Welcome to the Great Lakes ADA and Accessible IT Center's monthly Bulletin on Accessible IT in K-12 schools.

Trainings & Events

The Great Lakes Center offers technical assistance, trainings, referrals, and resource material for K-12 and Postsecondary schools on Accessible Information Technology topics.

Podcasting Resources

On-line Podcast tutorial, a step-by-step guide on how to podcast.
www.how-to-podcast-tutorial.com

Equal Access to Software and Information (EASI) four-part fee-based series on Creating Accessible Podcasts and Vodcasts. September 12, 19, 26 and Oct. 3, all at 11:00 an (EST). The fee is $150.
www.easi.cc/clinic.htm

Audacity is free, open source software for recording and editing sounds. It is available for Mac OS X, Microsoft Windows, GNU/Linux, and other operating systems.
http://audacity.sourceforge.net

Apple's GarageBand 3 puts many options in one packate for creating a full-featured podcasts and integration with other Apple tools like iWeb and iMovie.
www.apple.com/ilife/garageband

Technology Addressed in new IDEA Regulations

The Department of Education released final regulations on the latest reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act, incorporating more than 5,500 comments from the public into guidance for states and schools.

The regulations are the guiding document that educators use in interpreting the provisions of the IDEA, which governs the education of about 6.7 million children with disabilities nationwide. The landmark law was first enacted in 1975 as the Education for All Handicapped Children Act. The law was reauthorized by Congress in November 2004 and the final regulations are posted on the Education Department's website www.ed.gov/policy/speced/guid/idea/idea2004.html.

The most closely watched issues in the rule-making process have involved teacher qualifications, diagnosis of learning disabilities, and special education students attending private schools.

In the area of technology, the regulations did not significant change the explanation of assistive technology devices and services, with the exception of clarification on services required for surgically implanted devices, such as cochlear implants.

There was also clarification on the National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard (NIMAS). The final regulations reaffirm the responsibilities to provide all students with print disabilities accessible, alternate-format versions (braille, audio, etext, and large print) of instructional materials, such as textbooks, in a timely manner. Print disabilities includes children who are blind, have visual disabilities, or are unable to read or use standard print materials because of physical limitations, and children who have reading disabilities that result from organic dysfunction.

Educational publishers will now be required to use the NIMAS standard when preparing source files for content copyrighted as of August 2006. NIMAS will guide publishers in producing and distributing digital versions of instructional materials that can be easily converted to accessible formats.

Publishers will prepare and deposit NIMAS files in a national repository of digital materials called the National Instructional Materials Access Center (NIMAC) hosted by the American Printing House for the Blind. The Center will provide states and local education agencies appropriate instructional materials for qualifying students if states "opt in" to the program. (48 states have done so) Or states may provide a method for providing accessible electronic format files. The regulations clarify states are expected to have adopted the NIMAS by December 3, 2006.

There will be a series of public meetings to provide an opportunity to learn about the major concepts and principle changes in the new regulations. In the Great Lakes region, there will be a meeting in Minneapolis, MN on October 25, 2006, location to be determined, check www.ed.gov/policy/speced/guid/idea/idea2004-schedule.html.

Emerging Trends: Podcasting in Schools

Podcasting and other mobile learning ventures are becoming increasingly popular in K-12. "In some cases almost two-thirds of the students showed a preference for using the audio-only content and its ability to be played back on an iPod," (eWeek, December 2005)

Podcasting is the method of distributing multimedia files, such as audio or video, over the Internet, made available for downloading to a mobile players or personal computers. The term was based on the "iPod", a popular portable audio device, and "broadcasting."

Usually podcasts are an MP3 audio file with a Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed. This means a user does not have to the Web to get a newly posted file or to download them to their player. Anytime you log onto the Internet, the software reaches out and automatically downloads newly posted podcasts to which you've subscribed. The new files wait on your computer or MP3 player until you're ready to listen.

Getting started creating podcasts is simple. The basic method is to record your podcast, either from an MP3 player (like iPod) or directly from your computer, post the podcast on a Web server, create a RSS feed, and submit it to a podcast directory. There are several resources listed in this Bulletin to help you.

At this point portable devices have limitations which do not allow the simultaneous playing of text transcripts. Therefore, the best way to address accessibility is to offer a text transcript on a website that follows best practices for accessibility and usability.

Podzinger is tool to convert podcasts to texts: http://www.podzinger.com. Podzinger automatically reads podcasts and applies speech-to-text conversion and indexing to yield a list of relevant results comparable to Google's searches of web-based text.

The creator can also produce "video" podcasting with open captions. Open captions are similar to subtitles. They are "burned" onto the video and does not affect the content. However, a small majority of portable multimedia players have video capability and it adds to the complexity of creating the podcast.