Help!!

$499.00

Hey Tek-Ninjas! I'm looking for ideas. If you are an Occupational Therapist, or educator, you may have noticed recently that the makers of the Fusion Writer, WriterLearning, has gone out of business. The good folks at Alpha-Smart of course have been long gone.

So, if you are looking for a dedicated word-processor for your student who requires key-boarding, but is too distractible by a full blown computer, you are going to be in a jam. The only one I can find, the Freewrite, retails for $499, which is easily the cost of two Chromebook.

So, I'm wondering if anyone has suggestions for ready made products? Or perhaps experience locking down a word processing function on a Chromebook, Linux, or Pi unit?

Thanks, and Hajimé

Typing Support

Lessons

Hey Tek-Ninjas! Let's talk about keyboarding a bit.

I typically don't jump into keyboarding instruction until sometime in the 3rd or 4th grades. Occasionally, given compelling reasons, I may start earlier. The biggest predictor to keyboarding success is consistent exposure.  I will generally recommend 10-15 minute skill drill 3-5 days per week, with the idea that learning to keyboard is a process.

To support this process, I want to tell you about a free online typing site. KidzType is an amazing site filled with great instruction and games for reinforcement. 

KidzType touts the benefits of touch typing, and that is the focus of the instruction.  However, even for folks who are entrenched in a hunt & peck method, or single handed typing (secondary to a physical issue) the site can help users increase both speed and accuracy. 

Games

Remember, if you are keyboarding on an iPad, most folks benefit from an external keyboard. Also, because the site is Flash based, iPad users will need a Flash enabled browser such as Photon. 

Hajime!

Favorite Apps of a Dozen School Based OTs: Visual Motor/Visual Perceptual, pt. 3

This is part three of Favorite Apps of a Dozen School Based OTs. You can read part one here, and part two here.

Visual Motor:

Dexteria: $3.99, Refer to my blog article. Dexteria is a set of therapeutic hand exercises (not games) to improve fine motor skills and handwriting readiness in children and adults. Dexteria’s unique hand and finger activities take full advantage of the multi-touch interface to help build strength, control, and dexterity.

Just Find It: $0.99. You are presented two images almost identical but at most 4 different spots. If you find all the differences in each stage before the countdown timer runs out, the remained time will be added to your score. Be careful! Wrong spot means time penalty! But you will be relieved to know that some unused item is left!

Bugs & Buttons

Bugs & Buttons: $2.99. Bugs and Buttons 2 seamlessly incorporates numbers, letters, patterns, shapes and so much more into 18 exciting games and activities. Use a rubber band to bounce falling buttons and acorns away from a parade of marching metallic green beetles. Fine-tune your motor skills in a high-speed race on a remote-controlled car gaining speed boosts, avoiding obstacles, and running competitors off the road. Practice your listening skills in a fun game of “Simon Says” with a funky, button covered puppet! Learn to play popular tunes or record songs of your own with a working keyboard. Guess the shape as a water bug creates geometric ripples on a gorgeous, three dimensional, babbling brook.

Visual Perceptual:

Injini

Shape Builder: $2.99. Shape Builder educates & entertains your little one with easy to move shapes that snap into place on top of silhouette puzzles. Each puzzle has 5 to 10 pieces & after positioning all of the pieces, the real image is revealed along with a professional voice recording of the word spoken by a licensed speech therapist that specializes in early child development. Shape Builder encourages cognitive thinking & fine motor skills plus exposes young minds to new music instruments, animals, produce, objects & the alphabet in a fun & engaging format with LOTS of sound effects!

ShapePuzzle: Free, Shape Puzzle is a jigsaw puzzle especially designed for little children. After you complete a picture, a cute turtle will pops out and tell you the name of the object you just assembled. What's more, each object belongs to a certain scene and after you finish all the items, a vivid scene appears!

Injini: $29.99, 10 feature games with 90 puzzles, over 100 beautiful illustrations, 8 farm-themed mini-games and more. Injini is ideally suited for early intervention - it brings fun to learning and at the same time practices children’s fine motor and language skills, understanding of cause and effect, spatial awareness, memory and visual processing.


