2015 TASH Conference

Practitioners and family members who support students with deaf-blindness often struggle when it comes to accessing local resources to meet the needs of this unique population. Open Hands Open Access (OHOA) is a federally funded online training initiative developed by the National Center on Deaf-Blindness designed to provide free, high quality, relevant learning materials to support interveners (i.e., 1:1 paraeducators with specialized knowledge/skills in deaf-blindness) and other team members . We will provide an overview of the national movement for interveners as a related service and OHOA, including a demonstration of available OHOA modules and details on national training cohorts. OBJECTIVES: 1. Participants will learn the outcomes for students with deaf-blindness who receive support from effective, well-trained interveners and the national movement for designating this role as a related service under new authorization of IDEA. 2. Participants will learn the rationale and need for 1:1 paraeducator support for some students who are deaf-blind and the specific roles and responsibilities of an effective intervener including: using interpretation to provide access to the student?s educational environment and curriculum ; effective collaboration with other practitioners and family members; facilitating interactions and relationships between the student who is deaf-blind and others; and promoting the student?s positive self-identity, independence and self-determination skills. 3. Participants will gain knowledge of an available, fully accessible, and innovative system for training paraeducators and other educational team members using online learning platforms. 4. Participants will gain knowledge of how to access Open Hands Open Access for individual training or for professional development designed for schools and local educational agencies and learn of the professional development results of hosted training modules led by the state deaf-blind projects in several states over the past two years. 5. Participants will gain knowledge of practical tips that technical assistance providers or trainers may use to increase engagement and learning with adult participants, thereby increasing effective support to students with deaf-blindness.