Column: The invaluable iPad
Brad Kane
As a father of four autistic children – ranging in ages from 3 to 8 – I can tell you the iPad has helped my children learn in ways I never imagined.
After my oldest son and daughter were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder in 2010, we received a DynaVox from our insurance company for our daughter. Those touch-screen devices were large and clunky. The kids didn’t like them, my wife and I had no idea how to program them, and the therapists didn’t use them. When the insurance one for my son, we didn’t even take it out of the box.
At the time, my eldest, Maggie, was only interested in gross motor play. She never engaged in fine motor or imaginative play – things that would show she was developing as a typical child.
That all changed with the iPad, which debuted that year.
After a few times of using the iPad with her therapists, Maggie was playing with the apps and games on the iPad, showing precision finger usage to move icons around and complete complex tasks. I saw her using cognitive abilities she had never before displayed. When my mother first saw Maggie using such adept skills with the iPad, she gifted her one. We bought a second one shortly thereafter for my son to use, as it was helping him develop the same skills.
The problem with iPads is they are expensive, fragile machines and often need to be repaired. Luckily, we came across a grant program from the Greater New England MS Society, which would eventually buy the more portable and durable iPad Mini for each of my four children. The MS Society even bought us the Proloquo2Go app, a $200 program that helps speechless children with enunciation, word recognition and sentence structure. That app was particularly helpful in helping my oldest son, Desmond, learn to talk.
Because the iPads are communication tools, my wife and I let our children use the devices without restriction. Sometimes I wish they would use them more for complex games and less to watch YouTube Kids; yet, it is entirely worth it. The iPads require a level of intelligence and interaction my kids had previously not displayed, so even if I have to listen to a dozen variations on the song “Let it Go” from the “Frozen” movie for several hours a day, I wouldn’t trade them in for anything.
Brad Kane is the editor of the Worcester Business Journal.
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