Speak Selection tool and Voice Over in the latest iOS5 operating system for iPhones, iPads and iPods

For those using the latest iOS5 operating system for iPhones, iPads and iPods, try the Speak Selection tool in the accessibility area. The pathway is Settings/General/Accessibility/Speak Selection, once this feature is turned on it can speak text on applications that allow you to copy text, e.g. information on web pages. Make sure you slow the speed of the text to speech down, as it speaks very fast.

Once turned on, hold your finger on the text you want read, adjust the active copy box if necessary by dragging out the edges of the highlighted area, you will then have a choice of Copy or Speak, tap speak and hear the text.

Its been a hit with the students and people I have shown and is easier than the voice over for some students.

There are a few new accessibility features for those with different learning difficulties, have a play and see if they suit any of your students or family members.

There is also a voice over tool in that section, that some of my students find a little harder to use, but works over different kinds of text. This link gives instruction in how to use the voice over http://www.apple.com/voiceover/info/guide/_1128.html

Technology in SPecial Education

To all those that have purchased an iPad and don’t know where to start with aps, the Technology in (Sp) Education blog is a great starting point. The following link gives the top free or discounted aps that they have currently recommended for students with learning disabilities and disabilties.

http://techinspecialed.com/2011/04/02/freediscounted-apps/

The site has also divided aps into different goals and skills you wish your students to achieve. http://techinspecialed.com/2011/08/04/technology-in-education-apps-by-goal/

Maths Apps for iOS devices

Often asked for apps that are educationally useful for maths I am happy to thank Jill Ozols for alerting me to the following apps.

With the motto of Play, Explore and Understand MathTapper apps currently have 7 different mathematical apps that are currently free to download for your i-phone, i-pod and i-pads and four more on the way. To read more about these apps go to http://www.mathtappers.com/ Tim has told us that there are 3 more apps that will be available shortly, so keep watching their site!

abc PocketPhonics

The abc PocketPhonic app is available in two versions through the i-tunes stores.

The light version is free and gives full access to activities, but only 6 of the letter sounds and 20 words.

The full version is currently available from the i-tunes store for $3.99 and it provides practice with letter sounds and the correct formation of those letters when writing. The app also introduces students to 170 words. We  like this app. abc PocketPhonics provides a fun way for students to learn something that can be very challenging for some students, especially those with specific learning difficulties.

Things to know about syllables

Things to know about syllables

Many teachers, tutors, parents and students are unaware or unsure of the rules of syllabication, but knowing those rules and some tips and tricks to help students identify the sounds within words is very important for students with specific learning difficulties. Below is a chart that was published in our SPELD SA SPRING 2010 newsletter that you may find useful.

Things to know about syllables Every syllable has at least one vowel  When you say a word every time you drop your chin you are saying a syllable Syllables are in types that follow rules Syllables help you spell especially long words Syllables help you read especially long words

There are seven types of syllables, six that fit a pattern and an extra group that is differentType 1 the open syllable (o)  me no o/pen cry/ing fi/nal In these syllables the vowel is open at the end of the syllable and it often says its name. Type 2 closed syllable (c) in lost pest o/pen cry/ing These syllables have a short vowel, spelled with a single vowel letter, and end in one or more consonants. Type 3 the magic e syllable (vce) – vowel-consonant-e Kate  ice  mine  scrape  re/bate  dis/place   bit/ing This is the one where you drop the e to add ing eg, bite > biting The vowel has been opened and is long and says its name. Type 4 consonant+le syllables (c-le) ble, cle, kle, fle, gle, ple, stle, tle and zle ta/ble  pad/dle  stee/ple The preceding vowel can be short or long. If it is short, the middle letter is doubled, eg, pad/dle, and you drop the ‘e’ to add ‘ing’ – pad/dling Type 5 syllable The diphthong (dippy) syllable when two vowels or a vowel and a consonant make one sound (dip) Wait  snow Au/gust main/tain de/stroy/ing Type 6 syllable the vowel-r syllable (rc) This has combinations of ar er ir or ur A vowel combined with r when the vowel always comes first. Ho/garth  ford  bird  de/ter/mine The type 7 syllable is the suffix syllable These are usually final, unaccented syllables with odd spellings. Eg,  tion,  sion,  cion,  ing,  ed,  ly, ive The ‘sion’ syllable has two pronunciations. The ‘s’ can be pronounced ‘ʒ’ (eg, confusion) or, if it follows l, n, r, s, it sounds like a ‘sh’ (mansion) When ‘ss’ comes before ‘ion’, it sounds like ‘sh’ eg, per/miss/ion

Wordweb English thesaurus and dictionary

When students with learning difficulties start using text to speech programs they are often confronted with a lot of words they normally would have skipped over in their normal reading activities.

