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Vol.12, No.3, August 2023. ISSN: 2217-8309 eISSN: 2217-8333
TEM Journal
TECHNOLOGY, EDUCATION, MANAGEMENT, INFORMATICS Association for Information Communication Technology Education and Science |
Aawn: An Interactive Mobile Application for Improving the Communication Skills of Arab Children with Autism
Arwa Wali, Modi Alfrihidi, Nada Alasiri, Najah Alsabei
© 2023 Arwa Wali, published by UIKTEN. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 License. (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)
Citation Information: TEM Journal. Volume 12, Issue 3, Pages 1307-1315, ISSN 2217-8309, DOI: 10.18421/TEM123-10, August 2023.
Received: 24 May 2023. Revised: 02 August 2023.
Abstract:
Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder that causes challenges in communication and social interaction. Since there is no single treatment for autism, autistic children need extra attention from their parents or caregivers to overcome their linguistic deficiency. Scientific studies have shown that technology-based educational methods are effective and can lead to a significant improvement, especially for autistic children. In recent years, an increasing number of mobile and multimedia applications have been developed to enhance autistic children's verbal communication, emotions, social behavior, and interaction skills. However, many of these systems are either in English or in local autistic children’s native languages. Others are designed to promote specific knowledge, i.e., emotions, or are limited in their features. This paper designs and implements a prototype for Arabic mobile application, called Aawn, to help and improve Arab autistic children's, in their own language, communication and emotions, as well as educational and organizational skills. Aawn is integrated with various supporting technologies based on the Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) and augmented with graphical features. The system is built and developed using Android Studio and various cloud-based tools. The system can be extended by artificial intelligence (AI) technologies.
Keywords –Spectrum disorder (ADS), picture exchange communication system (PECS), mobile application. |
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