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Your weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs.
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Gina Baldwin:
Hi, this is Gina Baldwin. I’m a licensed speech pathologist and founder of APP2Speak. And this is your assistant technology update.
Wendy Strickland:
Hi, this is Wendy Strickland. I’m a speech language pathologist and AAC specialist at Easterseals Crossroads, and this is your assistant technology update.
Wendy Strickland:
(music)
Josh Anderson:
Hello and welcome to your Assistive Technology Update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson, with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. Welcome to episode 491 of Assistive Technology Update. It’s scheduled to be released on October 23rd, 2020. As you may have heard from our opening today, we’re excited to have two different guests on today to close out our AAC Awareness Month for October. First, we have Gina Baldwin who is the founder of APP2Speak to talk about anything and everything that it can offer. Then we have our very own Wendy Strickland on to talk about AAC assessments and training and why they are important. Don’t forget, we’re always looking for your input on guests on topics or on other things that you might like to see on the show.
Josh Anderson:
You can reach us by email at tech@eastersealscrossroads.org, you can call our listener line at (317) 721-7124, or shoot us a line on Twitter @indataproject. Also, don’t forget to join us next month as we celebrate Black Friday and our annual holiday gift show. This year, I’m lucky enough to have Brian Norton, Nicole Prietto, and our new CEO and president here at Easterseals Crossroads, Mr. David Dreith on to talk about some of the cool technology that’s out there that might just make some really great gifts. We always have a whole lot of fun. And of course, this year it’ll be done remotely via Zoom, but hopefully we’ll have a lot of fun and we can’t wait for you to join us. We have a very busy show today. So without further ado, let’s go ahead and get on with the show.
Josh Anderson:
Are you looking for more podcasts to listen to? Do you have questions about assistive technology? Are you really busy and only have a minute to listen to podcast? Well, guess what? You’re in luck because we have a few other podcasts that you should really check out. The first one is Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions or ATFAQ hosted by Brian Norton and featuring myself, Belva Smith, and then a bunch of other guests. What we do is we sit around and take questions about assistive technology, either about accommodations about different things that are out there or about different ways to use things. We get those questions from Twitter, online, on the phone and in many other ways. We’re also trying to build a little bit of a community as sometimes, believe it or not, we don’t have all the answers. So we reach out to you to answer some of those questions and help us along.
Josh Anderson:
You can check that out anywhere that you get your podcast and wherever you find this podcast. We also have Accessibility Minute. So Accessibility Minute is hosted by Laura Metcalf. And if you’ve never heard her voice, it is smooth as silk and you should really listen to that podcast. She’s going to give you just a one minute blurb about some different kinds of assistive technology, kind of wet your whistle a little bit and just let you know some of the new things that are out there so that you can go out and find out a little bit more about them yourself. So again, check out our other shows, Assistive Technology Frequently Asked Questions and Accessibility Minute available wherever you get your podcasts.
Josh Anderson:
Folks, as we continue our celebration of AAC Awareness Month this October, on today’s show, we’re lucky enough to have Gina Baldwin, the founder of APP2Speak on to talk all about it. Gina, welcome to the show.
Gina Baldwin:
Thank you, Josh. I appreciate being here.
Josh Anderson:
Yeah, we appreciate having you on and I can’t wait to talk about the technology. But before we start talking about that, could you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself and your background?
Gina Baldwin:
Yes. I’ve been a licensed speech pathologist for nearly half of my life, and I continue to have the passion for my career helping those who have difficulty with their speech and communication.
Josh Anderson:
And I know that’s kind of what led you into APP2Speak. So tell us what is APP2Speak.
Gina Baldwin:
APP2Speak is a photo-based software application helping people who have difficulty with their speech and communication. It’s available on the Apple iTunes and the Google Play stores.
Josh Anderson:
Gina, tell me, why did you develop APP2Speak?
