iStuff

=﻿Mobile Devices and Speech-Language Therapy= iPods, iPads, iPhones.....these devices have made a huge impact on speech and language therapy in a very short time. While I use them every day and most kids love working on the iPad, I think we need to be selective in their use. There are some students whom I have had limited success with using the iPad, mostly my Birth-to-Three children and students with moderate - severe disabilities. Some students who have motor control issues do not understand that any time they brush the screen they activate it, so when they move their hands across the screen toward their choice, they accidentally activate another option on the device. Other small children seem to need the tactile input of "clicking" a button and will perseverate on pushing the button at the bottom of the screen, exiting the app we are using. Finally, young children who appear to be demonstrating some Autism Spectrum Disorder tendencies focus on the sounds and lights generated by touching the screen in very basic cause-effect apps and they are not able to shift attention to the therapist's or parent's face to attend to communication. BUT, having said all of that, I love my iPad and use it every day in therapy.

If you are trying to keep up with technology and SLP practice you might want to check out the websites of Sean Sweeney [], Barbara Fernandes [], or Eric Sailers [].

Here are some apps that have been useful in my practice.

Cause-Effect Apps
__Bubble Popper__ (Free) - Touch the screen to pop the bubbles in bubble wrap. F__unBoard__ - Touch the screen and characters move or make noise. __Glow Draw__ (Free) - Touch the screen to draw pictures __I Hear Ewe__ (Free) - Touch the screen to enlarge a picture of an animal or vehicle and hear the sound it makes. __Leaf Jam__ - Tap the screen to fill it with leaves. __Talking Characters__ - There are many of these including Talking TomCat and Talking John. Most of them are free or $0.99. __The Wheels on the Bus__ from Sing-with-me.org. ($0.99) - Touch the parts of the bus and the people on the bus to hear the different verses of the song. __Tickle Me Animals__ (Free) - Wipe the screen to reveal a picture of an animal. __Tiny Ocean & Tiny Garden__ ($0.99) - Touch the screen and the objects move.

Preschool
__Alphabet Tracing__ & __Letter Route__ - (Free) Trace the letters of the alphabet. __Animal Flip Book__ (Free) - Match top bottom and middle of animals to hear their sounds __Articulate It!__ ($29.99) - Articulation flash cards with data tracking capabilities. __Charles Peattie's Animal Alphabet__ - Animal alphabet cartoons and a quiz. __Clean Up Category Sorting__ (Free) - Place a household object in the correct container (basket, toy box or closet) __Funny Phone__ - ($0.99) - Choose a character and talk to him on the phone. __Happy Hour: Who Am I?__ ($0.99) - Listen to an animal sound and choose the correct animal from a choice of 3. __i See-quence__ ($0.99 each) - Several apps for common school, home and community activities such as a day at school or going to the grocery store. Each app contains photos related to the targeted activity and allows for users to add more photos. Add text and audio to personalize the activity and create a social story for children with autism spectrum disorders. __Kindergarten.com Apps__ - (Free - $0.99) - Excellent Apps! Some are flash cards, others are matching activities such as "What Goes Together, What Rhymes" or "What Does Not Belong." These are usually free in April. __Monkey Match__ (Free) - A Between the Lions app. Match pictures to the initial sound/letter. __Moody Monster Manor__ (Free) - Teaches children about emotions. __PictoFun__ ($1.99) - Match pictures with an associated object in PictoJibe.

Board Games
These Apps can replace the board games that you use for turn-taking in therapy __4 in a Row__ (Free) - A "Connect Four" game __Animal iSpy Junior__ (Free) - Fit animals into place as if putting a board puzzle together. __Gobble Gator__ (Free) - Tap the Gator to eat the ducks __Guess 'em__ & __Who Am I__ - App versions of the classic "Guess Who" board game. Excellent for inferencing and practicing asking "Does" and "Is" questions. __iTools Game__ ($0.99) - Dice and coins to flip to play your own board games. No more dice flying off the table!! __JigSaw Animals__ - Use in place of a Jig Saw puzzle __Pickn Stix__ ($0.99) - Pick up the top stick on the stack. Good for fine-motor and visual-perceptual skills. __Pin the Tail on the Donkey__ - Tap the screen to find the donkey's backside. __Simon Says__ (Free or $0.99) - Watch and listen then repeat the pattern __Square-Off by School Zone__ - Connect dots to make a square and score points. __Who Do You Call?__ ($0.99) - Match a problem/need to a career and align parts of the character's image to create the correct picture.

