App Review: Activity Timer Trial

Happy Summer all!

Sorry for the delay in posting, things have been a bit busy, but I have a great app for you this week! Activity Timer Trial (there is a paid version here currently for $1.99) is an excellent visual timer app that I highly recommend.

The trial version has a few limitations after the trial runs out, such as limited number of timers and limited amount of time (10 minutes); however, I have found the trial to suit my kids just fine.  What's so great? It has a three color countdown, chimes that you can set for each if you want, and a different chime for the ending.  This is a great app for any kids that have trouble transitioning between tasks.  The color change and chimes are great for getting them ready for the change to come.

I have used this app with several children (including my own nieces and nephew), as well as recommended it to parents.  I generally run the timer on my galaxy phone while the child plays on the tablet, or with some other activity so that they are able to constantly monitor their time if they wish.  It is one of the best visual timers that I have encountered, and although I have not tried out the other functions, it appears to have a lot of great options if you have time to play with it.

I highly recommend checking out the free version as it has been all I needed so far, but I have already considered purchasing the full version to play with more features.  If you get the full version comment to let us know what you thought of it!

App Review: YouTalk AAC

First a short disclaimer:  I was not compensated in any way for this review and it was a free app, so I simply downloaded it and tried it out.  I was recently contacted by the developers of YouTalk AAC and asked to review their free AAC app.  I am very impressed with this simple and easy to use AAC app.

The first thing you have to do is make sure that you have a text to voice generating app such as "IVONA Text-to-Speech HQ" which they recommend on their page.  This is the one that I used and its quite good as the basic female voice.

Next you can choose either the YES/NO board which is instantly available, or create your own 3x3 board.

There are only a few slight issues: there is a little distortion of the pictures if they are not the same size as the tiles, but my kids didn't seem to notice this.  I could have done a little cropping and made them fit better, but they worked well.  Each button is large and when pressed it says whatever text you programmed.  It has the capability to store up to five boards that you program, I did notice that sometimes when switching between back to the first grid it will show the pictures as very tiny, if I hit the home button and then go back in this immediately corrects itself.  This may just be an problem with my tablet, and the other grids appear to load just fine.

This is a very easy to use app that is great when you need something quick, or something that parents can easily use at home.  It is very simple to edit and although the grids are static, there is a lot of versatility as you can choose to put buttons on any or all of the spaces.  The YES/NO board is also simple and quick to use making it very convenient when working in therapy, or if parents are out with their children.  I love that you could quickly take a picture and add it in if new choices or objects were around, very good for when our clients are out in the world, or when the therapist needs to add something quickly.

Overall, very good  app that is easy to use and does its job well with a few small bugs that are easy to get around.  If  issue of switching between grids were fixed (may just be my galaxy tab) and there were a way to crop the pictures first it would be perfect! I highly recommend that you give it a try.

App Review: Quick Artic

This app is hard to find!  I found it by accident, and now when I search I can never seem to find the page. Quick Artic is an articulation app that offers real pictures.  It's not the best, and some have reviewed that it force closes, but so far I haven't had any problems with it, and it's free, so I have even less to complain about.

It has a good number of real photos for almost every sound, although not all the pictures are great, some are terrible, but for the most part they are adequate especially in a pinch.  It also has tracing for correct and incorrect answers within the app, which is good, unless you accidentally touch the back button which erases all the data.

Overall, for free I think this is worth a try, but it's definitely not a stellar app.

SLP app Review: Pic Collage

Pic Collage is a great app for speech pathologists looking to make a simple communication board for a client.  This would be appropriate for children or adults as well.  This is a free picture collage app that can be very helpful in making a quick picture board for a non-verbal client.

There are several different options for backgrounds, colors and text.  Additionally, any pictures in the photo gallery can be used on the boards.  This is a tool that families could easily implement as well to support communication quickly, such as when they are out of the house and may want to provide a choice board in a new place that may not be programmed in an AAC device.  

Below is an example of a board that I made for a non-verbal 4 year old child for his favorite items.  The app is quick enough to operate that I made this in a session as a test to see if my client would respond to it and he loved choosing his favorite, music, on the new board.  

Other therapy uses for this app are to make boards for basic concepts, opposites, or matching.  You can easily save it and then have the clients use skitch to edit/draw on them.  There are many great uses for this app in addition to the obvious AAC potential.

This app is certainly not the best AAC option available, but it is free, fast and very user friendly, which is a big plus for many of the families who are a little less tech savvy and has lots of other possible uses for creative speech-language pathologists out there.  

Speechie apps for Androids Review: Alexicom AAC for Android

I was inspired by fellow SLP to do some research into some of the Augmentative Alternative Communication (AAC) apps that are available on Android.  After looking at several of them I found a free app: Alexicom AAC for Android.  This is an interesting app for several reasons.  It comes with 33 pre-loaded boards ranging from an 8 button board for a child to much more complex board (as the one below) for independent for adults or teens.  It also allows you to create custom boards and change the number of columns, rows and the size of pictures on the board which is a big plus.  You can upload your own pictures, or go into the picture files that come with it (by going into the Alexicom picture files on your device rather than using the gallery).  This seems like is has some great potential for a very inexpensive AAC device the speech therapist or parents are able to put in some time for developing the right boards for the client.

Unfortunately, the pages that are linked are only indicated by the tiny blue triangle that you may notice in at the bottom right of some buttons, however, it is still one of the better options that is available at the present time.

Please let me know if you find that this has been useful for any of your clients.  If it works well we could start a resource for pre-made boards as it appears that they can be exported so that other SLPs aren't reinventing the wheel each time.