The caregiver-teacher started to attach the symbols to the child’s body and leave them there during breakfast, the symbols she chose were, of course, the ones that contained images related with breakfast such as sandwich, butter, oats, etc.
The mobile phone application was tested also. The child quickly understood what to do and spent time playing with it in periods of about 30 minutes during that day.
Contrary to the mobile application that seemed to work very well that day, the wearable symbols where not as exciting for him, even though the teacher used it with him in the way they were meant to.
She used the mobile device the whole day at school and she also used the wearable symbols attached to the child’s t-shirt. During that day I wasn’t present at the school because I didn’t want to interfere with the normal activities of the child.
Video of the Test with Ludvig, first together with the teacher and at the end with the mother of him.
During the testing sessions I had a nice surprise when the child’s mother told me “It is the first time I see him (the child) trying to say some of the words and hand signals included in the mobile phone application”.
This meant the mobile phone icons and videos motivated him to copy and remember gestures and words. That was especially important because the more he practices to say words and signals the more he would be able to communicate.
Some of the successful characteristics of the application were to include videos with sound, also that it was easy to use for child and that it has clear sequence of steps to follow. The videos were taken from previous visits and always included known people for the child. In this way we assured the child could find familiar faces and locations which kept his attention and focus.
