Baptiste Melgarejo is a specialist teacher at a professional unité localisée pour l’inclusion scolaire (ULIS), (a dedicated unit within schools for students with learning difficulties or communication disabilities, Ed) at the lycée Henri-Nominé in Sarreguemines in Moselle, Eastern France. The aim of this special needs unit is to enable children with disabilities attend “normal” classes at a lycée professionnel (secondary school where students can receive vocational training, Ed.) It has around twelve year 11, 12 and 13 students studying for technical or professional qualifications, all of whom have a variety of complex learning disabilities.
Melgarejo’s ambition is to set up an innovative digital structure to help overcome the students’ cognitive difficulties and use digital tools to reduce the idea of disability. Introducing the special needs unit 3.0 with iPads.
testING NEW technologies TO FIND NEW WAYS OF LEARNING
In the special needs unit at the lycée Henri-Nominé, Baptiste Melgarejo has quite an ambitious project: to cater to the specific needs of each student and thus ensure success for everyone. The students, aged 16 to 20, have cognitive issues and experience learning difficulties, work at a slow pace and tire easily, making it difficult to spend their whole school career in a conventional class. They need more flexibility and diversity, so Melgarejo organises the classes based on their personalised school programme.
In Sarreguemines, the students at the special needs unit can work in a dedicated space featuring a computer area, a FabLab with 3D printers and Arduino prototyping equipment, a place where students can talk and another area where they can have a rest. Each student is provided with an iPad. Thanks to a software program called kapiKa Baptiste Melgarejo can organise activities on the tablets, while the students can do exercises and share their screen on the digital whiteboard.
In practical terms, the students don’t have their own personal iPad and only occasionally take them home with them: they are kept on the premises, so the teaching staff can make sure they are always charged.
digital IS IDEAL FOR diffErenTIATED INSTRUCTION”
Deploying digital tools enables Baptiste Melgarejo to come up with innovative teaching methods: a combination of active learning and project-based learning.
He draws his inspiration from educational studies, and the work of specialists such as French education researcher Celestin_Freinet, as well as the latest research in neuroscience. This allows him to understand the differences between two students with cognitive difficulties and apply differentiated instruction.
“You shouldn’t replace everything with digital, but see how you can combine it with traditional teaching tools.”
The aim is to empower students and make them more self-reliant so they can fit into a “normal” class, without the teacher having constantly to worry that the class isn’t catering to their specific needs.
To help them achieve this, students use digital tools every day. With Prizmo, for example, they can adjust the font on the iPad whilst another app allows them to write on the tablet with their finger. If a student has to write a report, Melgarejo explains, they can do it using a video capsule or an animated image. In any event, they don’t have to use a particular app: the students are free to choose the one they want. Melgarejo believes that these tools should be available for all the students, “whether they have learning difficulties or not.”
“digital pedagogy”
It was when he started focusing on learning difficulties that Melgarejo came up with the idea of implementing this current digital project. He believes in co-teaching and co-learning: the teacher no longer passes on knowledge, but facilitates students’ learning, whether they’re on the spectrum or neurotypical. Education is thus a more active experience as the students are in charge of their learning: it’s participative and collaborative. Melgarejo talks about “digital pedagogy,” because this sort of approach wouldn’t be possible without digital tools.
One example of students’ use of digital tools: when looking for an internship, one of the special needs students couldn’t find anything in the yellow pages. On Facebook, he saw a photo of a builder’s van posted by one of his friends: he zoomed in on it to note down the phone number on the side of the van, called the number and got a work placement!
“coopEration IS THE basIS OF OUR WORK”
It’s not always easy getting the special needs kids to study alongside the neurotypical ones. The students themselves generally naturally mingle, but it’s another matter convincing parents and teachers.
“You hear all sorts of contradictory statements. Some articles say that if you read on an iPad just before you go to bed you won’t sleep well. Whereas in actual fact, what’s harmful is the blue light on the screen: if you turn down the screen brightness on the iPad, you can fall asleep quite easily. That’s one of many examples of ‘neuromyths’.”
Another common fear is that replacing traditional learning with digital will stop kids learning. Melgarejo believes the very opposite is true:
“Digital helps you keep a note of things you learn instead of mindlessly remembering short-term knowledge. They learn how to look for documents and exercise their long-term memory.”
Teachers have to deal with parents who have questions about things they’ve read in the newspapers and other teachers who are wary of digital due to the various malfunctions that occur on the hardware. Fortunately, the increasing use of smartphones in their private lives is helping overcome their mistrust of digital tools.
“STUDENTS HAVE A NEW-FOUND APPETITE FOR LEARNING”
“I teach kids who are way behind most kids in the school system,” explains Baptiste Melgarejo. “And yet, they can perform very technical tasks with year-13 students, for example.” And as communication is important, students with difficulties can ask their classmates for help, either using digital tools or not: that’s how cooperation begins.
“Initially it’s very difficult: the students feel embarrassed because they can’t read or write. But after two or three months, they’re not as self-conscious. In neuroscience, it’s called the Pygmalion effect: if people tell you every day that you’re useless, then you will be. And the opposite is true too.”
Read our other digital education articles:
=> Nicolas Prono: using digital to help children with learning difficulties
=> Shona Whyte: using new technologies to make language learning easier