Malka Margalit

Word Processing and Writing Skills

Within most educational settings, writing serves as the primary means by which students demonstrate their knowledge, and it constitutes a powerful tool for recording ideas and exploring thoughts. Writing is also used as a common means of personal communication, fulfilling informational demands and emotional needs. In addition, writing has increasingly become a critical occupational skill: Successful performance in many occupations requires the ability to write in a clear and understandable manner.

Fathers’ and Mothers’ Roles in the Family

Within the family context, social support and family climate variables have been linked in different ways to coping among men and women. Caring duties have often been considered as the mothers1 major role among families of disabled children, whereas fathers tended to assist mothers in their overload of duties, thus identifying themselves as mothers’ helpers. This division of responsibility between the sexes may be in part a function of gender-related differences, but obviously, strictly traditional sex-roles are no longer the norm in our society. In the current discussion, mothers and fathers will be compared and contrasted, but the reader should keep in mind that each parent in reality takes on the most personally relevant and appropriate role, regardless of traditional distinctions. The entrance of computers into the homes of disabled children enables the development of a new parental role ~ in support of the home-computing performance. This chapter aims to investigate fathers’ and mothers’ roles and preferences within the family, with the goal of identifying new roles adapted to sex differences.

Case Study: Danny R.

This chapter aims to present a case study to exemplify the integrative interventional model developed for parental involvement in the home-computing of their disabled children. The model evolved on the basis of the comprehensive literature reviewed in the field of computer technology integration into special education, and in light of parents’ potential abilities and limitations as revealed by research on the stressors and resources available in families with disabled children. The case study of Danny R. will attempt to illustrate the different aspects of the suggested intervention model for empowering parents in their support and tutoring of their learning disabled children. The name of the child and demographic details of the family have been modified to protect their confidentiality, although the relevant facts remain faithful to the original data. The parents were trained by a special educator with vast experience working with children and families and presently specializing in computer applications for special education. Through attending to (a) the child’s needs in terms of specific difficulties, and (b) the parents’ expectations from technology, personal capacities, and difficulties, an attempt was made to identify the childparent interactional patterns in Danny’s family, to sensitize Danny’s parents to processes and consequences, and to encourage a dynamic approach that would foster the child’s growth and increased independence.

Summary and Future Directions

The overall intent of this volume was to provide a model for empowering parents in their support of their children’s home-computing, As such, the text focused on providing a relatively compendious overview of the literature dealing with three main subjects areas: n n1 n nEffective integration of technology for children with mild disabilities. n n n n n2 n nStress, resources, coping, and needs for support among the families of these children. n n n n n3 n nParent-child interactions and major strategies for supportive programs.

Bringing the Computer Home

The growth of interest in developing a model for effective parental support in the home-computing of disabled children calls for an investigation of the introduction and integration of computers into homes. In order to study the ecological aspects of technology diffusion as related to the locations and usages of computers within the home environment of mildly disabled children, and parental support for the children’s home-computing, an additional survey was conducted at Tel-Aviv University (Margalit, Rochberg, & Greenberg, 1988). The survey pinpointed three main aspects: n n1 n nDiffusion of innovations. n n n n n2 n nComputer usages in these homes. n n n n n3 n nParental characteristics as technology users.

Empowering Families: Effective Interventions

Professionals who offer assistance to those in need, do so in the hope that it will produce both immediate and long-term positive consequences. However, substantial evidence has now been accumulated suggesting that different types of help, and the manner in which they are offered, can have either empowering or usurping consequences, depending upon the intertwining of a host of intrapersonal and interpersonal factors (Dunst & Trivette, 1987).

Computer Games and Problem Solving

Playing computer games has been widely depicted as the most preferred computer activity reported by children with and without disabilities in both school and home environments (Carey & Gall, 1986; Swadener & Jarrett, 1986). The extracurricular use of computer games was an activity preferred by 61% of the boys and 54% of the girls in Swadener and Jarrett fs (1986) study of middle-school children, and only 8% of that sample reported that they had never played computer games. These children viewed game activity as their preferred mode of computer usage not only in the present, but also in the future. Carey and Gall (1986) reported that for secondary school students, the use of the computer for entertainment and leisure activities predominated, with games as the preferred activity. They also found significant correlations between the types of computer usages at school and at home.

Parental Support of Children’s Home-Computing

In an attempt to develop an effective model of empowering parents in their involvement and support of their children’s home-computing, ecological considerations and cognitive and emotional variables affecting the children’s home-computing will be identified and examined. Special attention will be directed toward aspects related to the effectiveness of different teaching methods for engaging children in various tasks and situations. Two types of strategies, essential in order to develop an effective model for parents’ intervention, will be detailed: n n1 n nTraining parents to support their children’s successful experience with computers and to develop and reinforce home-school involvement. n n n n n2 n nTraining parents to tutor and teach their children in their home-computing.

Familial Stress and Resources

Computers can be used to develop the skills of mildly disabled children, expanding their rehabilitation opportunities. The usage of computers at home may be regarded as an answer to the increased needs of these children for longer training periods, providing them with almost unlimited computer time. However, the simple provision of home-computers to these children has not been found to affect their performance, similarly to findings in the school setting. Role definitions and involvement levels of significant adults in structuring the computerized learning environment appears to be an important factor in advancing child-computer interactions. The extent to which parents affect their children’s computer-assisted activities may be related to a number of individual and family variables, such as the effects of the prolonged stress experienced by these parents, and the resources available to these families. Exploring variables present in the ecology of a handicapped child, with a focus on a stress, resources, and coping paradigm, will lead to a more comprehensive understanding of these families (Short-Degraff, 1987).

Drill-and-Practice Programs

Computer-based drill-and-practice is designed to provide immediate corrective instruction, and to reinforce previously learned information, thus developing fluency or automaticity in the skill. In order to advance knowledge within the mastery-learning paradigm that assumes that most students can learn most things to a specific level of competence in varying amounts of time (Ackerman, 1987), the nature of the computer makes it irrefutably the ideal means for providing endless practice in a needed curricular area, until reaching the desired level of fluent performance.