A typical workday for an itinerant teacher of the deaf (TOD) can vary tremendously, but one constant is knowing how to adjust on the fly to each student’s needs and learning environment.
Amanda Aliotta, MED, SLP-A, is a Clarke teacher of the deaf, based out of Clarke Northampton. When she transitioned from teaching in a classroom to becoming an itinerant TOD, she quickly found that it was more challenging to stay organized and have all her resources available.
“In the mainstream, you’re pulling materials in the moment because you’re reacting to what’s happening in the classroom, especially if you’re doing push-in services [when specialists work closely with students in a general education classroom],” Amanda says, noting that she’s collected hundreds of resources over her career as an educator but couldn’t bring everything with her when she traveled. “So many times I’d find myself thinking, ‘If I’d known they were doing this unit today, I would have brought X.’ It made me feel less effective than I knew I could be with the right resources.”
Inspiration struck when she watched her nanny taking notes on a tablet for a virtual class during the COVID-19 pandemic. “I saw her taking notes with a stylus and thought, ‘This is exactly what I need,’” Amanda recalls.
So Amanda tested her ideas with her own iPad. In addition to installing key apps, including Zoom, Microsoft OneDrive and Google Classroom, she began storing the educational resources she uses with her students.
Amanda was so thrilled with her improved efficiency that she pitched the idea of providing iPads or tablets for her colleagues—all the TODs based out of Clarke Northampton. After Amanda’s thoroughly researched presentation to the administration and a security assessment by Clarke’s IT Department, Clarke approved the idea and provided devices to the team.
“There’s always a learning curve, and I think it takes some people longer than others to figure out how to use [the device] effectively and adapt it to their own routine, but overall [my colleagues] are really happy with them,” Amanda says. “In the mainstream, there are a lot of things that aren’t predictable. To have this as a fallback to get materials as I need them is really helpful and has improved my efficiency significantly.” Amanda also notes that the devices have been flexible enough to be used in whatever way best suits a given teacher’s work process.
TOD Amanda’s Top Tips for Using a Tablet in the Classroom
From her experience using an iPad as an itinerant TOD, Amanda shares some of her suggestions for making this tech tool as useful as possible.
Compile a Cache of Student Work to Track Progress
Amanda discovered that by using her iPad, she would be able to keep all her student data files in one location (on a protected application for security), upload photos of student work and take notes on the screen if needed.
For example, she can quickly pull up a student’s writing sample from earlier in the year and compare it to their most recent writing to assess their progress. “It’s especially helpful with students you see monthly or quarterly, to be able to have everything available as a refresher in one spot,” Amanda notes.
Tablets or iPads can also be used outside the classroom to share files securely between members of the educational team, such as the student’s speech-language pathologist or classroom teacher. “It makes it easier to collaborate with the other professionals working with the student,” Amanda says. “Especially during assessments, that data can be consolidated to the student’s digital files, with audiological and other important assessments located in one place.”
Prepare for Meetings with Administrators and Caregivers
When Amanda prepares for a monthly or quarterly consultation with a family or school, she can quickly gather emails and notes from past sessions and consolidate all relevant information to make the most out of those sessions with longer stretches in between.
Because all her files live on the iPad and she can take notes in real time, she finds documentation and recordkeeping much easier too. “It makes me feel more organized and I can be a more effective teacher when I have everything I need at my fingertips,” Amanda adds.
Easy-to-Manage Size for Classrooms
The small size of the tablet or iPad, compared to a laptop, is also beneficial in the classroom. Amanda says that since it’s less physically clunky, she can use it just like a notepad and it seems to be less distracting for students.
Continuous Improvements as Tech Advances
Amanda notes that the more she uses her iPad, the more she learns about its capabilities and how they can be leveraged in the classroom. Recently, she was using an app to read a book aloud with a student. To create a lesson derived from the book, she took screenshots of the pages with her iPad, digitally cut out the pictures of the characters and drew thought bubbles to help the student work on perspective-taking and theory of mind.
Amanda has also used her iPad to create social stories, such as personalized books, with her students, which can be easily printed out into hard-copy form and shared digitally as well. Amanda notes that this tool comes in handy when a student needs support from a visual, such as a classroom anchor chart (a poster or large visual created for instructional support) or a daily schedule. (Learn more about social stories here.)
“Because certain applications allow you to cut out and crop pictures, I’ve used this for sequencing language from a student’s own schedule,” Amanda says. “I’ve also taken pictures of a student’s equipment and had them label their own devices.”
Hands-On Lesson Reinforcement
Another option with tablets or iPads is using apps to reinforce a lesson—for example, letting a child use an educational app at the end of a session as an engaging way to further drive home the lesson.
Amanda notes, however, that when letting a child use the device, it’s important to set expectations about how—and when—they can use it. She advises that the device should be used primarily by the teacher, adding that she always maintains control of it while students are using it. And with all the educational resources and materials Amanda has accumulated in her years as an educator, she now has the luxury of accessing them whenever they might be relevant for her students.
Adjusting and Adapting
“In the mainstream, there are a lot of things that aren’t predictable,” says Amanda. “To have this as a fallback to get materials as I need them is really helpful and has improved my efficiency significantly.”
Incorporating technology into traditional teaching methods is a perfect example of how teachers can leverage their adaptability and embrace new approaches for the benefit of their students, colleagues and themselves.
