Megan's Story
Megan was born in 2002 and diagnosed shortly afterwards with Global Developmental Delay. Everything about her has been delayed. She sat at 13 months. She crawled at two and a half and spent most of the intervening time jammed in a Bumbo to build her core strength. Her speech is delayed and her cognitive skills are significantly behind her peers. We sign with her as a way of assistive communication. There is nothing at all wrong with her hearing.
In 2010 I had a casual meeting with an Apple reseller at home. They offered to lend me an iPad “for research purposes”. I placed it on the table and carried on discussing the potential of introducing it to schools.
A few minutes later double panic ensued. Megan was nowhere to be seen. Moreover… the iPad was missing.
I called for Megan. She returned (in her own time) having drawn this picture.
No one showed her.
What a profound moment.
In that instant I realised three things.
ONE: there was SO much more going on in her head than we realised.
TWO: the seemingly innocuous iPad had literally given us a gateway into her world, and given her a whole new way of showing us what she was thinking.
THREE: we are going to need two iPad.
Since we gave it to her she cannot be without it. It literally goes everywhere with her. I have been passionately promoting their use in schools ever since and have delighted in seeing pupils light up and love learning and showing what they know in ways we would not have thought possible.
