[senit] Report of the SENIT meeting at BETT

A small but perfectly formed group met at BETT in one of the Inclusive Tech
conference rooms for the SENIT meeting on the afternoon of Friday 11th January .

1. First Sarah Greenland showed her latest software programme "Touching
Cats" operated from Touch screen, mouse IWB access and switch(es).
There were 5 very realistic scenes, which were not overly graphically
complex but very clear.
We saw the Kitchen and Alley way scenarios. A realistic animated cat can be
guided around the scenes using touch or mouse (or switches) The cat carries
out appropriate actions (jumps out of the window, climbs a tree, etc.).
Switch access is also included:
1 switch action carries out a full action sequence from the cat chosen at
random and a switch prompt is shown.
Sarah also plans a two switch option one switch to start an action which
then pauses and the other switch completes the action.
The finished program will be released by Inclusive Technology.

2. Chris Abbott
Chris talked about a new journal "The Journal of Assistive Technology" which
was being launched in 2007. It will have a mixture of more formal peer
reviewed articles with shorter less formal articles and case studies based
on some of the activities of practioners.
He spoke about the course he was planning to develop at Kings College of an
MA in e-inclusion. This would be a 2 year part time course which would be in
the form of 5 long weekend of study combined with online content. Thus it
would be particularly attractive to those living in other parts of the
country/world than close to London. Alternatively, it could be a full time 1
year course.

Further details from
Dr. Chris Abbott
Programme director
Department of Education and Professional studies Kings College London
Franklin-Wilkins Building (WBW) Waterloo Bridge road London SE1 9NH

3. Sally Pavely
Sally showed the progress she has made on the Whiteboard room "the Plasma
screen and whiteboard room" www.whiteboardroom.org.uk . It is a web site for
sharing resources especially from practioners in ICT and SEN. She showed
some of the resources on the site. This site has no log in and the resources
can be downloaded and used straight from the site.
The software is categorised by topic, and the pmld section is referenced to
the P levels.

4. Nick Wonham showed his latest program written in Powerpoint and
downloadable from the Whiteboard room "Rama and the Demon King Ravana"
- an interactive story incorporating rhythms, clapping and call and
responses (aka Keith Parks) and uses animations and pictures he has drawn.

5. There followed a discussion on the Bercow report "Review of Speech and
Language"
Richard Walter started by reading a contribution by Jeff Hughes (who
couldn't be at the meeting.) Mike Blamires then spoke about the report and
it was decided that it would be more effective if individuals should write
to the site.

http://www.dfes.gov.uk/consultations/conDetails.cfm?consultationId=1513 

for the site to add individual comments: closing date is Jan 18th.
The effectiveness of lots of individual contact was highlighted over a group
response.

6. It was noted that Becta has now reconvened an Inclusion presence.

7. A planned meeting of SENIT was suggested either at London or Abilitynet
premises (Microsoft) - possibly for the Summer term.

8. Finally Ann and Richard thanked everyone for attending.

9. Last but not least, many thanks to Inclusive Technology for the loan of
one of their conference rooms.

Richard Walter
Ann McDevitt