THE DEVELOPMENT AND

SIGNIFICANCE OF ICT IN
TEACHING AND LEARNING FOR
SPECIAL NEEDS STUDENT

WHY ICT??
Firstly, consider the potential of ICT to change the nature of work and leisure
over the next twenty years. Todays children need to develop the skills which
will enable them (and society as a whole) to benefit from new opportunities
offered by ICT.
Secondly, there is a growing body of academic research, which demonstrates
how ICT enhances the quality of teaching and learning in schools, and thus
contributes to the raising of standards of achievement in education.

DEVELOPMENT OF ICT FOR SPECIAL NEEDS

STUDENTS
FOR PUPILS WITHLEARNING DIFFICULTIES, USING ICT CAN:
provide pupils with a clutter-free working environment where features of programs are
linked to pupils' ability
enhance the development of activities which are clear, focused and attractive to pupils
enable pupils to practise skills in a different context, allowing numerous repetitions in
order to aid learning
support language development activities and offer multi-sensory ways of learning
offer a medium for differentiated activities

 FOR PUPILS WITHEMOTIONAL AND BEHAVIOURAL DIFFICULTIES, USING

ICT CAN:
offer pupils a non-threatening or non-judgemental situation
allow pupils to be motivated and offer opportunities for success
give pupils the opportunity to be responsible for their own learning
allow pupils to work on tasks that are more manageable and achievable

 FOR PUPILS WITHPHYSICAL AND SENSORY DISABILITIES, ICT CAN BE

USED TO:
provide switch access to classroom activities such as matching, sorting and
word processing
translate text into speech and speech into text
prepare work which is specially adapted with large fonts, symbols and
particular colours

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF ICT

Higher quality lessons through greater collaboration between teachers in
planning and preparing resources (ofsted, 2002)
More focused teaching, tailored to students strengths and weaknesses,
through better analysis of attainment data
Improved pastoral care and behaviour management through better tracking
of students
Gains in understanding and analytical skills, including improvements in
reading
Comprehension (lewin et al, 2000)

 Development of writing skills (including spelling, grammar, punctuation,

editing and re-drafting), also fluency, originality and elaboration (lewin et al,
2000)
Encouragement of independent and active learning, and self-responsibility
for learning (passey, 1999)
Flexibility of anytime, anywhere access (jacobsen and kremer, 2000)
Development of higher level learning styles (gibbs, 1999)

RESOURCES OF ICT
SOFTWARE/PROGRAMMES