My role and context in education
I am a teacher in primary school, but not an active one yet. There is a big catalogue with names awaiting to get a job in the government as a teacher, thus I am in the waiting list for 2 years now and I am moving on to the third year. I am working full time in a completely different job and at the same time I am helping kids with their homework everyday.
When I was in the University years we had to make our practice as teachers in various schools. Taking into consideration that I would like to mention it as my current context as I am not having actually an active job as a teacher. I would like therefore to refer to those experiences and to that specific context.
How they relate to accessibility and online learning
While I was making my practice, I did notice any matter for accessibility in my classes due to the fact that it did not happen to have any kid with impairments or any kind of disability. However, it happened to me, to have one case with a kid I was helping with homework in the afternoons. That kid is stil having a mental disability. Teaching in this case and trying to help the kid overcome some obsessions is really difficult! Online learning is still a little bit behind in our country, as I am coming from Cyprus. Online learning in primary school is still a "dream" here. There is actually only 1 or 2 personal computers in each class and there are other classes that do not have at all. Some schools have computer labs but still, there are many things that need to be done in order to make it work effectively and not only for disabled students but also for the rest of the students.
What I would like to achieve from the course
- to understand the various accessibility issues raised by the different roles in a school or organisation who are working online
- learn about educational policies issues as far as accessibility and disability is concerned
- take a look in the research area that covers the above aspects and develop an opinion in certain issues
- how to value accessibility in different organisations through particular technologies and assess it whether it does support the needs of the learners and the teaching staff