Elementary Apps
__Bluster__ (Free) - Address a variety of vocabulary building skills such as prefixes, suffixes, root words, synonyms and antonyms by grade levels 2 through 6. __Dog Party__ ($2.99) - Martha from "Martha Speaks" teaches vocabulary words to students. Good use of adjectives and adverbs. __Family Matters__ ($1.99) - Open ended questions and conversation starters to stimulate spontaneous speech and language. __House of Learning__ ($6.99) - Choose a room of the house, people to add and the furniture and accessories and then start building. Students can follow directions containing spatial and temporal concept vocabulary words that are provided by the therapist to address listening and comprehension skills. The student can give the directions and have another student or the therapist follow it to address expressive language skills. __i See-quence__ ($0.99 each) - Several apps for common school, home and community activities such as a day at school or going to the grocery store. Each app contains photos related to the targeted activity and allows for users to add more photos. Add text and audio to personalize the activity and create a social story for children with autism spectrum disorders. __Mobile Education Apps__ ($3.99 - $5.99) - Excellent for many communication activities. iSentence Builder addresses sentence grammar. iConversation Builder works on conversational speaking skills. iQuestion Builder addresses "wh" question comprehension. iLanguage Builder provides a picture and a cue to make a sentence about it. iStoryBuilder provides a picture with question prompts to assist students in building a short spoken story. iLanguage and iStory Builder allow the student to record his production and play it back. Some of these work well with preschool students also. __Model Me Going Places__ (Free) - Social stories for common outings. __Oh Can You Say__ Dr. Suess Book ($3.99) - A book of tongue twisters for advanced articulation practice. __ScreenChomp__ (Free) - Turn your iPad into an interactive whiteboard. Record your voice to go with the writing and drawings you make on the screen and save them. Send your images and recordings to facebook or Twitter. __Splingo's Language Universe ($2.99)__ - An interactive game of following directions with 1 to 4 elements in each direction. The speech is not natural sounding, but directions can be repeated if they aren't understood the first time. __WordGirl Word Hunt__ ($0.99) - Excellent vocabulary practice with Tier 2 words.

Middle School/High School Apps
__BrainQik__ (Free) - Work on reaction time and speed of processing. __ImageQuest__ ($0.99) - Recognize pictures, find their relationship and type in the correct vocabulary word to solve the puzzle. __Light It Right__ (Free) - Turn on/off lights in a house. Work on reaction time and speed of processing. __McGraw-Hill Apps__ (Free) - McGraw-Hill has several Vocabulary Apps that are arranged by grade level or subject. "Words to Learn By" focuses on building academic vocabulary skills. __Situation Shuffle__ ($0.99) - Sequence 6 scenes to form a story. There are very subtle differences in the pictures and this task is very challenging. Be sure to try each puzzle out yourelf first so that you can direct your student to the appropriate cues. Excellent for higher-level inferencing and sequencing skills.

Productivity Apps
__Wunderlist__ (Free) - Allows me to keep track of my home and work to-do lists on my phone and iPad __Evernote__ (Free) - Save documents to Evernote and have them available on your phone, iPod, iPad and/or desktop.

Podcasts
CNN Student News - News videos for middle school and high school students. Can provide discussion topic for spontaneous speech and language, practice for note-taking, comprehension stimuli, etc. Teach Me To Talk - An SLP and a developmental therapist discuss issues they encounter during their sessions with the birth-to-three population. TED - Interesting lectures by famous and not-so-famous people who are making an impression on the world. Watch Robert Ebert's speech on losing his voice. Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me - NPRs weekly quiz show. It's entertaining, informative and free! Great time filler when I'm driving between work sites.