Two Choices Do NOT Equal a 50-50 Chance

“Whoa!” you say. “Everyone knows that you have a 50-50 chance with two choices.  What planet is this crazy lady from? ”

You are not alone in this thinking.  I hear over and over that we have to give MANY choices per question…and have gotten caught up thinking this way myself in the past. We think many choices will prove our kids aren’t simply guessing. When our kids deal with motor impairments, though, too many choices can be an access nightmare. What to do, what to do?

The fact is, with testing, selecting from two choices can give statistically irrefutable results showing mastery of information. Let’s look at how this can be…

First let’s look at what makes a 50-50 chance

We’ll start by backing up to a situation where two choices DO have a 50-50 chance of being correct. Take a coin and predict whether it will land with heads or tails up. Now toss it one time and let it land. At this moment, you DO have a 50-50 chance that it will show heads. Or tails. Agreed?

You could repeat this same random coin toss ten times and about five of those tosses would be heads.

Try it a hundred times and you should get about 50 tosses coming up tails.

Why is this so? Why do half the tosses give heads and half give tails?

Because the only factor at play is luck. All the other factors are equal for each side of the coin on every toss…the balance of the coin, the number of rotations in a flip, the speed of travel... These weigh equally on the outcome. They won’t change the probability of a guess based on luck.

If a student is genuinely guessing at answers, they are strictly shooting based on luck. You could expect about the same results as the coin toss. They would score about 50% correct on the answers of a true/false test, a sorts assessment with two columns, or another binary choice test.

When odds are no longer random

When all the factors to support student success are in place, luck doesn’t particularly influence the outcome. If the child knows the answer, has the appropriate access methods, and is caught on a day when health and sensory issues are met, then a correct answer likely has nothing to do with luck.

The factors at play—knowledge, access, and health issues—change the game completely. Testing is unrelated to the coin toss, even when there are only two possible responses.

When a child is able to score 5 correct responses on a 5-point true/false test, the statistical likelihood that this was achieved by pure guessing is about 3%.

But 3% still leaves a tiny possibility the child was guessing. Three chances in 100. How do we reduce that so we can know beyond a doubt that the child was demonstrating knowledge rather than luck?

It doesn’t take very many corrects to get pretty strong data

Five isn’t many questions for a test, but it IS a good number for a child whose ability to attend to a task is impaired by issues of access, attention, health, or sensory processing. If you can cycle through a longer test in short 5-question chunks, you can get some highly valid information in relatively short time.

5/5 correct can only be achieved by guessing 3% of the time, as we said earlier.

5/5 done twice (totaling 10/10) gives <.1% chance--less than 1 in 1000--of guessing as the means for achieving the score. That’s good enough for me (side note: this would not be adequate if we are talking about skills needed to fly a commercial airliner or perform neurosurgery, but for academic skills for most kids, it works).

5/5 done three times (or 15/15 total) only gives a .00003% chance of guessing…and that is statistically improbable. Most definitely.

The great news is that a child can still demonstrate high levels of understanding even if they can’t get a perfect score every time.

Let‘s say they can manage to get 4/5 correct on a group of True/False test questions. There is a 16% margin for guessing, which is too high to put our money on.

If they can get 4/5 again on a second try (a total of 8/10), the likelihood of arriving at this score by guessing drops to 4%. Still a little high.

The third time they score 4/5 (raising the total to 12/15), the probability of guessing drops to 1%. That is 1 in 100, so getting smaller!

The fourth time they manage 4/5 (or 16/20 now), the likelihood they are guessing drops to only .4%, or 4 in 1000. For basic academics, this satisfies my confidence they are exercising skill rather than luck.

Great news for our kids with motor impairments

This shows that kids with severe motor impairments who can only select between two responses really can demonstrate to us that their answers are intentional.

Obviously, having the motor control to indicate an answer from THREE choices is terrific for giving strong proof that your answers are not guesses. It lets you get to that point faster.

For example, in a 5-question quiz where each question has THREE responses, a perfect score of 5/5 only has a .004% chance of being achieved by guessing. Everyone can agree that this score is pretty unlikely to result from luck!