Kids Can Match - Animals...: Free, An interactive, adaptive and fun memory game for children of all ages. This app contains an amazing, one of a kind, collection of over 70 authentic animal images and sounds.

Happy Therapy!

Favorite Apps of a Dozen School Based OTs: Story Telling and Typing (pt. 2)

Hey Tek-Ninjas, this is part two of Favorite Apps of a Dozen School Based OTs. You can read part one here.

Story Telling:

Pictello

Pictello: $19.99, Everyone loves to tell fun, engaging, and imaginative stories. Go ahead and make a social story or visual schedule for a child with autism or a slide show of holiday pictures for your friends - Pictello makes it a breeze to create and share! Whether you use the included natural-sounding Text to Speech voices, or record your own voice, Pictello is the perfect tool for visual storytelling.

Toontastic: Free, Refer to my blog article. Toontastic is a creative storytelling app that enables kids to draw, animate, and share their own cartoons with friends and family around the world.

Comic Life

Comic Life: $4.99, Refer to my blog article. Comic Life isn't just for creating comics.

You can retell a family vacation or capture a special day using your photos. It's simple to do: just drag photos onto the page and add your text in speech balloons and captions.

Voice Dictation with Siri: Standard on iPhone 4s or later, iPad 3rd gen or later, iPad mini, and iPod Touch (5th gen). Siri seems to work better with my students then some of the most expensive voice dictation software. Good blog article here. 

Typing:

Pictello: $19.99, Everyone loves to tell fun, engaging, and imaginative stories. Go ahead and make a social story or visual schedule for a child with autism or a slide show of holiday pictures for your friends - Pictello makes it a breeze to create and share! Whether you use the included natural-sounding Text to Speech voices, or record your own voice, Pictello is the perfect tool for visual storytelling.

Abilipad: $19.99. Refer to my blog article. Abilipad is a customizable keyboard and adaptive notepad, with word prediction and text-to-speech.

Snaptype: Free, Refer to my blog article. SnapType helps students keep up with their peers in class even when their penmanship holds them back. Students can easily complete school worksheets with the help of an iPad or iPhone.

Turbo Type

Typing JR: $ 0.99. The fish are swimming towards a shark. You'll have to save the fish by typing in the word, before they get eaten by the shark. Fun and hectic game for the kids, where they learn how to typ.

Turbo Type: $1.99. Race to the finish and turbocharge your iPhone typing skills!  Battle the ruthless CPU opponent in a no-holds-barred typing race across expansive retro-styled scenery and environments, attempting to keep up with the randomly generated sentences and stay ahead of the enemy racer by avoiding deadly mistakes.

Be on the look out for part three of this blog soon.

Happy Therapy!

Favorite Apps of a Dozen School Based OTs: Letters/Writing/Drawing Practice (pt. 1)

Hey Tek-Ninjas, back in June of 2012 I wrote a blog titled “Favorite Occupational Therapy Apps”. Several years later, it remains one of my most consistently visited blog pages.

Many of the apps are still some of my favorite, however I am not working directly as an OT anymore. Instead, I am serving my district solely as an Assistive Technology Professional.

Recently a colleague sent an email out to the Occupational Therapists in our district, asking what were their 3 most often utilized iPad apps.

I plan to share the responses in a four part blog.

This is not necessarily my endorsement, but rather the endorsements of several very skilled and experienced Occupational Therapists working directly in a public school setting. 

Letter/Writing/Drawing Practice: 

iWriteWords

Letter School: $4.99, Play to learn how to write all letters of the alphabet: abc - xyz and the numbers 1-10 with LetterSchool. Kids practice essential skills as they play four exciting games per letter or number.

Handwriting Without Tears: $6.99, Make handwriting practice fun! With our Wet-Dry-Try Suite App, children learn and practice correct formation habits for writing capitals, numbers, and lowercase letters. The app simulates our Slate Chalkboard and Blackboard with Double Lines and helps children learn handwriting skills in the easiest, most efficient way. The result truly is handwriting without tears!

