10 Ways I Used My iPad/iPhone This Week

As a busy mom and pediatric speech language pathologist, I can't imagine my life without my iPhone and iPad.  They make life easier for me in so many ways every day.  Here are just a few ways I put them to good use this week:

1.  iPhone "Clock" feature:  as a countdown timer that buzzes after 1 minute, to see how many perfectly enunciated /r/ loaded sentences a 5th grader could produce.  He loves trying to "beat" his own time in this type game.
2.  iPhone "Notes" feature:  to jot down 2 exciting blog post topics that popped into my head so I don't forget them immediately.    I also keep a shopping list in the notes section.
3.  iPhone "Maps" feature:  to find a shortcut from a daycare to a client's home when there was yucky traffic.
4.  iPhone Camera:  to record a "movie" that a student wrote about Michelle Garcia Winner's social skills superhero, "Superflex"
5.  iPad with Google Forms:  to record individual student data from a reading comprehension collaborative group.  The cool thing is that this Google form just asks me a few multiple choice questions and then uploads my responses into a spreadsheet that keeps track of the student's performance on each goal for each date.  This process is so exciting for organizing my therapy data that it deserves its own blog post.  (Let me just jot that idea into my iPhone notes section.  Done.)
6.  iPad Toy Story Book App:  to motivate a 3rd grader with autism to identify narrative structure elements and write them into a graphic organizer in complete sentences with punctuation and temporal markers.  Kids will write anything for me if I make it engaging enough.
7.  iPhone as a calculator:  several times each day to calculate accuracy percentages for my speech therapy clients during therapy.
8.  iPad Math Pop App:  to encourage two students with social skills goals to work together to solve problems and to take turns quickly and automatically.
9.  iPad Zoola Lite App:  as quick photo references of a variety of animals for a lesson in using "descriptors"/adjectives in writing
10.  iPad Cupcake Matching app:  as a reinforcer for a student for 2 minutes at the end of a productive therapy session

The funny thing is, that I think I only used my iPhone as a "phone" maybe 4 times this whole week!  Hah! 

I really don't know how I got along before touch screen technology.  It can be daunting at first, but ultimately, it makes me happy to master new technology. 


How has technology made your life easier?

Speechy Sunday: iPad/iPod Apps for Language Therapy

Today I'm going to review a few apps that I enjoy using for language therapy.

To review, my ratings will be on a scale of 1-5 stars,  with
1 = Waste of Time, 

2 = I've seen worse, 

3 = Okay, 

4 = Better than many,  and 

5 = Amazing App.

1.  Cookie Doodle by Shoe the Goose -  5 Stars  ($. 99)
I can't say enough about this app!  I just love it!   I keep finding new ways to use it in therapy.  It's basically an interactive simulation of making cookies.   It's interactive in that it involves shaking, tilting, tapping, pinching, etc., to follow the recipe to create the dough, and then rolling, cutting, baking, and decorating to create the cookie masterpieces.  Also, after the students make a cookie, they can "eat" it, which is very satisfying, even for my upper elementary students.   I've used this app to address language goals for sequencing, verb vocabulary, verb tenses, food vocabulary, following directions, commenting, rejecting, recalling steps in a process, answering wh- questions, and writing.   (I've also used it for generalization phases of articulation and fluency therapy, but that's another post in itself.)   For the money, I am amazed at all the use I get out of this app.

several cookies from my Cookie Doodle Cookie Jar

a "2" shaped cookie that has been eaten a bit

2.  Proloquo2Go -   3 Stars  ($189.99)
When I first got my iPad, everyone told me that I needed to use Proloquo.  Basically, this app is like having a gazillion voice output AAC devices and with premade communication boards instantly at your fingertips, without all the hard work involved in learning the device.  This app has the potential to be very useful for use with children who are nonverbal or emergent language learners.  Unfortunately, I don't currently have any children at this language level on my caseload, so I've used this app in ways other than what it was likely designed for.  I've mostly used as a visual prompt system for students who need ideas for what to talk about in different situations.

Regardless of how you use it, though, I think it would be easiest to jump in to Proloquo2Go using the "categories" folder.  In the categories folder, there are preexisting communication boards that contain a variety of vocabulary for settings, topics, and activities such as "art time," bathroom," or "weather."  I specifically like the "comments" grid, which I've used as a visual cue for some of my clients who are working on social skills like commenting in a group setting.  I also like the "feelings" grid, which I've used with a few of my students with autism when I wanted a good feelings/emotions word-bank with icons quickly at my fingertips.  I only gave this app 3 stars because of its high price and because sometimes I have trouble following the organization of the folders.  However, compared to other AAC voice output devices (which can run in the thousands of dollars), this app is cheap, and pretty intuitive.   I think back to my first experiences with AAC devices (can you say, not so intuitive?), and think that had Proloquo2Go been available back then, I wouldn't have been quite so intimidated by getting started with AAC.  

