Recursos de tecnologia assistiva digital para pessoas com deficiência sensorial : uma análise na perspectiva educacional

Abstract

Aiming to overcome various barriers faced by disabled people, new standards and laws were created in recent years. Therefore, the concepts of accessibility and inclusion have been more present currently. One of the main rights of people with disabilities refers to the right to education, once this right could provide a citizen to participate more actively in the social context. It was noted that nowadays, the basis of this challenge for accessibility and inclusion, is the potentiality of Digital Technologies of Information and Communication. Thus, this research aims to identify and characterize the role and the use of Digital Assistive Technology resources in education for people with sensory impairment. It was considerated for the proposed analysis, four specific objectives: identify and analyze possible benefits / advantages, challenges / strategies and difficulties / limitations faced by users of assistive technology resources at the institutions analyzed; map and categorize Brazilian initiatives on the use of assistive technology resources to form (or easier) access to scientific knowledge for people with sensory impairment; propose a taxonomic matrix for classification and evaluation of assistive software dedicated for people with visual or hearing impairments; and finally, analyze the role of Assistive Technology for democratization of scientific knowledge of citizens with visual and hearing impairments. The methodology used to achieve the proposed objectives were based in the following approaches: collecting data (bibliographical research, bibliometric study, online questionnaire and semi-structured interviews), Digital Assistive Technologies survey and taxonomic matrix with assistive software. Results highlight some points: although the focus theme of this research is of great importance to disabled people education, there are few scientific studies that deal with this issue; the majority (91.30% - 21) of the specialized institutions in the visual or hearing impairments uses assistive technology resources in its educational activities; the number of Digital Assistive Technologies that can be used in the education of visually impairments people is higher compared to hearing impairments.