iPads in Education -S14

This list is provided by the iPad Teacher Blogspot. There are approximately 100 different ELA apps and another 15 miscellaneous apps (e.g. iTranslate.) The list of apps was developed for teaching English Language Learners, however, many could also be used with students with disabilities.

This link, provided by the Spectronics Consultancy Team, provides links to 60 special education apps covering a variety of topics (reading & writing, math, early learning, cause & effect, visual supports, social stories, life skills, positive behavior support, and classroom organization). This link also includes comments on accessibility, differentiation, reporting and feedback, publishing and connectivity.

The creator of this app boasts that "The highly anticipated sequel to the #1 free education app in over 50 countries has arrived! Kids will master 1000 essential English words through hours of fun, engaging activities." Among many new features, this newer version of the original app allows you to: * Learn in an engaging way with audio flashcards and colorful graphics * Master perfect pronunciation * Earn rewards through a star system which maximizes motivation * Choose how you study with the Spin-the-Wheel widget * Learn words in categories * Retain words through comprehensive activities * Interact with fun new characters as you complete each level * Unlock challenges after completing level 20 * Track proficiency in the "Progress" section

This slide show identifies 95 different special needs apps, offering a brief summary of each app's function as well as providing its corresponding iTunes URL. The apps are designed to provide assistance to a wide range of different learners including those with autism, hearing or sight impairments, speech difficulties, and others.

This site provides a comprehensive list of apps that could help students with communication disorders.

This article from T.H.E. Journal lists the top 10 apps for special education as identified by teachers at The Children's Institute, which is a private program in New Jersey specializing in the instruction of children with Autism and related difficulties. The expertise of the teachers who composed this list is hard to ignore, and their findings are well worth your consideration, even though several of the apps are quite expensive.

Each app has a thorough description. Nice range, and some seemed suited to older students as well. Some were for idiom help, others for sentence fluency, and there was even one for speech/pronunciation improvement

Spectronics Inclusive Learning Technologies, an Australian company Each app shared has a brief summary of capabilities and links to the developers' websites. The page begins with a few tips for augmented communication app users. I use some of these apps with my son.

This site has 8 wonderful apps that may be helpful for word building, sentence building, language acquisition, and writing.

http://www.edudemic.com/top-9-fantastic-ipad-apps-esl-students/ This article discusses nine app that can be used for an EEL learner. The nine apps include Word Bingo, My English Coach, Sentence Builder, Wordbook XL, ESL Express, Intro to Letters, Kidioms and Preposition Builder. I like that it notes which level of learner the app is best suited for. The Kidioms seems like it would be a good app. I never gave much thought to having to teach idioms to a ELL student. However, they would have to be taught and are just as important as any other part of a language. http://voxxi.com/2012/08/15/esl-ipad-apps-elementary-education/ This article recommends eight apps for ELL learners: Simplex Phonics, Word Bingo, Sentence Builder, Speech Tutor, Kidioms, ESL Express: Words Frequently Confused, Rainbow Sentences and Preposition Builder. The Speech Tutor appears to be a unique app. It displays the side view and front view of person pronouncing words so that the learner can mimic the mouth movement.

This is one of the most popular iPad apps available for English language learners. It is the best app for students of elementary school who want to tackle grammar and vocabulary challenges efficiently. This amazing app features connector words that allow students to build grammatically correct sentences based on pictures and videos. Sentence Builder is designed to help elementary aged children learn how to build grammatically correct sentences. Explicit attention is paid to the connector words that make up over 80% of the English language. Sentence Builder offers a rich and fun environment for improving the grammar of all children. This app features a simple and intuitive interface to build sentences with 100 distinct pictures to build sentences around. It also has 3 levels of play and 60 encouragement animations and audio clips. Most importantly, this app has optional correct sentence audio re-enforcement and the ability to track student's progress.

This link is from Spectronics, Australia's largest supplier of special needs software and assistive technologies. They had a very large list of apps set up in table format. The table provided a description of the app, accessibility, differentiation, reporting and feedback, publishing, connectivity, and video.

This site provides a list of 24 apps that would be beneficial to English language learners. All of the apps are 4 or 5 star rated.

This website allows you to search for apps based on ratings, specific speech and language issues and/or specific pre-academic/academic skills. For example there are app suggestions for articulation, social skills, counting, reading, drawing, categorizing, and patterning. The author of the website provides the rating (1-5 stars), strengths of the app, weakness of the app and the suggested audience. 

BugBrained Phonics Awareness helps students work on blending, segmenting, and vowels. It offers feedback for students immediately. Phonemic awareness is necessary for EL students in order to demonstrate an understanding for the linguistic characteristics of English. This supports ELD standards as well as builds foundational reading skills.

This site gives a comprehensive list of free apps for students with various learning disabilities including autism, special skills, behavior, language development. and hearing impairments. The apps are separated into categories for easy access.

This site does share amazing apps. They focus on Autism disorders, hearing and visual impairments, executive functioning, reading comprehension etc.. Each app gives a brief desprition of its funtion. The one drawback is that they can be quite expensive.

List of 34 apps, some geared specifically toward student use, each list item includes app title, link to either a more detailed review or iTunes, and key info (price, storage, etc.)

Review of six apps, includes screen shots, key info, and iTunes link.

The website provides special education app suggestions in the area of reading and writing and speaking, math, early learning, cause and effect, visual supports, social stories, life skills, and positive behavior supports. The author of this website organizes the apps by alphabetical order and provides a description and lets you know if it is possible to customize the app to students needs. The author also offers video's for some of the apps in real time use.