I found these webinettes really accessible - not too long, and they run through a nice variety of apps for a variety of ages and abilities.

As far as implementation goes, I have had great experiences with the iPad touch in the classroom, as its size makes it inconspicuous and easy to use anywhere in the room. The student is able to work at their desk or in a quiet part of the room that limits distractions. The ability to plug in earphones is great for the apps that use sound effects as reinforcers. Also, the low cost makes them much easier to get your hands on and more likely that families will be able to purchase one for home use.

The student I had in mind as I viewed these is in Grade 3 but functioning at a beginning-Primary level. She has yet to be diagnosed with a label, but her main deficits are in her working memory and social skills. She does not know all her letters or numbers, can't count past 10 on most days, and has a sight word vocabulary limited to a handful of words. She spends time daily in the Learning Centre and uses an iPod Touch loaded with apps to support her IPP in the classroom.

Apps Supporting Pre-Math Skills

Alien Buddies: colour, shape, letter (upper and lower case), and number recognition. This would be a great app for her as she needs daily reinforcement in order to retain what she has learned, and it presents as very 'game-like'. This app is practically tailored to her IPP, which includes ELA and Math goals for letter and number recognition. The lack of a tracker of correct/incorrect responses means that you would have to make time to sit with the child so they could demonstrate to you their understanding of the concept being worked on.

ABA - Problem Solving - Which one does not belong? - This app looks like great practice for discrimination - the student is asked to consider 4 objects and decide which does not belong based on shape, colour, etc. It's really useful to have a progressive play feature, which means the game automatically increases in difficult, while monitoring the student's progress to ensure they are being challenged appropriately. Suggestion is to play with a partner - that interaction would be a good reinforcement of social skills (turn taking, discussing thoughts), and could be used as a chance for weaker students to review these concepts.

Apps for Social Thinking and Social Skills

Social Thinking: how we think about other people when we're interacting with them, which affects how we behave toward them, which affects how they respond to us, which affects our emotions
Social Skills: a set of skills people use to interact and communicate with each other

Social Adventures:
- This app is tailored to ages 4-9, which is perfect for my student as she will be interested by the look of it but not intimidated by the language.
- It is more expensive than many of the others, but when you consider that it gives you the ability to update the content, it seems as though it would be worth the money. Also there is a free version that restricts access to some features but appears to be quite in depth.

Social Skills Sampler: 
- video clips of social interactions 
- like already-made social skills books with video 
- tells you the steps and shows actors demonstrating the steps

                                                          
Social Express:
- a really fun-looking app that demonstrates social skills and includes different levels of ability, multiple choice quizzes, and highlights the 'Hidden Social Keys' to be watching for in social interactions.
- This would be a great app for my student as she does not currently have any apps that help her with social skills. These skills are directly tied to Health outcomes in Elementary, and could be used with any student in the class. Once the student is familiar with the program, they could be student mentors and teach a friend or the whole class how it works. They could lead the class through one of the activities on the SMARTboard. The language is quite similar to that used in Second Step, which is a program our whole school uses.

The case study was great - it was really beneficial to see how you could set a goal and then pull in sections of the different social skills apps to practice the skills in a variety of ways. While social skills do get explicitly worked on in the Elementary Health curriculum, for students who have deficits in this area, they need to be reinforced daily.


If you would like to access these and other webinettes, please click here.