Assisted Technology

Final Assignment
Student: Sarah Quinlan
App Reviewed: Socky – Autism Communication
Company and/or author: Ola Mundo
App Store: Apple

App Description
State how this app claims to
help support an individual with
special needs in the classroom,
community or home.
The Socky platform powered by Ola Mundo claims to
improve the lives of families affected by Autism and
their therapy circle. Ola Mundo develops technologies
that enables progress in social and communicative
skills using engaging activities and organized
curriculum through, Socky, a SaaS platform, and a
mobile application. Socky states that it is the first
personal assistant to bring the words out for unique
individuals that struggle with verbal communication
skills.

Age / Grade Level This particular app can be utilized by a range of ages
depending on the individual’s strengths and cognitive
development. Some children at age 5 are fully capable
of navigating technology to communicate their needs.
Others may need more time to develop these skills to
utilize this application and understand its capabilities.
Depending on maturity, it may be too juvenile for
teenage students. The caricature is adorable but most
likely not amused by young adults.

General Description and Main Features / Sections / What You Explored

In order to understand the full capacity of this application, I also had my oldest son
download it to his phone. I wanted to research both sides of Socky, the features using it
as a parent verses that as a child. The app advertises the following benefits:
 Send messages to your child in a visual and vocal multiple-choice manner
 Acts as a link from your child's social environment to develop better
communication
 Has the ability to interact with your child through animations and pre-set
questions
 Provides your child with ideas that enhance initiative to communicate with you
and your family
 Introduces your child to the world of mobile communication
I was able to compose questions for my son and attach multiple choice answers in picture
format. When he received the text, it automatically read the question aloud along with
the possible answers. The text to speech feature is only operational if your ringer is
switched to the on position. The child’s response is easy to select and the conversation
begins. If the child initiates a question or wants to compose a sentence, they have two
options available: texting using a keyboard or choosing from a variety of graphics. The
pictures are alphabetized for the child to find more easily. The sentence is read aloud and
requires confirmation before sending. “Whoosh”, say’s “Socky” when the message is
sent successfully. The “Socky” character does fun little noises, giggles, and sings when
you tap on it. This is purely for the child’s amusement. The free app does not come with
activities or games, lessons or curriculum-based programs. These special features are
only included with purchased software.

Intended Purpose / Outcomes of Your App Review Activity

From the “parent’s” profile, using Socky was comparative to texting on a phone. The
keyboard is the same size as on my phone but without the option to change it to
landscape orientation.

From the “child’s” profile, I was surprisingly disappointed. To use the keyboard, you
would require great vocabulary and spelling skills. It does not offer word predict or
autocorrect when composing a sentence. When read aloud, “Socky” will pronounce the
words phonetically thus making the sentence sound correct. However, when it is received
by the parent, they will have to decipher the message. The keyboard does not have a
larger option for typing. Any student with fine motor difficulties would struggle texting
their message. If using graphics to compose a sentence there are also many
apprehensions to consider. The pictures are not accompanied with text, and even though
they are alphabetized, the child would have to know what letter each picture started with
to find it. The pictures are not clearly represented. In other words, its content isn’t an
accurate depiction of the word. For example; the word “want” was represented by a
picture of a child staring at a balloon. I had to choose several different icons and listen to
their dictation before finding the one I needed. It would be necessary to learn the
meaning of each graphic prior to using the app in order for it to be efficient. Otherwise,
it would consume a lot of time trying to write a sentence through trial and error of
selecting pictures. Students will likely lose patience, become frustrated, and opt out of
this way to communicate.

General Points about App Review

5 = excellent, 4 = good, 3 = okay, 2 = weak, 1 = unacceptable

Instructions/Help Menu (answer each question) 3

 Are they clear and/or the process to find help is easy/automatic?

It’s easy to download the app and create your profile. They offer many personalized
options to customize your character including language, volume, pitch, and rate of
speech.

 Is there a tutorial or sample lesson?

There is no tutorial available for the communication app, but there is a demo
available on the website for the platform programs Socky offers.

Ease of Initial Use (answer each question) 4

 Easy to understand what to do; intuitive?

Yes, I found it fairly easy to learn how to use considering I’ve texted before. I think
teaching a child with ASD would be another consideration.

 Easy to navigate/exit/user friendly?

The visuals on the screen are simple and clear to help navigate through.

 Additional Comments:
It took some time to explore the app from both a parent’s and child’s perspective
and how the features differed from each other. But I suspected this because it’s free
and most products with no price tag generally don’t offer much support to navigate
through them.

Design (answer each question) 3

 Voice (text to speech) & graphics quality?

Enables personal control to modify speech to both the parent’s and child’s specific
likings.

 Attractive, appealing?
I appreciate that the layout was simple and free of clutter. It helps to keep the task
of communicating the primary focus of the app.