Gina Baldwin:
So Josh, a few years ago, I recognized the gap when working with my clients who had speech impairments. In particular, there was Dorothy. She had suffered a stroke and was not able to communicate clearly to make her wants and needs known. She used a picture word board, and that’s how she communicated to her caregivers and to her family. Well, one day when I went into her room, she was on her iPad using Skype, connecting with her daughter who lived in Bulgaria. I saw Dorothy hold up this picture word in communication board, and she was pointing to different things. I just saw the frustration on her daughter’s face. The board didn’t speak. So that’s when I had the idea of researching to see if there were any photo based, a hundred percent photo based, easy to use apps out there. I didn’t find quite what I was looking for. So that’s when I decided that I would design, create a photo based software application, which I named APP2Speak.
Josh Anderson:
And how exactly does APP2Speak work?
Gina Baldwin:
A simple touch to the photo and it speaks. There are four preset phot pages that indicate an immediate want or need. So if you can imagine a picture of, “eat,” someone eating and you touch that photo and it says, “I’m hungry.”
Josh Anderson:
Nice. So it’s very easy. That learning curve kind of isn’t there as much. As you said, it’s hard sometimes for some folks to process, “What is that stick figure doing? What exactly is it?” They kind of need… So whom would this be for? Is there just a certain population or is there special considerations for folks that APP2Speak might be for?
Gina Baldwin:
I created APP2Speak with the adults in mind. The preset pages, which consists of 80 preset photos indicating a want or need are more geared to the adult population because I have photos of hearing aids, glasses, wheelchairs, and walkers. But I’m coming to find out that there are younger users using APP2Speak because of the real photos. It’s just easier for them to comprehend, to see a picture of someone eating or a picture of a dog and them to be able to identify the dog wants to go out or, “I want a dog,” but it’s also being used by those who may have an impairment with their speech and communication such as a stroke, Parkinson’s disease, ALS, brain injury and autism.
Josh Anderson:
I know you talked about everything that’s already available on there. Can an individual make adjustments and modifications in order to really kind of meet their specific needs?
Gina Baldwin:
Great question. There are a total of three different features within APP2Speak. I referred to the first one as the preset photos, 80 photos indicating or want or need. The second feature are the endless custom pages, and that’s where the individual can easily integrate their own photo from their full library or take a photo within APP2Speak and create a conversation of that photo within APP2Speak. They can also record a personalized voice or use the prerecorded voice that comes within out to speak. The third feature is the text to speech. That is where someone would type in their immediate wants or needs or type in a conversation, and then speak it. They can also say those common words and phrases, so they’re not typing all the time, that they’re stored in the text to speech page and they can easily grab it and speak.
Josh Anderson:
So it’s very customizable for the situation and the individual. That’s very helpful.
Gina Baldwin:
Yes. It is.
Josh Anderson:
Gina, I think you’ve kind of talked about this a little bit, but just to kind of nail it down. Why do you think APP2Speak is important?
Gina Baldwin:
APP2Speak is important because it provides a means of communication to a variety of individuals who have difficulty. It is easy to use, the pictures are easily recognizable, and when we speak about the custom, the endless custom pages, they can personalize those pages. They can take pictures of their family, of things in their house or out in the community, or even take APP2Speak out in the community on their iPhone or Android phone and order a meal, go to a restaurant or to a store and to be able to easily communicate and be independent.
Josh Anderson:
Gina, know what are some of the other features of APP2peak?
Gina Baldwin:
That’s a great question. So on the preset pages, you are able to turn the photos on and off. So for example, if it’s a younger user that doesn’t have dentures and they don’t want to have the photo of dentures on there, they’re able to turn that photo off. It’s just a simple slide of the button and touching the photos you want off. In addition, you’re able to move the photos. So if there are important photos that you want on page one, you have the ability to move and put them on page one and arrange them what works best for you. So that’s the preset pages features. On the custom pages as I mentioned earlier, they are endless and that’s where you can integrate your own photo from the library, or take a photo within APP2Speak. In addition, you can move those pages.
Gina Baldwin:
You create the pages using categories, or say you have a community page, a home page, a school page or award page, and you can move those pages in any order that you choose. In addition for the endless custom pages, you can Bluetooth share your pages. So for example, Josh, if you were using APP2Speak on your iPad and you wanted to use your iPhone in the community, you would Bluetooth your iPad to your iPhone and Bluetooth and share your custom pages over to your iPhone so you don’t have to reinvent the wheel. On the text to speech pages, we have a visual display button. What that does is that provides an enhancement for those individuals who may have difficulty with their vision. They also can increase the font size on the text to speech page as well.
