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New in Share! This awesome lesson just shared by David from Allen, TX in the VizZle library brings history to life and makes it relatable. Check out Tail Gunner in WWII – ab fab for studying World War II, Vetran’s Day, Memorial Day, and 4th of July too! Thanks for sharing David!!

• Tail Gunner in WWII (Book), VizZle ID Number: 83414
  Image and text about Sonny Kemble, a tail gunner in WWII (e.g., “I flew in a B17 bomber. It was a big airplane.”), popup text question (e.g., “What war was I in?”) TO text (e.g., “WWII”), 10 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

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Cathy P from Shaker Heights, OH created and shared this great lesson on ASL Colors. Thanks for sharing Cathy!

• ASL Colors (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 79672
  Image of a hand pointing to the video play button and text w/ audio directing the student to watch the video clip of the ASL sign for a specific color (“Watch the video and match the color.”) TO color swatch and text label (e.g., “yellow”), field of 3 choices, 10 pairs
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

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VizZle updated over the weekend with a host of fixes and tweaks on the features released in 4.0 in response to your requests.

VizZle Web and VizZle Player Web (at www.govizzle.com) will update automatically with no prompt when you login. You may notice a 15 to 20 second delay the first time you login as it updates.

VizZle Desktop or VizZle mobile applications will ask if you want to update. Say Yes! The installation will occur automatically so long as you have admin rights (you are allowed to install programs on your computer without requesting help from school IT support). If you do not have admin rights, you will need to contact your support with an update request. Feel free to login to the Web versions at www.govizzle.com in the meantime.

If you have any questions or need any assistance, please contact us at support@monarchttt.com or call 1.800.705.1382. We are happy to help!

Happy (Updated!) VizZling,
The VizZle Support Team

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VizZle will be offline beginning at 9 PM ET Saturday, December 17, for approximately 6 hours as we update with a host of fixes and tweaks on the features released in 4.0 in response to your requests.

VizZle Web and VizZle Player Web (at www.govizzle.com) will update automatically with no prompt when you login on Monday. You may notice a slight delay the first time you login as it updates.

VizZle Desktop or VizZle mobile applications will ask if you want to update. Say Yes! The installation will occur automatically so long as you have admin rights (you are allowed to install programs on your computer without requesting help from school IT support). If you do not have admin rights, you will need to contact your support with an update request. Feel free to login to the Web versions at www.govizzle.com in the meantime.

If you have any questions or need more details, please contact us at support@monarchttt.com or call 1.800.705.1382. We are happy to help!

Happy (updated!) VizZling,
The VizZle Support Team

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Lessons for Skills Practice over Break – Autism VTips

Of course, as loyal readers of these fabulous pearls of wisdom, you’ve already taken to heart my best advice on sending work home over a school holiday (VTips for a Smoother Thanksgiving Break). And you just knew that I would provide you with a Winter Break version of the visual story, like this one:

• Winter Break (Book), VizZle ID Number: 71300
  Images and text w/speech about getting time off school to celebrate winter holidays, with a quiz and pop-up for discussion, 11 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

And having had a fabulous week exploring the shared user library in VizZle for holiday lessons (because you hopped right on all my suggestions last week in 5 Tips for Finding “The Best” Holiday-Themed Lessons), you realize, “Huzzah! I still have a week left on my free trial!” So you can find exactly the fun and engaging lessons you need for your kids to retain skills over break.

But just on that oh-so-tiny chance you haven’t quite gotten to any of that yet, (and because I just love showing off cool VizZle lessons) here are some common skills practice gems that you might find useful to send home over break.

