How to Develop Special Education Software? 

No barriers to learning and studying. No reason not to socialize and not share learning experiences. Special education is here to advance education for students of different possibilities. 

Dedicated educators who are interested in the student’s progress always strive to implement new software and tools to meet the unique needs of students. Partnering with the right software provider can make a difference in unlocking students’ potential. In this article, we’ll present the notion of special education, the top must-integrate features in special education, and tips to develop this software from scratch or integrate the existing one in the learning process. With our guide, you can better compare products when assessing special education apps and LMS platforms that are practical for your specific institution’s or district’s needs.

What is Special Education Software?

Special education software is a purposefully designed product based on specific criteria used in learning to help students with special needs. It helps teachers and administrators effectively manage and deliver support, form their individualized education plans, and handle all the aspects of individualized education programs. These programs are agreed upon by educators and parents to address the unique needs and learning goals of every student. Students with disabilities, learning difficulties, and gifted and talented individuals participating in special programs are all included. Special education software offers features for better collaboration among educators and stakeholders, ensuring compliance with legal regulations. One of its main functions is facilitating IEP compliance checks and evaluations and streamlining the production of IEPs and evaluating documents. Special education software that prioritizes accessibility, customization, usability, data management, and compliance can meet the different needs of learners and support their educational journey. However, to qualify the education software product for inclusion in the Special Education category, the product must incorporate strict guidelines. They should have features specifically designed for individualized education programs, include intervention tools, and have an elaborate personalized learning program. Other imperative features we’ll discover in the next sections. 

The Role of Accessibility in Special Education Software

If you’re the client who wants to develop this software or the education provider responsible for selecting the proper curriculum software for your program; the article is for you. You’ll find practical tips for your queries. 

When selecting the special software for your classrooms or considering developing such a product, you should consider factors that are critical to meeting the unique needs of the learners. The following factors are important both for educators and developers when considering special software selection or development: the software should be comprehensive, accessible, and easy to use. It should have an intuitive interface and provide step-by-step guidance through all challenging learner areas. 

Accessibility in education software means equal access and opportunities for every student, regardless of their physical, sensory, cognitive, or other disabilities. It’s a critical aspect of special education that guarantees that students with special needs can effectively acquire information, interact in inclusive educational environments equally, and have no gaps between peers without disabilities. 

Years ago, we understood accessibility from a different angle. We addressed the physical needs of available classrooms, libraries, materials, and easy transportation like elevators, disabled parking, and ramps. But as the digital world continues to advance, accessibility shows another angle. Today, more institutions find LMSs and resources to help students, from remotely accessible content to assistive technology integration and personalized experiences to collaborative learning environments. Some of the most common conditions where accessibility streamlines the educational environment are visual and hearing impairments, autism, motor disabilities, ADHD, cognitive disabilities, speech and language disorders, and emotional and behavioral disorders.

What is Accessibility

A concept of accessibility goes beyond simply addressing physical needs in the classroom environment. It encompasses a holistic understanding of the diverse needs of students and considers various factors that can impact their ability to learn and participate effectively. 

The industry of e-learning has grown by 90% globally since COVID-2019. We’ll examine which challenges students can face and how assistive technology in special education software development can help them overcome diverse issues. There is a vast range of forms of violations and restrictions among students, and below, we define the most common forms of special needs. 

Hearing

Students with hearing disabilities. The question remains: how can we support their learning and communication needs? First, sign language interpreters during lectures can streamline communication between students and educators. Secondly, captioning and transcripts for audio content, instructional videos, and multimedia presentations allow them to easily grasp the information. Also, assistive listening devices, equipped with a microphone, amplifier, and receiver, focus on improving speech and lowering ambient noise. In turn, students get an enriched listening experience, even in environments with substantial background noise. Thanks to AI power, transcription of the video and audio content is possible in real-time sessions.

Vision

Students with visual disabilities benefit from assistive educational technology. Screen reading software, braille displays, and optical character recognition software can convert digital text on a device screen, allowing students to interact with content and sync with other peers. The integration of personalized, accessible reading devices such as BrailleNote Apex has almost all the functions of an ordinary PC. Such devices have a Braille display with raised buttons so that students with visual disabilities can better feel them. Mobile accessibility applications with features like voice commands, gesture-based navigation, and high-contrast interferences can help students with note-taking, communication, and overall productivity. By integrating assistive technology tools, educators can create an inclusive learning environment, helping students access needed elearning platforms and improve their academic progress. 

