Apologies for the delay - Back in the green and beautiful land! A .rtf
file of the CSUN slides are available at
http://www.emptech.info/csun2007.php 455 dyslexic students took part in a
telephone survey, with grateful thanks to Microlink, as part of an on-going
research project at University of Manchester. We have been discussing with
students, their views about the use of assistive technologies in their
learning environments. I have cut and pasted the training section from the
paper we submitted for the CSUN presentation - this will also be available
on the webpage and the full paper should be published soon in "Disability
and Rehabilitation - Assistive Technology".
"Despite the training being freely available, only 47% of students took up
the offer of training. Students did not refuse training because they had
prior experience of the special-purpose software provided: whilst 87% of the
participants in the survey had used general-purpose software such as word
processors and web browsers prior to their assessment of needs, only 11% had
any experience with special-purpose software. Of those that missed training
(241 participants)
. 42% indicated that they felt sufficiently competent not to need
training,
. 17% indicated that the times, or length of sessions offered, for the
training were inconvenient
. 16% indicated that they felt that the type of training offered was
not compatible with their learning style
. 10% didn't comment on training
. The remainder (15%) gave a variety of responses ranging from
accidentally missing training sessions to indicating that they expected
training on general-purpose software (e.g. Photoshop) rather than
special-purpose software (e.g. TextHelp).
The students in our study who undertook the training were positive about its
benefits. Over 80% were very or quite satisfied with the training they
received and a number made comments about its positive effects.
The results obtained in our survey are broadly consistent with earlier work.
Fidler (2002) found that only 45% of participants in his study attended
training and MacLachlin (1994) noted that 35% of students accepted
additional support."
Please may I also add something that I missed out in an e-mail before -
that of course students may receive training in their Halls of Residence or
at home from trainers that come from universities or centres - I had not
added the and/or bit last time... Thank you Brenda. :>))
I am sorry if the formatting for this page is disrupted by the e-mail
process.
Best Wishes E.A.
Mrs E.A. Draffan
Assistive Technologist
Mobile: 07976 289103
http://www.emptech.info/
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