Doodle Buddy: Free, Doodle Buddy Gold is the most fun you can have with your finger! Finger paint with your favorite colors and drop in playful stamps. Connect with a friend to draw together over the Internet.

WriteMyName

Write My Name: $3.99, Write My Name is a fun way for children to practice writing letters, words, names and phrases. Write My Name supports children ages 4 through 6 to learn how to write their name, trace uppercase and lowercase letters, and write over 100 familiar sight/Dolch words. Write My Name meets some of the basic reading and writing Common Core State Standards for kindergarten such as the introduction and mastery of print and word recognition concepts.

Snaptype: Free, Refer to my blog article. SnapType helps students keep up with their peers in class even when their penmanship holds them back. Students can easily complete school worksheets with the help of an iPad or iPhone.

Ready to print: $9.99, Ready to Print progresses through the pre-writing skills in a specific order, so that children can master the visual-motor, visual-perceptual, and fine motor skills necessary for correct printing patterns. It is designed to teach children the correct patterns for printing, and to avoid bad habits that are difficult to change as the child gets older.  

iWriteWords: $2.99, Refer to my blog article. iWriteWords teaches your child handwriting while playing a fun and entertaining game.

Look for the second installment soon.

Happy Therapy!

Just Let Them Dictate...

Recently I was in conversation with a fellow OT and colleague (Molly) whom I've worked with since I came to this district. She is a veteran therapist, a wealth of knowledge, willing to share, and inquisitive ( I work with some really terrific people).

We were discussing the amazing progress in voice dictation software. We also discussed some of the inherent challenges of voice dictation, which users often don't recognize. Switching from brain-->pen/paper to brain-->voice output is not as simple as it might seem.

She made some really interesting observations, and so, seeing a gold mine to tap, I asked her to guest blog.

Below you will find Molly's thoughts on helping to train/teach students how to use voice dictation successfully.

The “go to” solution for children with handwriting problems used to be “just let them keyboard.” This solution was rarely a quick fix – 

keyboarding is a skill that needs to be learned and if a child has fine motor problems to begin with, keyboarding is also going to present challenges.  

Now, a frequent “go to” solution is using a speech to text program.  Thankfully, these programs have improved immensely in recent years and can be effective in helping a reluctant writer get words onto paper.  

However, what are the necessary component skills to make a child a competent dictator of text?  How can a therapist or teacher help a student use this software successfully?  

I am on the beginning of this learning curve, but have learned a few things that might be helpful for others.  

1.     Reading pre-written sentences is a good way to start using speech to text.  It gets the child used to the “mechanics” of the program (like turning the microphone on/off), and gives them a degree of instant success.
2.      The child will need to learn to say punctuation.  Reading from a written copy with big red periods/question marks helps teach this skill.
3.     As with writing, using some type of graphic organizer is crucial to organize and sequence information before dictating.  Using a traditional graphic organizer with key words does not work well.  The child sees the key word(s) and says that without thinking about putting it into a sentence.  What works better is “sentence starters” combined with the key word(s) so the child knows where to begin.
4.     Rehearsing with the graphic organizer can help achieve increased success.  It might also lead you to add additional words or cues to the graphic organizer if you see “stumbling” points.
5.     Proof-reading is vital.  Dictation software is not perfect and the child must learn to read their dictated text carefully to catch mistakes.  (You might even use a text to speech program to read it back to them.)
  

Dictation software has come a long way from the days when you would end up swearing at the computer because it was mangling your words.  It can now be an invaluable tool for children who are resistant to writing for any number of reasons.  You might even find yourself beginning to use it.

I hope this provides you with some useful tools in working with your students. Thanks for the guest blog Molly!

Happy Therapy!

A Note-Taking Conundrum

Researchers and educators have suggested note-taking-by-hand produces greater efficacy for learning than note-taking-by-keyboard. Supporting this notion, Pam Mueller and Daniel Oppenheimer*, posit that handwriting may create deeper processing of the content.

Mueller and Oppenheimer conducted three studies, and concluded that subjects who took notes via keyboard were able to generate more written product.

