Impact of the iPad as a Communicative and Educational Source for Children with Autism

Christine Michelson presents her research findings on how iPad apps and technology provide quality of life improvements for autistic and nonverbal children.

Impact of the iPad as a Communicative and Educational Source for Children with Autism
Graduate Research Symposium,
Bridgewater State University

I want to thank you all for being here today in the Cart Conference Room on this rainy afternoon.

I'm here to talk to you today about my research that I conducted this semester on the iPad as a communicative and Educational Source.

I'm sure everyone here has heard about the recent increase in the number of children diagnosed with Autism. It is now up to 1 in 88.

The Center of Disease Control recently announced that after a study of 14 communities back in late March.

And most of us here are education majors or professors or people that work with the Autism community.

And we are always trying to find new ways to either communicate or educate these individuals.

And as technology is becoming the future, so is this in our educational resources.

And when I was thinking of a directive study project my personal work with children with Autism

and my search to find a way to communicate and educate them, my research project was born to define the impact of the iPad on their education.

And in this research I wanted to know who benefits.

Students of all ability levels, specifically children with Autism, teachers, parents and other professionals

benefit from the various apps available on the iPad.

And in this process I wanted to search for various apps, in particular for apps that would work and benefit people.

And the apps that I chose were decided based on conversations that I held with professionals and parents and other students

as well as secondary sources which included newspaper articles, blogs, peer review journals, app reviews, text books and

they were based on their versatility, expense and usefulness.

And the apps that I decided on were

Proloquo2go, iCommunicate, Pictello and MyTalk Mobile which was produced by MyTalk Tools.

Proloquo2Go is a software that is produced by AssistiveWare. It is the most expensive program that I decided to look into.

It's $189.99 from the iTunes app store and can be purchased for a one time fee and it can be used on any device that you choose to as long as it's under your name.

You can use it on your iPad, iPhone or iPod. I have it on my iPhone and my iPad for when I work with students.

You can use naturally speaking voices in American, British and Indian English for male and female voices of all varying deepness or high pitched based on the natural voice of the individual you are working with.

And the program uses a pet system which is a picture exchange communication system which makes up of 8,000 symbols or icons

that you can choose to associate with the words or the symbols that you want to express.

So for example, you may have say I am going to the store.

You'll have a picture pointing to yourself with an arrow and then a picture of a store.

So it's all visual. It's wonderful.

And these are just screen shots that I personally use and they're great.

They're stick figures but they get the point across.

These are actually some boards that I have used personally and put together. You can make folders, you can make them individual and change the color of the icons depending on the phrase or if it's just a simple word.

And then this is just a parent review that I had found from the iTunes app store. [Reads slide]

And what's great about this program is that if you were to have an educational classroom and you needed to have say something that for snack time or if you wanted it for history class,

you can make an individual folder for each one and a child could just go through and depending on what activity they're going through they could just click on that icon and go on their way.

And the second app that I looked into was called ICommunicate.

It is created by Grembe Apps and it was actually developed by a parent of a child who has Autism.

It's available for $49.99 from the iTunes app store. Also available on the iPod, iPhone and iPad.

It's easily accessible. It's available in a number of languages throughout the world. So it's easily transferable no matter where that individual will be going.

Available in male and female voices with another icon picture system called symbol sticks which has 10,000 available within the program.

And there are also more that can be downloaded when necessary, and you can add your own personal pictures.

This program, rather than just a communication system like Proloquo2go,

gives you the ability to develop storyboards, visual schedules, communication boards, choice boards, flash cards, and speech boards.

And this is just an example of iCommunicate. It's similar to Proloquo2go where it gives you a chart,

however this one allows you to have a series of symbols as well as a schedule. So, as you can see here they have a bedtime schedule where you can say "You need to take a bath", "brush teeth", "read a book" or "sleep".

And you can then add your own pictures based on your own activity.

And this is another board that can be used, a choice board. So you can have it open on the iPad and a child can point to which snack they would like.

And this is our review from a Special Education Teacher. [Reads slide]

This is always important in special education.

And Pictello which was our third app that we looked into was also produced by a AssistiveWare which is the parent company of Proloquo2go.

It is a little bit cheaper. Only $18.99 from the iTunes app store and also available on all three Apple devices.

