Dealing with a child with autism is not easy, as their condition makes it significantly harder for them to understand the surrounding world. Also, their level of interaction with others is significantly decreased, and often quite complicated for both parties.
Luckily, technology can step in and help children with autism express themselves and achieve a better understanding of emotions, words and other elements through graphic elements that are simple and easy to understand. Here are some of the top rated Android apps that can help your autistic child develop better.
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Top rated Android apps for children
Starfall Learn to Read
Starfall Learn to Read is a great app for learning to read with the help of colorful images and sounds. Letters, numbers, vowels and names are presented in a manner that will make it easy for the child to create mental associations and remember them.
While the app is not specifically designed for autistic children, it’s simple and colorful interface and clear explanations should make it easy for them to use it as well. The app comes with a blend of activities, games, videos, music and sounds – all designed to make learning to read as easy and as fun as possible.
AutismXpress
It’s a known fact that autistic children have trouble identifying and understanding human emotions, this being one of the aspects that makes dealing with autistic people so difficult sometimes. AutismXpress aims to change that.
The free version of the app comes with a colorful graphical representation for the basic human emotions, allowing your youngster to easily identify and express the emotions he is currently experiencing, making it easier for you to understand his feeling and know how to approach him.
JABtalk
JABtalk is designed for autistic people, and other types of non-verbal individuals, as a communication alternative. The app combines simple voice messages with easy to understand images to create an effective augmentative and alternative communication device, commonly referred to as AAC by professionals. JABtalk is so simple to use and effective that it is actually recommended by professionals.
The app allows the user to categorize words into categories for easy navigation, create simple or complex sentences and even capture picture and audio, using the device’s camera and microphone, to integrate and use with the app.
PopMath
PopMath is an app designed to make learning basic math easy for autistic children. The operations appear in balloons that move around the screen, and the child has to pair the balloon containing the equation with the balloon that contains the answer.
By using colors and moving objects, the app intends to retain the attention of the child, which is more likely to stay interested and actually solve the equations, as opposed to a classical pen and paper approach.
Duck Duck Moose Reading
Duck Duck Moose Reading is another app design to teach children how to read using sounds and colorful scenery. However, this app focuses a lot on correct pronunciations, having multiple activities and games oriented towards clearly explaining this aspect.
With Duck Duck Moose Reading, children will learn to differentiate consonants, long vowels and short vowels, and even more complex things such as the correct pronunciation of words that use the consonant-vowel-consonant pattern, which are more complicated to pronounce.
Dexteria VPP Fine Motor Skills
Despite the fact that it’s not very popular, Dexteria VPP Fine Motor Skills is a very efficient app to help children with autism develop fine motor skills.
The app has various pinch, tap and write activities that will require the children to learn how to control their fingers individually or collectively, how to develop patterns and more.
Fruit Ninja Free
While this is not technically an app specifically designed for children with autism, it is a great example of an app that can be effective in developing attention span and quick-movement coordination.
Thanks to the game’s fast nature, the player will deal with different types of actions and movements, and learn how to effectively combine them to obtain a winning technique. Also, since the game features elements that are likely to be present in the child’s life – fruits, he or she will feel comfortable playing the game.