Josh Anderson:
Nice. That definitely helps out. Gina, you also have a trial version, is that correct? And a consult? Can you tell us a little bit more about those?
Gina Baldwin:
Yes. So Josh, we provide a free consultation. We do it over Zoom or Skype, or just a simple phone. In addition, we provide a virtual demonstration where we take the individuals through the whole APP2Speak and go over all three features. Then we also set up a 14 day free trial for those who are interested. We fully support through that 14 day trial, if they have any questions, they’re free to call us, send us an email. They can call, can chat with us. We’re here to help.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. You talked a little bit, kind of a story to start us off today, but could you tell me a story of someone who has been helped by APP2Speak?
Gina Baldwin:
Yes, it was a young woman that I met a couple of years ago. I’m a strong supporter of the St. Louis chapter of ALS and I was at a support walk. I had an exhibit booth with have to speak. She was recently diagnosed with bulbar ALS, which that is a subset of ALS where physically, she was fine, but it was her speech and her swallowing that was affected by this disease. I met her and she was using a wipe off board and writing. She had a high tech technology, but she explained to me that it was too cumbersome. It was big. It was like a computer.
Gina Baldwin:
So she could do email and internet, but she was looking for something just to throw in her purse and take with her out into the community to be able to communicate. So she tried APP2Speak and fell in love with it, and we sat her up and she set up endless customization. She did the text to speech and one of her famous words was always saying, she loved to take her speech with her and throw it in her purse and pull it out when she needed it when she was on the go.
Josh Anderson:
That does make a huge difference. I like how it’s available on the phones as well. There’s a lot of tablet based ones, but really have it on the phone, like you said, that’s a lot easier to take with you everywhere and just have in your purse and available anytime that you might need.
Gina Baldwin:
Yes.
Josh Anderson:
Gina, what are you working on now? What’s next for APP2Speak.
Gina Baldwin:
Quite a few things that we have been working on. We can’t disclose them at this point, but after the first of the year, we shouldn’t have some greater things to share to expand our reach to help many more people that are in need of AAC.
Josh Anderson:
Well, that’s awesome. Maybe we’ll have to have you back on for a little bit of an update then in order to kind of find out what some of that new stuff might be. Gina, the whole landscape of events and conferences has changed lately, but do you guys have any events coming?
Gina Baldwin:
Yes, we are attending Closing the Gap conference. It is all virtual this year and it is open to the public. It is from October the 28th through November the 11th. I would suggest anyone that would want to go attend, it is free to the public and there are many, many, many AAC vendors that have a virtual booth. So I think it would be a wealth of information. Closing the Gap is, I guess the website Closing the Gap is closingthegap.com and the public can click on their link and find the virtual conference and sign up to visit the exhibits.
Josh Anderson:
Well, excellent. We’ll put a link to that over in the show notes too, since that’s coming up here very shortly.
Gina Baldwin:
Yes. We’re looking forward to it.
Josh Anderson:
Gina, if our listeners would want to find out more, maybe schedule one of those consultations or try the free trial, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Gina Baldwin:
So our website is APP2Speak.com. Our contact page, that is where they can sign up for the free consultation demonstration and the 14 day trial, or they can simply pick up the telephone and call (314) 631-7551.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. We’ll put all that information over in our show notes. Well, Gina Baldwin, thank you so much for coming on today and telling us all about APP2Speak and how it can help, well, just a whole lot of individuals with communication.
Gina Baldwin:
Thank you, Josh. I appreciate being on your show.
Josh Anderson:
So, so far listeners, during October, which is AAC Awareness Month, we spent a lot of time talking about the technology that is available for folks who utilize AAC, but we haven’t really spent any time talking about perhaps the most important part of any kind of technology intervention: the assessment, and then the subsequent training on the devices. Well, luckily, today we have our very own Wendy Strickland on to talk all about AAC and AAC assessments. Wendy, welcome to the show.
Wendy Strickland:
Thanks for having me today.
