New mobile applications in the benefit of students with verbal disabilities

This paper reports the results of two ERASMUS+ projects which aimed to design and develop mobile applications for the benefit of disadvantaged groups. The aim of the first project was the creation of digital learning resources for mobile devices to improve the educational integration of disadvantaged learners in the educational system -groups in risk whose ethnocultural characteristics, special needs or socioeconomic status significantly restrict their ability for adequate education. The second project focused on social integration of people with verbal communication disorders that are at risk of social isolation by using mobile devices adapted to their needs. The research started with a systematic needs analyses in order to understand the basic characteristics of the target groups and to prepare its pedagogicalpsychological profile. This helped us build a conceptual model, corresponding to the skills, knowledge, competence, abilities and specific needs of the group, for which the digital resources for learning and communicating would be developed. The outcomes of the projects were two different adaptive and personalized software tools and two large databases with images and videos designed by educators and tutors and shared by the project community. Pilot stages confirmed the usefulness and the consistency of the new mobile applications for the specific kind of disadvantaged groups.