Saying single words

A straightforward phone/tablet based app which supports practice of single word picture naming.

Photographic picture prompts are provided one at a time for naming.  Users can also access cues for the initial written letter of the word, the full written letter and/ore the full spoken word.  

500 + stimuli items are provided.

Picture stimuli are presented in random order for naming.  Choice of items cannot be customised. Once app is restarted, the users restarts where they left off last time.

Target pictures are not categorised semantically but instead across three levels of complexity: simple, moderate and complex.  Target complexity is based on concreteness and imagability as determined through the developer's clinical experience. Target images have not been normed.

The app does not provide feedback regarding the accuracy of user's production.

App interface is intuitive and uncluttered.

N.B. The price of the android and iOS apps differ.

Available in English, Spanish, Chinese (Mandarin), Hindi, Portuguese (Brazilian), Filipino.

60 tasks with a functional bias to work on:

• Auditory comprehension (sounds/words/paragraphs/rhyming/auditory instructions)
• Speech (word repetition, picture naming, reading aloud)
• Semantics (written & spoken)
• Spelling (picture naming, copying, anagrams, auditory naming)
• Reading (picture-word matching, reading comprehension, written lexical decision making)
• Attention
• Visual processing
• Time telling
• Map reading
• Cognitive function
• Problem solving
• Planning
• Reading & understanding numbers

There are 2 versions of the therapy app - a user version & a clinician version

In the clinician version, the clinician can remotely edit exercise sets and access results

Supplier: Constant

Comprises a naming test and 3 treatment activities: describe, guess & repeat. There are over 500 stimulus items from categories such as personal, out & about, food & drink, objects

Test: the user is asked to name a picture aloud (there is no option for them to record their spoken attempt). If they struggle, they can request 4 written/spoken options to pick from. The user then judges whether they said the word correctly or not by clicking on a tick/cross

Describe: the user is encouraged to describe a picture using semantic feature analysis prompts (there is no option for them to record their spoken attempt). They are not required to judge whether their attempts were correct or not

Guess: the user is encouraged to name an item from a series of semantic descriptions (there is no option for them to record their spoken attempt). They are then prompted to judge whether their attempt was correct or not

Repeat: A picture is provided and a spoken voice repeats the word 3 times. The user is encouraged to tap out the word and verbally repeat it (there is no option for them to record their spoken attempt). They are not required to make a judgement about whether their attempt was correct

Results are stored in-app and can also be emailed 

NB The app uses Apple voices which are quite robotic, however enhanced US voices can be used if they've been downloaded to the user's ipad.  Users need to have good self-monitoring skills to know whether their utterance was correct

Free demo app for Advanced Language Therapy

Try out exercises for Advanced Comprehension Therapy, Advanced Naming Therapy, Advanced Reading Therapy & Advanced Writing Therapy apps (search each app separately for more detailed information)

1 trial is provided for each section of each app to enable you to inform purchase decisions for the apps which can be purchased separately or as a bundle in Advanced Language Therapy

Supplier: Tactus

4 bundle app containing:

Advanced Comprehension Therapy, Advanced Naming Therapy, Advanced Reading Therapy & Advanced Writing Therapy. We recommend searching each app separately for detailed information on each app however below is a brief summary of each:

Advanced Comprehension Therapy:

Written and auditory comprehension exercises, & sentence building exercises

3 modes: Identify (picture matching), Build (sentence building) & Follow (follow directions). Each set of exercises has 12-16 levels

Advanced Naming Therapy:

4 sets of sentence and conversation level exercises: Using verbs to make sentences; Comparing similar items; Category association naming; Generating conversations

Advanced Reading Therapy:

3 levels of paragraph level reading exercises with functional materials (cards, texts, stories)

Advanced Writing Therapy: Matching letters to sounds; Spelling words to dictation; Typing to dictation; Writing sentences & paragraphs

