Tech Support: Meet Mac

James “Mac” Starnes, 15, walks into the band room at Lake Mary High School and sets down his backpack.

He pulls out his sheet music and places it on the music stand in front of the endless line of drums, cymbals and chimes. He’s a percussionist in the marching band, and today he’s practicing cymbals.

The band room soon fills with laugher and chattering boys’ voices as Mac’s classmates also prepare for practice.

Mac smiles as his fellow percussionists talk and joke. When he wants to chime in — he can’t speak — he pulls an iPod Touch from his pocket and begins to type.

His classmates listen to the voice from his iPod, which says what Mac types out.

He no longer has to use American Sign Language or lug around a big computer to communicate. He can do it all with a device the size of his hand.

“I love this,” Mac said via the iPod program. “It’s smaller and easier to use.”

Mac was born with Congenital Bilateral Perisylvian Syndrome (CBPS) and also had a tracheostomy.

But with his iPod Touch, Mac’s outgoing, friendly personality can shine through and he can communicate with his family, friends and teachers with very little difficulty.

“Between his personality and this new communication device, he’s been able to make a lot of friends,” said Marty Varner, an Assistive Technology Specialist with Seminole County Public Schools. “And for a kid that can’t talk, this opens up their world.”

Touch to speak

When Mac pulls out his iPod Touch in class, it’s not to listen to music or play a game. The mp3 player is loaded with the iTunes program Proloquo2Go, which is a full-featured communication program that gives Mac the ability to type out or preprogram what he wants it to say for him.

“He uses it when he has a long question and communication between us is getting better because I can understand him more now,” said Michael Mitchell, Mac’s band teacher.

Mac has already given speeches with his iPod Touch, one of them to a graduate level special education class on assistive technology at the University of Tennessee, his parents’ alma mater.

iCanSpeak Campaign

The Seminole County Augmentative/Assistive Technology Team is sponsoring the iCanSpeak Campaign, which loads donated iPod Touches and iPhones with the Proloquo2Go program to give to students like Mac.

“It’s easy because it’s small and [Mac] doesn’t have to hit too many buttons to get his point across, and he doesn’t get tired using it,” Varner said. “He puts it in his pocket, and he’s good to go.”

Varner said one of the good things about being able to use iPhones or iPod Touches for this is that other students aren’t intimidated by Mac using it.

“He’s finding that he’s getting a lot more kids communicating with him now because of this,” Varner said.

Mac has used different communication devices since he was an infant, and though he has limited use of his hands, he’s able to use his thumbs to play video games.

“We decided to put an iPod Touch into his hands to see if he could use it, and he just took off with it,” Varner said.

He keeps it clipped to his belt and slides it back into his pocket when he’s done.

The mission

The Augmentative/Assistive Technology Team is made up of speech therapists, occupational therapists, physical therapists and vision specialists who assess students and test different methods to aid in their communication.

The team started looking into iPads, iPod Touches and iPhones at the end of last year because of the array of free applications that are available to download as well as ones that can be purchased like Proloquo2Go, which is what Mac has.

Varner said 10 students in Seminole County are using iPod Touches and three are using iPads.

“There are so many people that are upgrading their iPhones and iPods right now,” Varner said. “If they would donate them, we could put this program onto them and try to get this out into other kids’ hands because Mac has been so successful with it.”

The future

Mac’s mother, Linda Starnes, wants other kids to have the same opportunities as Mac.

“This wonderful campaign and this assistive technology are dear to our hearts,” Linda said. “So we said, let’s pull together and see if we can get something going for other kids too.”

Mac said he wants to be a preacher when he grows up. More specifically, “a pastor who travels around the world and spreads the word of God.”

And when asked what he would say to encourage others like him, Mac said, “God will be with you always, even in the hard times.”