• Penguins (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 9379
  Image of penguins TO identical matching image, field of 3 choices, 27 pairs
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Colors (Book), VizZle ID Number: 27035
  45 page Book. Images and text showing colors, color examples, then followed by quizzes for each color. All pages have TTS (text to speech) audio.
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Find the Sports Equipment (Game), VizZle ID Number: 16589
  Each tile has an image with a popup matching quiz with a text directive (i.e., “Find the Sports Equipment”) TO image, 20 tiles, number spinner
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• I Know My Numbers (1-11) (Book), VizZle ID Number: 17661
  I Know My Numbers (1-11) with color word quizzes. Match the color word to the correct set. Includes a video on the first and last page of the story.
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Word Families (Sorting), VizZle ID Number: 68706
  Sort into word families of /ap/ OR /an/ and /am/ OR /at/, text w/ audio instructions, text categories, image and text label w/ audio sorts, 8 tiles per sort, 2 sorts
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Time (Hour) (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 1184
  Digital time (e.g. 12:00) TO analog clockface, field of 3 choices, 12 pairs. Hour only.
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Coin Value (Heads and Tails) (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 29363
  Image of U.S. coin (both heads and tails sides represented for penny, nickel, dime and quarter) TO value (e.g., “5 cents”), field of 3 choices with set distractors, 8 pairs
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Where Would You Buy This? (Game), VizZle ID Number: 16590
  Each tile has an image with a popup matching quiz with a text question (i.e., “Where would you buy this?”) TO image w/ text label, 20 tiles, number spinner
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Next Dollar at the Grocery Store (Book), VizZle ID Number: 5146
  Grocery store scenarios with next dollar quizzes. Images and text w/audio, popups and quizzes, 12 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

Happy Holidays from the VTips Team!

VTips will be taking a winter break too—the next post will come in 2012 (and doesn’t that just sound… far away?) (I can’t believe it is almost here—how the heck did that happen?)

The VTips Team wishes you and yours a happy and healthy holiday, and a joyous and successful New Year.

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5 Tips for Finding “The Best” Holiday-Themed Lessons (and Examples)–VTips for Autism

The VizZle shared library has some terrific examples of winter holiday-themed lessons – way too many to highlight all of them here. Besides–it’s impossible to pick the “best” in any case, because the “best” has the content and difficulty level you need for that child, at that moment (not necessarily the prettiest with all the bells and whistles that I am partial to showing off here). So here are 5 tips on finding the best lessons for you and your kids this holiday season.

1) If you don’t have a VizZle license, sign up for a free trial!

You are welcome to sign up for a free trial and explore to find (or edit, or create) exactly what you need. Click on the big orange SHARE to enter the shared lesson library. Try some of the keyword searches. You can send yourself VizZleGrams of lessons you like best (I send myself VizZleGrams to collect the lesson information and playable links I post here in VTips).

2) Use Keyword “Christmas”

When you search the library, try keyword “Christmas” you’ll get lessons for the other winter break holidays along with Christmas lessons. You can run separate searches for “Hanukkah” or “Kwanzaa” to get results specific to those holidays if that’s what you need. “Winter holidays” has a ton of returns, but you’ll get some Valentine’s and Groundhog Day lessons too.

3) Use KeyWORDS, Not Sentences

You can also try two-word searches, like “Christmas counting” or “Christmas vocab”. But don’t use longer phrases or sentences—the shorter the keyword phrase, the more likely you are to get accurate and fruitful returns.

4) Read the Description Before You Open It

It will save you time if you check out the lesson’s description in the Activity Summary before you open it. The description should give you a pretty good idea if the lesson is what you are looking for, so you won’t waste time opening lessons that aren’t even close to what you need.

5) The Same Title Doesn’t Mean It’s a Duplicate!

We try to make sure that there is a lot of variety, but no exact duplicates in the library. If you see titles that are exactly the same, but the lesson type icons are different, those lessons are likely to support each other (like a matching board to quiz comprehension for the book of the same title). If the lesson title and the lesson type are exactly the same, you’ll probably find differentiating features by reading the description (for instance one will have audio and the other won’t, or one is an edit with videos or other features added by a different author).

Holiday-Themed Sample Lessons

May all of your holiday lesson searches be fruitful! Here are two of my favorites with winter holiday themes (a lower level and then a more advanced social skills lesson) but I hope you’ll go search and find exactly what you need!

• Ornaments on my Tree (Book), VizZle ID Number: 23174
  Images and simple text w/ audio about the ornaments being put on the Christmas tree, with popup counting quizzes, 8 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Opening Presents (Book), VizZle ID Number: 8029
  Images and text with audio about why we should say thank you, and how to do so, when receiving a gift during the holidays, with popups and quizzes for reinforcement, 17 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

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Happy Thanksgiving Break to VizZlers Everywhere

We are thankful for every one of the thousands of amazing VizZlers who have dedicated themselves to working in special education and autism. We appreciate your work and your passion.

