Universal Design and Assistive Technology 1

Universal Design and Assistive Technology

Universal Design is an idea that – is a great international – might allow those college students with a disability to go into a room and immediately have EQUAL ACCESS to any facts. With Universal Design, an assistive era may be used so that class lessons may be easily finished by way of all of us and people with disabilities who use assistive era.

Assistive Technology

The following variations are ordinary examples of Universal Design: sliding computerized doorways, huge restroom doorways and stalls, adjustable tables, sidewalk minimize cuts, texting, motion lights, lever handles, and e-books. Each of those examples makes anybody’s existence less complicated, no longer just a person with incapacity.

For individuals who are hard of listening to or deaf, a Sorenson service uses far-flung interpreters via a videophone. Videophones are free with the Sorenson carrier. Individuals can be in one region, and the interpreter can be in another kingdom. Some colleges have CART reporting to be had to Hard of Hearing and Deaf college students. The CART reporter sits out of doors a class and listens thru headphones to make an exact transcript of the lecture just like a court reporter. FM structures are also available for people who’ve hearing impairments. FM systems will extend the sound from room to room. One character wears a small tool with a transmitter, and the alternative person wears a receiver. The receiver’s character can pay attention to what the other character says as though they may be after every different. Assistive Technology like FM structures has to be available to all who visit a museum or enjoy an overall performance at an auditorium or film theater.

For a person who’s blind, Braille technology is to be had in private computers referred to as PacMates that permit people to take their very own notes using a Braille keypad. Tactile diagrams for technological know-how also are available for human anatomy fashions, move-sections of the head, brain, nostril, mouth, throat, breathing tract, coronary heart, digestive gadget, and so on. Tactile maps are also available for all of us taking a geography class or analyzing the globe. Textbooks and checks in college may be produced in Braille for all of us inquiring about such offerings.

Assistive Technology

E-textual content is now available thru many textbook and non-instructional publishers. Students who’ve disabilities might also qualify for free copies in their textbooks from Recordings for the Blind and Dyslexia. The University of Virginia additionally has thousands of e-books to be had for students. Kent State University has a non-commercial repository for ebook studies, and Project Gutenberg has many e-books that might be free of rate. Google has over 500,000 e-books that are unfastened to get entry to. Most publishers want an “evidence of purchase” for college textbooks earlier than supplying an e-text opportunity version of the ebook. Kindle, The Nook, and Sony all have electronic readers for lots of books. However, fascinated individuals have to test for text-to-speech software to allow them to listen to the e-book and examine it.

Wheelchair era and add-on systems are available for leisure activities like bowling and football. Paralympic athletes compete in global Paralympic sporting events. Also, specialized wheelchair carts with balloon tires are an option for riding over sandy seashores. For the ones human beings with limited higher body movement, pc get admission to can be completed by using big trackballs, a foot mouse, sip and puff gadgets, and a head-controlled mouse. Electric eyes can be furnished that permit computer access and management thru limited head movement, and even eye blinks.

Personal computers all have accessibility options, which include a zoom feature for a person with low vision. You can discover get entry to the Control Panel feature of your PC. Zoom Text enlarges print for someone with low vision, and Zoom Text with speech also includes a display reader. Products from Kurzweil and Freedom Scientific also provide screen readers and magnifiers. Home magnifiers aren’t only excellent for college kids. However, the technology will help folks that do high-quality work with their fingers. Their palms may be magnified onto a reveal so that human beings can see their knitting, writing, or small element maintenance. Camera generation additionally makes life more accessible to people with low vision. A variety of products extend textual content for someone with low imaginative and prescient use on a desktop, are portable, or are worn on the pinnacle for a person with mobility disabilities. For instance, Flipper uses a camera to task records from the schoolroom board onto a personal laptop. Jordy is a product worn on the pinnacle. Small pocket digital magnifiers are beneficial while trying to study small print for the duration of buying because the person can push a button and freeze the photograph for easier access to the enlarged print. These merchandises are to be had at low imaginative and prescient web sites. Also, you may get a digital microscope. The user hooks it via a pc with unique software. The pc is then attached to a projector, and it enlarges the slide onto a wall or desk for all to view at once. Math calculators are available that use an overhead to mission onto the wall.

Assistive Technology

Someone with low vision or hand motion restrictions can use a speech-to-textual content product like Dragon Naturally Speaking, one among Nuance voice control merchandise. Nuance voice Controls will allow customers to apply voice instructions to dictate Blackberry emails, feature appointments, and search the net. Sony ICD-SX46 Digital Voice Recorder may be used with Dragon NaturallySpeaking Software. Tablet PCs have a sensitive display designed to have interaction with a complimentary pen. You can use the pen without delay on display like a mouse to select, drag, and open documents and may be used in the vicinity of a keyboard to handwriting notes. Tablet PCs also need to have a speech-to-textual content era. Nexus 1 Smartphone has a Speech-to-Text feature as properly.

Screen readers also are available for free or buy, depending upon the product. ReadPlease is an unfastened display reader for domestic use that reads textual content reduced and pasted to the screen reader on a computer. Students who’re blind can use JAWS to pay attention to everything on their computer. Zoom Text and Magic additionally have text readers constructed into their software. Electronic pens are available to examine notes aloud, scan and keep text, switch facts to PDAs, Smartphones, and Personal Computers. Some of those pens also can translate English into other languages. In the Pulse, Smartpen by Live Scribe, we could record notes after replaying the written words by tapping on the notes. Notes can be stored on the computer and shared as Flash files, PDF documents, or audio documents.