Technology: Apps (Parents/Family Members)

Endeavor 3 helps give the structure of a simple, yet powerful schedule for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. It gives reminders throughout the day, making the person more independent.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

This app has self-directed learning sessions for 40 important skills necessary for living independently and accessing the community based on proven content. Anyone who needs support learning and maintaining skills necessary for daily living, learning context appropriate social skills and skills necessary for accessing the community can benefit from the simplicity of Everyday Skills.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

This app provides self-directed learning sessions for 27 important safety skills topics based on proven content. The topics include home safety and personal safety information.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

A tool for parents, therapists and educators to help teach pre-writing skills to children in order to build a strong foundation for beginning printers. This app was created by an Occupational Therapist with 25 years’ experience.

Award winning augmentative communication aid that uses visual scenes for context based communication and interactive learning aids. Personalize scenes with audio messages, video clips, symbols, and links to other scenes.
A new feature allows you to create and print custom communication books.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

A customizable app that provides a framework on the iPad to create interactive visual scene displays and social stories. Scene Speak allows an image to be edited with active “hotspots”. A hotspot is an area of the screen that can “sound areas” that can be selected and used as a means of communication.

Scene Speak is a communication tool for anyone wanting to enhance receptive language or visual memory.

Fun game that teaches about physics.

WayFinder 3 is an accessible Garmin or TomTom, and it helps people with intellectual disabilities to travel safely, whether by bus or on foot. The traveler simply taps on the picture of their desired destination and WayFinder 3 takes over from there.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

This app developer that has created several life skills apps to be used by professionals and families. These apps help developmentally disabled people function independently in various ways of life.

Their apps include:
WayFinder 3
Endeavor
Visual Impact 3
Everyday Skills
Living Safely

and are available for Android, iPad and smartphone applications.

This website aggregates apps, shows price reductions and gives descriptions of apps while listing them by category.

A comprehensive list of apps that are being used with and by people diagnosed with autism, Down syndrome and other special needs. The apps are divided into categories, and have consumer reviews.

Autism Core Skills is an educational platform built by autism experts, teaching academic, social, and communication skills that are interactive and engaging for verbal or nonverbal learners.

This is a yearly subscription program. If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

Smart phone app that allows you to collect behavioral assessment data.

All parents need help staying organized, but parents of children with autism may have even greater needs. With Birdhouse, parents and caregivers can keep track of behavior, medical information, schedules, nutrition, and more. You can track your child’s diet and sleep cycles, too. The app also lets you track changes in their medication and notes from their therapy sessions as well.

A personal learning tool that offers free access to tens of thousands of flashcards and carefully curated lessons across dozens of languages.

Free membership website that is a program of Easter Seals Greater Houston. It provides information about and access to educational and therapeutic tools for mobile devices. The site provides caregivers and professionals with the best resources for choosing apps to enhance everyday life for people with disabilities.The site was created by parents and therapists who began using the iPad with children who have special needs.

Speech language pathologists and occupational therapists created an app review system for the site that focuses on skills rather than age, diagnosis or developmental level to help improve outcomes for a person with a disability.

This app creates daily schedules and waiting picture boards. It will help children complete daily routines (morning, day, & night), assist in understanding & controling their feelings and improve their waiting skills (taking turns and not interrupting). Appropriate both for use at home and at school, and it offers many ways to customize.

It includes an image library with 180 common images, each accompanied with audio. You can also add and record your own images.

Theraputic hand exercises that helps improve fine motor skills and handwriting readiness for children and adults.

This free app provides a convenient place to electronically store photos and vital information about your children so that it’s all at hand if you need it. You can show the pictures and provide physical identifiers like height and weight to security or police officers on the spot. Using a special tab on the app, you can also quickly and easily e-mail the information to authorities with just a few clicks.

The app includes tips on keeping children safe, as well as specific guidance on what to do in the first 48 crucial hours after a child goes missing. Links to additional resources for families and victims are also provided.

An app that teaches counting to children by using their fingers.

Designed for caregivers to offer visual support to individuals with communication needs, developmental delays, autism or for those who benefit from a structured environment.

A reading game app, offering the chance to learning letters and words.

This app is designed to provide a fun and engaging way to practice listening, following directions, colors, spatial concepts, auditory memory and auditory processing. It is appropriate for a toddler or preschooler, or any young child who need practice following directions.

Software and smartphone app that offers a text reader, in addition to the ability to check grammar, definitions of words, and translations. There is also a “personal trainer” which can help teach proper grammar.

Portions of this software is available by paying a fee, other parts are free.

Advocacy tool for parents of students with disabilities working collaboratively with a school team to improve their child’s education.

Assistive technology for what to wear in conjunction with the weather outside.

This app’s design is based on peer-reviewed scientific research. It’s funded by the U.S. Department of Education. iPrompts is used by special educators and therapists in the treatment of children with autism. It allows users to design visually based daily schedules for their children. The app includes a timer and voice and video prompts.

A photo social story for individuals who need help and support in understanding going to the beach.

App that helps kids learn about the importance of dental hygene.

Based on the Language Builder Picture Noun Cards, Sets 1 & 2, which are used by BCBA’s, SLP’s Teachers and Parents to teach basic language skills to children with autism or related developmental challenges.