Students who took notes keyboarding were not as capable as their handwriting peers in remembering factual details, demonstrating conceptual comprehension, or synthesizing the material.  

According to Cindi May**, who writes for Scientific American:

"What drives this paradoxical finding?  Mueller and Oppenheimer postulate that taking notes by hand requires different types of cognitive processing than taking notes on a laptop, and these different processes have consequences for learning.  Writing by hand is slower and more cumbersome than typing, and students cannot possibly write down every word in a lecture.  Instead, they listen, digest, and summarize so that they can succinctly capture the essence of the information.  Thus, taking notes by hand forces the brain to engage in some heavy “mental lifting,” and these efforts foster comprehension and retention.  By contrast, when typing students can easily produce a written record of the lecture without processing its meaning, as faster typing speeds allow students to transcribe a lecture word for word without devoting much thought to the content."

For those of us working with students with special needs, who are doubly challenged by handwriting this becomes even more complicated. If the student cannot read his/her writing, what than? If the student's rate of handwriting is half the speed of his/her peers, what than? There are the obvious benefits of being able to quickly reorganize and edit word-processed work.

So, food for thought. No answers here, but when we make recommendations to switch a student to keyboarding, and possibly jettison handwriting, we need to consider the whole impact. Perhaps, we switch students, but ask the team to continue addressing handwriting. It may be that the student benefits from keyboarding notes, and then taking a short-hand set of notes at home.

I'd be curious to hear reader's thoughts on this.

Happy Therapy!


*Pam A., M., & Daniel M., O. (2014, January 16). The Pen is Mightier Than the Keyboard: Advantages of Longhand Over Laptop Note Taking. Retrieved September 12, 2014, from http://pss.sagepub.com/content/25/6/1159

**May, C. (2014, June 3). A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop. Retrieved September 12, 2014.

The elusive keyboarding unicorn...

Raise your hand if you've worked with/know a student with well documented fine motor issues and prescribed/asked for a key-boarding program for that student with all the home-row bells and whistles?

I have.

For years I've followed this protocol.

Sometimes I still will. But, if someone struggles with fine motor activities, does it make sense to ask this person to isolate individual fingers, utilizing all 10 in unison, with timing, precision, and speed, key-boarding from the home-row? Might that itself be a tremendous challenge? A very interesting, short, and understandable study by Niles-Campbell, Tam, Mays, and Skidmore in the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists journal dared utter this phrase:

"Ten finger touch-typing is a gold standard that may not produce gold"

 ZOIKS!!! Heresy!

The authors of this study suggest that for many students developing competence and functionality with a hunt and peck method may be a best outcome. They also go on to state that the "[engagement] in meaningful keyboarding activities is the best way to learn keyboarding", which then suggests NOT keyboarding programs.

Whoa! Meaningful activities?! Darned Occupational Therapists! Perhaps laboring over a keyboarding program for lengthy periods everyday is not ideal.

I still ask students to participate for 10 minutes 3-5 days a week if they do not have a sense of key-location. It should be an iterative process. Starting with a goal for home-row keys, but carefully monitoring and changing those expectations as necessary. If a student can type with a hunt and peck method faster or with dramatically increased legibility over their hand-writing, this is functional, and may be the end goal.

In addition to a keyboarding program, students will best acquire skills engaged in keyboarding activities that have meaning such as tackling homework, chatting online with a friend, writing emails or stories. The more interactive and non-repetitive the task, the more "fun" it's likely to be.

I'd love to hear other's thoughts on this topic.

Happy Therapy!

Word Prediction with Google

Lingapps apps creates apps for iDevices, Android platforms, and Google Docs. AppWriter provides word prediction and text-to-speech.  For your pc or macbook, the app is sold as a subscription for $12 annually, which is a pittance compared to most of the competitors. This review is based on AppWriter on my iMac.

AppWriter offers high quality synthetic voices for twelve different languages.  All menus and buttons are read aloud. The user can determine which reading strategies benefit them, such as read from cursor position or read words as you type them.  AppWriter offers context based word suggestions AppWriter comes with one free language. Additional language are offered through in-app purchases. Additional languages retail for $7.99.

