This page contains a curated list of special education resources and edtech products to support learners with disabilities in a distance learning context.
Questions? Feedback? Email COVIDresponse@digitalpromise.org.
Before trying a new tool or product, consider how you can provide individualized supports and accommodations for the products you are already using and that students are familiar with. Chunking directions into smaller steps or providing sentence starters could be simple ways to support students without introducing a new tool. Also, check out the products your district has already vetted and purchased, and if those do not meet your needs, then please feel free to explore this library.
In addition to built-in accessibility features and basic support strategies, there are numerous edtech products designed to support learners with disabilities. Many of the resources in this library require an adult for support and should not be used independently. Some are free, have a limited free trial, or are for purchase. All products in this library meet robust student privacy criteria. This list focuses on learning products and does not include data management tools or packaged curriculum materials.
*Please note that the tags for categories of disability under IDEA are based on product descriptions. These products have not been thoroughly vetted by Digital Promise staff from a learning or efficacy perspective.
Motivate, monitor, and manage students’ independent reading practice with Accelerated Reader® and watch as students develop a true love for reading. It delivers powerful insight into students’ literacy growth with real-time access to data, research-proven goal setting tools, and the “just-right practice” support to ensure the greatest growth is achieved by all.
Help teach your child how to pronounce the sounds in the English language with 6 fantastic and engaging activities. Articulation practice has never been so much fun!
Infiniteach Autism Core Skills teaches early academic, social, and communication skills that are interactive and engaging for verbal or nonverbal learners. Autism Core Skills quickly and easily customizes each lesson based on your student’s interests, attention span, and skill level.
BeeLine Reader makes reading on-screen easier, faster, and more enjoyable. We use a simple cognitive trick — an eye-guiding color gradient — to pull your eyes from one line to the next. This technique increases reading speed and enhances focus.
For students with dyslexia, blindness, cerebral palsy, and other reading barriers, Bookshare is a free online library that provides access to over 800,000 ebooks in easy-to-read formats. Students can read books in audio, follow text with karaoke-style highlighting, read in braille or large font, and customize their reading experience to suit their individual learning style.
BrainPOP’s animated movies, creative thinking tools, interactive quizzes, and playful assessments have made a difference for millions of students. It can be assigned by a teacher and used independently by a student. Students must have a desktop or laptop computer and internet access – low bandwidth (e.g. for email, web searching, word processing).
Use this site to create, share, publish, and read digital books that engage and support diverse learners according to their individual needs, interests, and skills.
The Choiceworks Calendar is a powerful picture-based learning tool that helps children learn what is happening day-to-day throughout each month. By presenting the abstract concept of time in a structured, visual format, Choiceworks Calendar helps children organize their lives as well as understand sequence and time.
Classworks provides students with an Individualized Learning Path focused on the skills and standards they are ready to learn. Each student’s learning path is automatically informed by his or her assessment data from one of our nationally-recognized partners or our NCII-validated screener.
Dexteria Dots is a fun, intuitive math game that teaches the concepts of number sense, addition, subtraction, and relative size. Equally playable on iPhone or iPad, the app will appeal to kids from age 2-8.
Online Learning