The opportunities of computer technologies in education are huge and far from being fully exploited. This is particularly true for preschool education. Features of perception of a preschooler, especially with problems in development, require a sufficient number of realistic, dynamic visualization, game form of presentation of information. For these purposes, the computer is best suited.
Children love to play on the computer, and the opportunity to study on it serves as an additional incentive to perform tasks that in other cases could cause negativism. Attention and interest are kept for much longer. Using a computer allows the child to assess the correctness of the task to some extent. Now it is not the teacher who decides whether or not the child acts correctly, but the child sees the result of his or her actions on the monitor.
Meanwhile, actively introducing itself into higher and secondary schools, information technologies have so far bypassed preschool education. Until recently, in most kindergartens for 25-30 teachers there was at best one – two personal computers, often morally outdated, which were used only as typewriters.
The share of correctional teachers with a confident computer skills hardly exceeds 25%, and among all teachers in preschool institutions this percentage is even lower. Only in the last few years, computers have begun to be supplied to kindergartens and it has become possible in many establishments to equip specialists, including correctional educators, with personal computers.
And the increase in the number of computers inevitably leads to qualitative changes. Among other things, there is a question of effective use of computers in the work of correctional educators. The first thing that appears in the words “computer technology” is the use of teaching and developing computer programs.
Everyone knows how many all kinds of games, puzzles, puzzles are in the “zakromah” of educators and specialists. Sometimes a teacher just forgets about some of them, and some are hidden so far, that it is not always easy to get.
Developing computer programs, of course, can not completely replace all the didactic aids, and should not, but significantly free shelves and shelves in groups can only a few disks of quality computer games. This means – to make room for storyline and role-playing games, give the child freedom of movement.
Among the developments that deserve attention is a package of specialized computer programs for children with hearing loss, speech, mental retardation “The world behind your window”, “Mathematics for those who have difficulty”, etc., created by the Institute of Corrective Pedagogy, their Russified program “Visible Speech”.
There are other products created by various institutes and centers (Institute of New Technologies, Adalin Psychological Center, etc.). However, their number is small and their cost in most cases is such that it is not yet possible to talk about their mass introduction into the preschool education system.
The widely available educational computer games for children, although they cost an order of magnitude less, are not always methodologically correct. First of all, it concerns literacy programs.
Among the large number of them, represented in stores, the author could not find a game that can be fully used for literacy training in a speech therapy group. However, the training programs are far from exhausting the possibilities of using computer resources in the work of a teacher. Many teachers lack subject and story pictures and handouts for their work.
Sometimes the picture needed for the class is too small or printed among other material. Scanning images and printing them in almost any format, you can easily solve this problem. Another option is to showcase your photos and slideshows.
Viewing slide films and virtual travels created on the computer (“Walk to the forest”, “Let’s go to the museum”, “At my grandmother’s vegetable garden”, “How a grain became a bun”, etc.), accompanied by music, recordings of birds’ voices, beasts’ voice-over text, is much more interesting for children and emotionally resonates with them.
Such information is easier to translate into long-term memory. Making films does not require much time and in-depth knowledge of the computer, and is available, if desired and with a material base, to almost all teachers. The necessary photo and video materials can be found on the Internet or collected independently and with the help of parents.
When you see an abundance of didactic games and manuals on the shelves, the correctional teacher is not always easy to find a game that he can use in his work. Computer resources allow you to create your own didactic material, taking into account the requirements of the remedial program, the level of training of children and the structure of the violation.
In our kindergarten in work with children with speech disorders and mental retardation for several years, successfully used games and manuals created using the graphics editor Paint.
Didactic games and lotto for development of phonemic hearing, lexical and grammatical structure, exercises aimed at preparation for literacy training, development of higher mental functions – all this can be easily done on the computer.
Exercises for correction of secondary deviations in children with general underdevelopment of speech are selected by me in accordance with the lexical topics studied. Such approach allows to be engaged in development of GPF, interanalyzing communications, fine motor skills systematically, moving from simple to difficult, in addition developing a lexicogrammatical order of speech.
With the help of the graphic editor on each lexical theme different in complexity exercises on development of visual perception, attention (noisy images, “Who hid in the picture?”, “Find Differences”, “Find the Missing Part”, “Whose Shadow?”), memory, visual and verbal and logical thinking (analogies, exceptions, series, etc.) are created.
It also includes exercises on the development of auditory memory, constructive praxis, fine motor skills and grapho-motor skills related to the topic under study. It is unrealistic to find so many suitable tasks in the print media. Information technologies allow creating the required volume of didactic material rather quickly.
Thus the teacher can set a level of complexity of tasks, lexical material which thus will be specified and fixed, in practice to realise an individual approach to the child, considering an area of its nearest development.