Grace - Picture Exchange for Non-Verbal People

The Grace app is a well designed, user friendly application. I really enjoyed playing around with it. It is very easy to use! Many people forget that it is not about how many features an aac app can offer, but it is about finding an aac app that meets the needs of the student. Not every student is ready for thousands of vocabulary choices. Many students DO need to build their vocabulary, and get accustomed to using picture exchange symbols. Grace app definitely can be an app for that. Well done.

I am a mother of an 11 year old daughter with autism. She has been using her communication book (a binder with lots of pecs) for a few years. After a while, she no longer wanted to use her book at home. I am guessing it was because of the size of her binder and maybe she became frustrated because she didn't have all the pictures she needed to express herself. So I was thrilled when I learned her school had introduced her to an iPod Touch with a communication app. That thrill was short-lived. Once I got over the cost of the app (even though it's better than the $1400 they wanted a few years ago for a big, bulky communication device), her teacher noticed that Lauren was relying on the app to talk for her. It took her years to start using her own words. I most certainly didn't want her to lose her voice. While researching the app that is being used in Lauren's school, I stumbled upon Grace. Despite the quantity of reviews and ratings, I decided to read further. Once I read that Grace doesn't have sound, I WAS HOOKED. Hello!! Not having sound is key! It encourgaes your child to interact AND use his/her own precious voice! I also want to note the following to dispute the negative reviews: (1) The developers are legitimate. Just reference the links listed above to their websites or check out Facebook to witness the hard work they've done to assist those in need. (2) I had no problem contacting Lisa Domican. She responded quickly to my email. She was very helpful & very generous. Her assistance exceeded my expectations and is greatly apprecated. (3) This tool IS simple, but not limited. Simple is good for a child with autism. If they get overwhelmed, they will just become frustrated. You can easily customize the app by adding your own pictures. I've always preferred the "real" pictures as opposed to cartoon pecs anyway. (4) This app is much more practical than the "paper system" mentioned in OSullivan's review. No more lost pecs and no more waiting to create, laminate and velcro new words added to your childs vocabulary and no more bulky 3-ring binders. WOOHOO!!! If your child or loved one is accustomed to using a picture exchange system, I am confident they will catch on to this app. It's simple and VERY ECONOMICAL. Even though the Touch is intended as a Christmas present, I just had to have Lauren give the app a test run today. She easily navigated thru the app; and unlike anoher app, making corrections to her sentence was a breeze. So far, I've only added about 40 pictures, but she was able to tell me she wanted a purple toy and what she wanted to eat for dinner :) Kudos to the developers! Thanks for making such a helpful and affordable app for our loved ones!!

Love that pictures (& pictures of symbols or words) can be added into any category. Also the ability to arrange the pictures within the category is great. I hope future updates will allow me to add my own categories, and will increase the number of items that can be chosen in one series. Would it be possible to save chosen sequences so that a series of pre selected pictures would display with one selection (instead of having to re-select commonly used sequences)? Possibly there could be a category that has multiple picture sequences. Thank you for a very useful app!

I highly recommend this app that helps children communicate. A must for Speech Language Pathologists, Special Education, Autism, teachers, parents and siblings will find this Augmentative Alternative Communication app useful. Megan Bratti, MS, CCC-SLP @avocadotech /avocadotech

I am writing this review as an iPhone developer who understands Autsim through a family member and also the system Grace App is putting in place. I am also writing this because I feel passionately that every word of the previous revue is hurtful to the developer and the Autistic community as a whole. The App is not intended to have sound. The system is not intended to speak for the learner but to help them find their voice. This is clearly written above. This is not Flash, it is not cheap. iPhone development costs hundreds of dollars per hour and requires deep understanding of memory management. There is a very good reason why iPhone DOES NOT SUPPORT FLASH. The support email and websites work just fine. If they did not at first the issue has been fixed. I contacted the developers to discuss the app. No corporate entity would make this app. If I thought it would be a profitable App I might even try to do it better myself. The App is made by a mother of two autistic children who is spending valuable time away from them and a developer who is donating his time to work with her to bring it to the public to help others. There are a handful of apps designed for Autistics in the App store. Near as I can each one is effectively a donation to the community even at a $39 price. If you want to see better apps for autistics and ongoing improvements I would recommend buying this and every other app that is out there so they can continue working. If you see a problem provide the developers with feedback so that you and they understand what is needed.

I think this app is great! Especially for my students who are able to produce speech, but are not motivated to use expressive language to communicate. I agree that the the function of adding your own photos need to be changed. I've added several new pictures but they show up all on top of each other.

I can't believe the price for this. All it does is display images from a TINY library, or the images that you upload. Only ONE level of categorization, existing categories are arbitrary, no labeling, no audio, no recall of image strings that you make, once you set an image string you can't re-arrange. WHY does it cost 38 bucks???

Removed immediately there is no sound, the pictures are too small for those with vision problems and the listening partner has to read what is being expressed instead of being able to hear it and respond more quickly and naturally to the person's request. My daughter got so upset because she kept trying to get it to "talk".