Directions for Me

Below is a very resourceful site for students to access packaging directions.  For example, if a student wants to make Kraft Macaroni and Cheese, but has difficulty reading the directions on the packaging, he/ she can go onto the site and access the directions.  On the iPad, a student can use the Voice Over feature to have the directions read to them.  Check it out:)

http://www.directionsforme.org/

Scanner for the iPad

http://m.brookstone.com/mt/www.brookstone.com/iconvert-ipad-scanner?bkeid=compare%7cmercent%7cgooglebaseads%7csearch&mr:trackingCode=77A68D86-812D-E111-B18D-001B21A69EB0&mr:referralID=NA&mr:adType=pla&mr:ad=13560904284&mr:keyword=%7Bkeyword%7D&gclid=CIO3lNS1s7ECFQQaQgodrFMAsQ

This is so cool!

Skitch

This is one I have talked about before, but am finding more and more usage for.  I can take a photo of a tool that a visually impaired kiddo uses and access it through the Skitch app.  Once the photo is there, you can draw on the photo, type on it, label parts of it, etc.  I have used it with maps too.  You can make notes on a map, draw a route, etc.  I can imagine it would be helpful in teaching a variety of concepts to non-visually impaired students.  It's free!

FREE Visual Timer

Vis TimerFree - a countdown timer similar to Time Timer.  Max is 5 minutes; can change color, add digital countdown, etc.

Sounding Board APP- currently FREE!!

Sounding board is a simple communication tool that you can use to create custom boards with 1-9 message cells.  Can link boards, add recorded voice and is switch accessible with an add-on.  It's also FREE at the moment, so download it now!!

Please share with others too!

Many thanks to Deb McGraw and Teresa Clevedence of the Southwest Ohio Assistive Technology Consortium for providing a workshop for our Speech Pathologists today!  They shared lots of great apps, tips and tools for using iDevices with students.

Free Cloudon to edit Word/Excel Documents on iPad FREE

Cloudon is a nice little app that lets you edit word and excel documents on the iPad. The app is free. It works with Dopbox, Box, and Google Drive. The cloud storage systems are uploaded to Cloudon so you can edit a document from Dropbox without opening multiple apps. It's free and a great tool to get some work done on the go.

Just spotted an APP called Ninja Fruit that would be great for OT!

Does anyone keep student data on the iPad?  If so, with what app?  I am looking to go paperless and need some advice.  I've tried "Teacher Notes"- no dice.

Any suggestions are appreciated:)

SoundingBoard

SoundingBoard, from AbleNet, is an awesome AAC app that was free for at least a little while this Spring (and it may still be).  It is really an iPhone app but works just fine on the iPad.  If you are looking for ready-made, simple communication boards then you want to have this app!

Braille Touch App

This is so exciting!

http://www.afb.org/afbpress/pub.asp?DocID=aw130502#content

If You Lose Your iPad (Oh Crap!)

Find iPhone

This is a great app that will allow you to find your iPad if you misplace it. Download the app to the iPad and set up is very quick. You can locate it using you computer through iCloud or through another Mac device. If anything you can just have fun with it and show the kids that you are "Watching them" haha. It's a smart app to have. If you do lose it you can remotely lock the device or show a text message with instruction on returning device. Download the app!

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/05/how-the-blind-are-reinventing-the-iphone/256589/

This is a link to how blind/ VI are using GPS with the iPad/ iPhone in order to assist with independent travel.  Very exciting!

Apps for working on vowel sounds, initial and final consonant.

Good apps for working on vowel sounds, initial  and final consonants.
*Louie's Letter Challenge  has a soccer theme and works on beginning consonants, final consonants, beginning vowels and vowels in middle position.
*Vowel Lite - There is 5 levels. Student finds the correct vowel sound to words given a choice of 4. The vowel sound is on a hotdog that goes into the word that is on a hotdog bun. When correct vowel sound is found the cartoon creature gets to eat a hotdog..

