There are several handheld communication devices out there. Most of them look similar to a PDA but also have communication software (text and symbol supported) avalible. Some places to look for devices such as these would be: http://www.cyranocommunicator.com/, http://www.dynavoxtech.com/products/ichat3.aspx, http://www.saltillo.com/, or http://www.words-plus.com/.

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I'm not sure I understand how Avinash is typing the first letter or two. Are you doing this for him? Does he use the scanning mode of Co:Writer to access the choices when they appear? I am thinking that you might want to add a scannable virtual keyboard for him to spell out words that don't appear in the list or to initially type the first few letters. I think Wivik is scannable, the new Windows VISTA has a switch-scannable virtual keyboard built into it as well as part of the Accessibility features. I could do a little research and find out about other ones.

Let me know if this makes sense or if I am misunderstanding your question.

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That's great. I hope it works well for the person you are working with.

Best regards,

Annette

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Word prediction software is a very popular tool for a large number of students in education. Students with a wide variety of disabilities (autism, learning disability, cognitive disabilties, physical disabilities, etc.) all can benefit from word prediction software. It can shorten keystrokes for those with physical impairments, it can provide support for poor spellers and the auditory feedback helps when there is processing difficulties.

The important question to ask is what is the learner NOT able that they might be able to do with the introduction of the right assistive technology. Will word prediction help them to do this task that they are currently unable to do? The way to answer the question is by collecting baseline information about how many words do they currently compose, how long does it take them to compose, what is the quality of the writing, and how do they perceive themselves as a writer?? Then compare this to information collected after a reasonable amount of time spent using and learning the tool.

There is a framework for making these decisions called the SETT framework. This is a whole other conversation but helps to organize how to match technology needs in different environments with the appropriate assistive technology.

Bridget

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