But when motor skills dictate that TWO choices are best, our kids can still demonstrate their proficiency without the fear of that guessing has influenced their scores. It just takes longer.

Also, it takes longer if they can’t achieve a perfect score every time. But it can be done. That, friends, takes a huge burden of pressure off both the student and his teacher!

A tool to simplify this statistical computation

Back in my college statistics class, we had to crunch the numbers to rule out the probability of guessing. On scratch paper. By hand. It was grueling!

Now, we have a fantastic FREE tool online that can do this for us. In  a split-second!

www.stattrek.com/online-calculator/binomial.aspx

It’s so easy to use!

1.       On the first line, type in the "chance" of getting one problem correct, expressed as a decimal. In a 2-choice problem, the chance is .5. In a 3-choice problem, the chance is .33. For a problem with 4 choices, the chance is .25. Kids with motor issues should not be given more than 4 selections per question, so I won’t go farther.

2.       On the second line, tell how many questions on the test.

3.       On the third line, write how many corrects the student scored.

4.       The fourth line will tell you the probability that the student could have arrived at their score by guessing. The tinier the number, the less chance there is that the student guessed.

Hidden messages:  guessing and intentional misses

Scores that are not perfect (or close to perfect) hide important information for us to uncover.

Those that fall around the 50% chance of being achieved simply by luck were probably the result of guessing. So why is the student guessing? Do they not care? That’s OFTEN the case! Do they not understand? Very possible, but the fact that they haven’t established any kind of generalization, even an incorrect one, means they have not caught ANY of your instruction.

Scores that show a statistical probability that answers are actual errors (say, 0-1/10) rather than guessing are also strongly telling. When you type the figures into Stattrek.com, you will see that the likelihood of guessing only errors is a slim as guessing only corrects. There is a message in a page full of errors. Does the student understand the teaching wrongly, applying the concepts backward? It’s very possible. Is the student trying to tell you she is bored? Hmmm…we need to pay attention to this.

Are you feeling more confident now in providing tests that ask students to select from just two choices? They can be devised to give you very accurate feedback about the child’s understanding.

The key is in the number of repetitions, but even that can be surprisingly small. Once you start crunching numbers, you can see that tests don’t need to be pages and pages of questions. Go small, add more if needed, and check back with Stattrek.com often to see if you’ve eliminated the probability of guessing. You saw from our examples how a perfect score on only 15 true/false questions is statistically irrefutable as being skill rather than luck!

Let me know if you still think I’m a crazy lady from another planet or if this makes sense. Just leave a comment in the box below…I read them all!

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You might also enjoy reading:

How Do We Reduce the Stress of Testing?

The Best Test for Kids with Motor and Sensory Disabilities 

The Best Test for Kids with Motor and Sensory Disabilities

Even kids with severe disabilities need to demonstrate their learning through tests. As we look at creating low-stress tests to accommodate motor and sensory disabilities, what type of tests should we use? Does one style work better than others for these students?  Let’s talk more about the response style that has the best chance for supporting student success.

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You want your kids to score well on tests.

As a teacher, you work tirelessly to help your students learn content and critical skills. You want to be able to prove to the world just how successful your kids are despite their special needs! That means they need to score as high as possible on classroom tests. We all know that tests play a big role in shaping a child’s educational future. We want our kids to succeed!

Yet no matter how strongly dedicated teachers and parents are, physical challenges still interfere with our students’ abilities to show us what they know. We can’t make these physical problems go away; we have to find a way to work within the same limits our kids face every day.

One standard testing format outshines all the others for accommodating physical disabilities.

To help our kids perform their best on tests, we need to reduce the physical demands of answering test questions. Of the five standard response styles typically used in classroom assessments, one stands far ahead of the others in being accessible to students with severely limited motor skills.

·         Essay—This style of response requires that students generate a lengthy answer, letter-by-letter or word-by-word. For most students with severe motor impairments, essay responses are far too motor-intensive to be practical. Avoid essay questions as a method of testing.

