Have you ever learned something new and, shortly after that, you see or hear about that same thing? Me too!
The Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, also known as the frequency illusion, is a phenomenon where something you recently learned seems to appear everywhere.
This happened to me this week. After completing the last assignment, a few different articles and discussions popped up in my feeds and peripherals, continuing the conversation on assistive technology, universal design, equity, and access with regards to technology in education. The following are a few worth sharing:
Finding Ed Tech Communities at Conferences
As with many things in education, PLCs and PLNs are great places to start to help build and foster local community based networking, especially for sharing and supporting these tech education topics. Beyond the local level, virtual networks or national and international organizations are also great community creators. I did a quick Google search for “accessibility in education tech conference,” and it yields a lot of interesting ideas. The following is a screenshot of the AI generated results:
Links to the above mentioned:
- HighEdWeb Accessibility Summit
- M-Enabling Summit
- The Science Accessibility Conference
- Signal Centers Accessibility Awareness Summit
- TechAccess Oklahoma
- Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATiA) Conference
- Ohio Educational Technology Conference (OETC)
Inspired by the fruitful results, I went down the rabbit hole and found even more conferences related to accessibility in educational technology!
- Access in Higher Education and Disabilities‘ Equity and Excellence Conference
- Future of Education Technology Conference
- ISTE Conferences and Events
- Continual Engine’s extensive list of accessibility conferences (not specific to education)
Innovate Design Example at a Library
The following post came up in my Facebook feed:
The post comes from a random “just for fun” page, but the photo looked so fitting that I wanted it track down the validity. In a Google Reverse Image Search, the results yielded multiple sources covering an innovative universal design project implemented at a Henrico County Public Library.
The library developed “Work and Play Stations” to help parents and other caregivers have an opportunity to use computers while children are safely playing next to them. This is a great example of digital access and equity.
For some more footage of the work and play stations and recognition of an award the library received for the project, watch the video below.