Web Sites and Ipad Apps for Children with a Visual Impairment

Web Sites and iPad Apps for Children with a Visual Impairment

Pre school iPad Apps

Babies 1HD Simple moving shapes with funny noises

Baby Vision Simple black and white still patterns changed by touching the screen. Good for visual stimulation

Baby Screen Moving patterns in choice of 2 or 3 bold colours. Touch screen for a new pattern

Infant visual stimulation Auto flash – classical music accompanies changing screens of patterns and line drawings in red and black on white background.

Art of Glow Move a finger across the screen and the lights follow.

Plasma Globe The plasma globe sparks and makes a buzzing sound when fingers tap or move across the screen.

Hot lights Cascades of changing, moving colours appear when fingers tap or move across the screen.

Fireworks Watch mini explosions of light or tap the screen to control when and where they appear.

Light box Fizzing exploding stars appear when the screen is touched

Bubbles Create blue bubbles on a black screen then touch and pop them again

Drum Kit Tap the drums and cymbals to play the drum kit

Little Bear sees. Tap-n-See Lite Little Bear sees. Tap-n-See Zoo Moving image with funny sound reward when tracked and touched. Different colour backgrounds, good for children with CVI.

Fish Fingers Water with fish swimming around superimposed on whatever the ipad camera is seeing. The image can be photographed.

Pocket pond Relaxing bird song and fish swimming slowly by. Touch the pond to hear a splash and ripple the water to watch the fish swim away.

Alphabet by Pi’ikea Interactive letters and sounds

Five Sharks Swimming Catchy song about sharks, with counting up, counting along a number line and counting in sets activities

Itsy Bitsy Interactive Itsy Bitsy Spider song – touch the spider to make the song continue, or touch other animals to make them react. Includes simple counting.

Tea Party Poem featuring insects, with reading, counting, matching, painting and jigsaw puzzle activities.

Multisensory activities

The following apps provide a range of multi-sensory experiences and help with developing fine motor skills, making and communicating choices and ICT skills.

Bloom: create music (colour, movement, sound) Bubbles Magic: make and pop bubbles (colour, sound, movement) Uzu: make/watch moving patterns on the screen (colour, movement) SoundTouch: Touch the objects to see high quality photos + sounds Balls: Like windchimes - paint balls fall under gravity, rebounding off the walls and each other. Pixelswarm: similar to Uzu (colour/movement) Ballonimals: blow up balloons which turn into animals, then pop them

Interactive experiences

Dophins: swimming with dolphins, watch and listen to them My Horse: care for Beauty by feeding, grooming, exercising her.

For early literacy and numeracy skills

Pocketphonics: letter sounds and formation (follows Letters and Sounds programme) Popmaths: addition/subtraction/multiplication/division (lots of different levels) Toddle Shapes: Identifying basic shapes with related games

Creative activities

Good for developing ICTskills-tap and drag/tilt&shake tablet, etc Jelly Doodle/ Cookie Doodle: make a jelly/cookie in a mould (fun activity making choices) ClickySticky: make a picture (drag and drop pictures onto a variety of backgrounds) PotteryHD: create and decorate pots and sell them at auction to buy more tools! Doodle Buddy: drawing program (wide range of tools to use) Garageband: play, record or listen to a range of instruments (good for all levels from beginners making sounds to advanced compositions.

Choosing, sorting, matching activities

Dress up baby: choose hair style and clothes for a girl Families 1 and 2: sort the objects into categories Things That Go Together: matching activity e.g. pillow and bed, monkey and banana Elmo's Monster Maker: Sesame Street characters, choose a monster (not scary) then decide what eyes, nose and hat to give it -then watch the characters play and dance

Interactive Stories

Nighty Night: turn off the lights to help the animals go to sleep Peppa Pig Stars: find the animated features as listen to story Elmer's Day: a follow up to the original Elmer story Day of the Diesels: a Thomas the Tank engine story

Thinking skills

Puzzlejuice: Tetris meets boggle, make the shapes fit together then make words from the letters Wordsearch Star: a word search app with several levels of difficulty Paper Toss: get the paper into the bin, adjusting your throw depending on the direction and strength of the fan blowing.