Josh Anderson:
Well, I am really excited to talk about all this stuff because I know in AT, I always try to just talk about how the evaluations and assessments is such an important part in the training. But before we get into talking about the AAC and everything that it has to offer, can you tell our listeners a little bit about yourself?
Wendy Strickland:
Yes. I am a licensed speech therapist who happens to specialize in the area of AAC. I’ve been working at Easterseals Crossroads as an AAC specialist for 12 years this month.
Josh Anderson:
Wow. That doesn’t even seem possible. So Wendy, what made you choose to kind of specialize in AAC?
Wendy Strickland:
I started out of college as a speech therapist working in early intervention with birth to three year olds. Some of the kids I saw used picture signs or low-tech devices to communicate. Often, I’d refer them to Easterseals for full evaluations to get devices too. So having had that experience made me enjoy working with kids who are non-verbal and who would most likely need some kind of assistive technology to communicate for the rest of their lives. When I saw the Easterseals had an opening for this position 12 years ago, I applied and that’s what started me down the path of becoming an AAC specialist.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. What age group do you work with at Easterseals Crossroads?
Wendy Strickland:
I work with children and young adults, birth to 18 years old or up to 22 if they’re still in school.
Josh Anderson:
Very good. Are there certain disabilities you assist or is it kind of just anyone who needs the service?
Wendy Strickland:
I work with anybody who needs these services and who need some kind of assistive technology for communicating.
Josh Anderson:
Wendy, let’s get into really the meat of what I want to talk about today. Let’s talk about the AAC assessment. What are some of the considerations during that AAC assessment for the individual?
Wendy Strickland:
There are a lot of considerations that play a role in assessing someone for AAC; their communication needs their age, physical abilities, how much support they’re going to have from parents, caregivers, schools, and other therapists are all taken into consideration too.
Josh Anderson:
Very nice. And how does the assessment work?
Wendy Strickland:
The first step is getting a referral from a physician. The physician can either fax the referrals to us or families can contact Easterseals and we can take care of getting that referral. Once we have all the paperwork in place and appointment is scheduled, for the parent and child to come in for an in-person evaluation, and then during that evaluation, we discuss their communication needs and review options for devices that are currently available. Once the child has had a chance to try a few devices, we make sure to decide on the best one, that they do a one to three month trial, and that will give them a chance to try the device in all settings and outside of the clinic.
Josh Anderson:
Very good. So they actually kind of try before they make a decision. I can see how that could be very helpful, especially with something you’re going to be using, well, every day to communicate.
Wendy Strickland:
Yes. And in Indiana, you’re allowed one every five years. So it’s a big decision to make and you want to make sure that you try it before you’re committed to that five years with it.
Josh Anderson:
What are some of the considerations when assisting them with choosing a device?
Wendy Strickland:
During the evaluation, we look at all the options for devices. Here at Easterseals, it’s nice. I have a great assortment of devices that they can see and get their hands on. During the evaluation, we discuss the pros and cons for each and then make a decision based on what would work best for their child. Since we always do a trial, the families do get an opportunity to try the device, to take it home, to send it to school or other therapies before we get one purchase for them.
Josh Anderson:
This might be a bit of a loaded question, but what do you think is the most important part of the AAC evaluation?
Wendy Strickland:
I think getting to know the child and the family, learning what has been in the past, what has worked, what has failed, what are their expectations? Sometimes even just having the consumer tell me what they want. That’s the best is when they can come in and tell me, “This is the device that I like, and this is the way I like it,” whether it be just sharing it with me on the talker or in the way that they’re using it, then that lets me know that they’re getting what they need.
Josh Anderson:
Then moving on to training, can you explain to me how training on a AAC device works? Because you’re not just teaching them how to use a device. You’re kind of helping them form language skills. So how does that training work?
Wendy Strickland:
Right. You’re actually teaching the child where the vocabulary is on the device, but you’re also forming their language and developing their language skills as they use it. With traditional speech therapy, it’s fairly similar to AAC in developing their language skills. If you think about typical language development with the child, they start with single words. Most of the time, it’s requesting: milk, cookie, ball, book, mommy, daddy, and then they move on to two word phrases like, “want milk,” “more cookie,” “get ball,” “read book,” “up, mommy,” “play, daddy.” So this is exactly where we begin with AAC and build up sentences. Now, those phrases and those words would be age appropriate and based on whatever the needs of the child are. So it would all be individualize and not necessarily just those groups of words. Through modeling on a device while playing or interacting, we can provide the visual inputs the child needs to learn how to locate the words and the vocabulary on the device. Then over time, you start to see those words and phrases carry over to new activities that the child uses spontaneously.
