Guide: The AGE Support Guide (ASG) provides guidelines for supporting AGE learners with special needs in the classroom as well as for evaluation situations. It outlines procedures for support plans, accommodations, and assistive technologies. To accompany the ASG, you will find templates and checklists to develop individualized support plans for your learners. 

This adapted guide was published by the ASG Team: Avi Spector, Kerrie Bremner, Matthew Kennedy, Casey Finn Lefsrud, and Shanna Loach. With additional support from Nicole Barley, Marc Gariépy, Karine Jacques, Marc Brisson, the Resource & Student Services Teams at PACC, Place Cartier, ACCESS, & New Horizons.

PROCEDE 2022: This is an English language presentation of AGE Support Guide (Guidelines for Ensuring Consistent and Effective Support for Adult Learners with Special Needs in AGE) which was translated and adapted by a team of AGE consultants. The team's goal in presenting this at PROCEDE 2022 was to ensure all AGE centres and school boards use the same directives and terminology around support plans, accommodations, and assistive technologies.

This session was developed and presented by the ASG Team: Avi Spector, Kerrie Bremner, Matthew Kennedy, Casey Finn Lefsrud, and Shanna Loach for the PROCEDE conference, in October 2022. 

QACVE: In this QACVE workshop, participants looked at strategies for creating accessible documents and explored Microsoft’s Immersive Reader through Microsoft Edge. Microsoft’s Immersive Reader is an accessibility tool that helps students decode written text. Immersive Reader allows students to change fonts, font size, spacing, background colour, split words into syllables, highlight verbs, nouns, and adjectives. It can also translate documents, read text out loud in a natural-sounding voice, and it features a picture dictionary. This presentation was developed for the QACVE conference, in May 2022. 

EMSB: This presentation was further adapted, in collaboration with Giovanna Salvagio (RECIT AGE) for EMSB SI/SVI staff and includes additional resources for MS Edge, Flipgrid and Word - May 2022.

This brief video contains an overview of the "how" and "why" of using Immersive Reader using the Microsoft Edge web browser.

This video was developed as a result of a collaboration between Matthew Kennedy (Consultant for Social Participation and Sociovocational Integration, LBPSB) and Avi Spector (RÉCIT A2T) for the Learning Disabilities Institute conference, in March 2022. 

This video contains 15 "must-have" tips around creating accessible documents. This video is beneficial for teachers looking for ways to create documents that help adult learners with and without learning disabilities. 

This video was developed in collaboration with Micheline Ammar, Équipe-Choc Pedagogical, English Sector and Avi Spector, RÉCIT A2T.

Why Better Together? The reality is that no single platform does it all! Teachers should not feel bound by one specific ecosystem, especially when it comes to thinking creatively and strategically about providing students with access to effective tools and resources that support their learning needs and profiles. 

This presentation was delivered by Matthew Kennedy (Consultant for Social Participation and Sociovocational Integration, LBPSB) and Avi Spector (RÉCIT A2T)  at the Learning Disabilities Institute conference, in March 2022. 

This presentation provides an overview of the different features found in Microsoft's Immersive Reader. This software is included with a variety of Microsoft products and helps increase document readability.  This workshop was provided to the Cree School Board on November 26, 2021, and was developed in collaboration with Karine Martin, Orthopédagogue, Équipe-choc Services éducatifs complémentaires and Avi Spector, RÉCIT A2T.

Note: Cette présentation a été adaptée d'une présentation en français créée par Karine Martin, disponible ici.

This student-facing presentation was developed specefically for students at the Riverside School Board on April 20, 2022. The goal was to provide a succinct, 30-minute overview of Immersive Reader in student friendly language/content. 

Mariève Gagné is a resource teacher at ACCESS West (RSB). In this 10-part video series, Mariève gives us an account of the tutoring approach that is used at ACCESS West. The teachers work with the adult learners on a weekly basis to offer support with academic and personal difficulties, along with motivational strategies.

These videos were made possible through a collaboration between Avi Spector, Karine Jacques, Orthopédagogue SEC (Services éducatifs complémentaires, CSSMI) and Karin Martin, Orthopédagogue (Équipe-choc Services éducatifs complémentaires).

Note: La version française de ces vidéos est disponible ici.

Terri Charchuk is a CCBE-DBE ESL teacher at Centre de Nouvel-Horizon (CSSDPS). In this two-part video series, Terri shares how she uses Learning Situations to personalize learning and explains the challenges and benefits of providing more choice to her students. 

These videos were made possible through a collaboration between Avi Spector and Karine Jacques SEC (Services éducatifs complémentaires, CSSMI).