Mobility within device

Students with special disabilities may encounter difficulties in effectively navigating educational mobile apps. Mobile edtech apps can lack sufficient accessibility features to adapt to the needs of learners. Thus, they may not be compatible with screen readers, have irrelevant color contrast, or have complex interfaces with multiple menus and navigation pathways. All clicks and gestures should be customizable so that physical restrictions don’t interfere with navigation.

Literacy 

According to research by the Human Resource Management Academic Research Society, the gap in literacy is one of the rising issues in the education field among students with learning disabilities. The findings show that a deficiency in parental awareness regarding children’s disabilities results in delayed interventions for them. One of the ways to develop their literacy skills is to conduct a few intervention programs. Educators can get students involved in mutual work with other people to allow them to learn together. Instead of doing simulations in classes, social interactions with peers can boost their interest in learning and help them adapt to different scenarios better. Interactive games, videos, animations, and hands-on activities can engage students and expand their literacy skills through various gamified education activities. Another way concerns special education software, which can offer activities like phonics and decoding practice, vocabulary development, reading comprehension, and writing practice with educators’ feedback. Not the least important, it’s necessary to promote parent involvement through parent portals, progress reports, and home learning activities to encourage literacy-rich activities.

Key takeaway 

Importantly, special education software can function properly only with the coordinators required. It’s handled by many stakeholders, and all of them can meet better due dates and milestones. Special education directors, coordinators, behavior intervention specialists, assisted technology specialists, and occupational and physical therapists are all involved in improving the learning experience for students with disabilities. Such a streamlined approach by all the stakeholders helps them analyze all the use cases and students’ learning behavior to make informed measures, set personalized goals, and deliver support services efficiently.

Who Should Implement Accessibility and Why?

The development process of special education software requires the involvement of the following professionals: 

UX/UI Designers are responsible for creating easy-to-use and navigated interfaces. All the buttons and menus should be easy to click on, the text should be readable, and everything should work well with assistive technologies like screen readers. Designers should use clear and consistent layouts and predictable placement of navigation elements, buttons, and interactive components. The high color contrast between text and background elements isn’t the least important. Other important aspects of designers’ work are using descriptive text and alt text, ensuring keyboard accessibility, and providing focus indicators. Incorporating user testing is a needed step to improve accessibility iteratively and address errors in the user experience.

Developers should know how to structure and style the content of web pages. Using semantic HTML is important for the logical and meaningful organization of all the elements. Through roles and attributes, the developers can determine the purpose and behavior of elements.

Testers and Quality Assurance professionals should conduct accessibility testing through manual testing and automated testing tools to identify common issues. Through scanning the pages for violations, they form detailed reports on areas that should be fixed. Testing across different environments, including devices, browsers, and platforms also ensures compatibility and consistency of special education software.

Online learning platforms are a beneficial inclusion for education businesses. For you, as a business owner, the driving factors to implement accessibility tools into your special education software are:

1. You can reach more students regardless of their abilities and provide them with equal access to educational resources and opportunities. 

2. You improve the user experience. Education shouldn’t be seen as an additional effort for some students. It should be accessible to everyone. So, while designing your software, you should strive to accommodate students with permanent disabilities like hearing or vision or temporary disabilities like broken arms. 

3. You increase your sales. Approximately one out of every four (27%) adults in the United States has some form of disability. Satisfied users will likely recommend your product to others, and it will generate an overall profit. 

4. You should follow rules and regulations. In October 2019, Guillermo Robles, a blind man, sued Domino’s Pizza’s app because he couldn’t order food because of no screen-reading software. He won the case in the court. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that any digital platform or app should comply with accessibility standards.

5. You reach high-performance marketing. Web accessibility of your solution increases performance marketing, including campaign reach, SEO ranking, click-through rates, and conversion.

Reasons Your Business Needs Special Education Software

Equal access to education

By promoting equal access to education, you show your ethical attitude toward every individual. As a result, you reach more learners and increase the reputation of your company. Every student feels part of the team, which boosts their motivation to study and keep up with their peers. 

Personalization and flexibility in learning

Through special education software, along with many accessibility features, you allow educators to personalize the learning material for learners of different needs, levels, and preferences. Educators can set strict goals for diverse learners, and by providing tailored education plans and instructions, they ensure that learners get the needed interventions to achieve academic results.

Enhanced interaction

Web accessibility gives users clear navigation, easy-to-use and understandable content, and practical features that simplify the process of accessing resources and information.

Insights from analytics

Analytics allows educators to get and visualize insights into students’ performance and academic behavior to identify challenges they may face. Special education teachers and administrators monitor learners’ progress, define gaps, and propose practical measures to support their development.

