30 days of apps: Day 30

Day 30: Aeolian Harp


Description:

Aeolian Harp is a relaxing app showcasing different sounds and colors.  Within this app there are 4 different sections of sounds.  You can choose what instrument you would like for each section.  Some instruments include marimba, xyllophone, etc.  As you play, notes and colors follow your finger and stay behind.

MT Applications:

1.  Relaxation
2.  Fine Motor Skills
3.  Choice Making
4.  Reward

Well that's all folks!!!  Stay tuned for more great posts to come!  I hope you enjoyed my 30 day iPad series!  Please share with other iPad enthusiasts!  Tomorrow I will make a post including links to every post created this month so it can be accessed all in one place.

30 days of apps: Day 27, 28, and 29

So sorry for the delay in apps!  I was a bridesmaid this weekend and was very busy!  Hopefully I can make it up to you by posting 3 apps today.  And tomorrow is my last day!  Don't worry I won't stop posting after that.  I have another series in mind but it probably won't be a daily series.  I need to rest before I try that again!  Here goes:

Day 27:  Dust Buster

Description:

Dust Buster is a piano lesson app designed for kids and adults alike.  You can either practice the touch piano on the iPad or practice with a real piano using the app.  It shows a grandma dusting the germs off keys every time you play.  It is similar to my app Dr. Seuss Band  but uses the piano.

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Sequencing
3.  Impulse Control
4.  Attention

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Day 28:  Space House

Description:

This is a wacky app that has three spheres with different sounds attached.  You can press one sphere to play melody, one to play voice, and one to play the beat.  If you play all three together you get music in all corners of the screen.  Move the spheres around to change it up.

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Reward
3.  Sound Discrimination

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Day 29:  Pitch Pipe

Description:

Pitch pipe is just what it sounds like.  It is a pitch pipe.  If you need to hear a pitch to sing or play on an instrument, this is the right app for you.

30 days of apps: Day 25 & 26

Day 25:  iMovie

Description:

iMovie is a really neat app that allows you to edit video and slideshows.  You can incorporate pictures, video, sounds, etc.  It allows you to choose from different styles of video whether it be neon, modern, or travel.  You can also create trailers for movies, life, or for fun.

MT Applications:

1.  Self Expression
2.  Emotional Expression
3.  Life Review
4.  Social Interaction
5.  Choice Making

Here is a video preview of iMovie:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 Day 26:  Autism Xpress

Description:

Autsim Xpress is an app that allows people to choose a face that represents their emotions.  There are many options including: happy, sad, nervous, hungry, angry, etc.  Once you press a face, the screen changes to that face's reaction.  If you press happy, the face starts to laugh.  This is a great way for nonverbal clients to express how they are feeling.  
 

30 days of apps: Day 24

 
Day 24:  Abby-Simon Says-Musical Instruments

Description:

This version of simon says is free and uses musical instruments.  Basically "Abby" talks you through the game.  She tells when to "listen" and when to play.  It is great for clients needing extra instruction.  The premise of the game is to press the same buttons as the game.  When you miss, you get a score at the end.

MT Applications:

1.  Sustained Attention
2.  Impulse Control
3.  Sequencing
4.  Fine Motor Skills

30 days of apps: Day 22 &23

 
Day 22:  Glee


Description:


Glee is an app that allows you to sing familiar songs from a list.  With this app, auto-tune can be turned on or off allowing anybody to sing on pitch.  Each song cost a certain amount to purchase.  You can also compete with others around the world gaining points.

MT Applications:


1.  Self Expression
2.  Choice Making
3.  Speech Articulation/ Fluency

---------------------------------------------------------------------

Day 23:  Ukelele


Description:


Ukelele sounds very similar to the real instrument and allows you to pick songs to play.  It positions the chords in order and you play them while singing the song.  You have to be familiar with the song already if you want to accompany yourself with Ukelele.

MT Applications:


1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Improvisation
3.  Choice Making
4.  Sequencing

30 days of apps: Day 21

Day 21:  Magic Piano

Description:

Magic is a fun and interactive piano app that allows you to play songs from a large list, play with other people around the world, and play 3 different whimsical pianos just for fun.  This is one of the apps that I use all the time and my clients love it!