Free trial: yes, free trial available through Advanced Language Therapy Lite app

Supplier: Tactus

App designed for creating therapy exercises

Create 'boards' of vocab to practise and incorporate these into spelling games (anagrams, missing letters, word search, cross words) or semantic exercises (odd one out, sorting exercises) or sequencing exercises.  Set up easy familiarisation activities for the user to familiarise themselves with the vocab items

The user can also record their speaking attempts

Suggested photos and voice recordings are provided but you can choose your own if you prefer

Work on answering questions with help

Questions on current affairs, updated weekly

Work on asking questions and social phrases

Work on people’s names with video and spelling practice

Spelling with sounds

Letter spelling

Rhyme judgement

Reading tasks

Matching tasks

Sentence processing (e.g reversible sentence ordering)

Written & spoken sentence building

Semantic associations

Tasks for working on verbs in a sentence context

Conversation starters

Articulation: 5000+ videos of target words and phrases, including breakdown into individual syllables & phonemes

Features a communication props drawer with maps, drawing board, numbers, time 

Multiple ways to create hierarchies (e.g. according to word length, sound, frequency, number of phonemes)

Video tutorials are provided to demonstrate how the app works & each exercise has its own tutorial to demonstrate how to complete the exercises

Can create multiple therapy sessions and can share sessions over internet

Error handling: Wrong answers are removed; the response is read aloud for the user to judge;  contextual information is given

Prompts/cues: Closure cues; spoken word

Record results: Results are shown after the session with % of items completed correctly. Can request additional details about accuracy, speed and help requested. Results can also be emailed to the clinician.

Option to break up sentence level questions into chunks to support reading and listening

Comments:  

• Can choose option for items to remain on the screen until the user moves onto the next exercise (i.e. no automatic scrolling onto the next item).  This is useful when used in therapy to discuss the user’s response
• Advanced settings for SLT to designate exercise features for each exercise set
• Remote management/allocation of exercises and results

Free version, monthly subscription option, 1 & 3 year subscription options

Type of exercises & brief description:

Photos of nouns are presented for confrontation, verbal naming.  There are 20 items in each exercise set and a total of 10 exercise sets which must be purchased individually

Speech recognition software is used to assess whether the spoken attempt was correct

Prompts/cues:

If the first attempt isn’t recognised, an initial, written letter is provided. If the second attempt isn’t recognised, the word is spoken and written and the user moves to the next item automatically

Record results:

Results are shown at the end of the session. In order to receive results, the professional license must be purchased

Comments:

•  It is difficult to identify what some of the photographs are of
• The items are always presented in the same order
• Not all regional accents or dysarthric speech are recognised. 

Exercises for working on short-term memory, working memory, attention and processing.  There is an added function of adding in background noise

Exercises have 2-3 levels of difficulty with 240 exercises in total

·       Recall of visual scenes: 2-6 questions about what the scene depicted. The user must provide a verbal response & decide whether or not it was correct

·       Recall of visual objects: the user must provide a verbal response about the 5 objects seen or the items missing & decide whether or not their attempt was correct

·       Visual/auditory recall of written/spoken words & sentences: read or listen to words/sentences and select from written selection or verbalise the items & decide whether or not it was correct

·       Recall of personal information: verbalise answers to spoken questions or repeat lengthy sentences back & decide whether or not it was correct

·       Recall of recent information: very lengthy auditory information is presented for the user to then verbally respond to questions relating to the information

If using independently, the user must monitor whether their spoken attempts were correct. There is no facility to record own spoken attempts.  There are only a few exercises where the answers are selected from written options

Error handling: none

Prompts/cues: none

Record results: Results are recorded by exercise or by date within the app and can be emailed

Comments:  The results recorded are reliant on the user self monitoring and knowing whether they named the item correctly or not. There is no facility for recording speech attempts and the app itself does not determine level of accuracy. This app would therefore not be appropriate for independent use by someone with poor self monitoring