Josh Anderson:
What do you think is the most important part of training an individual?
Wendy Strickland:
I think the most important part of training is understanding that everyone learns at their own pace. One child might move on to sentences in a few months and for some, that might take years or more. Some will explore the device on their own and quickly find new words and share them with you, while others will rely heavily on you modeling everything first before they use it. So the training has to be very individualized.
Josh Anderson:
I couldn’t agree more. The same thing goes true for AT, for sure. Wendy, can you tell me a story about someone that you’ve been able to work with and help out through the AAC department here at Easterseals Crossroads?
Wendy Strickland:
Yes. So I have lots of stories, but one in particular is a consumer that I work with who loves specific cartoons and YouTube videos. On his device, he has started to find words that are associated with those videos that he likes to listen to. I have not taught him directly those words associated with the videos. So it’s kind of fun to see what he’s putting with what he’s learning with what he knows. So for example, I’ll use, “notebook,” and, “chair,” to talk about Blue’s Clues because he wants to talk about the handy-dandy notebook and thinking chair. He’ll put, “guitar,” in there to talk about his Guitar Hero videos, or, “baseball,” for the [inaudible 00:23:53] videos. And again, it’s not something that we’ve targeted, but it’s something we’ve learned those words, we’ve learned where the word, “notebook,” is. He’s learned word, “chair,” and, “guitar,” and, “baseball.” He’s been able to associate those with something that he does and uses every day in his life.
Wendy Strickland:
This makes it a lot easier to understand what he wants. It really decreases the frustration that he has with communicating and trying to get to across to everyone when he wants. Once they start using the device more on their own, you also start to get to know their personality a little bit too. So on the funny side, he was working with his occupational therapist one day and he was done with therapy and he told her, “Go,” on his talker. And she told him that that wasn’t possible because they needed to finish therapy first. He went back to his talker and said, “Please, go home.” So I love it when children can start to use their words to control their environment and express their feelings. I think that is the way to open the door to so much more communication and understanding from everyone.
Josh Anderson:
No, it really is. I love kind of how you said being able to use it in different ways because I know with assistive technology, that’s always my favorite whenever I come back and somebody shows me something that they learned on their own that I didn’t teach him. I gave him the tools to kind of start and then they are already learning on their own. That’s always an amazingly great feeling.
Wendy Strickland:
Yes,.
Josh Anderson:
Wendy, really service delivery for everyone across the world was changed a lot with COVID-19, stay at home orders and stuff like that. How were you able to still provide services during these odd times?
Wendy Strickland:
Well, we are providing services via telemedicine. So over Zoom, I can meet with families to do their traditional therapy with their devices that they already have them. I’ve also been doing device trials over Zoom. The only thing that I want to meet in person for are the evaluations so that we can get the devices in your hands and see you using them one-on-one.
Josh Anderson:
Wendy, if any of our listeners would like to find out more kind of about you and the program, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Wendy Strickland:
They can go to our website at eastersealscrossroads.org.
Josh Anderson:
Wendy, thank you so much for coming on today and just kind of putting everything we’ve talked about this month in context by talking about the assessments and the training, and really thank you so much for the work you do with the folks here at ed Easterseals Crossroads.
Wendy Strickland:
Thank you, Josh.
Josh Anderson:
Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on Assistive Technology Update? If you do, call our listener line at (317) 721-7124. Shoot us a note on Twitter @indataproject, or check us out on Facebook. Are you looking for a transcript or show notes? Head on over to our website at www.eastersealstech.com. Assistive Technology Update is a proud member of the Accessibility Channel. For more shows like this, plus so much more, head over to accessibilitychannel.com. The views expressed by our guests are not necessarily that of this host or the Indata Project. This has been your Assistive Technology Update. I’m Josh Anderson with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in Indianapolis, Indiana. Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll see you net time.
