Registration For Learning Program Online - a great opportunity

September 2013    We are pleased to invite you to participate in 2013-2014 LP Online, the online learning community based on DSF's The Learning Program™. The Learning Program™ utilizes current research on best practices and effective teaching strategies to improve educational outcomes for children with Down syndrome.  For more information, visit www.dsfoc.org or click here. The LP Online will consist of ten sessions from our Level 1 class offered through Webex seminars in live and recorded formats.  Level 1 is for parents of children with Down syndrome between 3 and 6 years of age who are interested in support with vocabulary expansion, sight word acquisition, sentence building, personalized materials, and early number concepts.   PROGRAM DATES/TIMES:  (All live sessions are broadcast at 9:30 a.m. PST) September 16 October 11  November 15  December 6  January 10  February 7  March 7  April 17  May 9  June 6

Super Why reading and Umizoomi math learning apps

from PBS Kids:

Based on the popular preschool focused PBS show, Super Why! is a learning app that will teach your child to read without them realizing they’re learning. They'll be having too much fun.
— SheKnows.com

Help your child achieve the Power to Read with this collection of four SUPER WHY interactive literacy games. Your child can play along with each of the four main characters from the TV series: Alpha Pig, Princess Presto, Wonder Red, and, of course, Super Why, while practicing the alphabet, rhyming, spelling, writing and reading. Super Duper!

• Alpha Pig’S Lickety Letter Hunt - Help Alpha Pig find his way home by identifying the letters he needs to follow the alphabet path. That’s Alphabet Power!
• Princess Presto’s Wands-Up Writing - Help Princess Presto make objects appear by identifying letter sounds, tracing letters on the touch screen, and writing words. Spectacular Spelling!
• Wonder Red’s Rhyming Time - It’s time to rhyme! Help Wonder Red find the rhyming words missing from her Wonder Words Basket.
• Super Why’s Story Saver - Super Why...to the rescue! Help Super Why save the day by selecting words to complete sentences that fit the story.
• Learning Rewards - Collect virtual stickers along the way and decorate a “sticker book” with over 50 items.

from iTunes:

Team Umizoomi Math: Zoom into Numbers

Team Umizoomi, ready for action! Your child will use mighty math powers to explore Umi City, uncover hidden surprises, and play five Umirrific math games:

•Toy Store – A counting game
•Number Bubbles – A number identification game
•Race Around Umi City - A number comparison game
•Up! Up! And balloons! – An addition/subtraction game
•Rolling Toy Parade – A number line game

Each game teaches fundamental math concepts critical for preschoolers: identifying numbers; one-to-one number correspondence; rote counting; reading number symbols; associating symbols with quantity; and basic addition and subtraction. Games are leveled, and designed to increase in difficulty. Appropriate hints are provided to support your child as they practice and build their math skills.

Children will also earn badges and trophies through out the game. These badges and trophies are tracked in Team Umizoomi’s Headquarters and earning enough badges and trophies will grant kids a special key to Umi City!

With Milli, Geo, Bot, and your child’s mighty math powers, they can do anything! Welcome to the team, UmiFriend! Team Umizoomi: Zoom into Numbers includes:
•5 leveled games focused on fundamental preschool math skills
•Curriculum developed and reviewed by preschool education expert
•A rich, exploratory environment filled with surprises and added layers of math discovery
•Game instructions delivered by the voices of Milli, Geo, and Bot
•Player profiles that allow more than one child to play and save their progress
•Kid-tested appropriate games

iPad, iPod, iPhone apps for children with Down syndrome

from Touch Autism:

Touch Autism began to build mobile device applications (iPod, iPad, iPhone, and others) for children with autism spectrum disorders, Down syndrome, intellectual disabilities and other special needs after discovering how incredibly useful this type of technology can be.

Some of the many advantages of these apps are that they suit visual learners, they allow for non-verbal and non-written responding, they provide immediate and consistent feedback, and are very motivating, because they are just so much fun!

Touch Autism is a two person team dedicated to making the best technological apps for autism, Down syndrome and other special needs that we can! The Touch Autism Team is comprised of Jenny Winningham, a Board Certified Behavior Analyst and Tomas Krones a Software Engineer. The two of us continuously work toward creating technologies that can help people with autism spectrum disorders, Down syndrome and other intellectual disabilities live independent and productive lives.