And this program it has naturally speaking voices in English, Spanish, French, German,Turkish and Dutch,

with 23 additional downloadable languages available. This one in particular I was very impressed by because it has both adult and children's voices.

And you can add pictures and videos with five lines of text to make a story book or to practice literacy skills

and it is the only one that can be exported in PDF and printed.

And these are some screen shots of what is available for the Pictello.

Stories can be modified or multiple stories can be made to allow for various sample stories to offer, to say if a child was going to go to the dentist

a parent can provide them with pictures and a guidance to show what they will be doing to relieve anxiety if they do not know what is going to happen.

These are just some parent reviews. [Read slide]

And our final application that I looked into was called MyTalk Mobile. It's produced by MyTalk Tools

and there is a free version which is only if you would like to use it on a hand held device, it can only be used on one device.

Whereas if you bought the full version for $49.99 it is available through the iTunes App Store and you can use it on multiple devices and can be configured and manipulated through a PC or Mac format.

There is only American and English available on the MyTalk Mobile Light version. However, if you were to purchase the full version, you have the ability to download multiple voices as well as more languages.

This program also uses the Symbol Sticks icon which iCommunicate uses and uses 10,000 icon pictures within the program itself and options to add personal photos or more pictures form the downloadable site.

This app is also able to develop story boards, visual schedules, communication boards, choice boards, flash cards and speech boards with voice output.

And this is just an example.

And what's actually great about this application is a parent also developed this seeing a need for it for his son. [Reads slide]

And now when parents or professionals are looking at which app they should purchase when they're looking for the correct application for their students,

it's really all about the students. Like with education there's no great lesson that can work with all students.

If there was one app that could work with all students, there'd only be one app.

So, it does depend on the individual and the technicality of the different devices should be geared toward the ability level of the individual.

So Proloquo2go which is a more advanced program, if it's for a basic voice output or a child that is just learning or needs more assistance with talking,

iCommunicate might be more of an option because it has a simpler layout and it might be also less expensive for the professional or the individual and easier to work with overall.

And one thing to also do if you are looking into them is to read the reviews and speak to professionals about apps for advice.

As well as looking at the screen shots on the iTunes App Store and try to determine if your child would benefit from it as well.

And why the iPad? Working with kids and teens and adults who have communicative as well as developmental disorders along with which include Autism

a lot of them have sensory issues which is difficult to either hold a pencil or communicate or work in a regular classroom environment.

The iPad offers a tactile friendly solution where you can just touch the screen and you can learn.

And if its hands on instruction, there's no need for a paper and pencil if there's an issue with that. And it's kid friendly, it's cool.

Kids like to come and they socialize and they interact with each other because somebody has new technology.

Wow, that's really cool.

And if kids are already having issues learning socially, this is a great way to get them together. It's giving them the opportunity to socialize and learn together.

And on top of it all regular AAC devices which are operated on alternate communication devices reach up into the thousands. Some even 8,000 to 10,000 once they're programmed individually.

Where as the iPad is at most it might even get up to $800 with the highest memory and then on top of that then you have to purchase applications but then the options are endless.

You can use it to write. You can use it to learn to math. There are touch math products. Or with multiple augmentative and alternative communication applications, depending on what the need is.

What's Next?

The research with the iPad is just beginning. The iPad was just released two years ago this month and already we are seeing the benefits that have come across

not only for a general education student but in particular for students that need differentiated instruction which includes kids with Autism.

And in the future we are really hoping that more evidence based research is necessary so we can get more iPads in the hands of these kids that would benefit from them so greatly.

As well as teachers who could learn about assistive technology and also students at our own school who will be in the field working with these kids.

And let's just not forget that technology does make a difference, and it's the future and to keep it in our schools.

Thank you.

[applause]

[Audience] Would you take time for one question or comments from the audience?

[Audience] Easy One. How do you share images from Proloquo2go if the student doesn't have an iPad? How can you share them?

Alright. Well with Proloquo2go that is the downside of the program. As expensive as it is you can only use it on the iPad.

So in order to share the program with iPhone, a boy that I work with in particular, the iPad's very fragile and if you don't want it to get smashed or if they're having a rough day

you can develop your own schedule, your own chart on the device and take a screen shot and you can email it and print it out and that can be used.

So there are ways of exporting the chart or the communications boards to be used. So it's not supposed to happen, but it's a way to get around it.

[Audience] Thank you very much. Well thank you everybody.

[Applause]