Being able to communicate at a high level is what drastically shifted our entire species into what it is today. Storytelling, strategizing, and even expressing ourselves emotionally are essential to living in a society. Not everyone, however, will find it easy or natural to develop those essential social skills as they grow up.

Autistic children, in particular, struggle with understanding unwritten and especially unsaid rules about communication. Some may be selectively mute. Others may get frustrated by the unwritten rules of the world that exist, but they don’t understand why.

There are so many reasons why your kid may find it difficult to communicate, or why communicating with your kid feels impossible. This is because those who are not autistic aren’t using the same language, so to speak, and getting frustrated when the message doesn’t land or the response doesn’t live up to your expectations.

The first step to communicating better with your child is to throw out all your expectations and start working on their level. The second step is to use these top communication apps to help your autistic child learn how to express themselves and build up their vocabulary:

All-in-One Autism Apps

There are many autism apps for kids designed to help them with their communication skills. If you only invest in one, however, choose the all-in-one option like Autism 360. This way, you can gain benefits such as direct support from a licensed therapists all the way to workshops and communication and vocabulary-building activities.

Community Building Apps

It’s so important to have people around you who are like you. Yes, you don’t want to keep your kid in a vacuum, but having no one who thinks like them can be very isolating. That’s why it’s so important to help them build their own community. This can be done by getting in touch with parent groups and organizing play dates, but it can also be done right in-app as well, so long as the app in question supports that feature.

Speech-Specific Applications

If you are happy to invest in more than one app, however, then you have a host of options available to you. There’s Proloquo2Go, for example, Otsimo Speech Therapy, Speak Easy Home Speech Therapy, and more.

Some apps help kids expand their vocabulary by giving them ways to put words to how they feel. Others act as full communication devices, letting those with mutism communicate in ways they couldn’t before. By building up their vocabulary, letting them customize the words they use, and using effective speech therapy routines, you can help give your child a voice – regardless of whether they speak aloud, or not.

Let Them Build Their Own Routine

Communication isn’t just about expressing oneself, either. It’s about making choices in life and learning to trust yourself. A good way to do this while collaborating with you, the parents, is with decision-making apps. These apps help autistic children learn decision-making skills and makes it possible so that they can build their own routine based on what they need in a day. Even just a small amount of control over their lives can help them feel calmer, more in charge, and listened to in ways that talking alone can’t provide.