A free AAC talker app for Android which supports communication in all areas of life and therefore providing a voice to everyone.
Suitable for:
• autism symptoms and Asperger syndrome
• aphasia
• speech apraxia
• articulation/phonological disorder
• Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)
• Motor Neuron Disease (MND)
• Cerebral palsy
• Down syndrome

This app teaches eye-hand coordination by tapping dots on the screen to the rhythm of a song.

Increase math skills by learning special tricks to increase speed and accuracy. Teaches mental math calculation through multi-level lessons.

This is an app for more advanced math skills, not for young children.

This app helps elementary-aged children with numbers, telling time, counting money, and basic arithmetic.

Perform calming finger puzzles to the beat of music.

A series of free apps that help teach kids situational behaviors and emotions through video modeling.

A library of more than 14,000 lessons and the tools and media to customize them or create your own from scratch. The lessons can be tailored to any grade level, assigned to any student, and played on iPad or Android tablets, laptop or desktop computers.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

Money Up is an app for children learning to handle money, kids, teens and adults with developmental disabilities as well as for therapists who work with stroke survivors, those in the early stages of Alzheimer’s, and more.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

A website/mobile app that can teach children the rewards of earning money for chores and jobs determined by parents. The site can link to bank savings accounts for savings, and amazon.com for spending, once the child has earned the appropriate number of points.

This app teaches kids aged 3-12 necessary social skills and everyday life skills by simplifying the tasks into steps with corresponding pictures and checklists.

Purchasing the initial app is free. There is a minimal fee to purchase additional life skills.

The Special Education’s Newspaper for beginning readers and special needs students. Every US school week, students can connect with the world through concise symbol-supported news articles, puzzles, games and recipes.

The newspaper is designed for teaching and expanding literacy skills, from basic awareness of symbols and print to reading fluently with comprehension.

Drawing and coloring app that includes special effects and animated stickers.

The Picture Communication Symbols (PCS) Bingo App provides a fun, mobile way to practice vocabulary, articulation, language and rhyming. It includes 4 free Bingo boards.

Free app that lets you create stories and make them into movies. You can customize with your own images.

App that teaches students place and object association by putting things away in different rooms. Can also customize scenes with uploaded pictures.

Their mission is to transform emergency communication and are dedicated to harnessing cutting edge technology to change the outcomes of millions of emergencies across the United States and globally through specialized apps and related technology. The platform can be used by anyone, including people with disabilities, and is available for use internationally.

ONE-TOUCH-911
Sends your precise location and key info to 9-1-1 with one touch, lets you text 9-1-1, and notifies emergency contacts automatically.

FAMILY CONNECT
Lets you see real-time location of loved ones, check in with them, and even call 9-1-1 on their behalf.

INTERNATIONAL
One touch emergency calling in 250+ countries and jurisdictions worldwide, keeping you safe wherever you travel.

STUDENT CONNECT
Empower students and staff to proactively check in when they have arrived at their destination and request loved ones to check in if they are concerned they need help or are in an unexpected place.

Teaches children how to read sight words based on their grade level.

Flash-card style app that allows you to create your own library of cards.

Sesame Street and Autism: See Amazing in All Children is a nationwide initiative aimed at communities with children ages 2 to 5. Developed with input from parents, people who serve the autism community, and people with autism, See Amazing in All Children offers families ways to overcome common challenges and simplify everyday activities.

An educational app that helps teach words through sight, sound and touch.

Free app that creates custom communication boards.

Long-running computer game and curriculum created into a smartphone app that teaches letters and their sounds.

Learn-to-Read app through a variety of engaging activities, movies and songs. Based on the popular website and curriculum, the program was started in 2002 and has taught many children to read.

A mindfulness, meditation and compassion-building tool that is simple and easy to use. Check in to how you are thinking and feeling, and select emotions that guide you to recommended meditations.

This app can create custom social stories for a student on the go. The stories can be locked, so they can’t be changed. The user can add their own photos and videos.

Excellent app that can be helpful when making visual schedules, lists or written schedules.

TouchChat is a full-featured communication solution for individuals who have difficulty using their natural voice. TouchChat is designed for individuals with Autism, Down Syndrome, ALS, apraxia, stroke, or other conditions that affect a person’s ability to use natural speech.

It is an easy-to-use, Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) app for the iPad. It has a simple design and is intuitive, allowing people who are non-verbal to have conversations right away.

Allows for easy construction of picture and video schedules for Apple devices.

A free app that creates step-by-step instructions for daily tasks through images and videos.

Social skills app has 56 illustrated picture flash cards (plus audio of each card text). Select the cards you want child/student to see, and have them ask and answer questions about all aspects of home life.

WH Questions is a multi-player game designed specifically to help kids answer and ask WH questions. Designed by a certified speech-language pathologist, WH Questions features over 400 WH opportunities to answer and ask real-world questions.

Customization allows the adult to tailor WH Questions for the child’s specific needs.

If you believe this app would be effective for your family (or student) but find it is too costly, there are opportunities available for financial assistance, including your local Board of Developmental Disabilities. Contact our Helpdesk for more information.

A therapeutic tool designed to work on answering questions presented both auditorily and in writing. Five levels of increasing difficulty include answering questions about objects, color, shape, categories, verbs, features and comparisons. This app is designed in collaboration with a Speech Language Pathologist.