JSSAT@ALASKA.BITNET (Sheila Thompson) (12/01/90)
Index Number: 12070 I am initating a project to get students with various disabilities who live in rural or remote areas of Alaska on-line. I would like to get the students telecommunicating with other students world-wide as well as encourage communications with adults who are experiencing disabilities. I am an Occupational Therapist in Juneau, Alaska. For this project I will be working with Education Specialists from the Special Education Service Agency in Anchorage, Alaska. SESA is an agency that provides outreach services to school districts throughout the state serving students with the following classifications: visually impaired, hearing impaired, orthopedically handicapped, multihandicapped, deaf-blind, and emotionally disturbed. I do not know how many students will be involved in this project at this point in time. I will have a better idea of numbers and ages of students in a couple of weeks. At this time I know of a few high school students and a few middle school students who staff thought would be interested in participating. I hope to have the students online sometime in January. This may be a little hopeful, as I need to assist the education specialists and the students' teachers in learning telecommunication so they can get the students online. My primary purpose with this project is to provide the students with the opprotunity to develop communication skills with a medium which effectively removes the barriers that their disability may present when interacting with others. Additonal goals may address reading and writing skills, social interaction skills, self esteem, and disability awareness. I am asking for input from the teachers and education specialists as to goals for individual students. I plan to have the students participate in computer conferencing in addition to electronic mail. Frequently, the student may be the only person in the community with a disablity. I think it will be very helpful for the students to have the opprotunity to communicate with other persons experiencing disabilities. I welcome any comments or suggestions you may have concerning this project. Thanks for your input. ********************************* JSSAT@ALASKA.BITNET Sheila Thompson Box 34221 Juneau, Alaska 99803 (907) 463-5000 ********************************* *********************************