Steven Lodge, father of a child with severe autism, has created Speaks4me, a computer software to allow the child to communicate.
The small eleven-year-old Callum Lodge has serious learning and communication problems, being unable to speak, but thanks to this system he has been able to express sentences using images.
Six months using the application have been enough to show its effectiveness in this case and open hope when it comes to helping children with autism in new ways.
It is an easy-to-use device, Speaks4Me, which consists of a touch screen interface and images that represent words on the screen. These images can be dragged to the top of the screen to form sentences and they can be heard because the system "reads" them out loud.
To structure and facilitate its use, the images are divided into categories and users can add their own images and categories to help their child.
At the moment Speaks4Me is only available as a hardware solution on a touch screen device and only works with Windows, but it is working to create a software solution, which would allow it to be used on many devices.
Hopefully the efforts of this father see their fruits, for the most important moment and the reason why it was created seems to be fulfilled, the Speaks4me has already helped his son. Now he wants to market it to help other children with the same communication needs, it could even be interesting for other types of recipients with other learning problems.
Currently the price is around € 2,000 (the handheld device, which includes the hardware and shipping costs), but work is being done to market the system as an independent program that can work on mobile phones or other types of devices laptops, which would reduce costs.
Hopefully the Speaks4me, this software to help children with autism communicate It is another possibility that opens new doors to the investigation and treatment of this disorder.
