Testing Will Go On—Accommodations in the Age of eLearning

Presented by: Jennifer Pitts / Ruth Ziolkowski, OTR, M.B.A.

About the Webinar

High stakes testing has been on hold during the pandemic—but, it will resume for thousands of districts very soon. Students need practice with their accommodations to gain confidence and independence. Teachers need to gather the required data over time. Ask yourself:

  • What can I do to start preparing?
  • What will I need in my testing accommodations toolkit?
  • How can I get students started with accommodations now so they can use them on the assessment (when the time comes)?

Join us for a snapshot look at testing accommodations in the age of eLearning. We’ll dive into:

  1. The role of accommodations in high stakes testing
  2. Tools (Snap&Read and Co:Writer) that feature testing accommodations
    1. Text-to-speech
    2. Word prediction
    3. Speech recognition (voice typing)
    4. Test mode (to lock disallowed features)
  3. Proof of accommodation use — often a requirement that accommodations are used in instruction well ahead of the assessment (Co:Writer data provides evidence).

About the Presenter

Jennifer Pitts

has a Masters of Education and 14 years of classroom teacher experience. While teaching, she worked within multiple school systems – public, private, and charter schools. After teaching, Jennifer went into the Educational Publishing World and has worked for various K-12 publishers, training and educating teachers with best practices of teaching. Jennifer has been at Don Johnston Incorporated for a year now and enjoys helping all students have the right tools to unlock the doors of learning.

Ruth Ziolkowski, OTR, M.B.A.

s President of Don Johnston Incorporated. Ruth is an Occupational Therapist, a national education leader and speaker. She has acted as liaison between the assessment consortia and Assistive Technology professionals. Ruth is an AEM Center Advisory Committee Member and on the Board of Directors for The Assistive Technology industry Association (ATIA). She has been a strong student advocate for more than 30 years. Most importantly, Ruth cares deeply about supporting kids who learn differently.