Spastic Diplegia Parents Network

Chelsea Hagan, 14, is the only student in her class with a physical disability. She’s had cerebral palsy since she was born. Chelsea uses a wheelchair to get around and a communication device to talk to her friends and family. When she was 11 years old, Chelsea participated in a few robot projects at the Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine. She controlled Lego robots to do play activities, taking orders and delivering toy food for a sushi party. Chelsea did another robot project with speech-language pathology students where she used the robot to manipulate cards that had phonemes on them (sounds for making words). To learn math and measurement, Chelsea used the robot to line up non-standard units like straws or toothpicks. Then, she would count them. She also measured the length of objects with the ruler. The robot is controlled by Chelsea’s communication device using infrared technology, much like a TV remote control. This is how Chelsea felt about using the robots in these projects: What did you like best about the robot? I can do it myself. I like to do that [the activities] all by myself. What do you like to do with the robots? I liked to color with it. It helped me to read. Did you like using the robot to work on math measurement? Yes, a lot. What else did you think about the robot? I like the robots. They are fun. I wish I could have one. Children with severe physical disabilities such as cerebral palsy are at great risk of developmental and academic delay. These …