Tutorial 7:Assistive Technology

This tutorial had us up and about playing with all sorts of assistive technology switches and gadgets, computer keyboards, interactive software and finally getting together in the House/Motel to see how it could be wired up to be practically entirely remote controlled! Rather interesting. We as a group also made pikelets using assistive technology such as a remote controlled (or special switch operated) food processor. Heaps of fun!

So what is Assistive Technology?

Cook & Hussey (1995) use the term "assistive technology" to refer to "a broad range of devices, services, strategies, and practices that are conceived and applied to ameliorate the problems faced by individuals who have disabilities" (p.5).

One piece of equipment introduced in the assistive technology tutorial was a little red plastic thing that I was tasked to record the steps for making pikelets into. It's called a "Talking Tin" according to the star-educational website. It's also known as a "label" for visually impaired people. It allows the user to record multiple messages up to 30 seconds in total and like I did, record a recipe, or "label" a container with the name of its contents. The user pushes a button and it plays back the message, which could be "flour" or "sugar" or "peeled whole Roma tomatoes" or whatever you like. It costs $24 and comes with batteries (replaceable). It's small enough to grip in one hand and has magnets on the underside to attach to metal containers in standard sizes. Adaptors are also available to make it compatible with bottles, sprays and plastic containers. See here for pictures and details.

This chosen piece of equipment increases functional capacity for the user. By being a small handy portable gadget one could use it in any part of the home to tell the user the contents of any container they might need to use, or it could be used to record something the user might need to be reminded of, such as a list of tasks or steps to a task. This piece of equipment increases functional capacity of visually-impaired users, or users with cognitive deficits such as memory problems.