Best of all, I just love the way this app says, "Kway-suh-dill-uh" for quesadilla.   It's not perfect, but it's a nice place to start for an easily accessible voice output device.

3.  Princess iSticker Lite -  3 stars (Free)
I downloaded this app over my winter break and have enjoyed using it with some of the third grade girls on my caseload.  It's basically a computerized sticker book featuring princesses and princess accessories.  I use this app to work on goals such as:  following multistep directions (ex:  Put a princess in the ballroom and then add a cake by the window.), spatial concepts (ex:  Put the prince under the rainbow, and move the raccoon beside the tree), vocabulary (ex:  stream, lake, hills, mountains, etc.), and to inspire students to write stories and imaginative narratives.  I find that starting with a blank scene is a nice way to inspire my students to describe the setting of their story with details, and that when we add princess/prince/animal stickers to the scene, it's a natural time to discuss introducing and describing characters in a story.  I've used this app as a reward for writing, as well, having students try to recreate a story using the sticker boards (this can be difficult if the story the student wrote was not about princesses, but you can be imaginative!).  I like that the app allows you to save the scenes you create to your iPhoto library, because I find that students enjoy having created such beautiful pictures themselves and want to print them to pair with their written work.  

Who let the animals into the ballroom?

4.  My Pictures Talk  by Grembe Inc.-  4 Stars  ($9.99)
This app allows you to use photos from your own iPhoto library and turn them into buttons that speak when you touch them when viewed through the My Pics Talk app.  I actually use this app on my iPhone, but I'm contemplating buying it again for use on my iPad.   I decided to buy it for my phone rather than my iPad because I can take photos with my iPhone camera and instantly use them with this app; whereas, it would require several steps to get photos into my iPad for use with My Pics Talk.  I think I've just scraped the tip of the iceberg in using this app to its fullest capability, but so far, I've used it to make social stories (walking in line, riding in the car), to create process instructions (making hot chocolate), to create personal info "interactive books" (ex:  The People in My Family), and just to scrapbook events and classroom activities for later speaking and writing activities (ex:  pumpkin patch field trip, Thanksgiving feast).  This app was relatively simple to learn to use, and I've really enjoyed using it for language therapy.  I've typically used it by recording my own voice to speak when a photo is touched; however, I think that the scrapbook feature lends itself to having students record their own voices.   (I also this it could be used with articulation and fluency clients as part of generalization and self-monitoring activities.)    What I haven't yet figured out is a good way to send the finished product to anyone else.  So, we enjoy our creations in the therapy room, but I would much rather share them with family and teachers via e-mail.  (Right now, it seems to send them as separate photo and sound files rather than a photo that produces the sound file when clicked, which I would prefer.) Anyway, if I figure the sharing piece out, I'll be sure to share my wisdom!

5.  Word Girl - Word Hunt -   3 Stars    ($ . 99)
This is a cute app starring PBS's Word Girl.  I've used this app for narrative structure lessons, with the added benefit that we can work on vocabulary and sequencing skills.  Word Girl is a secret superhero who defeats bad guys with her powerful vocabulary skills.  I like this game because it presents simple stories told aloud that all include a problem and a successful attempt to solve the problem.  After the initial scene is set up, the app switches to "quiz mode" and asks the player what the character should do to solve the problem.  Then it provides a multiple choice question "quiz" in which the player is to choose between three different options (verbs) regarding what the character should do to save the day.  If correct, the player moves immediately to a motivating game.   If incorrect, the app tells the child why that choice was wrong and to try again.  There is built in success here, because even when only one answer choice is left, the app still asks the player to choose the best answer and then says, "You're right!" and moves to the game.  The "word hunt" part of the game is played by simply tilting the iPad back and forth to move a flying Word Girl so that she catches the target word from the quiz ten times while trying to avoid flying into the bad guys.   I wish that the app said the vocabulary word she is catching along with a brief definition each time she catches it--it only says the word the first time, and the definition is only really provided once during the "quiz" section of the game.  I find myself pausing often and supplementing this game with extra language to help my students understand the story and cement the vocabulary.  I also wish the app allowed you to scroll backwards and re-watch the story game you just played.  Sometimes I'd like to review the story again immediately afterward, but so far, I haven't figured out a way to pick which story is played or to go backward within the stories. The Word Girl Word Hunt app contains many different stories, so this game can be repeated with the same students several times without losing its appeal.


So, there you have it--5 apps that I think are rather useful for language therapy.  