Effectiveness of educators

A professional software product promotes enhanced communication and fosters transparency and collaboration within the educational community, ultimately leading to improved results for students with special needs. With special education software, teachers have all the tools and resources they need to streamline administrative tasks and deliver differentiated learning. By minimizing their administrative tasks, they can focus more on analytics, personalizing content, and offering students new opportunities to engage them in the learning environment.

Parents participation

Parents become active in supporting their kids. By getting access to real-time progress data and communication channels with educators, parents can participate in meaningful collaboration with the education community, including educators, administrators, and their kids. 

Savings to company

By releasing special education software to the market, you can allow educators to reduce paperwork and optimize their resources properly. They can apply fewer errors, automate their administrative processes, and maximize their participation in advancing education. If your software is used for a specific company, the users of the software can make significant cost savings for specific businesses over time. 

Compliance with standards and policies

Behind the development of special education software, there are strict regulations and policies. The software provides tools and features to support documentation and accountability, which accordingly help businesses meet regulatory standards and show transparency before stakeholders, like government agencies, accreditation bodies, and funding sources. By following regulations properly, the institution ensures no legal-related risks and protection of the institution’s image.

Competitiveness

When using special education software and constantly enhancing the learning resources and procedures, the institution increases the quality and efficiency of its special education apps. In turn, by implementing advanced technologies and innovative features into your software, you attract more parents and students interested in getting a high-quality educational experience.

Must Integrate Features in Special Education Software Development

In special education software development, various features contribute to the final product’s success, much like ingredients in a dish enhance its taste. So, selecting high-quality ingredients is essential for creating impactful special education software. Let’s see which they are. 

User-friendly interface

The user-friendly design of the app impacts the visitor’s time on your website or app. Students with disabilities should easily navigate needed resources instead of navigating cluttered interfaces. 75% of users prefer a simple and clean design; industry statistics say that minimalist app design increases user engagement and retention rates. What’s more, when it comes to SEO, it has its cons. Since a simple design requires less code and content on the page, the loading time and performance are quicker and better. 

Accessibility 

As we’ve mentioned in earlier sections, accessibility features offer every student an inclusive learning environment. All can fully participate in educational activities without barriers to access. All have equal opportunities and support for personal needs. Assistive technologies and customizable settings for accommodations provide the students with complete control of their learning, fostering a sense of empowerment and confidence.

Customized user experience

To target two audiences – educators and students—the software should offer teaching and learning paths with dynamic activities. While teachers can upload lectures and tests, schedule, conduct, and record their live sessions, students attend online lectures, download material, and track their assignment scores on their profiles. The inclusion of customization options enriches the overall user experience for educators and students, ensuring that their needs and preferences are met. Educators can tailor their teaching materials and activities to suit their teaching style and the needs of their students whereas students can personalize their learning experience by choosing how they engage with the content and manage their learning journey.

Chat with a teacher

The ability to interact with educators is sometimes not a zone of comfort for the students. Fear of judgment, lack of confidence, and power dynamics may be the core challenges. By integrating chat with a teacher into the app, you automatically create a supportive learning environment where students feel valued, respected, and encouraged to communicate openly.

Gamification

You shouldn’t be afraid of the concept of gamification. Gamification is more than just playing games; it’s about applying game-like elements to non-game contexts, such as learning environments, to boost student engagement and motivation. The gamified format of learning can tap into learners’ intrinsic motivation, allowing them to solve challenges and persist in their efforts, even when faced with challenges.

Block mode of teaching

Block mode of teaching allows learners to see the mark of passing specific blocks in learning. It gives a sense of achievement to the learners and they then can focus on the next modules. Through this feature, the learners see their sequential progression from basic concepts to more complex ones. Educators can customize settings to accommodate different blocks of students’ learning styles, preferences, and needs. 

Progress tracking

Progress tracking offers learners a clear visualization of their academic journey and accomplishments. Students, in turn, have the right sense of direction and motivation and know which areas they still need to focus on. 

Multiformat content

Through multiformat content, it’s more efficient to grasp the students’ attention. Plus, multiformat content focuses on different learning styles and types of students. It’s critical not to forget that all students are different in retaining and processing information. Visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinesthetic – all types of learners should be considered when developing this type of software. Multiformat content includes text-based activities like articles and instructions, audio elements such as audio narrations and transcripts, visual aids like images and animations, and interactive features such as simulations and quizzes. Additionally, assistive technologies such as screen readers and text-to-speech software enhance accessibility for people with disabilities. By offering a range of content formats, educators can ensure an inclusive and engaging learning process for all users.

Alerts 

Reminding students about schedules and course updates can help them organize their workload and prioritize their tasks. There’s a higher chance to get students’ interest and make them informed and connected with their peers. Alerts and critical updates on education programs can also reduce missed deadlines and overlooked tasks. 

