Learning Community : Final Interactive Experience

The information I pulled for my concept map informed the projects for the rest of the semester. We had three specific interactive projects that involved our community at various levels. I chose to combine all three into one cohesive interactive experience for a member of my learning community. This is what was presented at my final review to my peers, faculty, and guest critic, Angela Shen-Hsieh (President & CEO of Visual i|o).

The following describes the goals of each phase/project (as outlined by Dori Tunstall's presentation, Micro-analysis of a community—five experiential elements):

project one : community identification

life goals: What matters most to parents of an autistic individual is to understand how the child experiences the world so that they can provide the best possible life.

historical consciousness: Parents recognize their child’s current phase.relationships: Parents find information by connecting to other people in their community; these people include support groups of medical experts, family, and peers.

agency: Parents choose what information they need at a particular time.

organizational structure: Experienced parents become advocates for new parents in the community.

project two : exchange

life goals: Experienced parents want to provide support for other parents in their community, thus becoming advocates.

historical consciousness: Parents develop a sense that many people have learned to deal with the challenges of autism.

relationships: Parents view the advocate stories, developing a foundation for trust.

agency: Parents chose to schedule face-to-face chats with the advocate, to further discuss the topic and related issues or experiences.

organizational structure: The parent and the advocate review files and information together so that the parent can begin planning a sensory diet for their child with a occupational therapist.

project three : collaborative task

life goals: Parents of autistic children want to help their child establish self-regulation capabilities through daily sensory activities.

relationships: Parents and the occupational therapist work together to plan and implement the sensory diet.

agency: Parents have a great deal of responsibility in choosing, conducting, recording, and analyzing the daily activities over a span of several weeks.

organizational structure: The occupational therapist reviews the parent’s documentation of activities then provides comments and an assessment.

historical consciousness: Parents view the progress in achieving specific goals set by the occupational therapist.

Screen shots of the interactive experience:










NOTE: The videos in this are purchased from istock.com and do not accurately represent autistic children. I was at the mercy of stock footage. Also special thanks to Marty for being my parent advocate actress.