1. Staying Safe and Safer Strangers- A Stranger Danger Social Story for Autism, Down Syndrome & Other Special Need - This app is made up of two community safety social stories. One story focuses on safer strangers and buildings, and the other focuses on what to do if you are lost. 
2. Calm Counter - Social Story and Anger Management Tool for Autism, Down Syndrome and Special Needs - The app opens up to a "I need a break screen" that vocalizes "I need a break" when it is tapped. The screen then transitions to a red screen with an angry face and the number ten. With each tap the screen transitions to a calmer face and color. In this way, the app prompts the user to count backwards from ten followed by a deep breath. The app also includes a simple social story with line drawings about anger. The social story talks about feeling angry and things you can do, like counting to ten, breathing deeply and taking a break, to calm yourself down. The settings screen allows you to choose from male, female or no vocals for counting back from ten and for reading the social story out loud.
3. Touch Trainer - Autism & Special Education - The Turn Taker uses visual and/or audio cues to facilitate turn taking and/or sharing in children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder, Down syndrome or other special need. This app has also been used successfully with young children, children diagnosed with ADHD, and with any child that finds it difficult to share! 
4. Divorce Social Story - A Social Story for Children about Divorce – Autism, Down Syndrome and Special Needs - This app is a simple and short social story about diveroce and what it means for a  child. The app uses simple language and graphics to explain that divorce means parents living in separate houses, and that it's ok. 
5. Turn Taker - Sharing Tool and Social Story for Autism, Down Syndrome and Special Needs - The Turn Taker uses visual and/or audio cues to facilitate turn taking and/or sharing in children diagnosed with an autism spectrum disorder, Down syndrome or other special need. This app has also been used successfully with young children, children diagnosed with ADHD, and with any child that finds it difficult to share!
6. Preference & Reinforcer Assessment - Autism & Special Education - his Preference (Reinforcer) Assessment app was designed by a BCBA (board certified behavior analyst) to make running a preference (reinforcer) assessment amazingly easy to do, so that anyone can effectively and scientifically determine their child’s or client’s preferences. Reinforcement (Preference) Assessments are an incredibly important procedure in any behavior change program. They are not conducted nearly as often as they should be because they can be difficult to run, or because many parents, caregivers or practitioners have not been sufficiently trained to run them. This app includes such features as descriptions of all of the types of preference assessments, a timer to determine the end of a trial, and specific instructions and visuals to help you set up and run the assessment. Once the assessment is finished the app will automatically calculate the percentage of times each item was selected in which it was available, and will present this info in an easy to read bar graph. The data and graph from each client will be saved on the app, so that the user can easily review results from past assessments.
7. My Day With WH Words - A Social Story and Speech Tool for Autism, Down Syndrome and Other Special Needs - This app includes a social story about talking about one's day, and a simple visual support for "WH" questions (Who, What, When, Where, Why, How). The story focuses on why it's important to tell people about your day, and what each different WH questions mean.
8. Potty Training Social Story - Autism, Down Syndrome & Special Needs - This is an interactive story about potty training that is customizable for boys or girls. The app also includes and extensive FAQ page that lists answers written by a board certified behavior analyst to common potty training questions.
9. Knock Knock Numbers - Autism & Special Education - Knock Knock Numbers was designed by a BCBA as a fun way to teach kids how to tell knock knock jokes, while working on number recognition. The app teaches 20 different jokes and each one prompts the user to identify a number between one and ten.
10. Conversation Social Stories and Simple PECS Communication Tool - Autism, Down Syndrome & Special Needs - This app is made up of four social stories about different conversational skills and simple communication tools to go with them. The stories focus on greetings, asking someone to play, what to talk about in a conversation and tips for great conversations. 
11. Autism Apps - Autism Apps is simply a comprehensive list of apps that are being used with and by people diagnosed with autism, Down syndrome and other special needs. It also includes links to any available information that can be found for each app. The Apps are also separated into over 30 categories, and the descriptions are all searchable, so any type of app is easy to find and download.
12. Touch Tutorial - Elderly, Autism & Special Education - Touch Tutorial was designed by a BCBA (Board Certified Behavior Analyst) to teach users with little to no experience with new technology how to use touchscreens. Touchscreens, like those found on ipads, iphones, ipod touches or other devices, are being used more and more frequently in every day society. This application uses easy to understand language and icons to teach foundational skills and then builds on these skills so that the user learns many of the common gestures necessary to operate a touchscreen device. Also see Touch Tutorial Lite - Autism, Special Education & Elderly