AppWriter Cloud is offered free for a month trial.

I was especially excited about this app as my school district talks about moving to a Google platform.   I don't know if this will happen, and if it does, will that include our special needs population, but, apps like this and ChromeVox make it seem as though we could make it work.

AppWriter worked seamlessly. Word prediction was solid, and the voice quality was terrific. This is an app that I definitly recommend you take a look at.



Happy therapy!

Key-Guards

A handful of folks have asked about getting a key-guard for iPads.

Lasered Pics is an online company that makes a wide array of quality key-guards for a very reasonable price.  They make 1/8 inch clear acrylic key-guards to fit with a variety of cases including my favorite, Big Grips.

Their key-guard retails for $23.95, and adheres with four suction cups.  If you are needing a specific key-guard, perhaps for a custom Abilipad keyboard, they will make custom guards.

The Lasered Pics key-guard I've been using is well made, no sharp edges, burrs, or irregular cuts.  It appears to be designed to last.  The suction cups are removable, so they can be replaced when they finally wear out.

Definitely a quality product for a reasonable price.

Happy Therapy!

Touchfire: Typing on your iPad!

I don't know about the rest of you, but I essentially don't "type" with my iPad, but rather I "text". The keyboard looks like a keyboard, but it doesn't feel like a keyboard. I hold the iPad like a giant iPhone and type with my thumbs.  This is because there is no tactile information, and so typing by touch feels impossible.  I don't necessarily want a big keyboard to bring with my iPad, as that defeats the whole point of the elegant tablet. So ultimately, if I have a significant amount of writing to do, I wait until I'm at my desktop.

Approximately a year ago a colleague brought to my attention an interesting Kickstarter site for an unusual keyboard. The  product was called the Touchfire, and it was to be a silicon overlay for your iPad keyboard, essentially providing you with tactile feedback as you type.  We bandied the idea back and forth, thinking it interesting, but then moved on to problems that were facing us.

Almost a year later, reading a tech blog, I ran into the Touchfire again. Only now, it's a product that is available for consumers. When I realized it was available, I was intrigued again, and went to their website to learn what I could about it.  The Touchfire retails for $49.95, and ships within 24 hours. You can purchase the keypad straight from the website.  What you receive is the silicon keypad, a carry-case, and magnets to attach to your smart-cover if your using one. The keypad is as thin as two credit cards and weighs just 3/8 of an ounce.

The Touchfire seems simple, and on one hand it is... after all, it's just a clear piece of silicon right? Well, yes and no. The high-grade silcon is very durable. It wipes clean easily. The keypad is compatible with all four generations of iPad. In addition it is compatible with Canadian French, Catalan, Cherokee, Chinese Simple, and Traditional Pinyin, Chinese Traditional Cangie, Croation, Czech, Dutch, English, Estonian, German (QWERTY), Hawaiian, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Romaji, Korean, Latvain, Lithuanian, Malay, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Swiss French, Serbian Latin, Tibetan, Turkish, and Vietnamese keyboards.


So, what is it like?

The Touchfire keypad is like typing on my computer, but a little gentler. 

Turns out the silicon is nicer to strike (I am a rather aggressive typist) than my normal keyboard.  The keypad is a tad more sensitive then my typical one, and there was a small learning curve to ease up a bit, but after just a few minutes I was typing at my normal ferocious rate! Folding the keypad out of the way is easy to navigate the full iPad screen, but I found it even easier just to take the keypad off and put it back on when I needed it. I also use a Smart-Cover and found the keypad rolled up nicely in it.

I think the Touchfire is a great add-on that will make the iPad a viable writing tool. It's light portability will appeal to folks who really want to keep the iPad lean and streamlined.

I've written this blog using the Touchfire and have been pleased with it's performance. My intention is to keep using the Touchfire for awhile and I hope to report back in several months regarding it's resilience under heavy usage.

Assuming that it is as durable as I hope, the Touchfire can definitely contribute to our students with special needs utilizing an iPad to access their curriculum. 

Happy Keyboarding!