Get your motor running to help Saplings Rathfarnham this May

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Luke Maiden of The Saplings School Rathfarnham

Please Support Saplings in a sponsored Bike Run from Dublin to Kinsale, on Sat 8th May.

When Luke Maiden started in Saplings School for Children with Autism aged 5, his language was so delayed that he could barely put three words together. After three years of special education and therapy at Saplings, Luke is a changed boy.

“He now talks fluently,” says Luke’s mother, Rowena. “And he’s learnt how to read and write. Not only has Saplings taught him how to communicate, but it’s also given him the coping ability to attend the local national school for his first class every morning.
He absolutely loves it and is making friends.”

Although Saplings is a recognised "Pilot" Intensive Autism Therapy School, parents must fundraise to provide full-time Speech and Language, Occupational, and Group work therapy in the school.

They also fund an additional behavioural supervisor - to ensure that all of the children and their families get the kind of home/school support they need to overcome the challenging behaviours that occur with severe autism.

Each month they must raise a total of €14,000 just to maintain these posts.

Recently Saplings had to let go of their full-time Speech and Language Therapist because of funding problems. Luke’s granddad, Pat Brown, was horrified when he heard the news.

“He was heartbroken that other children won’t get the chance that Luke has been given,” explains Rowena. “He felt really strongly about doing something to help his grandson’s school.

So he got a team of his Harley biker friends together.

The sponsored ride from Dublin to Kinsale is their gift to Saplings School and the kids who attend there.”

Saplings School Rathfarnham provides one-to-one education to 24 children on the autism spectrum.

The educational and therapeutic team work together to teach everything from lifeskills – such as toileting and coping with visits to the dentist – to communication, reading and writing and the national curriculum.

Children who are non-verbal are taught to use sign language and to communicate with pictures.

Most importantly for the children and their families, Saplings tackles the extremely challenging behaviours – such as tantrumming, aggression and self-injury – which often accompany autism.

And when they are ready; like Luke, the Group work tutor teaches them through play and co-operative task work to learn in small groups, ready for "Big School".

“Without the early intervention provided by their school,” adds Rowena, “many of the children who attend Saplings would face institutional care from an early age. The school is literally a lifeline for the kids and their families. We can’t afford to not keep it going.”

One of the easiest ways to help is to go on to our MyCharity Page and make a donation to support the Group Work Tutor by sponsoring the Bikers. Every single cent raised will go towards maintaining this valuable service for another day.

• For more information or to arrange interviews, please contact Adrienne Murphy at 086 363 2554.

Saplings is a registered charity No. CHY 14453.

Autism iPhone breakthrough: from tantrums to app-y days

Saplings has proved to be a crucial factor in the development of Grace App that enables non-verbal and those with developing vocalisations to use picture exchange, on an iPhone.

ASHER MOSES: The Melbourne Age, Sydney Morning Herald, Brisbane Times and W.A. Today - Digital Life
April 16, 2010




Few can legitimately boast that an iPhone app changed their life but for 10-year-old Grace Domican, unable to speak due to autism, the touchscreen phone has given her a voice for the first time.

Her mother, Lisa Domican, created a picture-based iPhone application to help her communicate and the tool was so successful she is now trialling it in a school for autistic children in Ireland.

Domican, who was born in Australia and lived here until she moved to Ireland in 2001, is also planning to provide it to schools in Australia and is selling both iPhone and iPad versions on the iTunes App Store.


Aspect, Australia's largest non-profit organisation providing support for people with autism, has expressed interest in trialling the app with its clients, while Domican said she had also been in contact with the Woodbury School in Baulkham Hills.

The Grace app is essentially a digital version of the Picture Exchange Communications System - a book of laminated pictures attached to a board by velcro that allows children with autism to build sentences and communicate.

Children with autism are often unable to use and understand expressive language because the developmental disability means those parts of the brain don't work. Some children with autism go on to develop speech, while others never do.

As the child learns new words via pictures they are added to the PECS book, a system that quickly becomes unwieldy, particularly outside the home setting.

"You have to take the photo, print the photo, laminate the photo, velcro it and repeat this every time they decide they like something new," said Domican, whose older son Liam, 12, also has autism.

With the app, which is being sold for A$45 on the App Store with some of the proceeds going to charity, Grace has access to more than 400 symbols and photos in the palm of her hand. She can add new ones herself by taking pictures with the phone's camera.

Domican is able to share new words and interests instantly with Grace's carers and teachers so they can use them in their interactions with the child.

The iPhone's touchscreen was critical as Grace was used to pointing at the pictures in her PECS book, so it was second nature to open and operate the apps.

"With the phone showing exactly what she has requested, it is now very clear to all of us what she needs and we see a huge reduction in frustration behaviour as a result," Domican said.

"Grace is capable of a two- to three-hour tantrum that leaves your ears ringing, so this is a good thing."

Now the app is being trialled on several of Grace's fellow students at a Saplings school in Ireland, designed specifically for children who cannot be taught in mainstream schools.

Members of the public have been donating their second-hand iPhones, which are then cleaned up and donated to autism schools.

Domican even credits the app with improving Grace's verbal communication, saying she can now make many three- to four-word verbal requests, such as "I want to drink" or "I want purple chocolate" (Cadbury).

Anthony Warren, Aspect's director for children, young people and families, said he thought the Grace app was "a great idea" but suspected it would not be a substitute for the formal PECS program. He said he was sure Aspect's schools and speech pathologists would be interested in trialling it.

"It certainly sounds as though it would be very motivating and helpful for clients who have higher support needs and who are motivated by that sort of technology," he said.

Domican said she got the idea for the app after seeing iPhone ads on the sides of buses just before the device launched in Ireland. The telco O2 Telefonica supplied her with an iPhone after meeting Domican at a World Autism Day event.

Last year, Domican tracked down an iPhone developer, Steve Troughton Smith, who helped her make the app. Since the pictures used by Grace were owned by a company, Domican had to draw sketches of each image she would need for a basic vocabulary and then contracted an artist to make professional, digital versions.

Smith created a prototype of the app in September and "by the end of November we had four additional phones and we were trialling it with three more children in the school".

Domican and her family have lived in Ballarat, Melbourne and Sydney. They regularly fly down to visit family in Ballarat.

Liam was diagnosed in the Royal Brisbane Hospital in 2000 and attended the Autistic Association of Queensland school in Brighton for almost a year. Grace was diagnosed by a paediatrician in Ballarat in September 2001, just before the family moved to Ireland.

Domican said she would like to move back to Australia but said at the moment there were inadequate provisions for autistic kids in state-funded schools.

"A one size fits all special needs education would not suit kids like mine and their potential could be lost," she said.

Grace is launched and now available in the App Store - for iPad, iTouch and iPhone

The launch of Grace iPhone App for Non verbal people has gone really well and we are getting a lot of enquiries.

After the item on the Gerry Ryan Show on the 16th March; we got an email from a fellow who wanted to donate his old iPhone to Saplings.
He wants to remain anonymous but I can say that the phone is in perfect working order and about to be put to good use by the Supervisors in Saplings as they select 4 children for the next trial group.

If anyone else is upgrading their iPhone - we would be delighted to collect, restore and donate it with the App installed to your local autism classroom.*
The app runs perfectly on the old 2G, 3G, and the iTouch along with the newer model phones and now - on iPad!

TV3's Morning Show also contacted us to show the app on World Autism Awareness Day and here is some video from that. With thanks to Steve again, for uploading it!

Grace - TV3 - The Morning Show from Steven Troughton-Smith on Vimeo.

*If you have a phone to donate, please email Irish Autism Action on affinityautismireland@gmail.com to arrange collection.