·         Short answer—Students are expected to generate shorter answers, ranging in length from single words or phrases to a sentence or two. When motor disabilities challenge a student, even short answer responses may be too great a demand on physical output. Rather than expecting students to generate answers, short answer questions may be adapted to allow students to choose from a list of words, lessening the motor demand considerably.

·         Multiple choice—This format challenges students to select a response from a list of potential answers. Multiple choice tests are not as easily adapted as one might assume. If we ask students to hold 4-5 possible responses in their heads while they indicate the letter matching the correct response, we ask them to perform a huge memory task. This is a different skill than recalling the information we are trying to draw from our students. If you must use multiple choice tests, ALWAYS assign reminders for each answer choice directly on cards or switches rather than simply labeling them A,B, C, and D.

·         Matching—Matching tests typically ask students to pair items from one column with items in a second column. We might ask them to draw a line to connect the items or copy the letters or numbers that precede each item. Either of these response modes presents a great motor and visual challenge. Instead, print the choices off on colored paper (one color for the prompts and one for the matching choices) and cut them into cards. Students can arrange the matches in pairs on the table, reducing the motor and sensory complexity of this task.

·         True/false, yes/no (aka binary choice)—For kids with motor planning or sensory challenges, this testing strategy far outshines the other four we’ve talked about so far. With only TWO possible responses, this style makes the fewest demands on motor planning. It sharpens cognitive focus by reducing distractions. Think about all the distractions a child has to filter out with a matching or multiple choice task; having only two possible selections reduces this problem greatly. This format makes it easy to present one question at a time, whether by masking off a single question on a page or reading it out loud to the student.

Binary choice tests are bigger than just "true/false."

Test questions that can be answered by choosing from two responses are technically known as “binary choice.” The formats you are most familiar with are probably true/false and yes/no. Questions answered with these right/wrong responses have to be worded with tremendous care, which is a skill in its own right. Poorly worded questions confuse or mislead students. When children lack the verbal skills to ask for clarification, ambiguous wording sets them up for failure. If you need help to write clear questions, refer back to most any Educational Measurement textbook. Ebel and Frisbie’s Essentials of Educational Measurement or Popham’s Modern Educational Measurement are both excellent resources.

The great news is that binary choice options for testing extend past just true/false and yes/no questions. Information can be categorized into columns to clearly demonstrate mastery of the skill being tested. This format has been used in the literacy word with a high degree of success since the 1980’s under the name of “word sorts.” Fortunately for our kids, this sorting format extends to most content areas, varied levels of complexity, and all ages of students. It can be adapted using a wider variety of access methods than most styles of testing.

Sorts used to categorize words starting with /m/

I’m a huge fan of sorts as both a practice and a testing activity. I’ve used them quite often in my classrooms and at home with my motor-challenged daughter. Sorts tend to break down skills into definable increments, making assessments easier to create. I find they direct my instruction leading up to the test so that I focus more intentionally on the objective. I’ve successfully used sorts as an assessment for pre-literate students with autism who needed to have other types of tests given orally—yet whose echolalia interfered with their ability to say anything but the last answer choice they heard. Once they understood the process of sorting answer cards under category headings, they could demonstrate the target skill independently without any verbal input from adults. Their output was now under their control and no longer hampered by echolalia. Recently, my daughter sorted her Agricultural Science vocabulary under the headings of “lactation” and “reproduction” during their dairy unit, showing that sorts are appropriate even through high school.

If you will be testing your students this week, how might you adapt the test to support the motor challenges of your students? Is there a way to convert some of the more complex response styles into simpler binary choice questions? Please leave a comment to let us know how this worked for you this week. Or, feel free to ask for suggestions on how you might accomplish this.

Next week, let’s explore the many ways sorts can be adapted to meet the diverse motor and sensory challenges our kids bring to testing.

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Did you catch last week's post on reducing the stress of testing for students? If not, be sure to check it out here!

 

How Do We Reduce the Stress of Testing?

Creative Commons by Amy McTigue

Let’s face it, testing is stressful. It’s stressful for teachers AND for students.

