Dysgraphia affects a child’s ability to form words and letters, space words properly, and express thoughts in writing. These apps can help.

Many students with dysgraphia struggle with spelling, handwriting, and expressing their thoughts on paper when writing. ‎While an individualized, multi-sensory instructional plan is most ideal for remedying these academic challenges, there are many tech tools that can help kids with dysgraphia build these key skills. Try some of the apps detailed below.

iTrace
‎Handwriting, letter spacing, and fine motor skills are all areas that are typically challenging for kids with dygraphia. iTrace is a great tool for helping students build these important skills. With this app, children as young as age 3 can practice letter, number, and word formation, and can even work on spelling their name properly. An animated “hand” demonstrates tracing each letter before the child writes it, serving as a helpful model for proper formation. Parents can even add their own words, select background music, and receive progress reports on the status of their child’s writing. iTrace is a useful tool for helping your child master these key writing skills.

ABC Pocket Phonics
This is another great app for teaching students in grades pre-K-1 proper letter formation when writing, along with letter/sound recognition and how to blend sounds together when spelling. Kids are introduced to various phonemes, starting with basic consonants and short vowels and gradually increasing to more complex sounds, and are asked to say each phoneme, write it, and apply it to a word. At the end of each unit, they are awarded with stars based on selecting the correct phonemes to complete certain words and accurately tracing letters. This app is Orton Gillingham–based and much more fun for most kids than traditional pen-and-paper phonics activities.

Montessori Crosswords
Montessori Crosswords is another great app for building spelling skills. Preschool and elementary-aged students learn to spell words by dragging letters into a crossword frame that is associated with selected pictures. Students start with basic CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) words and drag letters to spell simple words like can‎, dog, and mat, and later progress to words containing blends (like flag, plug, and glad), words with consonant and vowel digraphs (like ship, bath, and feet), and multi-syllabic words. When they correctly spell a word, colorful confetti fills the screen, providing children with a fun and engaging experience.

Dragon Dictation
Many kids with dysgraphia have intelligent and creative ideas but struggle to express them on paper when writing. Dragon Dictation is a voice recognition app that allows students to dictate their ideas orally and have them presented on a screen, rather than transcribing them. ‎ To use the app, students hit “record” and begin speaking, then hit “stop” when they are done. They can then cut and paste their text and save it elsewhere, or send it out via email, text, or social media. It’s important that kids speak clearly when using this app, and it’s helpful for an adult to check the text for accuracy after it has been dictated.

Inspiration Maps
Inspiration Maps helps students with dysgraphia organize their ideas into visual maps. Children can create organized mind maps using a touch screen as a means of brainstorming before writing a paragraph, essay, or speech. They can add colors, icons, pictures, and photos to their mind maps, making the process fun and engaging. Once completed, they can convert their map to a linear outline, or can print it, share it via email, or save it to DropBox, iTunes, or the app itself. Templates are available, or students can create their own maps.

Students with dysgraphia typically face continued spelling and writing challenges as they progress through school. These apps can help ease these struggles and set them up for academic success.

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Educational apps to help your child start Kindergarten on a positive, confident note

With summer in full swing, most kids enjoy spending their time running, swimming, and playing outdoors. Yet summer is a long period of time without consistent learning, and if your child is getting ready to start Kindergarten in the fall, you won’t want to miss this opportunity to reinforce early learning.

Help your child prepare for Kindergarten while still having fun‎ with the apps detailed below!

ABC Letter Tracing
Learning to form letters properly when writing can be challenging for many students. This app helps children learn to form letters correctly and gives them ample practice tracing them. Players are presented with both upper- and lower-case letters and work on tracing these letters with proper top-to-bottom formations using their finger (great tactile reinforcement!). A colorful picture corresponds to each letter, giving students a visual aid for remembering the sound each letter makes. This app is useful for both early learning and fine motor skills development. Free on iTunes

Montessori Rhymetime Learning Games for Kids
Learning to rhyme is a key component of reading success. In this app, students learn to identify different sounds in words and match words that rhyme using bright, colorful pictures. ‎ The app contains six hands-on activities, starting with basic rhyme games and progressing to more challenging ones. The games can be played independently, or parents can engage with their children by having them articulate their reasoning for why they selected certain pictures. This multi-sensory app is one students love playing, and helps solidify phonemic awareness, a precursor to reading. Free on iTunes 

