What is Supported Typing? 

In education, there is a large body of research that demonstrates how English Language Learners and students with disabilities can achieve academic success when provided the necessary supports and scaffolds in the classroom. 

In the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act (IDEA), the law emphasizes that students with disabilities should be educated, to the maximum extent possible, with their nondisabled peers, using whatever supplementary supports and services necessary to achieve satisfactory success.

• When using supports such as communicative prompts, emotional support and physical resistance, a student with autism can learn to access assistive technology.  
• By providing supports for motor planning difficulties, students can learn to make reliable choices, spell and communicate.  
• And by fading those supports through continual daily practice, students can become independent typers and master academic skills necessary for literacy acquisition.  

Supported Typing is a strategy to help students with autism gain access to assistive technology, communication, and academics.  Supported Typing is a strategy that uses educational scaffolds so that students with autism can access the general education curriculum.  Together with physical, communicative and emotional supports, an assistive technology device can be used reliably. 

The goal of Supported Typing is independent typing, so the supports are faded over time as the student becomes successful using their assistive technology device.