Getting started

On a phone or a tablet held upright, Kalam turns the bottom of the screen into one large switch, labelled SELECT.

The person does not need to touch individual words. They press the large switch while Kalam moves through the board, and press again when the thing they want lights up.

A highlight moves from group to group. Press on the group you want, and the highlight then moves through the choices inside it. Press again to select. After each selection the highlight returns to the start, so the next choice is predictable.

Nothing extra. The on-screen switch is built into Kalam and is already on wherever the board is running in a single column on a touch screen — a phone, or a tablet held upright. On a tablet held sideways it is available too, but you turn it on yourself in Settings → Switch & scanning.

The first press starts scanning — there is no separate “start scanning” button to find.

Before the first press, a line above the switch says what to do. Two more lines appear as scanning runs, one for each level, and then they stop for good. The board does not keep instructing someone who has understood.

Beside the switch there is a small ⓘ for you. It explains what the bar is, and it is only offered the first time — after that, Settings owns the subject.

Touch and scanning can both stay available, and often should — the same person may use both on the same day.

If you do not want the on-screen switch shown at all, open Settings → Switch & scanning → Switch on screen → Off. Settings is the only place this is turned on or off.

An external switch or a keyboard works at the same time as the on-screen switch. You do not have to choose.

Kalam will not hide the on-screen switch because another input was used. A keypress proves that another input worked; it does not prove that you want this one taken away, and taking it away could leave the person with no way to reach the board.

Kalam does not see your switch. It sees a keypress.

Anything that can send a supported keypress will work, which is why so many different devices do — and it is also why Kalam cannot show you a list of connected switches, or tell you a switch is “connected”. It only knows that a press arrived.

A keyboard already sends one: Space and Enter select, with no setup at all. That is the cheapest way to try scanning before buying anything.

Many adaptive switches — a cheek switch, a finger switch, a proximity switch or a large button — are simple physical switches with a cable and a 3.5 mm plug. They do not pair with a tablet by themselves, and you will not find them in its Bluetooth list.

A switch interface sits between the switch and the tablet or computer. When the person presses the switch, the interface turns that press into a keyboard-style input that Kalam can understand.

Some interfaces have more than one switch socket, and each socket can be set to send a different key. If one switch input works and another does nothing, check which key each socket is configured to send.

Pair or plug the device in using the tablet’s own Bluetooth or USB settings. Kalam does not pair anything itself, and nothing needs to be done inside Kalam at this stage.

Space, Enter and the number keys 1, 2 and 3 are recognised automatically. Most remotes send one of these.

If the device sends something else, open Caregiver Controls (the gear button) → External switch, press the switch once, then once more to confirm. Kalam learns that key alongside the ones it already accepts.

Space and Enter keep working whatever you set, so the person can never be locked out by a setting.

Different switches and interfaces send different keys. Test the whole setup — switch, interface, tablet — before relying on it for everyday communication.

Just press the switch. The first press after opening the board starts the scan automatically.

A highlight ring moves in two steps: first group by group — press on the group you want, and the highlight then moves through the choices inside it. Press again to select. After a selection the highlight returns to the start, so the next choice is predictable.

Have the person make a few real selections before you rely on it. Overshooting? Slow it down. One press being counted twice, or a twitchy switch? See the scanning settings below.

Stop at any time from Caregiver Controls → Stop scanning, or press ESC on a keyboard.

A caregiver stop is deliberate, and Kalam protects it: a switch knocked in the bedding will not bring scanning back on its own.

Start again with Start scanning in Caregiver Controls. If the on-screen switch is visible, the person can also press it to start again themselves.

You land on the Home screen: a message bar across the top, and six zones of tiles below it.

Each tile adds its word to the bar at the top. The bar is the message — real communication even before you press SPEAK, and the completed message stays visible whether or not it is ever spoken.

A few urgent tiles (like YES, NO, STOP) also speak the moment you tap them, and still add themselves to the bar.

For a word that isn’t a tile, tap ABC. Choose a letter group, then letters. Suggestions appear as you go — tap one, or tap ADD to add the word. Tap HOME to return; your message is kept.

Tap 123 for digits, units and time. Build the number, tap ADD, then HOME.

Tap SPEAK to say the whole bar aloud. Speaking doesn’t erase it — the message stays so you can add to it.

DELETE removes the last word. UNDO reverses your last change. CLEAR empties the message.

On a phone or an upright tablet, the on-screen switch is shown by default. Touch still works exactly as it does without it — it takes the strip at the bottom, nothing else.

If this person will only ever use touch, turn it off in Settings → Switch & scanning → Switch on screen → Off. Kalam remembers that choice on this device until you turn it back on.

Do this before you change anything. Whatever you customise is saved by the app you customised it in, and on an iPad the installed app keeps its own storage, separate from Safari — so a board you personalise in the browser can open blank from the home-screen icon. Installing first means doing the work once. On Android or Chrome, accept the install prompt, or open Settings → Install Kalam on this device. On iPad or iPhone, tap the Share button in Safari and choose “Add to Home Screen”. Then open Kalam from its new icon and do everything below from there.

Tap the gear button, then choose Edit communication. Two deliberate taps help prevent the board being edited by accident, without requiring a password.

On the Edit the board tab, tap any editable tile. Change its label (shown, up to 20 characters) and its spoken output (said, up to 60). Layout, positions, and action buttons are fixed on purpose — you change what a button says, never where it is.

Put real names on the people tiles, and the person’s own frequent phrases where the defaults don’t fit. Save each tile — a brief “Saved” confirms it. Leaving with unsaved changes asks before discarding.

On the Saved words tab, add the person’s own vocabulary so it surfaces as suggestions on the Spell screen — real accelerators for the words they actually use.

Open Settings from Caregiver Controls, then Switch & scanning. This is where access lives: External switch to test or teach a physical switch, Switch on screen to show or hide the on-screen switch, Scan speed, and Advanced scanning for the finer timing.

Decide this before you spend time on the words. How someone presses decides whether any of the rest is reachable.

In Settings, under Board: choose which screen Kalam opens on (Board, Spell or Numbers), and drag the Label size slider until words look right, using the live preview.

Before handing over, tap through the urgent and daily tiles and press SPEAK. Confirm each says the right thing. If a tile is silent, see Troubleshooting.

After customising the board, go to Settings → Backup → Download backup. You get a kalam-backup file holding all your customisation. Because Kalam does not keep a cloud copy, save it somewhere separate from the tablet.

Open Kalam in your browser and use it normally.

Open Kalam once from its home-screen icon while you still have internet — that first launch is what fills its offline store. After that it opens from the icon with no connection at all.

Turn on airplane mode and open Kalam again from its icon. Home, Spell, Numbers, your saved message, and all settings should load. Then press SPEAK to check the voice offline too — on some devices the voice needs installing for offline use (see “The voice disappears offline”). If speech doesn’t work offline, the completed message still shows in the message bar.

On a new device — or if the icon opens a blank board because this device was customised in the browser before it was installed — open Kalam → Settings → Backup → Choose backup file… → pick your backup. Kalam shows a summary first (customised tiles, saved words, language) and only replaces the setup after you confirm. Then test it offline.