And now for the disclaimer:   The contents of this blog are for informational purposes only. The information is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. You should seek the advice of your health care provider regarding any questions you have. You should not disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on this blog. The Gladdest Thing Under the Sun disclaims any liability for the decisions you make based on the information on this blog.  Ideas posted here are just general strategies that work for me, and should in no way to be taken as medical advice. If you have a child or grandchild who needs speech and language support, there is no better way to get it than in person with your very own SLP. You can find a certified SLP in your area by going here. 


What iPad, iPhone, or iPodTouch apps are you raving about right now?  I'd love to hear!


By the way, have you heard about the brain injury dialogues  yet?  If not, check out the trailers for this neat documentary.  I can't wait to see it!  It's going to air on PBS sometime in February or March.

iPad apps for Phonics

I've been challenging myself to use technology more in my speech sessions, and the iPad has been a wonderful way to enjoy that challenge.  If you don't know much about the iPad, it's a neat little touchscreen computer that's really easy to use.  There are lots of little "games" for the iPad, called "apps" (applications).  Many of these apps can also be used on the iPhone or iTouch.  You can download apps from iTunes and use them right away with your iPad, iPhone, or iTouch.  The thing I love about the iPad is that students don't have to know how to use a mouse or keyboard to use it.  They just touch the screen.    For students with fine motor difficulties, the iPad simplifies access to games and activities, and lets the content be the focus.  

Anyway, in the next few weeks, I'm going to do a series in which I review some iPad apps that I've used with my speech students.  Today, I'm going to focus on apps that I've used for beginning readers.  I'll use a scale of 1-5 stars to rate the apps overall, with
1 = Waste of Time, 2 = I've seen worse, 3 = Okay, 4 = Better than many,  and 5 = Amazing App.

ABC Pocket Phonics: Letter sounds & writing + first words - 4 stars ($1.99)
I used ABC Pocket Phonics lite for a while, and then decided to pay the $1.99 for the regular app, because one of my students with autism did so well with this app. Basically, ABC Pocket Phonics has two games:
1) Letter sounds & writing - in which the student is shown a letter, hears its sound, and is then asked to trace the letter. The cool thing is that the tracing game models the correct directionality and gives the child feedback about whether they traced the letter correctly or not (you can set the "grading" to easy, normal, or hard, depending on the child's ability). I've used this part of the game for teaching specific letter sounds, and I just keep pressing the back arrow button to repeat the sound I'm focusing on. The OT I work with appreciates that we model the correct directionality for writing letters while we're learning their sounds.  The thing I don't like about this part of the game is that you can't pick the set of letters/sounds to focus on. But it's pretty motivating, with applause when the student traces the letter correctly. The second game is:
2) the Word Game - In this game, the narrator says a phoneme (sound) and asks the child to pick the corresponding letter (from a field of 7 or so). Then the narrator says the next sound in the word until the whole word is spelled. After all the letters are chosen, the narrator models blending of the new word. I wish that the narrator would wait a bit longer before saying the word, to allow the child more time for blending. Also, again, I wish you could choose the set of words to be used ahead of time, but most of the words are simple CVC words with short vowels, so I'd only use this app for children at that level of encoding/decoding. The best part of this app, to me, is that it's motivating and good for multisensory learning. I wish it could be more individualized, as then I could use it with more of my students who are at a higher level but still need phonics instruction to meet their reading/writing goals.

Build a Word with Word World Characters - 2 stars ($ .99)
I used the lite version of this app for several weeks before upgrading to the regular version because one of my students with autism was so motivated by the TV show "Word World."  I typically use this app as a reward for this student, who is a solid reader and is way past the "building words" stage.  However, I've used this app for fun with my 4 year old daughter, too, and she enjoys it, although it doesn't hold her interest for very long.  Don't let the name of this app fool you---it's basically a letter matching game, and doesn't really teach children how to create words themselves.  (By the way, I'm constantly amazed at the apps that teach something completely different than they claim to teach, but I'll save that rant for another post.)  Build a Word displays a letter on the screen, and then the child must choose the matching letter from a variety of floating letters, at which point the app says the letter name (not the letter sound, as I'd hoped).  Then, the app displays the next letter in the word, and so on, until the student has matched all of the letters in the word that they're "building."  Once they've matched them all, the student squishes the letters together to make a word, and the app sings the little "It's time to build a word" song (from the TV show) and then says the word the student "built."  The repertoire of words that the child is able to build is very limited (maybe 10 words total, and then it just repeats the words in upper or lowercase), so this app gets boring very quickly (unless you're a student with autism who is completely gaga over Word World!).  Overall, I gave it 2 stars just because it's cute, engaging, and slightly educational. 

