What you are looking at is the origin story of a little white lie that began by a student who just didn’t want to finish his math at the After School Program. This is also the a reconstruction done with that student to showing him how one action can lead to more and more problems. But in reality, the story with this student doesn’t matter, what does matter is the manner in which I was able to recreate his actions in a visual manner so that he could see exactly what happened.
I used the Bamboo Paper app (it’s free) on my iPad and was able to mirror the image onto through my projector so the student and I could see exactly what happened, when, and why. This is just the final project, but there were portions of this timeline that were drawn and erased multiple times as we went over options and decisions that could have been made.
I’m not claiming this is rocket science. I also know that people could say “you could do the same thing with paper and pencil.” Well, you’re right I could have, but I didn’t. In fact I’ve used this tool on past occasions with multiple students. Students who have autism have responded very well to this because they’re seeing a visual representation of what is happening. It is a tool.
And when the kid realizes that instead of digging hole for himself he should have just done his stinkin’ 30 minutes of math homework, it is totally worth it.
