Visual Schedule will Travel! 

Work tasks integrated into a students day can be part of a students life skill programming.  Using visual strategies may also be a need for many students to facilitate independence with task completion by providing photos, symbols or text in a concrete, static, visual manner and decrease verbal prompt dependency.

What happens when when students need to travel and use visual communication at the same time but independence in interacting with the a device is a goal?

A number of shoulder strap cases are available to allow students easy access to iPads for communication purposes ( see iPads and Student Transport and Easy Bee case review  for suggestions). Numerous apps also are available providing visual schedule prompts for student to follow a visual sequence of events customized to their individual needs. One such app is  First/Then Visual Schedule (iOS) (Android) app by Good Karma available for iPad and Android which provides different views (full, split or list) of scheduled tasks or places they will participate in during the day.

Using a shoulder bag, visual schedule app on an iPad, cart and a few other inexpensive items, here is a cheap way visual communication was adapted to provide  a visual schedule on a cart for use during transport:

1. A sturdy, ballistic nylon travel case or bag with a shoulder strap (available from Amazon) when traveling about the school had been chosen due to its low profile, ease of donning and doffing independently, ability to view the iPad visual schedule and safety during travel.

A pocket on the back of the bag allowed the cover to be managed and  tucked away allowing easy viewing of the screen (see image below). It also provided a quick easy method of adapting the iPad to the cart (see below)!

2.      Large book stand repurposed from our library with heavy duty velcro to secure it to the cart.

3.    Sliding the pocket of the case onto  the secured bookstand provided the visual schedule at eye level for the student.  This means the iPad is upside down in the case, but zippers on the bag secure the device from falling out. Changing the orientation of the iPad screen for correct orientation of the app was needed but an easy thing to do on the device.

4.      The iPad with visual schedule is available at eye level on the cart for the student. There is plenty of viewable space to watch where he is traveling with the cart!

The existing cart and bag provided easy method of mounting the device on the cart with only a repurposed book stand and some Velcro required! It’s off to work we go!

References:

Visual Supports and Autism Disorder. Retrieved on December 16, 2012 from: http://www.autism-center.ucsd.edu/autism-information/Documents/A_S_visual_supports.pdf

Using Visual Schedules a Guide for Parents. Retrieved on December 16, 2012 from: http://www.iidc.indiana.edu/?pageId=394