Last-Minute Lessons

Just since the Thanksgiving lessons post, VizZle creators have added some awesome new lessons to the shared library. They might be just what you need to keep your kids focused as the break approaches.

• Ten Little Turkeys (Book), VizZle ID Number: 53660
  Image and rhyming text for counting turkeys from 10 down to none (e.g., “Ten little turkeys walking in line. One went away, then there were…”), popup related quiz image and text question (e.g., “How many turkeys are there?”) TO number (e.g., “10”), first page includes “Turkey in the Straw” video, 12 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Thanksgiving Words (Book), VizZle ID Number: 61443
  Image and repetitive simple text w/ audio related to Thanksgiving words (e.g., “I see a turkey.”), 7 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Thanksgiving Match (Pix for Print), VizZle ID Number: 60539
  For print, tile/direction tile (“Thanksgiving Match Game”, “Match the items that go together”), image of Thanksgiving food item before being cooked and another of same item after cooked, 9 tiles, prints on 1 page
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Holiday: Halloween or Thanksgiving (Sorting), VizZle ID Number: 55183
  Sort into Halloween OR Thanksgiving, text instructions, text categories, image and text sort tiles, 8 tiles per sort, 1 sort
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)
• Thanksgiving Vocabulary (Matching), VizZle ID Number: 57180
  Text for vocabulary word associated with Thanksgiving (e.g., “Colony”) TO image and text definition (e.g., “A place where people settle far from home.”), field of 3 choices, 7 pairs
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

Happy Thanksgiving from the VTips Team!

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MTT Hosts Some Awesome Conference Events

Last week at the Ohio Center for Autism and Low Incidence Conference in Columbus, Ohio MTT sponsored the Keynote address given by Larry Bissonnette and Tracy Thresher, the stars of the documentary film Wretches and Jabberers. Larry and Tracy later joined us at the VizZle booth to sign autographs, where they then stayed on playing VizZle games on the TAP-its.

The VizZle games on the TAP-its were also a big draw at the welcoming reception MTT hosted for the National Autism Leadership Summit, which also took place during OCALI. The summit gathered professionals from across the nation and engage them in discussions and activities with the overall goal of improving the quality of life for individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), their families, and caregivers.

For us, the best part about attending education and technology conferences to spread the word about visual learning and technology is getting to meet you and hear your stories. Come see us at one of the next conferences on our schedule! We’d love to hear your stories about how technology is changing your classroom and opening new doors for your kids. And, as always—we have tchotchkes!

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Larry Bissonnette and Tracy Thresher (front), the stars of Wretches and Jabberers, with (rear, l to r) VizZle Marketing Coordinator Brian Wiszniewski, CEO Terry Murphy, and Visual Learning Software Consultant June RIng at the VizZle booth at OCALI

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OCALI Conference-goers showing off their autographs from Larry and Tracy

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VizZle games on the TAP-it at the opening reception for the National Autism Leadership Summit in Columbus, Ohio

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Wendy Bonneau from DeKalb, IL stopped by at ATIA Chicago with her new iPad to download the just-announced VizZle App and share her excitement about technology and visual learning.

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Larry and Tracy signing autographs and giving out tchotchkes at the VizZle booth at OCALI

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MTT Presents Ohio VizZle Educator Awards at OCALI Convention Keynote Address

MTT has always had and will always have a special relationship with educators in Ohio. The Monarch Center for Autism-the incubator for VizZle-and the nearly 4 years of research and development involved in making VizZle available to educators across the country all started in Ohio.

Because of that relationship, MTT used the VizZle-sponsored keynote address introduction at the Ohio Center for Autism and Low Incidence (OCALI) Conference in Columbus, Ohio yesterday to honor two Ohio educators who are using VizZle to make a difference in the lives of kids with special needs.

Ohio VizZle Creator of the Year Award

The first award acknowledged an Ohio educator who not only goes the extra mile for the kids directly in her own classroom and creates custom curriculum to suit their needs. This educator then shares those creations, making the effort to submit and meet the VizZle moderators’ exacting standards for inclusion in the shared library (persevering despite the moderators’ persnickitude).

