What is Assistive Technology?

Assistive Technology creates access for people with disabilities.

Computer adaptations can be critical for children with disabilities to succeed in schools and for adults with disabilities to be employable.

These adaptations can be hardware and software, and take a variety of forms.

For people with literacy difficulties, many solutions exist that can assist them in achieving success. For example, word prediction software helps people who have language based difficulties. Inspiration is a software program that assists those who have difficulty organizing their thoughts. Speech output programs give feedback as the user type, so they hear the words they’ve typed spoken aloud (as well as see it on the screen).

For people with disabilities these solutions are critical – but anyone with language difficulties can benefit from these programs. The phrase “Assistive Technology” (AT) covers both hardware and software solutions.

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