Free App Friday - Fingerfun and Toca Hair Salon Me

There are two free apps today (11/14/2014) that are worth taking a look to add to your pediatric therapy tool kit.  The first one is Toca Hair Salon Me.  Personally, I love any Toca Boca app but this one is super cute.  Kids can add their own pictures and style the hair.  The step by step actions work well in a therapy session as a motivator - if the child completes an activity they can add to the hair style.  You can download it for free today at https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/toca-hair-salon-me/id730873197

 



The next free app today (11/14/2014) is Fingerfun HD which is only available on the iPad.  Kids have to press all the circles on the screen at on time to reveal the picture under the circles.  It is a little tricky when many circles are on the screen so excellent motor planning and finger isolation skill practice.  The nice thing about this app is that the progression is based on how well the child complete each puzzle.  So if it is too difficult or takes too long to complete, the number of buttons decreased at the next picture.  It is available in several different languages as well.  You can download Fingerfun at https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/fingerfun-hd-multilingual/id586215504

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FREE Interactive Alphabet App

Sometimes a new app comes along that I have to recommend.  Interactive Alphabet is one of those apps for sure and it happens to be FREE right now (8/6/14).  This app offers so much in terms of differentiated instruction.  I know there are letter tracing apps out there but this one offers just a little something different.  For example, Interactive Alphabet includes more customization than most letter formation apps, letter sounds as you practice tracing and keyboarding practice!

1.  Choices - Choose from baby where it is read to you, explore, sing, type, trace and customize.

2.  Letter Tracing - fun light up letters that also speaks the letter sound as you trace.

3.  Typing - type words or customize your own words as in the picture at the top of this post.  You can type in any name or word, add your own photos and it will be saved automatically into the word list in alphabetical order.  You can record your voice speaking the word out loud as well.

In my opinion, this is a must add for a pediatric occupational therapist and it is FREE for now.  Check it out at Interactive Alphabet - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/interactive-alphabet/id383967580?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

One more thing - works on iPhone and iPad.

 

 

 

 

Your Opinions on the Effects of Tablet Use on the Overall Development of Young Children

We asked and 264 of you responded on what effects you think tablets and smartphones have on the overall development of young children.  Here are the highlights:

• 61% of the respondents were pediatric OTs.


• 53% of all respondents think that tablet/smartphone use delays social development in 0-5 year old children.


• 36% of all respondents think that tablet/smartphone use delays speech development in 0-5 year old children (although 34% responded no and 30% responded not sure).


• 56% of all respondents think that tablet/smartphone use delays fine motor development in 0-5 year olds.


• 69% of all respondents think that tablet/smartphone use delays gross motor development in 0-5 year olds.


• 46% of all respondents that that tablet/smartphone use creates behavioral problems in 0-5 year olds.

To view the complete results visit http://www.yourtherapysource.com/surveytableteffects.html

Please respond to the current survey on using social media for professional reasons.

Would love to hear your thoughts about these results...

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Free App Friday - Some Fun Apps

There are a few good apps that are free today, 2/28/14.  Here they are:



1.  Toca Boca Doctor:   https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/toca-doctor/id424209938?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D4 - This is a great app for young children.  It challenges visual perceptual skills, visual motor skills and eye hand coordination.  It works well as a reward - complete a certain number  of tasks and the child is rewarded with a mini game that only lasts less than one minute.



2.  Creating Character in Kids: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id700942891?mt=8.  I just tested this app out on the ipad and give it a big thumbs up to use as a token economy system for therapy sessions or suggest to parents.  It comes preloaded with many behavioral expectations but it has the ability to create your own goals, with your own rewards or consequences.   It may work as a great motivator for certain children to accomplish their goals.  I love all the ideas for parents to offer as rewards ie - extra hour with parents undivided attention, pick the dinner or dessert, have a chore free day, etc.  The list of consequences are also preloaded with some good ideas ie do a chore for a sibling, no electronics, write an apology letter, etc.  You can add more than one child to track progress.  

 

3.  Tiny Firefighters: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id632012899?mt=8.  For those little ones who love firefighters and police this is a cute visual perceptual app.  You could ask the child to find certain objects.  When they do and touch on the object there is some nice animation.  Again, this may be a nice reward type app or with adult guidance a visual discrimination app.



 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Free Friday Apps!!!!!

Handwriting App Review - Writing Wizard

Social media from Pediastaff informed me that Writing Wizard was free for the iPad.  Of course, I quickly downloaded it so I could test it out.  It is now $2.99 but well worth the price.  After testing it out, this app has a lot of promise.  

Starting off you can choose what font you would like to practice - Zaner Bloser, D'Nealian or Handwriting Without Tears.  You can change various settings - set game time limit, sound, etc.  

You can choose to do capital or lowercase letters in any order you would like.  There is also an option for numbers and words.  Once you choose the letter, it models the correct formation.  You can change the settings for the modeling including the speed and what is even said while it demonstrates.  You can record your voice to the exact verbal cues you would like the student to follow.  

As the student traces the letter, there are fun patterns.  Once the letter is completed you can play with the fun patterns or objects.

For example, after the letter M was traced, you can hold the iPad and tilt it in different directions to make the dots move all over the screen based on how you tilt the iPad.  This is an entertaining way to sneak in some bilateral coordination.  

A nice bonus is the data collection.  It will keep track of the user and email reports regarding details such as the letter, size, difficulty and other features.  It logs each letter and practice session for the user.  The feature I really appreciated was the tracing report.  It shows through picture exactly how the student traced the letter.  This would make a great visual to show to teachers, students and parents to indicated progress over time.  See picture below.

All in all I give this app a big thumbs up!!!  Always do find it ironic though, that many say handwriting does not need to be taught due to the electronic age, but yet developers continue to create and update apps to teach handwriting.  Kind of an oxymoron, but hey for some kids the iPad adds that motivation to practice. 

Tracking Data App

Thanks to the OTwithApps blog I heard about the TrackandShare app. This app is really amazing for tracking data over time. I had been playing around with the lite version (free) and quickly upgraded to Pro since the lite limits how many entries you can input.

This app is wonderful to track patterns or progress over time. If you want to start with the regular app settings it would be wonderful to track behavior for students.  It comes all set to go to track happiness, stress, weather, etc.

As a PT I am not usually involved for tracking behavior but it is very easy to use and customizable for any goals. I started out tracking time on treadmill. You can enter in minutes and seconds how long a child completed on the treadmill. All you have to do is write the time and hit the stamp button. Then you can view a graph of progress over a day, week or month.

If you just want to track one student you put various measurements in different categories. If you want to track different students you can create different categories naming them for each student. This would make a great app to determine if a student's sensory diet was effective.  Basically it can keep track of any intervention. 

Now let say you want a paper record of all the data you have collected. You can share it via email. It is not graphed but in table format.

I give this app a super thumbs up for tracking progress. The pro version is only $1.99.