Distance Learning for ASD Students

Inspiration

Students with ASD, or autism spectrum disorder, are used to specialized curriculums. In the classroom, they have access to many tools and visuals that can help enrich their learning; however, distance learning changes all of that. Many students no longer have access to these resources. It is also difficult for parents who have to actively monitor their children while doing their own work, and for teachers who have to develop a new curriculum while still keeping students in a somewhat familiar and friendly environment. For this, I have created a friendly distance learning model for ASD students.

What it does

This is an interactive website that utilizes visuals for lessons and assignments. All of the lessons/assignments are listed in a visual schedule that is interactive so that the student can check off items that they have completed. The last item on the visual schedule promises a reward after completion of all assignments for motivation. The assignments are automatically changed everyday based on an external database of assignments that a teacher can regularly update according to their curriculum. Each student has their own account so that the website can fit their preferences. Some things they can alter are the order in which their subjects appear in their visual schedule and the visual supports so that they are most helpful for them. As of now, there are tabs for english, math, and science. The english tab has exercises for writing sentences using visuals and a memory card game to reinforce vocabulary. The math tab has resources such as an abacus so that students can reinforce concepts such as counting and simple addition. The science tab has interactive lessons to teach concepts such as the rain cycle and others. All of these assignments can be submitted with the click of a button and are updated to an external database that a teacher can look over so that they can review the progress of all of their students. Upon submission, students are redirected to a rewards page, which for now is an interactive drawing resource. If students wish to look at/do past or future assignments, they can do so on the home page.

How I built it

I made the website layout using html, css, and javascript. I used processing for the abacus on the math tab, the interactive rain lesson on the science tab, and the interactive drawing on the rewards tab after submission. I used php and mysql for the database connections.

Challenges I ran into

The CSS was probably the hardest part of this project. The elements were hard to organize on the pages and often didn't work the way i wanted/expected them to.

Accomplishments that I'm proud of

I am proud of the way the website turned out in the end. I am especially happy about the interactive bits that I made using processing (the abacus, rain lesson, and interactive drawing tool). I am also happy that the php and mysql parts worked out.

What I learned

I got to reinforce my knowledge of php and mysql, which is something I haven't worked a lot with in the past.

What's next for Distance Learning for ASD Students

I hope to add many more lessons and make it even more user friendly by having a registration tab on the page and allowing the user to control more aspects of the website, such as background color, types of assignments, etc. I also look forward to incorporating some kind of adaptive learning model to this website to make it more user friendly.

Built With

• css
• html
• javascript
• mysql
• php
• processing