Remedial versus Compensatory

Deciding between remediation vs. compensatory is an important decision point when considering using assistive technology with students. Remediation refers to technology that teaches the student skills through re-teaching using different approaches, where compensatory refers to providing tools to students to compensate for different functions.

At what point do you stop remediation and start the compensatory process?  We learned from the Fine Motor Skills Webinar that once kids reach the age of 10 or 11, their fine motor skills are already developed and can’t be remediated, at which time compensatory assistive technology would be put in place.

There are many myths that surround allowing children to use assistive technology, such as fairness, the need for children to learn to print, cost and loss of instruction time. (Broun, 2009) As a society, we need to move away from this kind of thinking, and move towards being inclusive to all learners.

It is important for teachers to understand that “handwriting is not an essential component of literacy”. (Broun, 2009) We need to give our students the tools to express their thoughts independently, and often times that means providing compensatory assistive technology.

Reference

Broun, Leslie. “Take the Pencil out of the Process”. Pages 14-21. Teaching Exceptional Children Sept/Oct 2009.