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Attention (they follow the lights to play correct notes)
3.  Sequencing
4.  Improvisation
5.  Reward
6.  Impulse Control

30 days of apps: Day 20

Day 20:  Sound Brush

Description:

Sound Brush is a unique app in which you can paint a picture and music will sound.  The music is very soothing and relaxing when you paint.  This app is 1.99.

MT Applications:

1.  Relaxation
2.  Fine Motor Skills
3.  Color Identification
4.  Emotional Expression

Here is a video explaining more about its capabilities:

 

30 days of apps: Day 19

Day 19:  Choice Board Creator

Description:

Choice Board Creator is an app where you can attach pictures, text, and/or sound to a number of boxes.  You choose how many boxes you would like on screen up to 6 I believe.  You can incorporate anything you want to.  In the picture above, I used this board for the song "Old McDonald" having clients point to animals being sung about.

MT Applications:

1.  Client Preferences
2.  Visual Aids
3.  Communication (in particular for nonverbal clients)
4.  Sequencing

  

30 days of apps: Day 18

 
Day 18:  Square

Description:

If you run a music therapy private practice, this is a great thing to have!  Download the app on your iPhone, iPad, or Android and go to square.com.  You can receive a free Square card reader!  All you do is put in your bank account information where you will be receiving funds from others and for every swipe, square receives 2.75%.  Not bad considering this little item is free and easy to handle.  I think it's much easier than bulky credit card machines that still take out a percentage.  With square, you can receive funds anywhere from your phone or iPad.  Tired of cashing all those checks, get Square and you don't have to.  Funds go directly to your bank account every night after you have swiped.

Check out the website here and receive your free Square today.

30 days of apps: Day 17

Day 17:  D-Volution Percussions

Description:

This app isn't a whole lot different from Percussions+ which I discussed a couple of days ago.  The difference is that this one is FREE.  I would have posted this one first but I just found it.  It does not have the option to play your own music but you can create loops that can be positioned within the app.  You can play multiple percussion instruments and record your performance.

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Emotional Expression
3.  Impulse Control
4.  Reward
5.  Sound Identification
6.  Improvisation
7.  Attention

Here is a video demonstrating how to use this app:

30 days of apps: Day 16

Day 16:  Virtuoso Piano

Description:

I have found this to be the most realistic iPad piano app.  The keys can be magnified to the size of real piano keys.  You can start on any keys you want.  For example, you could show C-C, D-B, etc.  You choose what is on the screen.  You also have the option to make two keyboards with different octaves or two keyboards facing opposite directions.  Virtuoso Piano is free too!

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Social interaction (due to showing opposite keyboards allowing more than one player) 
3.  Reward 
4.  Letter identification

   

30 days of apps: Day 15

 
Day 15:  Percussions +

Description:

Percussions + is a great app that provides percussion instruments of all types.  These instruments include bongos, congas, tambourine, egg shaker, DJ scratcher, claves, cowbell, and so much more.  You can change the size of these instruments allowing for many per screen.  Play instruments loops in the background changing volume, speed, and reverb.  You can also turn on background music found on your iPad that will play during instrument manipulations.

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Movements
2.  Sound identification/ discrimination
3.  Reward
4.  Attention
5.  Improvisation
6.  Impulse Control

Here is a video of some of the great features:

30 days of apps: Day 14

 
Day 14:  Sign Now

Description:

Sign Now is a free app that allows you to import pdf's or documents and lets you sign your paperwork.  You can import from many places such as dropbox, e-mail, a photo, etc.  You can then save and send your work where it needs to go.

MT applications:

1.  Have clients sign paperwork on iPad, iPhone, or Android
2.  Save paper and ink!

   

30 days of apps: Day 13

Day 13:  Thumbafon

Description:

Thumbafon is a type of xylophone instrument that provides 8 colored squares with different tones.  You can change the scale to 6 different modes including Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, and Aeolian.  You can also change the sounds with 5 different sound options.