Think about the stresses that evaluation places on students. They become fearful of failure rather than being free to learn. When this happens, we see students shut down. If their bodies tend to interfere with their output, as is common with conditions like Rett syndrome, the chance for unintended errors increases and elevates stress levels even more, causing the emotion of fear to inhibit cognitive freedom to learn. This, in turn, creates an internal struggle that tends to worsen apraxia and interfere even more greatly with accurate output. It’s a very negative cycle.

At the same time, testing is necessary. Done correctly, it provides helpful information on which we can base solid decisions for planning instruction. It provides feedback to children and their families. It can be a good thing in its rightful place and at appropriate, limited times.

There are a number of challenges to assessing students with severe disabilities that may sound familiar to your student or child:

1.       The lack of verbal speech

2.       The inability to control voluntary movements efficiently, or at all (apraxia)

3.       Performance that varies based on current state of health or sensory processing

4.       Variations in the way others interpret a child’s responses

All these factors make it difficult to use traditional classroom tests. Over the next few weeks, I’d like to talk about how we can address these issues to support success when it comes to assessment. My hope is that this will reduce the stress you feel about assessment.

For now, though, I want to focus on ways to reduce the stress of testing for our students. You might find these strategies help lesson some of your testing stress, too.

1.       Teach, don’t test.  Yes, you need to assess, but for the most part, learning time should be just for that—learning. There is no need to “test” all day long! We don’t do that to typical learners and our kids with disabilities need that same attitude of respect. 

Let kids explore, let them learn from their mistakes. Help kids think of mistakes as learning opportunities. You may have to lead them through this process, but it is an important life skill.  

This is oh-so-true when it comes to learning to communicate. Let natural consequences shape learning. It’s much better to offer a child a bite of less-preferred asparagus (and then let her  use her refusal skills to object!) than it is to tell her, “No, you really meant ice cream.” 

2.       Test the same way you teach. Too often, we test kids using a different response method than they used to practice a skill. What we need to do instead is assess using the same familiar response strategy.

For example, pretend your student is learning to sort objects from smallest to largest. Together you work to line up real objects – toys, cars, fruits, whatever – in size order. You progress to pictures and the child continues to succeed in lining them up from smallest to largest.

The appropriate assessment, then, is to have the student demonstrate size order by lining up a collection of objects or pictures. It is NOT to give a multiple choice question asking which one is the largest! This wasn’t how the child practiced and the skill needed to respond is different from the one he has been rehearsing.

3.       Save testing for “up” times. When a child is off their game, whether due to illness or a sensory issue, save the testing for another day. They may be unable to concentrate on the task you are measuring. To collect data about this skill during such a time isn’t a fair reflection of ability.

This means that when kids are “up,” we need to collect data. There is no promise of a good streak of days leading up to an IEP meeting, so we must have a good bank of data to draw from. This doesn’t mean that we need to be testing continuously on good days though (see #1); it means that during good times we should…

4.       Collect little bits of data often. If you are applying the other principles, you’ll see how this is easily accomplished. You’re going to collect data from a “test” that is similar to the activity used to practice this skill. It isn’t like you have to set aside a special day for testing; in fact, it’s more likely you’ll catch the child on an optimal health and sensory day if you take your cues from the child, rather than the calendar.

So on a good day, when the child feels comfortable inside his own body, you’ll simply keep track of his independent performance on this activity.  From our earlier example of lining up objects from smallest to biggest, he shows you he can line up 4 objects correctly. His data sheet now shows 4/4. How long does this take? A couple minutes? 

In two days, he may repeat this for another 4/4. Next week, there might be 3 opportunities to collect data. When you compile this information, adding up the number of corrects over the number of opportunities, you might get something along the lines of 18/20 or 20/20.   

This data was collected in small bits of time over two weeks. It maximizes the student’s energy and attention levels. It doesn’t feel like a test. He is relaxed and able to perform at his best. You are relaxed too. 

