Classroom of the future

"Classroom of the future" Was a short video from 1987. This video had a bunch of things in it that the people of that time would be in our future for classroom learning. The question I have answered is that "Is the technology we see here being used in today's classrooms?"

Entering class from home is already happening just not in the since they have in the movie. We have online classes. Then in the second part we have voice recognition, voice synthesis, and we are just now starting with A.I. technology. A lot of what that kid was doing with his information search we can do today. We have the internet to look through those areas, and we also have programs like “dragon naturally speaking” which lets you search and type with just your voice. (My husband loves this program if you like to see it I have it on my laptop and can show you on our next class day). Really the only thing I see we don’t have is the classroom itself.

Assistive Technology

Computers can help people with physical disabilities do homework, search the web, or to just type. Wheelchairs help them move around without the help of others, while cell phones are a source to call for help when they cannot help themselves. However technology for them holds a far bigger place in life for them. A student with physical disabilities in college or looking at going to college can use a laptop to take notes, do their own test, their own research, and their own papers all things that could not be done before without someone there to help them. This one undergraduate is using her wheelchair, cell phone, and computer to help her get a college degree and help her get her dreams filled. 

Do not go thinking that it only helps people with physical disabilities. It also helps people with disabilities that stop them from talking, moving any part of their body, or just communicating all together. Example is there is this child who can only move his eyebrow and nothing else. With the use of a custom made computer and head devise he is able to talk and communicate to his family, teachers, friends, etc. These types of technology can be hard to learn how to use therefore it is imperative to learn at an early age, and then work on the items of a normal education. Reason being is if the child cannot communicate, how can the teacher and parent know what that child is learning?

Technology has even gone to help people with no limbs to play instruments. A teenage in Seattle who cannot move his limbs very well, but he loved to play the horn. So his mom goes down to a instruments repair shop and ask the man to make her son something to help him play his horn more than one note. The man made a system that uses a joystick to play the different notes. Yes the teenager need to learn how to work the joystick right but now he is playing his horn all over the place and is even real good at it. He dreams of getting a college scholarship in music and be a musician afterward.

The AT tools serve to bridge not only the gaps in their independence but also lets them do things there body would not otherwise let them do. These people now have the chance to make dreams and be able to go after them. Before technology came into place these people were bound to have someone help them for everything and would never be able to make their dreams come true or even have the chance at a job. Therefore, I think it is important to get the AT Tools to the students who need them as fast as possible so that they can become independent while going for their dreams. Just like any parent would what out of their own child regardless of disabilities or not.