- Preface
- I. A new era
- • Globalization, the first sign of change
- • English - the new planetary language
- • A change in the scale of education
- II. Education and its context
- • Education and business
- • Education and the state
- III. The digital habit
- • The new digital culture
- • Digital projects
- • Time for assimilation
- IV. The extended school
- • Education at a critical moment
- • A definition of the extended school
- • Yesterday: concentrated knowledge
- • Today: knowledge disseminated
- • Tomorrow: knowledge connected
- V. New tools and old
- • Chalk and blackboard
- • The spinning globe
- • Microscopic life
- • Desk and work
- • The computer garden
- • Slides and liquid Crystal
- • Projectors and projections
- • Dry and digital copies
- VI. Digital transition
- • Continuing education
- • Cultural exchange
- • The mental switch
- • Critical thought
- • Internal communication
- • Educational frontier posts
- • Technological updating
- • Creativity and deregulation
- VII. Means and ends
- • Values for today and for always
- • Technocentrality and consumerism
- • Software in the public domain
- VIII. The digital library
- • Atoms versus bits
- • The dual book
- • Digital quality
- • Reading and writing
- • Text and hypertext
- • Consult and navigate
- IX. The home computer
- • A new piece of furniture or a new instrument?
- • Playthings and electronic toys
- • Robots for assembly
- • The silent printer
- • The community network
- X. New instruments of thought
- • Word processors, a new way of writing
- • A friendly mouse
- • More portable learning
- • Designing with computers
- • The golden link in communications: the modem
- • Electronic mail always arrives at its destination
- • Fax, a threatened species
- • WWW: three magic letters
- • Reliable and accessible data bases
- • Tables, abacus and spreadsheet
- • The Scanner, a bridge between two worlds
- • New interfaces and old keyboards
- • Presentation aids
- • So-called multimedia
- • Digital cameras without film
- • Digital videos in schools
- • Music for all
- XI. Presence and remote presence
- • Features of distance education
- • The three generations
- • Synchronous and asynchronous moments
- • Spaces for meeting
- • Classrooms open to the world
- • The advantages
- • New educational niches
- • A new type of teacher and student
- XII. Talents and handicaps
- • The right to communication
- • The obstacle of the keyboard
- • The obstacle of the screen
- • The expression of individual talent
- Conclusions
XII. TALENTS AND HANDICAPS
The concept of digital education should also be extended to include special education. Undoubtedly it is in the areas of mental and physical disability that the resources of these new information and communications technologies have achieved the most notable results in recent years. Helping children and adolescents with physical, sensory and cognitive disabilities has led to the development of "computer prostheses" of many different types. Almost all the problems that could be faced by a disabled computer user have already received technical solution, and it is only necessary to put into daily use elements that in many cases have only just emerged from the research lab.
Above all, special digital education begins by offering unrestricted access to the educational establishment, whether for classroom courses or to participate in distance learning programs, especially over networks and using videoconferencing. Such unrestricted access must be extended into the home itself, not just at school.
It is possible to create intelligent homes in which the disabled member of the family can have access to the "environment controls" that improve that person's quality of life and degree of independence. As an example, it is possible to control lights, television, radio, household appliances, doors and windows, etc. from a wheel-chair. Special digital schooling to a certain extent begins at home. Good oral training of deaf children helps to incorporate them into the hearing world, and for this reason they should learn to use the telephone from home or school. This will require the adaptation of existing systems to include sound boosting systems, or so that they are connected to a computer via modem.
