficulties. One of the first stages of our project is to grow a team of “pioneer” ICT managers to discuss and develop a common approach to using touchscreen and apps for both teaching staff and parents. This will include creating a database of recommended apps and simple best-practice, user guides for each.
We will do this with regular group calls that will fit around your school week and we will phase in face to face events to help grow your peer network when possible.
Proposed Cohort:
We plan to start with a small selection of UK special schools and ICT teachers to help build and test the initial Show Me "Programme" project strand (see website for introduction to project strands) of apps and guides.
The proposed SEND cohort for initial focus is:
SLD or SLD/ASD diagnosis
Ambulant and have good fine and gross motor co-ordination
Predominantly non-verbal
Functioning consistently and over time above P4 but below P7/8
Motivated by technology, particularly touchscreen devices
Developing skills to navigate such devices, even if for singular or limited, stereotypical and repetitive use
Age and gender neutral
We are happy to discuss this and are flexible, but believe restricting the cohort in the early stages will help focus the work.
App Guides:
The apps and guides will be categorised by educational objective, operating device and system, for their use with SEND children. The simple guides will provide a step by step approach for classroom teaching staff, parents and carers. There will also be general guidelines for how to set up and use devices for each operating system (Microsoft, Android, Apple).
Our goal will be to make these programmes (recommended apps and guides) available for teachers, parents and carers through the Show.Me community website and services.
Data Collection:
Once the common framework approach discussions are under way, we will incorporate the “Data” project strand. This will have the aim of building observed and automatic data collection tools into the apps and programmes in order aggregate and evaluate the results of app use, to help learn and improve all aspects of the programmes.
We are excited to start this project and want to involve as many schools and interested parties as possible over time.
If you'd like to find out more or are interested in getting involved, please complete our contact form and we will get in touch.