5.       There is no need to label measures of performance as “tests.” For the purpose of your planning and your district, it may be. But we don’t need to pressure students with a loaded word such as “test.” To them, it’s okay if you’re simply writing down numbers about how they did on a task.

These are strategies you can implement today. I’m curious to hear whether your see your student scores improve simply by putting these stress-reducing strategies to work. Please let me know!

For All the Parent Warriors

Some days we parents may seem strong on the outside, invincible warriors fighting tremendous battles for the sake of our kids...and doing it successfully! But there are days when, inside, we are tender children aching over the challenges our own precious kids face each day, torn down from all the medical stresses, or just plain worn out from the daily extras.

A wonderful song from Twila Paris came up on Pandora this morning, at just the right time. This song has really strengthened me during tough patches in my Christian walk, and I was blessed to hear it again today.

For all you warrior parents (and teachers too!), this song's for you.

The Warrior is a Child
by Twila Paris

Lately I've been winning battles left and right
But even winners can get wounded in the fight
People say that I'm amazing
Strong beyond my years
But they don't see inside of me
I'm hiding all the tears

They don't know that I go running home when I fall down
They don't know who picks me up when no one is around
I drop my sword and cry for just a while
'Cause deep inside this armor
The warrior is a child

Unafraid because His armor is the best
But even soldiers need a quiet place to rest
People say that I'm amazing
Never face retreat
But they don't see the enemies
That lay me at His feet

They don't know that I go running home when I fall down
They don't know who picks me up when no one is around
I drop my sword and and cry for just a while
'Cause deep inside this armor
the warrior is a child

They don't know that I go running home when I fall down
They don't know who picks me up when no one is around
I drop my sword and look up for a smile
'Cause deep inside this armor
Deep inside this armor
Deep inside this armor
The Warrior is a Child


Here's a video version if you aren't familiar with this song...

 

 

Have an amazing day!

Comfortable AND Fashionable Adapted Jeans

Back-to-school means new clothes. Jeans are the fashion choice for most kids. But for kids in wheelchairs or with feeding tubes, the waistbands on many jeans can be uncomfortable. How do we help our kids go back to school in style AND comfort?

A couple years ago, Junior’s mom posted this great tutorial on adapting jeans on her blog, Adaptions4Kidz. She has so many fantastic ideas there! If you haven’t bookmarked her site, I highly recommend that.

But there are decorative features on jeans that my daughter wanted preserved, so we came up with a slight variation to adapting jeans that made her happier and feeling very stylish. This variation also works well with junior girls’ tops that are shorter in length than boys’ t-shirts. Let’s celebrate back to school with some comfortable and fashion-forward (sh-h-h-h...pull-on) jeans!

Three pairs of adapted jeans

 You’ll need:

·        1 pair jeans

·        1 pair worn pull-on stretch pants or yoga pants (okay if they show wear in the knees or crotch, as these will be discarded. We recycled last year’s stretch pants)

·        Thread, seam ripper, sewing machine, serger (optional but nice)

1) Prepare the jeans.

·        Pick out the lower end of any belt loops using a seam ripper, being careful not to nick holes in the fabric. Cut off the remainder of the belt loop/s and discard.

 

·        Cut out the zipper, snipping away the zipper tape. Be sure to remove all teeth, the zipper stops at both ends, and the pull. This decreases bulk and increases comfort.



·        Stay-stitch (stitch straight through all layers to hold together) the front half of the jeans about ¼” below the waistband stitching to secure the fly and pockets.

Stay-stitch 1/4" below waistband seam

 

·        Cut off the waistband where it attaches to the pants. Cut above your stay-stitching.

2) Sew jeans openings closed.

·        (Optional, to simplify dressing) Pin pockets closed and stitch just next to the decorative topstitching on the pocket, through all layers. Your stitching will be hidden in the shadows of the commercial topstitching, especially if you use thread that matches the color of the denim. Stitching the pockets closed keeps them smooth and flat when dressing.

Stitch just beside the decorative stitching. Here, the
presser foot is removed so you can see the needle position.

