Android games for 5 year old (Autism, pragmatic language impairment)

April 16, 2013 1:08 PM

Looking for android games (Motorola Xoom 1st Gen) for a 5 year old with special needs (pragmatic language impairment)

I am looking android games for a 5 year old that has Autism diagnosis but major impairment is in Pragmatic language. Although these deficits direct to certain kind of apps, I am looking for games that address issue of fine motor skills, general entertainment (He loves Cordy and Angry Birds) and pragmatic speech development (where he needs to interact with the game).

He is not interested in painting or letters apps.

In the long run, I would like to develop his game playing skills. I may game dedicated game console in a year or so but until them Xoom is a gaming pad.

Any ideas?

(P.S. - If you don't know any games that specifically address his special needs, I would love to hear game suggestions for entertainment purpose.)

posted by zaxour to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (2 answers total)

My son has related issues -- speech difficulties and an ASD. He is four.

He loves Talking Ben (we have an iPad, but I'm checking that everything I'm recommending here is available in Android, too).

Basically, you speak and Ben listens and repeat back what you say (so long as he's sitting in his chair). You can also help him eat his canned dog food, drink water, burp, answer his phone, break the glass on his graduation picture,and work in his lab. Ben has numerous friends. For example, my one year old kept getting upset when she would open the ad for Ginger the talking kitty and we'd think she'd done it by accident. She wanted the kitty. So we have Ginger as well (Ginger you help get ready to bed by giving her shower, blow drying her, brushing her teeth, and helping her destroy a roll of toilet paper --- complete with a fart sound -- when you complete the set of those four activities, you get a puzzle piece -- and there are 65 puzzles that contain about 5 pieces).

The original Dexteria app is also great (scroll down to the hand in the maroon box). My son loves pinching the crabs --- he has trouble following the directions on the other games that come with the app, but the pinching game is designed to help the pincer grip.

Speech with Milo is also adorable.

And I really, really wish the ABA Receptive Identification app was available on Android, but it seems to be exclusive to the i-Products. If you can find a similar app --- you'll be amazed. If nothing else, it helped us realize how many words our son knew but couldn't say.

All this said, do you have a BCBA? Ours at school provided us with this super amazing list of autism-related apps. We have yet to thoroughly go through it and add to our collection, but it's awesome.

And my son likes to also look through the video camera of our iPad, tell us what he is seeing, and then watch the video of telling us what he is seeing and describing that.
posted by zizzle at 1:30 PM on April 16, 2013

My 6yo Autistic child LOVES scribblenauts. I don't know if it helped her speech but it taught her how to spell (the game gives you the ability to summon any object for your characters use to solve puzzles by typing it in) so well that she's far ahead of neurotypical her classmates. Plus it seems way fun too. I'll go through her games later and see if I can suggest some more.
posted by tenaciousmoon at 1:31 PM on April 16, 2013