The annual pilgrimage to BETT has become something of a ritual to me. A chance to see the latest Tech Ed and also to network with fellow colleagues. Ironically the wow factor did not come from any high-tech device or app, but by a unique organization called “Work As One.” We worked as a team using colourful graphics and post-it notes to solve problems such as maintaining effective and consistent teaching towards displaced persons. Things are BETT usually last an hour or a few minutes so I was skeptical when I was told it would take an hour and a half but I was totally captivated by it. I can’t give you a website but a name or two. Mike Bond and Erica Neve, Mike is from Bond & Coyne . Working with complete strangers and using ideas such as ideas generalization and visual means such as drawing our answers to their questions. Not a computer in sight!
Here are a few shots of what we did! If you want to solve the world’s displaced persons problem with your ideas go to menti.com and enter the code 5877 4177
So to the rest of the show. I was impressed by two things from 2Simple Python in Pieces which gets educators, parents and pupils all taking part in simple coding activities via your smart phone.
Also attended Aaron Smith’s Accessibility talks and the power of assistive technology built into Windows 11. He mentioned Voice Access Control which can run a laptop offline. Simple commands such as Show Numbers will make you able to control your machine with your voice using numbers and all the action points. We are moving closer to my dream of a speech driven computer. Just a few additions I would like to see such as integration properly with screen readers . I also like Windows key + U to instantly get to the accessibility settings and also on the tray
Also the Microsoft Learning Tools are guides that can help explain how these tools can help interactively. Including a great Reading analysis tool that trains and helps children learn from reading texts in teams. Also, the Edge has great accessibility features that brings text-to-speech to life. There is more….. but for another time when I have gone through my bag! So this is a good start for Saturday morning!
Started the day with Anderton Tiger with Russell Prue with an interview about “The Power of AT“
AccessAbility Solutions 