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Review by Dana Villamagna, Common Sense Education | Updated January 2013

My Video Schedule

Name: My Video Schedule
Item: My Video Schedule
Rating: 4
Author: Dana Villamagna

Special-needs scheduler for daily tasks; customizable for kids' use

Subjects & skills

Grades This grade range is a recommendation by Common Sense Education and not the developer/publisher.

Pre-K–12

Great for:

Common Sense says (See details)

Teachers say (2 Reviews)

Take a look inside

4 images

Stock photos and videos with audio help users anticipate a situation.

The activity template guide users through the schedule-creating process.

Select rewards or create your own to encourage kids to follow the scheduled items.

Activities range from practical everyday life skills to occasional appointments.

Pros: Best for individual use, it's a great way to model routines and predictable outcomes for kids who need help with these parts of daily functioning.

Cons: Some of the stock images are stereotypical and lack diversity, but you can customize schedules with your own images and videos.

Bottom Line: Activity scheduling helps give structure -- the visual cues help students connect routines with their outcomes.

How Can I Teach with This Tool?

My Video Schedule can be a useful tool to help offer predictability and consistency to students who struggle with transitions, new situations, or maintaining a schedule. It's best to add personally relevant images and videos that correspond to your student's daily schedule. Individualizing these specific tasks can be particularly meaningful and engaging for students. Rewards are also customizable to help encourage and engage.

The app is best for individual use, and classroom teachers should take special care to use the password-protection feature so students can't access all image options, some of which aren't intended for young children. Also, teachers may suggest that parents use the app at home to maximize consistency and establish regularity with this type of schedule system.

What Is It?

My Video Schedule is a scheduling app made especially for adults and students with special needs like autism. The app includes photo and video modeling as well as a rewards system for scheduled activities and behaviors. The library of photos and videos includes actions like putting on a jacket, eating lunch, going to special classes, and getting on a school bus, among many others.

Admin Mode allows teachers to set up scheduled tasks and events. After selecting a date and time, teachers can add one of the 100-plus pre-loaded photos or videos most closely related to a given activity or event. Teachers can also add their own custom media to help personalize the experience. Rewards can come in many forms, whether they're animal crackers, a DVD, or even just a happy-face icon. Events can be set up as one time only or repeating for regular activities. Students can view a rewards page after clicking Finish on an activity or task.

Is It Good for Learning?

The My Video Schedule app is designed to help people who struggle with structure, time management, and motivation; with a teacher's careful use, it can be effective at helping kids cope with these important parts of daily life. Scheduling activities with corresponding videos can help kids learn to make smoother transitions when changing activities. The app's rewards system helps build motivation and can help increase independence at school, at home, or in the community.

My Video Schedule's stock images tend toward the stereotypical -- for example, doctors and dentists are male, and there's a lack of cultural diversity. However, this weakness can be addressed by adding your own images and videos, which students are likely to find much more meaningful, anyway. For students who respond well to visual cues and rewards, My Video Schedule may be an invaluable tool to help reinforce structure and necessary tasks in their daily school schedule.

Rating Details

Overall Rating

Engagement Is the product stimulating, entertaining, and engrossing? Will kids want to return?

With careful one-on-one use, the images, videos, rewards, and gentle schedule reminders, can help engage kids in the process of following daily routines.

Pedagogy Is learning content seamlessly baked-in, and do kids build conceptual understanding? Is the product adaptable and empowering? Will skills transfer?

Kids with special needs can learn life skills through this simplified medium. By increasing predictability and easing transitions, kids may not feel as frustrated with our sometimes hectic world.

Support Does the product take into account learners of varying abilities, skill levels, and learning styles? Does it address both struggling and advanced students?

There are more than 100 videos and images already available on the app -- users can also personalize with their own. The scheduler is easy enough that some kids could make their own entries.

Common Sense Reviewer

Dana Villamagna Classroom teacher

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Teacher Reviews

(See all 2 reviews) (2 reviews)

Featured review by
Emily S. , Technology coordinator

Technology coordinator

Holly Hills Elementary School
Denver, CO

My Video Schedule is pricey, but a good tool for students with autism

This app was significantly more expensive than what I usually pay for apps. It cost $11.99, but it really is worth it for something I use with my son everyday, and it keeps him from having a meltdown when the schedule changes because he is prepared ahead of time. I would recommend it for any student that has trouble with changes in the schedule. Although it is very motivating, it does take a lot of time to set up. You can create recurring events, which is helpful, and you can use your calendar on your phone to add events. It makes you give a reward for each item on the agenda, which I didn't necessary like. Although I like the option of adding a reward, sometimes I just wanted it on the schedule. You can control the amount of time the reward lasts, and there are options such as a thumbs up which allow you to limit the stakes of the reward, but I would prefer the choice not to have a reward. There are pros and cons, but the bottom line is that I would recommend this app.

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