ABC Phonics Rocks Lite - 3 stars (Free)
ABC Phonics Rocks Lite is an app used to teach students their letter sounds. On the "Letters" section of the game, it just displays the alphabet (capitals), and when students touch a letter, its sound is produced. I wish it had an option for teaching lowercase letters, as well. Also, some of the sounds are hard to understand, so I don't use this part of the app much. On the "Words" section of the game, the student is shown a picture of a simple word to spell (word family words), and blank spaces are provided for the student to fill in letters to spell the word. When the student touches a space, they hear the phoneme that goes there, and then can choose the corresponding letter to go in that spot.  I like that this app says the sounds of the letters rather than their names.  Again, I wish lowercase letters were used, but only capitals are used here, as well. Once the child spells the word correctly, the word dances to music as a reinforcer. My students with autism who typically would not work diligently on a writing/spelling task will encode word-family words many times using this app. I do wish that the app were more flexible and that I could pre-set the target words, but for me, this app works ok as an intro or review for phonics lessons for very early readers focusing on short vowel word families.

Clifford's "Be Big" With Words word writing game - 3 stars  (Free)
In this game, Clifford's friend Jetta is painting, and needs ideas for what to paint.  The object of the game is for the student to spell a word for Jetta to paint.  Below an art easel, the student can choose from 2-4 capital letters to give Jetta some ideas.  The student drags and drops any letter they want into each slot (words are typically 3 letters in length), and the app displays only letters that will work to create simple words, so there's no chance the child will produce a non-word.  Once the 3 slots are filled, the narrator sounds out each letter and then says, "You spelled, bug!", or whatever word was spelled.  I like that this app provides the student with some autonomy as to what word they might want to spell, rather than giving a word and asking the child to spell that word.  Also, I like that success is built-in.  However, I wish this app said the letter sound instead of the letter name when the student is dragging and dropping each letter onto the easel.  I also wish that the narrator paused for a few seconds before telling the child what word they just spelled, to give the child a chance to try blending the sounds themselves first.  This game might be useful for a child who is learning to spell simple CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words with short vowels; however, it's more of a practice activity than a teaching activity.  I've used this app to buy myself time to cook dinner while my daughter plays it, and my daughter loves to show me all the words she spelled and the pictures Jetta painted because she "told her to."

Doodle Buddy - 4 stars (free)
It might seem strange to call this app a phonics app, because it's truly just a drawing app, but I've used it so many different ways to target phonics skills, and students are generally so motivated by this app, that I wanted to include it here. Doodle Buddy is pretty much a fancy magnadoodle.  The student uses his/her finger to draw on the screen, and has options to change the color of the paint, the size of the crayon, to use stamps, etc.  You shake the whole iPad to erase, which is fun for students, as well.  I've used Doodle Buddy to add a multisensory component to learning sound-letter correspondence.  I'll write a letter in one color while saying its sound, and then have the student trace the letter in another color while saying its sound.  I've also written a word family rime on the right side of the screen and allowed the student to use either the "eraser" or "undo" feature to change the onset to make as many different words from that word family rime as they can, while I transcribe the words they've made for us to review later.  There is an option to save pictures that you make into iPhoto, which the students also enjoy.  I find it's a nice way to review what we did in our previous session by looking back at some of the Doodle Buddy pictures we've made together.  This is a very versatile app, and my students really enjoy using it.  Writing activities they would never enjoy with just a pencil and paper become fun and engaging with Doodle Buddy.  Below are some doodles I've made with Doodle Buddy, focusing on short vowels with a student with autism who is a beginning reader.  (Disclaimer:  You probably want to monitor your student/child while using Doodle Buddy, because some of the ads can be difficult to navigate if you accidentally click on them, and you'll want to be there to close them quickly to get back to the fun.  If it weren't for the ads, I'd have given this app 5 stars---too bad!)

Tracing Over my "e" in many different colors for overlearning the short "e" sound

onset and rime game; we had written cat, then turned it into bat, and
will erase the onset (beginning letter) and make mat or hat.

We made a sun chart with short "e" words

So, there you have it, 5 apps that will get you started if you're working on phonics with your iPad (or iPhone or iTouch).


And now for the disclaimer:   The contents of this blog are for informational purposes only. The information is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. You should seek the advice of your health care provider regarding any questions you have. You should not disregard professional medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read on this blog. The Gladdest Thing Under the Sun disclaims any liability for the decisions you make based on the information on this blog.  Ideas posted here are just general strategies that work for me, and should in no way to be taken as medical advice. If you have a child or grandchild who needs speech and language support, there is no better way to get it than in person with your very own SLP. You can find a certified SLP in your area by going here. 






What are your top 3 apps for the iPad, iPhone, or iTouch?