Rara Avis is a private nature reserve in Costa Rica. They are working hard to develop sustainable ways of using rainforests in order to help conserve them for future generations.

Tools For Inclusion at the Institute of Education, London University, commissioned Twan Leenders at Rara Avis to develop the Rainforest Website as a resource for British schools. They also commissioned SymData to create the symbol site to facilitate inclusion of pupils with special needs.

Tools for Inclusion site

Rainforest Symbol site

Click on the image for larger version

Switch accessible symbol site

This site has received wide recognition from users in the UK. It has become an international resource for with Learning difficulties and foreign language teaching, with the addition of Spanish, Dutch and German versions of the site. As well as a widely accessible source for information on environmental and social issues.

The site has
- highlighted scrollbars to aid scrolling
- easy navigation
- switch access
- new interactive pages.

This site is for students with learning difficulties in mainstream and special schools including those with severe learning difficulties. One of the most important features of this site is its inclusivity. In order that some students with profound disabilities can gain from the site, we have added in pictures, animations and interactive pages. These help to motivate students, and give useful practice in other skills.

For example, in the butterfly game you have to move and hold your mouse over each flower to catch the butterfly. This helps children practice their mouse skills, cause and effect, colour recognition, visual tracking and counting.

Play the Butterfly game