SCOtutor for iPad

SCOtutor for iPad is an app that will help new users explore their iPad. The videos will start at basic features and will move through advanced. It is free for a limited and can come in handy for new iPad users. Check it out in the app store. Search for SCOtutor. Thanks, Chad

iBooks

I was able to go into the iBook app and find free children's books to download. Some of the titles I found were: Digger the Dinosaur, Garbage!Monster!Burp! and Pookie and Tushka.

FREE - Comparative Adjectives App

I just downloaded the FREE app called "Comparative Adjectives". It provides kids with pictures of various objects/items and they are instructed to touch the item described. It uses words such as fast, faster, fastest, good, better, best, big, bigger, best and so on. It provides a visual for students to grasp the concept of comparative adjectives and is fun at the same! Click the link below to download it.

http://itunes.apple.com/app/comparative-adjectives/id506997421?mt=8

Dropbox! Get it!

You need to download Dropbox. I'll wait while you do so..... Great, now that you have it you can do so much with it. In simplest term it is an online filing cabinet. Take a photo or movie on your ipad and upload it to Dropbox then access the video from your computer. It's great for files and papers you view often. You can also share folders. I have made a couple yoga videos and clips and have made them available through Dropbox to a couple teachers already. Now they can view my files and do yoga with the kids in the classroom. If their was a video they wanted of a student performing an activity then BOOM, I can put it in a shared folder and they have it. It is really great and I use it everyday for class.
Bad news is our district will not allow access to the Dropbox website :( so you will have to set up your account through another internet provider (I recommend the McDonalds on Brieil).
Check out the site and the tutorial video.

Thanks,
Chad

Dropbox

I use the Ipad for recording kids more than anything for 'self evaluation':

Stuttering

Articulation

Classroom social skills

I have junior/senior high students so they love being recorded and seeing themselves.  After I record them in class,  they get to watch it and  I have a 'checklist' of skills for the student to 'rate' their skill  from 1-10 and then they make a 'goal' that they need to do the next time.

An app for cause/effect or a motivator as well as entertain young and old is 'I love Fireworks' Lite

It was free...even better.

Anyone looking for a free visual timer app?  Try VisTimerFree- it's not perfect but hey, it's free!  I think I found it on edtechteacher.org.

Rewards Wanted...

I've used a number of fun apps as rewards for students when they complete their work. I have one student who is very interested in dinosaurs so I downloaded an app for him to learn more about the dinos. I also have a student who enjoys playing family feud, who doesn't. So when we have a break or after our class he will want to play that. Where's my water is another fun one that the kids enjoy.

I've used Facetime a couple times with kids at other schools and in the same school. I think that's an app that should be used more often.

Chad

Mobile BINGO

This is another Freebie! Students can use the pictures of road signage and vehicles to mark what they have seen along an O&M lesson. If they see a "For Sale" sign, a speed limit sign, a car, a bumper sticker and an intersection- they can mark it by pressing the buttons and getting 5 in a row for a BINGO. This is especially good for my low vision cane users. I am always saying, "Let the cane do the work- eyes up". With the BINGO game, the students are motivated to look around and be aware of their surroundings...something that all travelers need to do in order to be efficient.

Skitch

Skitch is an app allows you to annotate, edit and share screen shots. I use it in O&M with students who have low vision. I can take a photo of a hallway, intersection, store entrance, etc. and have the students circle a landmark or clue for figuring out their travel route. We can also analyze an intersection and make notes right on the picture. It is free!

TIme Apps

Some good time telling apps are: Clock Master (I may have mentioned this one before.), Learn Time Lite, Tell Time Lite (The Wooly Wormies Tell The Time) . Clock Master and Tell Time Light work on hour, half hour, quarter to and after the hour. Learn Time Lite work on hour unless you buy it. All interactive and fun!

A great free app that is great for a reward or reinforcer is "fast traffic". The preschoolers really enjoy this one. Another great free app is "Hello Kitty". You get to change "Hello Kitty's" outfits.

A more educational one: Let's Build also free

Ines-SLP

SLP Pocket Pairs App

My kids really enjoy this app as much as I do! They are able to listen to their recordings of their speech sounds. They enjoy hearing themselves and are learning to identify their own errors. I love how it keeps data and graphs the last 5 sessions. The graphs are great to e-mail to teachers or print and send home so their parents can visually see their child's progress. The kids like to see their progress as well.