·        Fuse pocket bag to inside of front leg. Use a permanent fusible adhesive web, such as Heat N Bond, following the manufacturer’s directions. This keeps the pocket bag from riding up inside the pants.

Add the fusible webbing between the pocket bag
and front leg. Fuse with an iron according to
manufacturer's direction.

·        Pin fly closed and stitch. Follow beside the decorative stitching on both the right and left sides of the fly to secure it completely flat.

3) Attach knit waistband.

·        From discarded pull-on pants, cut down 2” to 2 ½” from top of waistband. This will add about 1” in height from the original jean's waistband, helping prevent exposure of undergarments. Enough said. If your original jeans are cut very low, you might choose an even deeper portion of the stretch fabric. Smaller children may require smaller depths.

For a teen, 2-2.5" of knit waistband and fabric
will probably be appropriate. Feel free to vary the width
for your child's needs.

·        Right sides together, match knit waistband to jeans at back, front, and sides. Pin as needed and sew with a 3/8” seam. Be careful not to sew over any decorative rivets in the jeans so you don’t break a needle.

·        (Optional) If you own a serger, overcast the seam for strength and comfort. Otherwise, overcast with a triple zigzag stitch on your sewing machine.

My daughter's service-dog-in-training, Mercer, holds down
the waistband so you can see the overcasting inside.

 

There you have it. In 15-20 minutes, you have converted a pair of fashionable but restrictive jeans into fashionable and comfortable ones. All the decorative pockets and stitching are preserved, with the exception of the waistband. You’ve put those outgrown stretch pants to good use for another year as well.

 

 

 

 

 

One Easy Way to Increase Vocabulary on AAC Devices

How do we add vocabulary when a child is physically limited to a few keys on a screen?

In the world of AAC, conflicts and compromises abound. We sacrifice battery life for weight, screen size for portability, budget for specialized access modes. We sacrifice the size of the vocabulary set for the number of buttons a child can access.

When children begin to use an AAC device, motor or cognitive challenges may limit them to just a few words on a screen. How in the world are we going to help them transition smoothly into a larger vocabulary accessed with more—and smaller—keys?

The secret is to use motor automaticity to our advantage.

Let’s step back and take a look a motor automaticity. Motor automaticity is the ability to carry out motor patterns without thinking about the movement. We all do this, all the time.

For example, walking is a skill many of us can do successfully without thinking about. Many of us can even complete other tasks at the same time as walking, such as talking to a friend, carrying objects, or looking for a misplaced coffee cup.

But someone recovering from a brain injury or stroke who has lost that motor automaticity must concentrate hard on the movements needed to walk. All their cognitive energy must focus on moving their legs correctly; carrying on a friendly conversation or looking out for that missing coffee mug is too demanding during the task of walking.

Another example of motor automaticity at work is touch typing. A typist can concentrate on forming words on the page without having to think about which finger to move to spell out the words. Remember this example; we’ll come back to it again.

When kids rely on AAC to communicate, motor automaticity allows them to access symbols on a screen without having to think about movement. This greatly enhances their rate of expression and makes conversation much more accurate and fluid. Kids can focus on the meaning of what they are trying to say rather than the motor mechanics of finding and targeting a symbol on the screen.

Without motor automaticity, locating a target and touching or eye-dwelling on it can be very demanding work. Communication is slow, exhausting, and creates a frustrating number of mis-hits.

We support motor automaticity by keeping buttons in the same location as much as possible. Just as we keep letter keys in a consistent arrangement on a QWERTY keyboard, symbols located in consistent arrangements are easier for kids to retrieve. They can find the symbols and letters they want easily, without having to scan through many keys.

To maximize motor automaticity...

Introduce screens with the end result in mind.

How many buttons on a page will a child be able to access in the future? No one has a crystal ball, so you’re just going to have to make an educated guess based on your child. With semantic compaction vocabulary sets, it’s hard to access a full vocabulary in less than 45 or 60 keys. Category-based pages might allow you to communicate with 30 to 42 keys on a screen, but fewer than that is going to mean a whole lot of tedious page flipping. The more buttons per screen, the fewer hits are needed, whether you are accessing words through categories or semantic compaction.

