Fear, denial, confusion, or even helplessness at times—the feeling of being a parent to an autistic child can be many. But the emotion of being there for them is alike.
This was the same feeling, Anila Gonsalves felt when her older son was diagnosed with autism at the age of two. A shattering moment for her, she decided to choose a different road map for her son’s upbringing –that’s when Fabulaa—an idea to make an app for autistic children came into the picture.
A homemaker by profession, Anila saw her son lacking natural speech and the ability to express his feelings, making it difficult in understanding, thus difficulty in communication.
“After meetings with specialists and interacting with other mothers at coffee mornings and several discussions, I understood that other children, just like my son were receptive to visual cues,” Anila shares, adding, “Post diagnosis one of the first training that was introduced to my kid was PECS Picture Exchange Communication System, a training that uses visual cues that help to learn and communication,” she shares.
While meeting many such mothers of autistic children, she understood that autistic individuals are more receptive to learn and communicate with visual cues as they learn faster. So Fabulaa had to be an app that catered to these concerns. She shares, “The app is inspired by Augmentative and Alternative Communication, which means, this methodology helps many who are more receptive to learning and communicating with visual cues. That way major purposes of communication –to inform, express, feel, imagine, to influence and to meet social expectations, thus reflecting in the form of communication.”
The app that helps children communicate better has four main built-in features—speech, phrases, cards and scribble. The speech feature converts speech into text by allowing users to record messages and use their mobile device as a physical speech bubble. The Phrase is an editable preloaded library of commonly used sentences that are given a voice with the click of a button. Cards contain images that describe a single or more word and when clubbed together, these cards form a sentence for playback and the last feature scribble, a freehand tool that allows you to draw objects or write sentences.
The app caters to pretty much all age groups isn’t that difficult to use, Anila shares. She tells, “Right from kids, to adults, to senior members of our society Fabulaa provides users, caregivers and parents a simple adaptive way to reach out to their loved ones who struggle to communicate. It is like putting words in your hand.”
Explaining how one would introduce the app to an autistic individual, she quips, “It is necessary to get familiar with the child’s system. Use around the child and encourage the child when he/she attempts to use it and provide differential reinforcement. Make sure the app is present at all times while making use of the opportunities for the child to use the app.”
While the app has made many lives easy for parents with autistic offspring, materialising the app wasn’t a cakewalk for her, especially with not having a technological background. “When I started, I had to educate myself on technical nuances, vocabulary and bring the right people together to get this passion project off the ground. But in the end, I just wanted to make sure that parents like me don’t go through so much anguish and also to expedite acceptance, inclusion and independence for these individuals.”
Image Credit: Fabulaa | Anila Gonsalves
