Specialisterne (Danish for ‘Specialists’) seeks to harness strengths that many people with Autism Spectrum Disorders possess - good attention to fine details, precision, and high tolerance for repetitive tasks. Their consultants bring the joy of work into areas where it is often missing.
To ensure their consultants achieve their full potential, the social enterprise creates a highly-planned and predictable working environment to minimise stress.
(source: BBC News - Jobs cash for people with autism in Scotland)
The above is an example of ‘niche construction’ - this is the term Dr. Thomas Armstrong uses for modifying an environment (creating a ‘niche’) to adapt to each unique brain. Assistive technologies represent important resources to help accomplish these environmental modifications.
Aside from his work at Walker Digital, Dan Tedesco is the co-founder of HandHold Adaptive, LLC, a company that has developed a niche in ‘caregiver tools’. This refers to assistive technologies that go beyond ‘direct use’ by those with disabilities like Autism.
iPrompts was the company’s first product - a revolutionary picture-based prompting application for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. iPrompts is now used by many special needs caregivers, allowing for the rapid creation and presentation of picture schedules, visual timers, choice boards, and other prompts while ‘on the go’. Here is a good video showing the features of iPrompts: iPrompts - YouTube
Although it is designed to be a ‘caregiver tool’, there have been ‘direct uses’ of the application too:
(sources: A Key Set of Resources for Neurodiversity: Assistive Technologies | Dr. Armstrong’s Blog; Special-Needs Business Profile - HandHold Adaptive; Welcome to NEAT Marketplace; State Of The Spectrum - UConn Journalism)