“But,” you say, “my child can only handle 8 buttons on a screen right now...”

You could offer eight buttons that fill the screen. However, what happens in the future when your child is ready to add more vocabulary? You would have to shrink the buttons and shake up their order to make room for more words or categories. Remember motor automaticity? Your child would have to learn their locations all over again. How discouraging is that?!

How naturally do these 8 buttons...

...become this? (Sono Lexis 9 x 6)
Not very!

Instead, take the screen that is your end goal and hide all buttons except the eight starter words/categories your child is using. He still has access to the same eight selections as the large keys filling the screen. Yes, these buttons will be smaller, but they are surrounded by plenty of null space that won’t activate if he hits it. You might be surprised how fast he can learn to target the smaller button size.

With this end goal in mind (Unity 45, full hit)...

...we start with these few word combinations.

When it is time to add vocabulary, you UN-hide hidden words or categories. They won’t change anything your child has committed to motor memory; they simply begin to fill in void space.

Child begins with these words and category...

...and ends with this 9 x 6 Sono Lexis display over time.

Remember learning to touch type in your keyboarding class? You started with the home row of keys:  asdf jkl;. It wasn’t much; you were limited to words like “fad,” “ask” and “lass.” But after a few days (weeks?), the teacher introduced “e” and “i,” and that opened up a huge new world of words! Now you had command of “alike” and “fleas” and “skidaddle!” The good news is that you didn’t have to relearn where the home row keys were located; they stayed consistent while new keys were added. Eventually, you mastered all 26 letters of the alphabet, along with some punctuation and formatting keys. That’s at least 40 keys...more for the kids who mastered the number row and got an A in typing.

This same concept is what I am asking you to try.

·        Start with the board set you think your child might be able to manage in a few years.

·        Select a few important buttons—the same ones you would have made up into a smaller set with large buttons.

·        Hide all the buttons around these select few.

·        Give your child time to learn to target these smallish buttons in the middle of large null spaces; it may take awhile, but trust that it will happen.

·        Then, when it is time to reveal a few more buttons, your child will be able to move forward with great confidence.

Want more information on hiding keys to support motor learning? Check out this comprehensive training material from Prentke Romich Company or sign up for one of their Language Acquisition through Motor Planning trainings. Although these are geared towards Unity's semantic compaction, the principles can be applied to most other language access software programs as well.

Your voice counts

The gold star.

Remember earning a gold foil star on your paper at school? It might not have earned you a prize, but it made you feel so wonderful knowing you had done a good job. Not only that, someone recognized your effort and let you know through a five-pointed bit of shiny recognition.

Everyone appreciates that same pat on the back. Bloggers are no different. Not even this one. :0)

You have a chance to pass out gold stars.

The 2012 Fascination Awards for Special Education blogs are now ready for YOUR vote.

Only one-third of the special education blogs submitted to the 2012 Fascination Awards earned nominations. How exciting is it that Adapting Creatively made that cut! Wahoo!

The post that attracted the sponsor's attention is Five Tips for Successful Teaching at Home. The aim of this post is to encourage parents with ways to support their child's learning at home, but there are tips that teachers will find useful as well.

To Vote, head on over here:

1. Make sure you have upgraded to Google Plus. If not, you will find the Google Plus UPGRADE button on the top left of the page. Creating your profile will only take a few minutes.
2. Click on the double arrow in the Comments to view the entire list of nominees and look for your blog of choice. Adapting Creatively is listed first--how easy is that?
3. If you hover your cursor at the end of the Blog URL, a red "+1" will appear that you can click on. It's on the same location where you can find the votes that have been cast for other blogs.
4. For blogs that already have some votes, the "+1" should be found immediately beside the vote count, to the right.

You can make a difference.

Many bloggers rake in votes through Facebook or Twitter. Since my time is too limited to participate in these networks, it's all up to readers here.

Thanks so much for reading Adapting Creatively. I appreciate your presence here. If you feel so inclined, I'd love a little gold star from you that says "keep up the good work."