Moose Math by Duck Duck Moose
This app helps build several important Kindergarten math skills, including ‎addition, subtraction, counting, and sorting. The app contains five different activities, including Moose Juice where kids make “smoothies” (and practice addition, subtraction, and counting skills); Paint Pet, where players count dots to match pets; Pet Bingo, where kids answer counting, addition, and subtraction problems; Lost and Found, where players sort colors and shapes; and Dot to Dot, where players connect dots. $1.99 on iTunes

Starfall Learn to Read
This app is a great tool for building and reinforcing basic phonics concepts, including sound/letter recognition and blending. Similar to the Starfall website, the app presents fifteen “mini books” that each focus on a certain vowel pattern, including short sounds, long sounds, vowel teams, and r-controlled sounds. The app also includes whimsical, fun-filled videos to reinforce reading  (like “The Amazing Silent e” and “Y can be a Vowel!”) and other engaging phonics-based activities. $2.99 on iTunes

Stumpy’s Alphabet Dinner
This is a great app for teaching kids to recognize letters and shapes, while they “feed” colorful characters.  To play the letter segment, a word pops up and kids must “feed” ‎Stumpy the monster by identifying and dragging specific letters. Likewise, they feed Stumpy’s friend Lexie shapes in a similar manner, while building key early academic skills. Free on iTunes

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Don’t let your child’s academic skills fall to the wayside this summer

Summer is a time for outdoor games, splashing in the pool, and spending long days in the sun. Yet‎ summer is also a long stretch of time without consistent academic instruction. During this time, many students lose up to several months’ worth of reading, writing, and math skills. Help your child prevent summer “brain drain” while still enjoying the summer with the ideas detailed below.

Plan an activity day

There are so many fun “excursions” to take over the summer–trips to amusement parks, zoos, museums, boardwalks, and the like. Have your child research and plan each activity, while developing important academic skills. She can start by searching the web for nearby options. She might decide on a local history museum, for instance, with interesting exhibits and shows. Before starting your adventure, have her plan a budget, including admission fees, costs for snacks and lunch, fees for any additional shows, and perhaps even the cost of the gas required to get there. To build time management skills, have her map out a time schedule, including the time you should leave as well as pre-determined times for shows, exhibits, and lunch. When you get home, you may even have her write a summary of her favorite parts of the museum and whether or not she would recommend it to a friend.

Write daily

During the summer, to prevent regression in writing skills, students should write every day. This writing can come in various forms. You may give your child a daily writing prompt, for instance, and have him keep a summer journal. Such prompts may include: “Describe your favorite vacation,” “If you could be a land animal, which one would you be and why?” ‎or “Would you ever want to travel to outer space? If so, why?” You can also try matching your child with a pen pal–a friend, family member, or someone with a shared interest, and have him write weekly letters to his pen pal sharing his summer adventures. The key is to write regularly and consistently.

Create your own science project

You can bring science to life over the summer with engaging and stimulating science projects. Try planting a garden with your child, for example, to teach many valuable skills. Start by having her decide which plants or flowers will be in the garden. Once she plants the seeds, have her predict (and write down) what she thinks will happen next and what she needs to do to ensure that the plants will grow. As the plants grow, have her track their growth and later create a visual chart, including dates and specific changes. She can even create a write-up detailing her observations and whether or not her predictions came true.

Take your child grocery shopping

Combine the fun of shopping with the excitement of learning by taking your child to the supermarket. Based on your family size, ‎have him predict how many items you will need for a given week. For instance, you may need two boxes of pasta, one pound of salmon, one box of cereal, and so on. Based on these amounts and the cost per item, have him try to figure out how much the grocery bill will come to (without any last-minute add-ons), then compare it to the actual cost to see if his prediction was correct. For younger kids, have them find certain quantities (4 apples or 6 oranges), or items of a certain shape (round fruits) or color (red vegetables).

Help your child strengthen her critical thinking and fine motor skills (amongst other key skills) by building a bird feeder. To build a basic one, you’ll need just three items: a cardboard toilet paper roll, peanut butter, and bird seed. Have your child predict what she thinks she may need to do with these items to make the bird feeder. Discuss her predictions, then get started. Using a spoon, have her spread a generous layer of peanut butter all around the cardboard roll. The more peanut butter you use, the more the seeds will stick. Then roll it around in the seeds and slide the roll onto a branch‎. Watch the birds flock to your feeder!

Summer is certainly a time for relaxation and fun. However, it is also a time when key academic skills can fall to the wayside. Try these activities to engage your child and prevent the all-too-common summer brain drain.

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