 Comment on the use of animation, sound or other multimedia?

I enjoyed the fun animated character for the child’s use.
  Control – can you skip or cancel some features?
There are very few features available. I think most people would want to utilize all
of them for efficiency of communication.

 Additional Comments:
I was torn at rating the design. I loved the voice features and your control to alter
those to your explicit preferences. I also thought that the “Socky” icon was creative,
cute, and funny. However, the quality of the picture communication graphics were
subpar and could benefit with modifications.

Content
Level (answer each question)

 Is it grade/age appropriate? 4
The app itself does not specify what age it is
designed for, but appropriate for children on the
Autism spectrum.

 Is it adaptable to groups, other than intended? 4

I think this app would be great for children that
struggle with reading and writing but would like
the ability to communicated digitally with friends
and family.
  Does it do what it says it does? 5
Yes. The app emphasizes that it is an
introduction to the world of mobile
communication and is intended to link a child to
their social environment.

 Graphics? 1
I was disappointed in the quality of the picture
communication system. The need for including
the text to each picture should be obvious. This
modification could support the child in
developing their language skills, reading, and
writing more effectively. The representation of
picture to text can be confusing. The images
used are part of the Socky software products, and
I am more familiar with PECS, boardmaker, and
Icommunicate. I would imagine that
incorporating the entire Socky collection of
programs would help alleviate this problem.

 What is the language level like? 4

The graphics symbolize one word. The extensive
list of pictures available are high frequency
words for typical children pre-school, primary,
and junior levels.

 Sound – Text to Speech? 5

Given that you can change the settings to adjust
volume, pitch, and rate of speech, the text to
speech sound is always to your personal
preferences.

Educational Considerations
Effectiveness (answer each question) 4

 Does it do/deliver what it promises?

I think that the application has potential. Beginning with the parent posing
questions along with the multiple-choice answers will be a great introduction to
engaging the child and developing their communication skills. Having the child
initiate conversation will demand many preliminary skills. A child with ASD will
need to solidify their understanding of the images and how to string them together to
form sentences. They will need many trials of searching the images singularly to
 develop efficiency. It will definitely be a long process to successfully use the
pictures as their means of communication. Like most new skills, it will need to be
taught and practiced. Parents should be aware of that reality. This is not an app that
is simply going to get your child to communicate without putting the time and effort
into teaching them. I researched some reviews on Amazon and very few people
were happy with the results. However, Apple gave it a 5 star.

Engagement (answer each question) 3

 Is it sufficiently interactive?
It can be. The parent or adult has to be motivated to use it at every opportunity.

 Does it capture and hold the attention of the intended user group?
I honestly don’t know. If I had the time to teach it to a variety of children on the
spectrum, then I might be more conclusive with this observation.

 If there’s a game…how many players?

No game.

 Is it fun?
It is to promote social communication. Ideally, I want the child to realize that it is
fun to interact with others. But there is no immediate reward or reinforcement when
using the app.

Preferences/Personalization (answer each question) 3

 Can individual preferences or performance be saved?

Preferences can be saved. The conversations are saved through Socky and you can
access them online to review the dialogue.

 Can individual student performance records be kept?

It would be at the parent’s or adult’s discretion to save the conversation and
document the child’s progress. Collecting the data might be an effective way to
monitor the child’s progress and whether the app is suitable or not.
Summative Comments (point form):

What is your overall impression? Mention pros and cons.

 Initially I was not happy with the child’s features. There has to be more modifications to
broaden the variety of individuals this could potentially help. When considering the
functioning abilities of the students with ASD, there is an incredible range of needs. The
app is limiting who could possibly use it.
 When introducing new skills to students everything has to be taught. Most things for
children with Autism don’t come naturally. Some require more diligence in learning than
others, but will need a sequential plan to develop each of the skills to use the app. This
realization made me a little more hopeful in the outcome of using Socky.

Things you would like to see changed...

 As addressed earlier, the features on the child’s profile should be changed.
o Larger keyboard option with landscape orientation.
o Including text with images.
o Linking more appropriate pictures to represent words.
o Having word predict and spell check options on the texting keyboard.
o Perhaps offering a different “Socky” character for girls or boys, and the younger
or older child.

Would you recommend this to teachers/parents? Would you recommend to Community Living
staff? Why or Why not?
 I would recommend this to teachers or parents if they were using all of the Socky
programs. I think that when collaborated together the app is most effective. If a school
or home is using Boardmaker, then using a mobile communication syncopated with those
images would be most effective. The student needs to be familiar with picture
representation and what image signifies the word. Mixing different programs would only
add confusion and we want to eliminate those unnecessary obstacles. We want to
promote a positive learning environment for the child to be successful.