Over the years, we've heard many stories about the Apple Watch has changed
people's lives through its fitnesses and health features
<https://9to5mac.com/guides/apple-health/> . This weekend, a new feature
from
<https://people.com/human-interest/texas-dad-apple-watch-noise-app-helped-so
n-autism/> People tells the story of how the Noise app in watchOS 6 has
helped a 21-year-old in Texas with autism improve his social skills.
Scott Bennett tells People that his youngest son Sam had always struggled to
keep his speaking voice down, despite being a social butterfly:
Sam, 21, is on the autism spectrum, and though he's the epitome of a social
butterfly - "People just fall in love with him," Scott tells PEOPLE - he's
long struggled with an exceptionally loud speaking voice. "He just never had
the ability to modulate it," says Scott, 59. "For years we've been
struggling with this, since he started talking. and the voice level is
really, really, really loud."
According to Scott, Sam will initially respond to being asked to use his
"inside voice," but that is only temporarily and his voice gradually gets
louder again. For the Bennett family, this significantly hinders their
ability to go places together:
"We just can't go places. He's also got a short attention span, too, so you
put all these things together, and it's hard on the family," says Scott.
"You learn to adapt, but it's always tough, and especially for a guy like me
who thrives on silence, I got blessed with the loudest human being on the
planet."
That's where the Apple Watch's noise app comes into play. After updating his
Apple Watch to watchOS 6, Scott noticed the new Noise app - and he instantly
thought of how it could help Sam with his communication skills. At this
point, Scott says he had "tried everything" else with no luck.
"My first thought was, 'I gotta try this with Sam. Why didn't I think of
this sooner?' Because we had tried everything," Scott says.
Scott then showed Sam how the Noise app on Apple Watch works, including how
the decibel measure increases in real-time based on volume level. Sam was
instantly able to use the Noise app to monitor the volume of his own voice:
"He immediately saw that and started using his own voice to make it work,
and then immediately started talking really quietly," he says. "I was like,
you gotta be kidding me. My wife Cristy is not gonna believe this. I don't
believe what I'm seeing."
Now, when Sam is speaking too loudly, Scott says that he can "simply flash
Sam his watch to adjust his volume." Scott says that using the Noise app to
monitor Sam's volume level makes "things a lot more tolerable for us and our
family."
"There's 5 million of these folks [with special needs] out there, and every
one of them is different, and has different issues and needs. And it's
really hard to make use of all the technology that's out there," Scott says.
"I'm sure there's other things out there that my son could benefit from,
it's just, who has the time to go through them and sort through all these
things? I just happened to see one thing and it really made a difference for
me, and I'm excited enough to want to share with other people."
By Chance Miller at:
https://9to5mac.com/2019/11/16/apple-watch-noise-app-texas-family/#more-6202
46
===========================================================
The fb-exchange mailing list
Manage account, subscribe or unsubscribe:
//www.freelists.org/list/fb-exchange
Archives: //www.freelists.org/archives/fb-exchange ;
Administrative contact: insight@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
===========================================================
