Assessing Student's Needs for Assistive Technology (ASNAT)

Chapter 5 – Assistive Technology for Reading, Studying, and Math
♦ Repeated Text-These books and stories have sentences or phrases that are repeated throughout the
text. The advantage of the repeated text is that it becomes familiar to the student much more
quickly. In addition, it lends itself to be recorded on a voice output communication device so that
the nonspeaking or minimally speaking child can use it to participate in oral reading, which is a big
part of classroom instruction. An example of repeated text is the line, “I’ll do it myself,” said the
little red hen in The Little Red Hen or "Run, Run, as fast as you can. You can't catch me. I'm the
Gingerbread Man" in The Gingerbread Man.
There are many texts that have repeated lines. In selecting texts for instruction, the first concern is to
match the difficulty of the text to the student's level of literacy development. (See examples of
repeated text at various levels in the chart on Guided Reading at the end of this article.)
♦ Pattern Books-These books are usually very simple. They may also have repeated lines, but what
makes them unique is that they have a specific pattern that runs throughout the book. Teachers can
create pattern books for their use, (e.g. "I see a red one. I see a blue one. I see a yellow one too. I see
a purple one. I see a green one. I see an orange one. How about you?") This pattern supports the
child as they learn that there is meaning in words. It can be used to make a variety of different
'books' with a slight variation on the theme. The pattern usually has a definite cadence to it that also
helps the child. These very basic, teacher made texts are very effective with children at the
beginning stages of literacy (see chart). For higher stages poems are excellent choices that
incorporate patterns that can support the developing reader. Many of the works by Silverstein or
Prelutsky can work well for students at the Transitional or Functional Levels.
♦ Predictable Books-These again, have repeated text, and often a pattern, but have a better developed
story line. Examples are Eric Carle books, such as the Very Hungry Caterpillar or Bill Martin
books, such as Brown Bear, Brown Bear. These predictable books allow the student to use
contextual cues and pictures to help them anticipate and understand the story line.
♦ Song Books-Books that use songs once again provide a pattern and predictability that provide extra
support to beginning readers. The cadence and rhyme help students remember the words as they
read. Books by Raffi are excellent for this purpose. In addition teachers can make song 'books' for
older students who are still learning to read by adapting songs and printing them. Many country and
popular songs have limited vocabulary with repeated lines and are familiar to students. Additionally,
the tapes of the songs themselves can be used to support the students and add motivation.
♦ Adapted Books-Books can be adapted for students at all reading levels. Trade (commercial
children's) books can be adapted by editing and simplifying the text, adding graphic support by
using PictureIt (Slater Software), or using Highlighting Tape to cue students to key words. Comic
books can be used as an alternative to ‘traditional’ reading materials because of the picture support
and shortened text that they generally use. Teachers can create their own adapted books for older
students by making books about celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey or sports figures.
♦ Story Boards-Story boards (a piece of foam core with a Velcro strip, a carpet strip, etc.) are low
tech assistive technology that can be used to support students reading of individual words or single
sentences at any level.
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