Tutorial 8: Assistive Technology

Assistive technology is an umbrella term that includes assistive, adaptive, and rehabilitve devices for people with disabilities. Assistive technology promotes greater independence by enabling people to perform tasks that they were formerly unable to accomplish, or had great difficulty accomplishing, by providing enhancements to or changed methods of interacting with the technology needed to accomplish such tasks (Wikipedia, 2010). This means that assistive technology is all the technology that people use to adapt or change tasks to make them easier for the individual.

In this tutorial we were lucky enough to have a guest speaker to come and talk to us about his area of work. He is an Occupational Therapist working in a school with children who have very high needs disabilites and he uses alot of assitive technology in his everyday work. His talk was awesome, and he showed us alot of photos and videos of his students using the equipment. It was so cool to see his students using the equipment and figuring out for themselves how it all worked. He even bought along some of his equipment and let us have a wee play. One of the items he bought along was an iPad. The iPad offers a huge range of applications which are very interactive and fun! It is about the size of a regular novel, however alot thinner and very light. It has a touch screen which is great for all of the interactive applications. It retails for around $799 in New Zealand and applications range from free up to around $10, however the majority are around the $1-3 mark.
The reason this is so great for children with disabilities is the level of interactivity and the range of applications available. They can help with reading, writing, maths, and even just be fun little games. The iPad is so much fun to use, I got to have a little play with it in the tutorial and we played clapping games with a Giraffe, which was simple, great fun and very cute!
Below I have included a video clip I found from http://www.youtube.com/ which shows an autistic boy using the iPad to do his homework. It is great to see how much he enjoys using the iPad and how enthused he is about getting his work done.



References:
Wikipedia, (2010). Assistive Technology. Retrieved, April 20, 2011, from http://www.wikipedia.com/

Tutorial Seven: Linking blogs of interest and exchanging comments.

In this tutorial we were expected to link with other blogs including other student's blogs or different blogs related to OT. This involved me searching for blogs that I found interesting and were relevant to Occupational Therapy. I found some which included information on various topics such as Wii-hab and speech therapy in children. I also linked to classmates blogs by looking through their work and commenting on what I liked and what I thought they could do to improve their work. The picture below shows evidence of comments exchanged over a post between Charlotte and myself about a video from youtube which we both enjoyed. 



Tutorial 6: The Internet and Online Communities

An online community is a virtual community that exists online whose members enable it's existence through taking part in membership ritual (Wikipedia, 2011). In this tutorial I have explored three different online communities - their purpose and the services they provide. These include:
http://www.neopets.com/
http://www.pokerstars.net/
http://www.kongregate.com/

These are all gaming sites promoting play which is a very important aspect for Occupational Therapists. Play is used in therapy with young children as a means to learn and in adults as a leisure activity / hobby.

Neopets is an online gaming site for children. It allows children to chose a pet, name it and take care of it. It needs to be fed, played with and groomed. There is a large variety of games in the games room which earns points that can later be spent to buy things for their pet. It provides children with a fun way of learning to take care of something, and includes some basic math, and word games.
Pokerstars.net gives poker lovers a place to go to play poker against others all around the world. It provides training and is a great place to get in a bit of practice to suprise your mates next time you are all playing. The best part? It's free to join!!
Kongregate is an online gaming community which allows the user to play and rate online games, post in forums, and gain achievements through play. The user is able to create an avatar and make friends through playing games, which is a great way for the users to find people who have similar interests to them.

All sites that I have chosen to look at are highly interactive as they all encourage active game play. Pokerstars.net and Kongregate also allow players to interact with other players which boosts the level of interactivity. Neopets however does not allow interaction between other players - quite possibly due to safety reasons. However, it does allow the user to interact with their chosen pet through game play. All of these sites are free to use, however there is an opportunity to use real money in both pokerstars.net and Neopets. Pokerstars.net allows users to place real bets on the games being played which will make the game more exciting for alot of users. Neopets allows the user to load real money onto their accounts which is called Neocash, rather than the Neopoints which can be earned through games. Having Neocash allows the user to buy special items for their pet which Neopoints are unable to buy. Such lucky little pets!!
People chose to contribute to all of these sites for entertainment reasons. They are able to post on forums about games in Kongregate which allows game creators to see what people really think about their games, how to improve them and see what the player really wants. Pokerstars is a great place for people to practice their game and also earn a little money if they were wanting to place real bets. Neopets is just a fun site for children to use, however a large range of educational games, and the need of having to take care of your own pet makes it a great site for parents to show their children.

