On Saturday, April 13 and Sunday, April 14, Dominican College will host a training on the use of the iPad to improve educational success for students with visual impairments and multiple disabilities. This event is sponsored by the Perkins Training Center.

The presenters for this workshop is Dr. Therese Willkomm, Director, the NH-Assistive Technology State Institute on Disability, University of New Hampshire, NH.

The use of the iPad to improve education success continues to grow. This hand-on, interactive workshop will explore how to successfully use the iPad for students with visual impairments and multiple disabilities. We will explore the built in features on and iPad to support vision, hearing, cognitive, communication, and physical impairments. We will also explore over 100 apps related to reading, writing, communication, memory, prompting, organizations, math, science, art, and music. This workshop will also discuss and demonstrate various iPad accessories, adaptations, switches, keyboards, and mounting solutions to accommodate students who experience vision or physical impairments. All participants are encouraged to bring an iPad.

At the completion of this workshop, participants will have increased knowledge of:

• Accessories and adaptations to assist children who experience vision and multiple disabilities to achieve full success; among the accessories are: pocket trackers, switch access, interfaces with EADLS, stylus adaptations, mounting solutions, and voice recognition.
• Apps and adaptations for individuals who are blind or have a vision loss, including: making tactile graphic overlays on the fly; the best magnifications apps and interfaces with HDMI TV's; color, light, and currency identification apps; built-in magnification and text to speech features; and stabilization strategies and mounting solutions to use for camera access.
• Apps for print disabilities- Audio book apps using digitized speech and synthesized speech, and hybrids that sync printed and highlighted words with digitized or synthesized speech output.
• Apps that use the camera
• Resources for help selecting appropriate apps
• Identifying 15 built-in features of the iPad to support children who have visual and multiple disabilities

The workshop runs Saturday at 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday at 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. The cost to attend is $125 and includes a continental breakfast on Saturday morning.

Completed registrations and fees are due by March 29 to the Perkins Training Center, 175 N. Beacon Street, Watertown, MA 02472. Contact information for Perkins Training Center is perkinstrainingcenter@perkins.org or fax: (619) 972-7209. For questions about registration, please call (617) 972-7712.

For more information about this workshop, please contact Dr. Rona Shaw at Dominican College, rona.shaw@dc.edu or (845) 848-7613.