Good News Friday!

Today I’m happy to share one of my favorite recurring “Good News Friday” posts. For the past three years, a group of University of Colorado Engineering students in classes taught by Associate Professor Melinda Piket-May have worked on projects to design adaptive technologies to aid increased independence for some of the individuals Imagine! serves.

Each time, we have made short videos of the students demonstrating their projects. Below are videos of the projects created by Professor Piket-May’s Spring 2012 class.

The first five videos below share a theme: technologies that can help teach about cause and effect, enhancing the ability for even those with significant disabilities to make their own choices about their environment. That may seem simple, but for an individual who has never had the capability to verbally or physically indicate his or her preferences to others, the simple act of making a choice is a profound first step toward independence. Simple choices like the ones that can be made using the technology shown in the videos below are the first step in changing a lifelong mindset of dependence.

Choice Board



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Electroluminescent Cube



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MP3 Player 



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Simple Environmental Control Unit



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Light Pillar



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The project shown in the video below also offers lessons on cause and effect, and additionally can help teach math skills, and assist in learning about numbers, money, and turn taking.




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And last but certainly not least, this video shows a "Vibe Chair," which allows a woman with cystic fibrosis to control a vibrating system set up to her wheelchair on her own, which helps break up fluid in her lungs. It also provides assistance in learning cause and effect lessons.



Can’t see the video? Click here.

Thanks to all the students who worked so hard on these projects, and thanks to Professor Piket-May for her continued support of people served by Imagine!.