Virtually Back to School: Parents and IEPs

Image: Remote Learning

This week, we’re here to support all parents with the transition to online/hybrid learning.

The uncharted territory of learning completely online can leave a lot of parents in the dark. Teachers are busy preparing for a fall semester that, in some cases, might be completely online and school districts are understandably preoccupied with the rapidly changing situation. For you as parents, there’s a lot to contend with, so our aim is to help you navigate the new school year with some helpful tips and resources to help your children get the most out of online learning.

There are, of course, benefits and drawbacks to learning remotely.

For example, children with anxiety may feel more comfortable learning in their home environment. However, interacting online can cause other anxieties to come to the surface too, particularly when presenting or reading social cues. We know that face-to-face learning is really important for developing recognition of social cues as well as engaging students in physical tasks.

With completely online curricula, some parents are still considering how to teach their children, particularly children with special needs. Even tutors who are well versed in teaching online have said helping students with additional needs online ‘is not easy, we’re seeing a big learning curve.’ There’s lots of uncertainty surrounding what’s happening with IEPs this year, whether there’s any legislation regarding their implementation, and what parents can do to help their child.

Image: Scales and IEP logo on laptop screen

Read on to find out what’s going on with IEPs, and how you can advocate for your child.

4.6% of all American children K-12 have IEPs, one of the big questions that has stemmed from the pandemic is how students’ accommodations will be provided remotely. The answer is, it varies from state to state, and even district to district.

It can be really difficult to know where to look for help or support on this, luckily there are loads of online groups such as the IEP/504 Parent Resource Platform which can help guide you in the right direction. It’s a space for parents to share as much or as little of their experience as they’d like. It also includes bespoke resources, such as data sheets, to track your child’s progress in online learning. To explore this space and access your own data sheet, join here.

Tips from the experts

Image: Selene Almazan quote

Selene Almazan from the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates (COPAA) said: ‘We are encouraging families to document where their child is as far as skill level, either through video or through data sheets, that kind of stuff so that when the pandemic closures are over they can see whether or not there's been any regression in skills for students.’

However, this still leaves a lot of the onus on families to figure out their child’s accommodations; something that would usually be handled by support tutors, Speech Language Pathologists or other special educators in a face to face learning environment.

Experts are advising that parents should pursue their child’s IEP arrangements as they normally would. This can put extra pressure on parents. However, in terms of the legality of this, Denise Marshall, also from COPAA, advises: “I think that’s where people get lost, they think that COVID changes things and under the law, it does not”.

If your child has an IEP, how can you help them progress their skills?

Many schools are setting remote tasks that’ll have to be handled slightly differently in an online setting. Like we mentioned earlier, online learning can bring up a whole host of other anxieties, and perhaps your child might be expected to submit quizzes assigned by the teacher or send in videos of themselves practicing their spelling or a speech.

If you’re at a loss for how to help your child with this, at Present Pal we’ve created a presentation support software that acts as a reasonable accommodation for students with IEPs. It can be used remotely, from any location, and we want to level the playing field for this new way of learning. If your child has an IEP for dyslexia or other specific learning differences, features of the app such as line-by-line magnification can help them master the art of breaking down information during these practice tasks before having to do the real thing! Take a look at our video below to find out more.

Video: What is Present Pal?

Have you thought about accommodations for presentations?

As you can see, with Present Pal as an accommodation on your child’s IEP, they can craft presentation notes in the form of interactive flashcards, creating bullet points using key trigger words instead of writing out lengthy scripts on paper! By adding a ‘safety net’ prompt to the bullet point your child can access images and additional text which helps them to elaborate on their point if they need to.

If presentations are on your child’s syllabus, Present Pal can help provide a solution at home.

We care about helping students deliver their best when presenting, and more importantly, feel confident about doing so. Students can also use Present Pal to present in smaller zoom rooms or Google Meets with their peers, giving them that personal connection that’s really important for mental health. A key part of successful remote learning is social contact and confidence too!

Image: GIF, using Present Pal remotely

We hope the rest of the semester goes smoothly and that this post has sparked some inspiration for learning online. Continuing to support each other during this time is essential; the world of IEPs/504s is complicated anyway, on top of experts’ advice, joining some of the Facebook and parent advocacy groups provides a fantastic source of informal support. Equity and wellbeing are really important to us, so if you want to find out how your child can get Present Pal, then feel free to drop us a line on info@presentpal.co.uk or contact us via our Facebook page.

Remote learning series

Image: Remote Learning

Welcome to the first blog of our remote learning blog series!

In this blog we are focusing on tackling presentations in a remote environment. This year, learning has been completely transformed. Both teachers and students have shown a huge amount of resilience in adapting to online teaching, and the choice of additional tools needed to level the playing field is huge. Looking towards the fall semester, US schools from K-12 are still considering how teaching and learning will take place in a virtual setting, and for many presentations are still on the curriculum.

So, how do we make sure we can use tech for good and level the playing field while teaching remotely? 

Now that educators are getting more familiar with remote teaching, we wanted to share some cool ideas for getting the most out of your online time with students, while making lessons accessible for everyone. At Present Pal, we want to show you how the app can be a fantastic tool for your students while encompassing UDL principles. 

UDL is the key to equity in education, both in the classroom and online.

