Inspiration
From my years as a practicing physician, I have learned the importance of keeping the mind sharp as we age. A few years after I retired, Alexa was rolled out and I was amazed at the technology, the potential for advances in every aspect of our world, and the excellent support provided that enabled a retiree like me to learn how to build Alexa Skills. Since then I have built 31 certified Skills, many related to health and several that use laughter as medicine. Your Memory Challenge was designed to help the user improve their listening skills.
What it does
Every time Your Memory Challenge is opened, it sequentially gives the user 5 different stories composed of only a few sentences with a question about each. The Skill responds to each answer and tracks the number correct compared to the number of questions answered.
How I built it
It was built with JavaScript and supports Alexa Presentation Language (APL). I paid special attention to being very directive so the user is guided specifically on how to frame their answer.
Challenges I ran into
The main one was to make sure the questions were randomized and not repeated.
Accomplishments that I'm proud of
I'm proud that I was able to succeed in meeting the challenges noted above & especially that it was recertified within 30 minutes of submission!
What I learned
I learned the value of the Utterance Recommendations in the Developer Console, as well as how to use a JavaScript function to prevent the repetition of one of the questions within each set of five.
What's next for Your Memory Challenge
The addition of new stories and questions. Also, I am considering telling the user the correct answer when they answer incorrectly, though I'm not sure if that is the best approach to help the user improve their listening ability. I'll have to do a little research about that.
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