Developing Virtual Reality Resources Introducing Technology Tools for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder to SEN Teaching Undergraduates Erasmus Project

Project Title

Developing Virtual Reality Resources Introducing Technology Tools for Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder to SEN Teaching Undergraduates

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; Disabilities – special needs

Project Summary

Context
Technology tools for disabled refer to devices or systems that support people with special needs to maintain or improve their autonomy, self-reliance and wellbeing. These tools address a wide range of special needs related to social, behavioural, cognitive, perceptive or physical conditions.

As the focus of this project, “students with autism spectrum disorder” may suffer from difficulties with social communication and interaction, repetitive behaviours, delayed speech development, problems with eye-contact, reasoning, differentiating perceptions, and orientation that prevent them from performing their academic tasks in the same manner as other students. Technologies produced especially to ease social and communicative challenges of students with ASD play an important role in reducing barriers to learning. Obtaining knowledge about how to use these assistive technologies for students with ASD will provide SEN teaching undergraduates to improve both their teaching and technology skills. It will also enable them to facilitate learning processes of these students.

In this respect, a curriculum is needed for SEN teaching undergraduates which will meet social and communicative needs of students with ASD and focus on the use and selection of the appropriate technology and when and how to utilise it and evaluate its efficiency. Need Analysis results that we conducted to frame this proposal, revealed the necessity of training courses on this issue. Hereby teaching materials consisting curriculum as modules and VR resources will be used during the course delivery.

Objectives
Hereby, the objectives of the project are as follows.
1- Capacity building of SEN teaching undergraduates and enabling them to excel in teaching
2- Promoting assistive technologies for better social and communication skills of students with ASD
3- Investing in innovative technologies as teaching materials (VR content) and contributing to the development of education technologies
We plan to develop;
a- A Curriculum “Introduction to Technology Tools to Improve Social and Communication Skills of Students with ASD”
b- Teaching materials
VR Resources

Number & Profile of Participants
The target group of the project are 120 SEN teaching undergraduates in the partner countries, specifically interacted during the project practice. Other participants will be 60 lecturers, teaching professionals, SEN teachers and other stakeholders working in the study field who will directly be involved in the project practice. 250 participants will be invited to the proposed multiplier events as audience and be informed of the developed intellectual outputs. In this way, we aim to reach different universities across Europe and introduce project’s intellectual outputs to be included in their education programmes. In addition, staff members of the partner organisations will be active during the project practice and the project website will enable us to reach a wider audience.

Methodology & Activities
Methodology consisted of three cycles on the course of the project is as follows.
Cycle 1 – Literature Reviews & Curriculum Development (Individual & Team Works)
Cycle 2 – Content & Software Development (Workshops & Technological Support)
Cycle 3 – Piloting (Training courses & Evaluations)

Activities to be implemented are as follows.
Cycle 1
1- Partnership will review literature to prepare two reports named “Autism Spectrum Disorder & Social and Communicative Challenges” and “Assistive Technology Tools for Accelerating Learning Processes of Children with ASD”. These reports will form the basis of the proposed curriculum.
2- Curriculum will be developed as modules on a cloud service and necessary arrangements will be made on the curriculum in order to adapt it to national contexts.

Cycle 2
1- Workshops will be organised for the content development. Subject matter experts, lecturers and other stakeholders will participate in the workshops. The focus will be on the most effective assistive technology tools for ASD.
2- After the workshops, team works will take place and scenarios (6 in total) will be written necessary for VR resources. Then the software will be developed.

Cycle 3
1- After the preparation process of the intellectual outputs, training courses for SEN teaching undergraduates will be organised. Pre and post tests will be applied before and after the training courses to reveal the effectiveness of the courses.

Results & Impact
SEN teaching undergraduates will directly participate in the project practice and be equipped with necessary pedagogic and technology skills about these assistive tools. Interested lecturers from all over the world will be able to use the developed curriculum and VR content in their classes. Partner organisations will be able to use developed curriculum and VR resources during their course delivery. Through panel discussions and a valorisation conference project results will be disseminated to a wide range of stakeholders.

Project Website

http://autismtechtools.com

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 179235 Eur

Project Coordinator

Düzce University & Country: TR

Project Partners

• CANAKKALE ONSEKIZ MART UNIVERSITESI
• SPOLECZNA AKADEMIA NAUK
• SCUOLA DI ROBOTICA
• LATVIJAS UNIVERSITATE
• Nara Egitim Teknolojileri Anonim Sirketi
• UNIVERSITY OF MACEDONIA