Homemade Key Guard

If you are using the iPad with an app that has several choices for the child to choose from, this can be a challenge for the child who has motor issues. I went to workshop yesterday and they suggested taking very thick cardboard (like from an old political yard sign for example) and cutting it to make a key guard for the iPad. You can customize your key guard to fit the number of choices that are available for that task- 4, 6, etc. I saw this used with the app "My Talk Tools". The screen was split into 6 interactive pictures...

It was used to include a student in circle time with the top left being the student's picture. When she touched it, it said "My name is ______". The top right had a weather symbol. When she pushed that it said "It is sunny". And so on. The key guard made this all possible. From a VI perspective, I think the key guard also created a visual border that helped to separate the choices too.

Whiteboard Apps to use in Speech-Language Therapy

Since I am not always in my therapy room with access to a white board, I have found the following apps useful- Educreations, Kid Paint and Glow Coloring. I use them to write on the iPad, whether making a graphic organizer or setting up a color template for the Expanding Expression Tool. All three apps allow you to save your work as a photo so you can use it another time.

PlayHome Lite

Fellow SLP Kristen Brown told me about the free app  My Play Home Lite.  I found that it is a great app for eliciting the present progressive tense in preschool and kindergarten students since the actions they control in the play house occur in real time.  It features 5  family members so it is easy to elicit lots of correct subject pronouns too.  The free app only has the kitchen and living room.  You can get more rooms in the full version of My PlayHome, but the 2 rooms in this version offer plenty of choices to fill a therapy session.

Magnification Device

There is a free app called "Over 40". It acts as a magnifier and the magnification can be adjusted from 1x to 10x. Not for distance, only for near! Love the name!

Spelling

A1 Spelling App

Spelling Free: Enter your own spelling test and record your voice for students to follow

Spelling Bug

Reading

MeeGenius: Collect free books every few months

Monster Town: Simple stories with comprehension questions, vocabulary and simple sentence structure activities.

Articulation apps

Articulation! : This is my favorite app so far. It allows you to use words, sentences, loaded sentences and loaded reading passages followed by simple comprehension questions for practice.

ArtikPix

Pocket Pairs

Interactive Books

I have found several interactive books where the student can read the story or it will read the story to them. Also when you click on the objects in the picture they pictures with do different things.

1. Grimms Red Riding Hood - Interactive Pop up Book

2.The 3 Little Pigs (Lite) by Coleco

3. The Shoemaker (TabTale Books)

4. The Princess and the Pea (TabTale Books)

5.Alice in Wonderland (TabTale Books)

6.The Wizard of Oz (TabTale Books)

7.The Selfish Giant (TabTale Books)

8. Toy Story - Disney Digital Books

IPAD Social Skills

I have been using my IPADs with lots of my nonverbal or somewhat verbal MD kids.  TouchChat really seems to be making a big impact because of the language system and its opportunities for growth.  This has saved me some time so that I don't have to make as many communication boards for them since they are using the core vocabulary on their IPAD.  I have also been using the IPAD for my kindergarten social skill intervention in the classrooms.  Each week we cover a topic (keeping your hands to yourself, listening to the teacher), watch a video, and then I tape the kids practicing the skill or not practicing the skill outside of the classroom.  It is a great learning tool and the kids give feedback on how they did.  They really enjoy watching themselves and I think it is good for them to see what they are doing and break down what they can improve on next time.
Blake

Video Modeling in APE; YOGAtta Read This

We are starting a Yoga unit in APE that I am pretty excited about. I have downloaded a couple Yoga apps and have already begun using them in class with the students. The apps are free and somewhat basic, but the invaluable part of them is the picture modeling that come with them. I can takes pictures of myself in various Yoga Positions and use them as well with the students but the nice thing about the app is that eventually they will be able to search the app for poses they would like to attempt. I am in the process of creating videos of myself getting into the positions which will come in handy for students who need to see step by step what to do.

Endless Possibilities for iPads in the Classroom

I'm trying to find time each week to update the blog and add information that will help everyone make the most out of their iPads in the classroom.  This week I found a  great link - 75 Interesting Ways to Use an iPad in the Classroom.  Check it out....