Other iPad tips

Search the app store under categories such as education/games/music or visual impairment. ViA Lists great/useful Apps for VI children and adults. There are some great video magnifiers here, text to speech and text to enlargement Apps.

Download favourite stories and songs using iTunes Other useful Apps and websites www.nbcs.org.uk The National Blind Children's Society. Providers of large print books. School can approach as well as yourselves. Great organisation, also provide days and weeks away for VI children and their families. www.rnib.org.uk Lots of useful imformation from an events calendar, what groups are local to you, free downloadable software, how to make your IPad accessible, advice on music and music based services, education and lots, lots more. www.load2learn.org.uk Free resources for school and home. Curriculum based material that has been uploaded by education specialists in various formats. www.whitestick.co.uk

Lists all useful links for Visually impaired adults and young adults. Includes social groups, national and local resources. www.rlsb.org.uk The Royal London Society for the Blind. Includes helpline for young people and parents, parent and baby groups, forum for teenagers plus lots more resources for London and surrounding areas. www.victa.org.uk Visually Impaired Children Taking Action. Runs youth events, family weekends, grants plus support and advice for all family members. Children iPad apps. www.multi-sensory-room.co.uk/ipad-ideas Hirstwood Training web site has some useful short videos– scroll down the page to watch ‘Visual Stimulation Apps’ and ‘iPads For Communication’ http://www.specialparentconnections.com/ipad-apps.html American website set up by the parents of a child who has special needs, listing apps which they find helpful. www.healthybooks.org For books about disabilities. http://www.wonderbaby.org/ipad-apps#started American website with iPad apps suitable for children with visual impairment, sorted by category (e.g. cause-and-effect) www.multi-sensory-room.co.uk a website developed by Flo Longhorn, a leading expert in the field of multisensory activities) http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/games The Cbeebies web site has a variety of games

Understanding Visual Impairment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVQvqmze5SU&feature=related. Short youtube clip illustrating common types of visual impairment http://vinesimspecs.com/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=2

www.viscotland.org website that includes information many different eye conditions written specifically about children with the eye condition or diagnosis

www.BCUK.org.uk Blind Children UK. Providers of large print books. School can approach as well as you. Great organisation, also provide days and weeks away for VI children and their families. www.rnib.org.uk Lots of useful information from an events calendar, what groups are local to you, free downloadable software, how to make your IPad accessible, advice on music and music based services, education and lots, lots more. www.load2learn.org.uk Free resources for school and home. Curriculum based material that has been uploaded by education specialists in various formats. www.whitestick.co.uk Lists all useful links for visually impaired adults. Includes social groups, national and local resources. www.rlsb.org.uk The Royal London Society for the Blind. Includes helpline for young people and parents, parent and baby groups, forum for teenagers plus lots more resources for London and surrounding areas.

www.victa.org.uk Visually Impaired Children Taking Action. Runs youth events, family weekends, grants plus support and advice for all family members. Children iPad apps. http://www.multi-sensory-room.co.uk/ipad-ideas Hirstwood Training web site has some useful short videos– scroll down the page to watch ‘Visual Stimulation Apps’ and ‘iPads For Communication’ http://www.specialparentconnections.com/ipad-apps.html American website set up by the parents of a child who has special needs, listing apps which they find helpful. http://www.wonderbaby.org/ipad-apps#started American website with iPad apps suitable for children with visual impairment, sorted by category (e.g. cause-and-effect) www.multi-sensory-room.co.uk a website developed by Flo Longhorn, a leading expert in the field of multisensory activities) http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbeebies/games The Cbeebies web site has a variety of games

Understanding Visual Impairment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVQvqmze5SU&feature=related. Short youtube clip illustrating common types of visual impairment http://vinesimspecs.com/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=2 www.viscotland.org website that includes information many different eye conditions written specifically about children with the eye condition or diagnosis

ViA Apple app