My Superpower

This week I put on my superhero cape. Although I have used iPad apps such as Epic, Bitsboard, Pages, and Explain Everything to help students who struggle with language issues to read and write, I recently learned of the built in accessibility function on iPads. (In general settings under accessibility choose speak, then turn on speak selection and highlight content.) This setting makes ALL web content, iBooks, and PDFs accessible to students no matter what their reading level is. I found out about this feature just a few days before my students started their Polar research using the webmix I created. One pair of students was just choosing an article when I asked them if I could borrow their device for a minute. I quickly changed the settings and went back to the article they had just been looking at. I told them I was going to select some of the text by pressing on it and using the stretch buttons to highlight a paragraph. Then two options showed up just above the paragraph. I showed them the two buttons that popped up, (speak and copy) and I pressed speak. Next, I said to one of the students, “The iPad is reading me the article.” The look of astonishment and delight on his face was amazing. That’s when I became a superhero.