Our winner felt that her students were so motivated by and learned so well from VizZle’s interactive lessons that she wanted to create lessons to access the entire year’s curriculum for English Language Arts for her students. She spent much of her summer creating those lessons, and she shared them so that the other school staff in her district could use them too.

Her voluntary efforts have saved countless hours of educator time in her school, her district and across the country—sharing her work with other educators to save them time, and sharing her great interactive lessons that benefit not just her kids, but kids everywhere.

The Ohio VizZle Creator of the Year Award went to Michelle May, of Canton, Ohio. Also receiving honorable mentions for their outstanding creations and generous sharing were Linda LaKamp from Cleves, Ohio and Jennifer Pearson from Hudson, Ohio.

Ohio VizZle Educator of the Year Award

The second award was presented to one of the four Ohio educators who had made the ranks of our VizZle K Club (VizZlers with 1,000 or more log ins).

This award was given to a woman who considers her classroom a VizZle classroom. She told us the story of a boy new to both their school and to her classroom who had serious difficulties with transitioning, and adjusting to things like the many field trips she makes with her class.

After seeing his struggles, she found a VizZle story she could edit for their next field trip—that time to a bowling alley—as well as a schedule he could carry with him. She said “He watched this several times before the trip and he took his visual schedule with him on the trip. He had the most successful trip ever and I feel the instructional aide of VizZle allowed him to do that so well. It also did not take a huge amount of time on my part to prepare all that –which I love—that’s huge when you look at all the paperwork I have to do in this job!”

The Ohio VizZle Educator of the Year Award went to Carrie LeBeau, Intervention Specialist, Alliance Middle School, Alliance, Ohio. Honorable Mentions went to the three other K Club members from Ohio, Courtney Monastra from Highland Ohio, Cathy Rodeheffer from Dublin, Ohio and Kristal Austin from Avon Ohio.

Our congratulations and thanks go to all the award and honorable mention winners for all their efforts on behalf of kids with special learning needs.

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5 Tips for a Smoother Break (and a Better Monday after Break!)

You don’t need to spend tons of time and effort preparing for break to look like you spent tons of time and effort preparing for break! Use available resources and consider these tips. The parents will appreciate the support, and the kids will reward you with a better transition back into the regular routine on Monday.

1) Provide a visual story about the break (and look! Here’s one now!)
Don’t assume that students (of any age) know what is happening when there is a disruption to the usual schedule. Ideally, show a visual story at school before break, and send home a copy (either a print copy or an electronic copy). Feel free to use this example however it helps—use it verbatim, or edit it, or use it as a springboard to make your own:

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• Thanksgiving Break (Book), VizZle ID Number: 59356
  Images and text w/speech about getting time off school to celebrate Thanksgiving, with a quiz and pop-up for discussion, 11 pages
  (No access to VizZle? Click here for a browser version—remember to maximize your browser and click play at the bottom.)

2) Send some work home over break
Providing some lessons for the student to work on over break can be really helpful to both the kids and the parents. It gives the kids a connection to school even though their schedule is disrupted. It gives the parents something structured to give the child to fill some time productively. But it can backfire unless you follow tips 3, 4, and 5 too!

3) Make sure the work you send home is mastered (or darn close to it)
Break time is not a time to challenge the student with content they are struggling with. Instead, send work that they can handle confidently independently. Generalizing it to home is a challenge in and of itself.

4) Make sure the work you send home is something the student enjoys doing
It’s also best not to challenge the student (or the parents for that matter) with non-preferred activities over a break. If the student likes art, send home coloring or an art project. If the student likes interactive lessons, send home VIzZleGrams or lessons in the student folder.

5) Avoid calling it “homework”—don’t make it mandatory
If the student is having a rough break, coping with homework might be too much (for the child and/or for the parent). Make sure everyone understands that the work is there to help—not to be a burden. And it shouldn’t be a burden to you either! Don’t spend so much time on prepping it that you’ll feel resentful if it doesn’t get done.

Setting Up Your Student Player

For all you dedicated VizZlers who want to send home lessons for break in a Student Player, the VLS Team has a 3 Step (takes-you-longer-to-read-about-it-than-do-it) “How To” ready for you at Vizzle U. It includes:

• A short “How To” video
• A 3 Step print “How To” for those that prefer a printed guide by your side
• A letter for you to send home to parents explaining how to use the Student Player