#UDLIRN pic.twitter.com/4o2JrMtgwI

— UDL-IRN (@UDLIRN) June 3, 2020

83% of school superintendents said that providing special education services was difficult to provide equitably during remote learning

Adapting to technology has been a huge change for many educators since the beginning of the pandemic. One parent, whose son Joseph has ADHD and Aspergers, reported that he would not be able to complete the work on his own and he would never log back on to the remote service the school used as: “It required executive functioning skills that Joe doesn’t quite have.” 

Image: A teenager using a laptop sitting at a desk

Apps can support online learning

This is a situation familiar to many teachers and parents since remote learning became the norm, how do we ensure all students, including those with disabilities, can engage with online learning?

By being more flexible with the delivery of the material this can make life a lot easier for students with learning differences. Technology like Present Pal, gives students the ability to personalise the app and to create your flashcard notes and the ability to practice your presentation helps immensely with this. 

A major dilemma for some teachers is how to balance synchronous learning with asynchronous learning.

For students with information processing or reading difficulties, uploading class recordings online gives students the opportunity to revisit and fill in any gaps from previous lessons. Present Pal can help you support this equity too, through features like audio recording and note creation, the app can be used in real time to present as well as a way to personally review rehearsals of presentations. Using the app’s rehearsal audio recording feature, teachers can encourage students to practice presentations online without the anxiety of a face-to-face run through. You can see more of Present Pal’s features here.

There’s a lot to consider when picking the ideal video conferencing tool.

Curbing this new form of online anxiety can be done with the use of Present Pal in Zoom rooms, or smaller Google Meet, where students can present to each other using their accessible notes on Present Pal in small groups to nail their presentations. There’s a lot to consider when picking the ideal video conferencing tool, but for accessibility, Google Meet or Microsoft Teams proves popular due to the ability to turn on captions. For Present Pal too, our PowerPoint add-in can integrate seamlessly for schools that use MS365, making presentations online that bit easier and more accessible. 

Image: Question marks above Microsoft Teams, Zoom and Google Meet logos

We’d love to hear more about your experience moving to remote learning and teaching. If you want to learn more about how we can support you and your students with presentations then get in touch via email here.

Stay tuned for more remote learning content on the blog next week, see you soon! 

Present Pal 2.5.1 - What's New?

Present Pal has been revitalised with some glittering improvements…

Present Pal has undergone a sparkling reformation, with version 2.5.1 now available on the Apple App Store and Google Play Store! Since launching the software in September 2018, we’ve been busy bees collecting your feedback and preparing Present Pal for some essential repairs. Our first build allowed us to analyse user journeys and identify little glitches, and so we’ve been working hard to smooth these out for you. (We’ve also been occupied supporting students with presentation anxiety in over 50 UK universities!).

The Present Pal team are delighted to offer you ‘Present Pal 2.5.1’ which is now available on the App Store and Google Play with bug fixes, new dyslexia-friendly fonts and language changes. Alongside these shiny new improvements, we’ve been working on the App’s stability to prepare for our exciting new AI feature in partnership with Microsoft.

Remember to update your existing version of Present Pal and leave us a rating or review. We’d love to hear what you think of Present Pal’s rejuvenation!

IMAGE: Download on the App Store

IMAGE: Get it on Google Play

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GIF: Present Pal Pop Up Bubbles

BUG FIXES

Thanks to your feedback, we were able to identify a few flaws from our initial September build. We’ve ironed out these issues (including pop up bubble crashes) and made various performance improvements to ensure that your Present Pal experience is seamless and stable!

IMAGE: New Personalise Screen

NEW FONTS

Here at Present Pal, dyslexia-friendly fonts are a critical feature for us as they help to make the App even more accessible. Taking into consideration monospacing and distinctive lettering, we’ve introduced 3 awesome new fonts including Cadman, Merienda and Nimbus. If there are any fonts you’d like to see in future Present Pal updates, get in touch and let us know!

IMAGE: ‘Edit Bullet’ text box on Present Pal Notes mode

LANGUAGE CHANGES

After observing user journeys and chatting to a few Present Pal enthusiasts, we discovered that some of Present Pal’s language was a little misleading. To solve these confusions, we’ve made a series of language changes to ensure that you’re guided through the App with ease!

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REVIEWS

Your reviews, ratings and feedback are of great importance to the Present Pal team as they help us to ensure that each update is even more fantastic than the previous. Please give us a star rating on either the Apple App Store or Google Play Store.

If you’d like to personally get in touch with feature suggestions or to make a comment on an existing feature - we’d love to hear from you! Pop us an email at info@presentpal.co.uk or use our contact us form.

“There are not many dyslexia apps that have helped with presenting, so I was very happy to find Present Pal. The presentation tool is fantastic, really helps take the stress out of getting up in front of people and speaking in public! ”

— Ali M, Apple App Store

“Present Pal connects to Microsoft PowerPoint to enable you to control presentations and to be given useful speaker notes and reminders along the way. It’s very customisable in terms of colours and fonts, with obvious applications for dyslexic users. For anybody who needs assistance in delivering presentations, Present Pal could be a valuable addition!”

— Richard T, Google Play Store

“I love the new App!! It’s been such a god send for my presentations at uni! And it’s been so fun to use. You’ve done a fantastic job to design something that’s so wonderful and easy to use for dyslexic students like myself...Also during my presentation I felt more confident than I ever had before.”

— Emily P, DSA Feedback

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Need some help getting started with Present Pal? Watch our ‘Setting Up’ tutorial video.