None of these websites require the user to submit any personal details, so therefore they are all doing a good job at trying to maintain security for the user. A big issue for theses sites though is the potential for addiction, or spending too much time on them than need be. Pokerstars.net could be a big concern for someone who has a gambling addiction as I am not aware of any precautions they have in place to do with limits of bets or frequency of bets. It would be very easy to create a fake account to play under, whereas if they were using traditional gambling areas such as a casino, they may not be allowed in if they are attending too regularly. There is also the option to play for free on Pokerstarts.net, which is the same for the other too sites, however some people may not be able to limit the amount of time they spend using these sites. This could eventually effect their work / school performance and/or relationships if they are constantly using these gaming sites.
With the sites directed at younger audiences (Kongregate and Neopets), there is a real concern of potential isolation. They may enjoy these gaming sites so much that they turn down time to spend with real friends. It also means that children will not be outdoors playing the way I or my parents and grandparents would have played and entertained ourselves when we were younger. This could potentially lead to health problems such as obesity, which is obviously a big concern in the world right now.
However, even though there are alot of negative points to consider when thinking of these online gaming communities, when used appropriately, they can be a great tool for people to use for enjoyment and leisure. They provide entertainment for those involved, and may even develop some areas of skill and knowledge.


References:
Wikipedia, 2011. Online Community. Retreived April 2, 2011 from http://www.wikipedia.com/

Occupational Therapists: Making A Difference

Toddler Sofia Ali~ Occupational Therapy

Occupational Therapy for Kids

Occupational Therapy Practice: Pediatrics (Sensory Integration)

This guy is awesome! I chose this clip because this is a field I really want to explore. It looks like so much fun and also rewarding! :)

OT Rap

Tutorial 5: Video Production Sessions

Youtube is a website that allows users to post videos that anybody can watch. It is a great site to watch comedy clips, education clips, music, sports, news events etc.

For tutorial 5, we were required to find videos related to a topic of interest in OT. When people ask me what I study, it can sometimes be difficult to define exactly what OT is, and what we do, so I have included the OT rap as a fun way to explain what we do as OT's. I am very interested in working with children when I graduate therefore my remaining 4 clips are associated with how OT's working in Paediatrics fill in their days.

Tutorial 4: Video Production Sessions

At this tutorial we were required to create a short film (30 secs - 1 minute long) which adressed the topic 'overcoming adversity'. After a short deliberation, we decided to express how we felt about the fabulous Polytechnic internet. The star of our film, Tim, shows how we have all felt at one time or another when technology does not quite work as it is intended to. Enjoy.

Tutorial Two: Digital Imaging

Digital images can be stored transferred and manipulated in many different ways using technology. Photoshop is a very popular tool used by people to manipulate their photos, and to create special effects which make their photos stand out from others. Photos can be stored in multiple different places including USB sticks, external hard-drives, back up disks or on the computer in different documents. USB sticks are ever so popular as they provide a portable device to carry information on and they are small too, so no lugging around heavy albums! That's always good! Images can also be posted onto sites such as Flikr or Facebook where others can gain access to them, which is perfect for those living away from friends and family, to share what they have been doing / seeing.

"A new technology is rarely superior to an old one in every feature."
There are many benefits to the new digital camera's that we use so commonly now. However, are we losing anything through getting rid of good old fashioned film cameras? Digital cameras have multiple benefits including:
-the ability to look at photos as you take them
-the ability to delete as you go
-much smaller, compact devices
-alot cheaper to print off to hard copy
-easily changeable XD cards which can hold hundreds of photos at one time
-the ability to automatically upload photos to a computer / view on a tv screen
and many many more! However, it is quite possible that with this easy view and delete feature on digital cameras, we are losing the art of true photography. It is too easy to just take multiple pictures and flick through and delete until you find one that is a good image of what you were trying to capture. Whereas with the more traditional film cameras, you are unable to check the images as you go and have limited film, therefore you need to take time and care to get the right image.

Confidentiality is a huge ethical issue when thinking of how often images are taken and how publicly they can be distributed. People may be unaware that they are being captured in an image and then later find themselves in an image publicly posted on a website. When taking photos in a public place people need to be careful that they are not capturing any members of the public unwillingly, and that the people in their images need to know what is going to happen with the photos and who might have access to them.

In a placement I attended, a day centre which worked with intellectually disabled adults, images were used to show which tasks were going to be done that day. They had a large photo library which included images such as crafts, baking, puzzles or music, and photos of places to go out to such as the library, swimming pool, or a cafe. The guys loved seeing the photos up on the whiteboard as it meant they could see what they were going to be doing that day. It was also great for helping those who had difficulty communicating, to pick a photo to show what they wanted to do.