MT Applications:

1.  Improvisation (you can accompany mode on piano while client improvises)
2.  Self Expression/ Emotional Expression
3.  Color Identification
4.  As a reward
5.  Attention (play an instrument at the same time stopping, speeding up, louder, etc.)

 

30 days of apps: Day 12

 Day 12:  Pandora

Description:

Pandora is an internet radio that has been made into an easy access app for your iPhone, iPad, or Android.  I love Pandora because you can type any artist, song title, or album, and that station will play music related.  You can save your own stations for later and add as many as you like.

MT Applications:

1.  If your device has 3G, then you can access Pandora anywhere
2.  Great for client preferred background music during instrument play
3.  Free!  No need to purchase a ton of music
4.  Categorize stations for each client

  

30 days of apps: Day 11

 Day 11:  Go Rewards

Description:

Go Rewards is a rewards system where you can create your list of activities, behaviors, etc.  For each list you have up to 10 stars that you can reward.  You can also separate each reward chart by name if you have multiple clients.  Each time they receive a star, a sign pops up with a positive remark.

MT Applications:

1.  Build up stars for a musical reward
2.  Reward stars per session and once they get so many, give a big reward
3.  Increase Participation
4.  Appropriate responses receive a star

30 days of apps: Day 10

Day 10:  Vid Rhythm

Description:

Vid Rhythm is a fun and entertaining app that calls for no music experience.  You make up your own sounds and fill them into the video.  You can choose the song and the style.  It is pretty entertaining because it is fast and unpredictable.  Check out my video below to see my demonstration.  

MT Applications:

1.  Self Expression
2.  As a reward for participation
3.  Speech/ Vocalizations
4.  Just for fun!

30 days of apps: Day 9

 
Day 9:  DocScan HD

Description:

DocScan is an app that takes the place of your printer scanner.  Since an iPad cannot actually scan documents, DocScan takes a picture of your document and then gives you options to make it brighter, darker, etc.  The full version can hold many documents at one time and allows you to send and backup the documents through e-mail, box.com, dropbox, evernote, google docs, or other apps.  

MT Applications:

1.  Scan Paperwork
2.  Send progress notes to guardians
3.  Less paper and ink!
4.  Scan any document to save for later

30 days of apps: Day 6, 7, and 8

Well I feel terrible for not keeping up this past weekend with my daily posts!  I had a very crazy and busy weekend in several different cities running around!  I will hopefully make it up to you guys by posting three apps in one post!  Here goes....

 
Day 6:  Pinterest

Description:

The pinterest app is very handy on the iPad.  You can download a bookmark that allows you to easily pin any information from any website onto your virtual pinboards.  Pinterest has become the new hottest trend in the Music Therapy World!  You can pin anything from recipes, fashion, decorations, crafts, MT interventions, and music!  You can keep all of your ideas in one place for other followers to see and repost.  They still haven't created an official iPad app so I just use the iPhone version and magnify it.

MT Applications:

1.  Networking with other therapists of all kinds
2.  MT Intervention ideas
3.  Intervention ideas from SLP's, OT's, and PT's (can be incorporated in music therapy sessions)
4.  Unlimited resources for any population
5.  Ideas for creating your own visual aids
----------------------------------------------------------------------

 Day 7:  Box for iPhone and IPad

Description:

One day I realized that my dropbox was pretty much almost full and I did not really want to pay a monthly price to upgrade to more gigs.  So I looked around and found this wonderful app.  Box awarded me 50 free gb just for creating an account and downloading the app.  This app is becoming more and more compatible with other apps in backing up your documents.  I can save them directly to my box app on my iPad and it shows up in my account on any computer I log into.  With dropbox, I only received 5 free gb.  If you want more storage, this is the app to download!