Cross-platform compatibility

Cross-platform compatibility ensures seamless accessibility and usability across different devices and operating systems. By integrating this feature, it’s more efficient to reach a broader audience of users. They all get flexibility, convenience, and inclusivity in learning. 

Note

Just as the quality of ingredients affects the taste of a dish, the quality of each component in software impacts its usability and effectiveness. Using high-quality design elements, well-written code, and evidence-based educational content ensures that the software meets the needs of students and educators.

Special Education Software Development: Key Steps to Consider

How to develop special education software? Being well on your way to education software development means at least following the next steps.

Market research

To make your software competitive, you should focus on the market, trends, and challenges in the education sector. By the way, in our blog, we overview the E-Learning App Market in 2023-2025. Consider what is already available on the market and what you wish to see. You can research what features competitors offer and what clients look for in educational products. Try to identify any gaps and opportunities for innovation and creativity. 

Conceptualization

Brainstorming your idea isn’t a less critical stage than the very development. What problem do you want to solve, which functionality to include, and whom to target? A detailed plan with your goals, project scope, timeline, and resources will allow you to estimate efforts, project costs, time, and resources for development. 

UX/UI design 

Only user-friendly special education apps with an intuitive and easy-to-understand interface can engage an audience. Especially the students with disabilities. Minimalism can increase the chances of your software succeeding. You should think about how the users will interact with your software and ensure that the navigation, features, and internal interaction within the software are pleasant for everyone. 

Development and testing

Although development and testing should be logically separated into two stages, they always function together. To make the development smooth and bug-free, you should implement many iterations and tests. Using the latest technologies and coding practices is foremost. Regularly test the software and catch any bugs and glitches before it goes live. 

Top-Rated Special Education Apps

1. Proloquo2Go

Proloquo2Go is an augmentative app for autistic students, serving as a practical daily communication tool to build the language skills of individuals. With integrated assistive tools, systems, and strategies, it provides high flexibility and personalization for individual needs and disabilities. Symbol-based communication includes 27,000 symbols to allow users to communicate effectively through recognizable images. Integrated Crescendo™ grammar support promotes language growth by teaching students to move from simple to complex sentences. Availability in four languages, customization, accessibility, and an active community are other useful features the app provides. 

2. Speech Blubs

Speech Blubs is another high-rated, unique voice-controlled speech therapy app for kids with Don syndrome, articulation issues, or ASD. The app helps children with disabilities learn new sounds and words and practice speaking. It offers 1500+ activities to trigger sound and word production, voice-activated functionality, and 24 fun modules, from shapes and colors to singing along. Kids watch and repeat, role plays by taking pictures with fun face filters and listen to their progress. On the official site of the app, parents can find real-life use cases of how the app helped different kids develop.

3. MindNode

Special education students with ADHD often find it difficult to concentrate during lessons or homework time, follow instructions, or accomplish tasks requiring mental exertion. MindNode is an app that helps students efficiently visualize their thoughts through many features, including mind maps. These maps are efficient, even for writing papers. For instance, the Outline helps users brainstorm in a structured manner. With Visual Tags, users can categorize and add more context to their thoughts by prioritizing ideas and focusing on otherwise unrelated ideas. These and other features, including blocking out distractions, progress tracking, quick entry, and stickers, can be found in MindNode.

4. ClassDojo

ClassDojo is a universal classroom management and communication app that fosters a positive, engaging, and interactive environment for students, parents, and educators. The teachers provide real-time feedback, track the performance of the students, and share updates with parents. The parents in turn monitor their children’s progress, view announcements, and maintain direct communication with teachers.

5. Choiceworks

Children with autism and other special needs who struggle to make choices, manage their emotions, and complete daily routines can do it with the Choiceworks app. The schedule board allows children to see the completion of their tasks and visualize their daily routines. The waiting screen allows them to learn to be patient and instead of passively waiting, they do some cognitive, educational, and engaging activities. Feeling boards and choice boards with many pictures and symbols are other integrated features that help users develop their social learning skills and express themselves through their portfolios.

Conclusion

Special education software can reduce barriers and unequal opportunities for quality education. Using elearning platforms, education stakeholders, parents, and students can achieve equality and accessibility. When developing learning software, it’s highly critical to consider students with learning disabilities to incorporate the tools that can be practical for their special needs. 

When integrating technology into the education sector, it functions well underway. If you wish to build special education software, you should analyze whether you have the right skills and potential for this development. To achieve success, you should know the tech stack and how it works, and find the best strategy for software development. If you don’t have enough expertise, you can either reach out to a third-party software development company or hire an outsourced development team that can control the entire development cycle and get you informed about the potential of your product.