VAST Songs 1 - Intro

Description

VAST-Songs is part of the growing VAST family of apps that use VAST videos to augment and enhance proven speech therapy techniques. It is a great therapeutic tool for a wide range of speech impairments and communication disorders such as Apraxia and non-fluent Aphasia.

VAST is an innovative application of video technology to facilitate and improve communication abilities for speech-impaired individuals. Following close-up video of mouth movements allows these individuals to speak themselves. The simultaneous combination of visual, auditory and, in some cases, written cues, allows these individuals to readily produce speech.

This app supplements the accepted use of singing in speech therapy by providing extra cueing: simultaneously hearing the song while following the oral movements. Songs have been an accepted treatment technique in speech therapy for many years. This originated with the awareness that many people with speech problems can sing better than they can speak: using melody and rhythm enables individuals to say words and phrases that they could not produce under other circumstances. It’s also well known that music stimulates several different areas of the brain. Multiple research studies have shown that stimulating different areas of the brain results in improved speech production.

The material in this app was developed by Darlene Williamson, M.A., CCC-SLP, an Apraxia expert with 30+ years of professional experience and 2+ years of experience using and developing the VAST program in a clinical environment.

The app provides 10 songs that were carefully chosen for a specific reason or therapeutic application. Since language areas of the brain are stimulated when someone sings, there is an inherent value for the user to just sing the songs. The most desirable end result of using this app would be for the automaticity involved in singing to generalize to speech production. The app includes a Use Guide for therapy – background on the use of singing in therapy, suggestions as to how the translation from singing to speech can be approached using this app and why each song was chosen.

The user may choose to view written text subtitles in the videos for an additional visual cue. Additionally, this app gives the user the option of choosing songs performed by either a male or female model. While this has no particular significance to the success of VAST videos for singing, it was an opportunity to gather more user feedback with regard to the male/female preference.

If you’re willing to offer any feedback about this or have any other input surrounding VAST-Songs, please contact us at interest@speakinmotion.com.

*Please look for upcoming VAST apps and SpeakinMotion’s custom recording service….COMING SOON!