MT Applications:

1.  Storage for anything and everything
2.  A way to save downloads from your iPad
3.  Passcode to keep out curious clients! ;)
4.  Sheet music ready when you need it

-----------------------------------------------------------------

 
Day 8:  Blogsy

Description:

I don't know a lot about this app but I know that it could definitely be a great edition for me.  If you are an avid blogger, this is very helpful when you don't have access to a computer.  On my iPad I cannot usually post blogs because I am not allowed to insert images or media within the new post.  With blogsy, you can drag and drop photo and video from sites like Flickr or Picasa into your post.  Basically this is the go to app for anything blog related.

 MT Applications:

1.  MT blog editing
2.  Compatibility with blog sites: Wordpress, Blogger, etc.
3.  Create rich text emails with photo, video, etc.

30 days of apps: Day 5

Day 5:  Super Duper Data Tracker

Description:

The Super Duper Data Tracker is a really great app to track progress made within short and long term goals.  This app can sort clients by name, day, or group.  I have created a group of clients I see each day.  This app allows you to write your own goals and set you own data gathering choices.  You could track by tally, approximations, or cueing.  This app makes it easy to quickly gather data within a session without creating a distraction.

MT Applications:

1.  Data gathering
2.  Calculates percentages based on data
3.  Organize Clients by day
4.  More accurate data due to in session gathering
5.  Track progress over time

30 days of apps: Day 4

Day 4:  Bottle Xylophone

Description:

Bottle xylophone is a simple app that shows you a row of bottles with different amounts of liquid.  Each bottle has a different tone and color.  My clients really like this one because it is such a different sound.  This one of those apps you get just for fun!

MT Applications:

1.  Fine Motor Skills
2.  Color Identification
3.  Can be used as a reward (1 of my clients always looked forward to this)
4.  Impulse Control

30 days of apps: Day 3

Day 3:  Dr. Seuss Band

Description:

This is the cutest little app I found the other day which is totally free!  Dr. Seuss Band comes with a couple of preloaded songs within the app.  One of the songs is "Dr. Seuss's ABC".  The more you play and succeed, the more songs that are unlocked.  I have already unlocked 4 songs.  Each song has three levels: easy, medium, and hard.  As you succeed with playing, the harder levels open up.  This app is basically Guitar Hero geared towards kids.  It shows colors that match the scale and you must play the correct color.

MT Applications:

1.  Color identification
2.  Learning the beginning of the alphabet
3.  Sequencing
4.  Attention, Attention, Attention
5.  Fine Motor Skills
6.  Impulse Control

Need I say more?  What are you waiting for, download it now!  Here is a video demonstration:

 

30 days of apps: Day 2

Day 2: ABC - Magnetic Alphabet

Description:

Magnetic alphabet is definitely one of my regular go-to apps within almost every session.  This app has alphabet letters upper-case and lower-case, various picture magnets, theme packs as an in app purchase, and many different backgrounds included.  There is a free version and a 1.99 version.  I decided to upgrade to the paid version because I received more options with pictures and themes.  There are other magnet boards out there but I believe this is the best one because of the various packs included and the backgrounds that most other apps don't have.

MT Applications:

1.  Identifying the alphabet
2.  Spelling words
3.  Math (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, etc.)
4.  Picture identification
5.  Visual aids to supplement songs
6.  Funner than pen and paper!

Here is another picture of what is available.  The have a special Easter theme right now.

30 days of apps: Day 1

I am excited to announce that I will be doing a 30 day iPad/iPhone app series for the month of April.  APRIL FOOLS!  No just kidding, I really am. :)  Everyday, I will post a new app and review the content and music therapy applications.  So let's get started with DAY 1!

Day 1:  OnSong

Description:

OnSong is definitely my favorite and most frequently used app on my iPad.  I am almost positive it is an iPhone app as well.  OnSong is the perfect app for a music therapist.  If you need a handy way to keep all of your music organized, this is perfect.  Stop carrying around that heavy notebook and switch to OnSong carrying hundreds of songs with you everywhere.

MT Applications:

1.  Easy access to chord sheets
2.  Zoom in feature to see easier or lyric explanation
3.  Be able to look up client preferences within the session rather than having to wait and print it out
4.  Access songs by book so as to find client preferences easily and quickly

Here is my video reviewing OnSong: