Complete tutorial on Pictalk AAC: our innovative free AAC application

What is Pictalk AAC?

Pictalk AAC is an augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) pictogram communication app which was awarded the Handitech Trophy 2022 in the digital innovation category. It is copyright-free, free of charge, and without ads. It works on Android, iOS (Apple), and as a web version.

We are a team of two telecommunications engineers and started developing Pictalk during our study years for our younger brother with a disability.

Pictalk AAC allows vocal feedback via a speech synthesis voice and provides a pictogram search engine ARASAAC, Sclera, Mulberry, and others. Importing images from your photo library is also possible.

The current version of Pictalk AAC does not support advanced AAC features (conjugation, sentence structure, complete library) but may be sufficient for people with severe cognitive impairments or major oral language difficulties. It is important to note that, due to a lack of contributions from speech therapists or other language professionals, we could not provide complete starting libraries designed for language development. This is an objective for us.

Installation

The app is available on Android (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.pictalk.www.twa&hl=us) and on iOS (https://apps.apple.com/fr/app/pictalk-aac/id1617860868). It is also possible to access the application directly through your web browser (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, etc.) at this address: https://application.pictalk.org/public?fatherCollectionId=346

To add your own pictograms and customize your album, you will need to create a free account. Once the app is installed, offline use is possible.

Video tutorials are available at this address https://www.pictalk.org/fr/pictalk/resources/

How to use?

First use

Once your account is created, you can log in to your personal space. You will then discover your grid of pictograms. You will notice that some elements have a black border. Indeed, two types of entities exist on Pictalk:

• Collections (similar to “folders”). They have a black border (similar to a shadow). A collection can contain pictograms as well as other collections.
• Pictograms (similar to “files”).

 

By tapping on a collection, for example "food":

We are redirected to this page:

This is the inside of the “food” collection. Here, you find pictograms related to this collection, including: hot, coffee, drink, eat… A bar appeared at the bottom. It is called the “Sentence Strip”.

To compose your own phrase and verbalize it, click on pictograms. Here, I clicked on “I”, “Want”, “Eat”, “Fries”.

Let’s look at the buttons on the “Sentence Strip”:

1. The “Trash” button deletes the current phrase and takes you back to your home (initial screen)
2. The “Delete” button removes the last clicked pictogram and returns you to your previous position
3. The “Volume” button in green reads the phrase:
4. The “Copy” button in blue copies the phrase to the clipboard to send it via WhatsApp, Messenger, SMS, or others.

Create your content (essential!)

For any modification, you must switch to “Edit Mode”. To protect your library from accidental deletion or modifications, it is necessary to answer a very simple arithmetic calculation:

After switching to edit mode, numbers will appear below each pictogram indicating the display priority.

The lowest numbers will appear at the top left of the screen and the highest numbers (10) will appear last. We are currently working on a better solution (drag and drop) for organizing pictograms.

Hovering the mouse over a pictogram or collection shows three vertical dots (blue) and 12 rectangle-shaped dots (red).

Blue dots give access to “Pictogram Actions”: 

1. Modify it (image, text, speech)
2. Delete it
3. Add it to the sidebar

Red dots allow moving the pictogram within a collection via drag-and-drop gestures.

Actions available for a collection:

(Thanks to Aurélie REGENT for this very clear description of the available copies) 

It is possible to make “linked copies” of collections to include them in other collections. For example, if you created an “educators” collection and want to copy it into the “school” collection, this can be done via the “linked duplicate” button then “paste” in edit mode. If you then add a pictogram to the isolated “educators”, it also automatically appears inside the “educators” collection within the “school” collection. This is indicated by a green chain symbol labeled “Linked duplicates”.

Conversely, a “Separate copy” will not be updated if an educator is added or removed from the original collection.

Creating a collection

In edit mode, press the “Create + ” button and select “Collection”.

Pictalk integrates a pictogram search engine that uses Sclera, ARASAAC, Mulberry, and Tawasol.

Once the pictogram is imported from your computer or found among the search suggestions, you need to enter the speech message “speech” as well as the written “meaning”, then assign a color. For a collection, it is also possible to mute it.

Editing a pictogram or collection

It is possible to modify the image of a pictogram or collection from the “Options” menu. Here are the four editing options:

It is also possible to modify the “Speech” and “Meaning”.

Sidebar

Like other AAC applications, you can pin pictograms or collections in a sidebar. They will then be highlighted and accessible at any time.

Settings

In this settings menu, you can change:

1. The size of the interface and pictograms
2. The phrase display time
3. Protection from accidental editing via a calculation
4. Automatic pronunciation of pictograms on click

If you click on the “Languages” symbol, you will reach the second panel:

Here, you can change the display language and voice synthesis.

In the next tutorial, we will explore Pictalk AAC’s sharing features in a professional use context.