iPad/iPhone apps: ABA Flash Cards (free)

ABA Animals Flash Cards

ABA Food Flash Cards

ABA Alphabet Flash Cards

ABA Flash Cards Food free app from iTunes
ABA Flash Cards Animals free app from iTunes
ABA Flash Cards Alphabet free app from iTunes
[It's possible that these apps are only free in April 2012]

What it is: These are three flashcard collections, each one is a separate app, from kindergarten.com. Obviously these apps are intended for young 'uns, but settings can be customized to use with adult populations. Each app has a nice collection of mostly common words (animals, foods, and a word that starts with each letter of the alphabet). The animals and foods apps contain over 100 words, and the alphabet app has, obviously, 26 words.

Screen Image 1

As you can see in screen image 1, each word is presented as a picture and text (text labels can be turned off). There is an audio for each word, which also can be turned off (I prefer to read the words if needed instead of using the included audio because the audio just sounds like it's talking to kids, which of course it is). Other customization settings allow you to choose alphabetic or random order, and you can select which of the 100+ words to show, hiding the ones you know you won't use. Or you can just skip them as you go (that's what I do). As you flip through the flash cards, you can mark cards with the green checkmark or the red cross, or you can just flip through them without marking. The "i" at the top left of each card takes you to settings, and the graph icon on the right of the "i" takes you to the Data page.

Screen Image 2

The built in statistics make this app extremely useful for Tx (see screen image 2). It shows you how many cards have been shown (flipped through), how many were marked with checks (=correct) and how many were marked with cross (=incorrect), as well as how many remained unanswered (if I didn't bother removing some cards from the deck, I just bypass them and leave unanswered). So you can easily get accuracy measure (in this example, I don't count the ones I passed over, so there were 6 total cards attempted, of which 4 were correct). Below these stats you also get an overview of which cards were correct or not ("N" in the list = incorrect, "Y"=correct, and a blank would be unanswered). And as long as you haven't closed the app, you can go over the entire deck again and re-try the incorrect cards (or just read them from the list in stats) if it suits your needs. As you can see, there's also an "email" button if you want to email yourself the stats. I haven't tried that yet, but I'm sure it's straightforward.

How we can use it in Tx: Basically these apps are collections of vocabulary words with pictures, text, audio, descriptions, and some built in customization and stats. As an aside, there's a few other options that would only come in handy if working with kiddos (like reinforcement and chimes), so if you're interested in using the apps for the intended population be aware there's still more to love. As far as my intended population, adults, go, there's a few ways I can imagine using these apps for word-finding goals: I'd remove the text label and let pts name the words from pictures, or from the descriptions (the "description" button at the bottom of each card includes text and audio), or from both. I can use almost any app for memory work: choose a few words and ask the pt to remember them whether in sequence or not. But what I've used these cards the most for is my apraxia pt who is only just starting to be able to repeat words. This pt benefits from seeing the word he is trying to say in print (he does not need the picture, but it doesn't hurt, and down the road I'll want him to generate the words without modeling or seeing the text). This pt benefits especially from practicing the same list over and over, and from being able to go back and re-try the words he couldn't produce at first attempt. So basically, I use these apps for easy access to word lists with built-in text labels and built-in stats. He is starting to be able to say the words without having them modeled, although he periodically asks me to say it first. We have started short phrases, and I generate those using these flashcards (e.g., if he can say "cupcake" I ask him to also say "sweet cupcake", and on good days I add a carrier sentence like "I like cupcakes" and "I want bacon").

Goals we can target with these apps: The main goal I've used these apps for has been apraxia-related, but I think these could obviously be used for word-finding goals, descriptions, categorization, and other language-related tasks including some reasoning (name the word from its description). And as always memory: auditory or visual presentation of a group of related words followed by recall.

Some specific examples:

1.  For memory goals, as I mention above, present a pt with 3, 4, 5, or 6 words at a time either in pictures, in both pictures and text, or by speaking them and assess % recalled. For an easier level task you can use the food or animal apps so the word lists are of related items, and for a slightly more difficult level use the alphabet app because those words aren't related in meaning.

2. For language goals you can use the alphabet flash cards where there's a word for each letter of the alphabet, you can ask the pt to come up with 1-3 additional words for each letter.

3. For word-finding goals simply show the picture (without text label) of each card and let the pt name it. If they are having trouble, read the description to them and see if that helps find the word. It's a great strategy to teach pts with word-finding issues.

4. For my own apraxia pt I use the app to repeat common words, generate common words, repeat short phrases, and repeat/generate short sentences. I love having such easy access to the stats: when we go through the word list we can stop at any point, whether it's after 10, 40 or all 108 words, and I note the % words repeated after the first pass, then we do a second pass of the words he couldn't say at first. Currently he is normally able to repeat about 60-75% of the words at first pass, and then tries again the ones he couldn't do, ending with 90% repeated. Phoneme accuracy is a different story, and that I have to assess subjectively.