Below are five more links I think you will find informative:

1.  Top 100 Learning Tools for 2011
2.  100+ iPad APPS Perfect for High School
3.  100 iPad APPS Perfect for Middle School
4.  65+ iPad APPS Perfect for Elementary School
5.  Khan Academy - educational videos (like having a second teacher in the classroom - one that can explain the quadratic formula.  Not an APP, but you can use your iPad to watch the video clips).

TouchChat

A second-grade student who is apraxic and extremely unintelligible transferred into my school.  He had received speech therapy since preschool and it seemed time to explore using an alternative communication device to help him express himself.  I introduced the TouchChat app  while working with him in the resource room.  He immediately loved working with it and within a few sessions he was writing simple sentences although it was very labor-intensive for him.  One day when I came to see him, he had just finished his spelling test and his substitute teacher for the day told me that while he could spell all the words correctly as a list he had memorized, he could not spell them on dictation and did not really know what they meant.  I used the keyboard feature on TouchChat and had the student type in one of his spelling words and then have the i-Pad speak the word for him.  His eyes lit up and he quickly typed in another of his spelling words.  I wish that I could tell you that this was the break-through moment like Helen Keller at the water pump, but unfortunately he transferred from my school after that session so I'm not certain of the impact.   I do think that this app had a lot of potential for him.

NASA

NASA has a very cool free app for those that love space or for a science lesson. You can learn about the planets and watch videos. Although my student with Autism isn't back this year, I searched for this app for him. He loved learning about space!!!

Patterns

I found an easy pattern game. It is called PatternGame...original...right?? Is has a beginner and advanced game. Working with the Numbers World curriculum in my the resource room, this app goes great with the patterns unit.

Target sounds in stories

So, I now have become sucked into Pinterest, which is where I got the link to www.communicationconnects.com. It has free stories for target speech sounds. I bookmarked the site on my iPad. Then found the story for R (my student's target) and took a picture of the story on the iPad (press the on/off button and Menu button simultaneously). Next I opened up the app Educreations, which is a white board that you can write on and records voice as well. I "chose the picture from my library" containing the story. Now while the student reads the story, I can record him/her AND use the color pen feature in Educreation to mark any sound errors made. It sounds complicated but took all of 30 seconds to set up!

artic pix

I have used artic pics with a preschooler and he loved recording his voice!

How Stuff Works

How Stuff Works- just discovered it this afternoon. Free for iPad. Put out by Discovery Channel. Tons of educational videos, funny surveys, popular topics. Great resource for all content areas and just general topics of conversation. I would suggest close supervision on this one as some of the topics were geared towards older students.

incentive App

I found an app called "fast traffic". It is an intersection with cars crossing from all four legs. The idea is to make sure that the cars cross without colliding. I have used the app as an incentive after a long lesson. The students get a "bird's eye view" of the intersection and have to make cars stop, speed up, slow down, etc. It is a game that is educational in the context of orientation and mobility. It does a nice job of simulating what would happen if an intersection had no control (stop signs, lights, yields, etc.). Check it out!

New Look for the Ipad Blog Site

I've been working to hone my blogging skills, and have finally learned how to add multiple pages.  Over the next few weeks I will continue to develop content under the tabs along the top with Apps organized by a specific service or academic content area.  My goal is to provide lists of Apps under each tab, both free and fee based that the district will purchase, so please keep blogging about your favorite Apps!!!

 If you're interested in helping with the reorganization, please send me an email!

Deborah

Apps for reading Classroom

There are many features and apps that we use in our reading classroom. Ms. McNabb and I use Dragon dictation for our kids that have hearing issues. We tape the directions and they appear on the screen for the students to read. We have some kids that hear only bits and pieces of directions. so, this gives them another way to receive directions.

We also use the Merriam-Webster app to look up unknown words. The free word games such as Word to Word  deals with word relationships and helps students understand the different word relationships: synonyms, antonyms, attributes, etc.

Overall, the kids like the fact that they can research something from their desk as a group. Each class completed a research project and took turns using the I-Pad to search the net for info.

Scott