A fun, interactive, and adaptive auditory training app for children with hearing loss — built in partnership with the Texas Hearing Institute.
| Home Screen | Exercise Screen | Results Screen |
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Texas Hearing Institute (THI) is the most comprehensive pediatric hearing loss organization in Texas. In addition to specialized audiology, speech therapy, early childhood education, and family support services, THI provides compassionate care and hope to children and families affected by hearing loss.
THI Spondee is a mobile application designed to address a core gap in current auditory training methods: lack of interactivity and motivation. Traditional exercises tend to produce limited engagement and progress. This app delivers:
- 🎮 Fun & interactive exercises that feel like a game
- 🔄 Adaptive difficulty that adjusts to each child's progress
- 📊 Assessment tools to track auditory skill development
- 🌍 Multilingual support (in development)
The app focuses on spondee word recognition — a standard clinical tool in audiology where two-syllable words with equal stress (like "baseball" or "hotdog") are used to assess hearing thresholds and speech perception.
- Adaptive Spondee Exercises — Dynamically adjusts difficulty based on the child's performance
- Child-Friendly UI — Designed for young users with intuitive interactions and engaging visuals
- Progress Tracking — Session history and auditory skill development metrics
- Audio Playback — Clear, high-quality audio prompts for each exercise
- Multilingual Support (planned) — Support for non-English speaking families
- Therapist Dashboard (planned) — Tools for audiologists and educators to monitor patient progress
- Framework: Expo (React Native)
- Language: TypeScript
- Audio: Expo AV
- Navigation: Expo Router
- Node.js (v18 or higher) or Bun
- Expo Go app on your iOS or Android device (for physical device testing)
- Xcode (for iOS simulator) or Android Studio (for Android emulator)
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Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/your-org/thi-spondee.git cd thi-spondee -
Install dependencies
npm install
or with Bun:
bun install
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Start the development server
npx expo start
or with Bun:
bun run start
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Run on a device or simulator
After starting the server, press:
i— open in iOS Simulatora— open in Android Emulator- Scan the QR code with Expo Go on your phone
- RiceApps — for providing the opportunity and organization support to bring this project to life
- Texas Hearing Institute — for their mission to provide compassionate care and hope to children and families affected by hearing loss