KID COACH APP | Helping Autistic Children to Communicate

Ad/Gifted –  A years subscription of the Kid Coach App featured in this post was gifted to me in exchange for this post. All thoughts are my own.

Communication when you have a child who is autistic can be difficult. There are different ways someone with autism may communicate; this can be via a communication device, PECs (picture exchange communication), Makaton or another way. The Kid Coach App wasn't actually created for the autistic community in mind, however it has many benefits for those on the spectrum who are verbal.

Today I am sharing how we are getting on using the Kid Coach App with Blake. Blake personally is behind in speech but can communicate verbally and uses PECs, especially at school. With Blake it is hard to have a back and forward conversation with him. Echolalia is something that is frequently part of his communication. Echolalia, for those of you who don't know is the name for repetition of words, phases or sounds of others speech.

When I came across the Kid Coach App I thought it was a brilliant way to help us to explore fun conversion topics with Blake. Kid Coach App is aimed at parents of children aged 6 to 12. It is compatible with all devices and features hundreds of questions to start having deeper conversations that encourage critical, analytical and creative thinking and empathy. There are easy, medium and hard questions depending on your child’s capability.

Each question features guidance and prompts to help children think more and consider different perspectives. You can score the conversation using a simple traffic light system and the app then makes tailored recommendations for your child. There are new questions added each week.

We started using the app during half term with Blake and the easy questions are suited for him. The first question we did was to name 10 things that go fast. Blake mainly was listing things such as cars, trains, planes etc so we expanded thanks to prompts with what animals are fast that can be added to the list etc. The most recent question we did was about what's the best thing about going to the park? We listed all the things we do at the park together and then asked Blake which is his favourite. He said the slide which was no surprise to us. The prompts are definitely helpful and we like that the questions are fun and meaningful. We are hopeful that over the year that Blake's communication will improve and we can have more longer conversations. I feel its going to be a useful tool for us with helping Blake.

If you are interested in trying out the app for yourself you can get a 2 week free trial. There is no need to hand over any payment details when signing up so if you decide you don't want to carry on with the app no money is taken from your account. If you choose not to continue with the subscription, you can still see content on the app, although a smaller selection. If you decide to carry on with the subscription, it’s £5.99 a month or £49.99 a year. 

If you head over to their blog page there are a great range of articles on communication.