I usually encourage students to use their text to speech program to read and explore the meaning of any unknown words with a digital dictionary. Wordweb is a very good program that is available in a free version.

Features of the free version include:

Definitions and synonyms Related words 5000 audio pronunciations 65 000 text pronunciations

150 000 root words 120 000 synonym sets Look up words in almost any program

 

Students who tend to use safe words in their writing can also highlight any repeated words and use the thesaurus feature to make their writing more interesting.

The program starts in your computer’s start up process which makes it available at any time, and can be used in almost any program.

Wordweb is available for download from the following link  http://wordweb.info/free/

Making the most of your Jolly Phonics Budget

Making the most of your Jolly Phonics Budget

A list of resources in our recommended order of importance/value/usefulness

 1. The Phonics Handbook 

Jolly Phonics can be taught with just one resource: The Phonics Handbook.

It includes everything you need to know and/or photocopy to get the program up and running.

If the budget will stretch to visuals for the classroom, next on our list is

2.  The Wall frieze of 42 sounds

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. SPELD SA Letter Sound Booklets

 These are photocopiable materials that provide practice with the formation and sounding of each grapho-phoneme and additional opportunities to trace and copy the correct formation of the graphemes.

4. Flash Cards – of letter sounds and words

We recommend you make your own flash cards, using the words in the Word Boxes on pp 137-148 of the handbook, enlarging them to a suitable size and laminating them. 

Lists of words can also be taken from the Jolly Phonics Word Book.

 5.  SPELD SA Phonic Books

The Jolly Phonics program recommends the teaching of letter sounds and blending techniques before students are asked to read books for themselves. This approach helps children understand that there is a code to reading and that most words can be worked out.

The SPELD SA Phonic Books contain short texts to consolidate the learning of the sounds following the order used in Jolly Phonics. There are 57 texts available free on the SPELD SA website at speld-sa.org.au. We recommend creating, or purchasing, hard copies of the readers to give students the experience of holding a book in their hands, and reading the words without help as they turn the pages.

Fx Toolbar

The Fx Toolbar was created by the same software developer (FX Software) that has tools such as the Vu Bar (some of my clients are finding extremely useful), which are included in the Mystudybar ( previous post below). http://www.fxc.btinternet.co.uk/assistive.htm

This tool was created to work in an add on tab in MS Word 2007 and is definelty worth a trial with your students. The Fx toolbar gives you options to highlight and collect parts of the text from one MS Word document into a new document, it will speak highlighted text, identify confusables(honomyns), change the case of the selected text and identify if your sentences are overly long. A must for anyone studying if they are using Word 2007. Give it a go and let us know if you like it. Please explicitly teach all students, not just those with learning difficulties how to use the toolbar.

Below is an example of the Fx Toolbar idenftifying confusables (in red) and long sentences (in blue) from a section of my daughter’s year 12 essay for art.

Visual Search Engines

Visual search engines can enable students, both learning disabled or not, to quickly  judge if a web site will have information that is useful for their project. A visual search engine allows one to get past misleading meta data, or meta tags that are used to describe the keywords and content of webpages for search engines.

A visual search engine also makes it easy for teachers who are trying to teach their students which websites are more likely to have the information they need.

The visual search engine content will be governed by the parent controls and filters you use in your home or school. For instance if your school blocks YouTube the students will not be able to see content from YouTube.

Below is a link to a visual search engine I regularly recommend in consultations.

http://search.spacetime.com/

SpaceTime3D a visual search engine

MyStudyBar

Excerpt taken straight from the RSCs website where you can download this fantastic toolbar for free.

http://www.mystudybar.org/?page_id=7#Download+MyStudyBar

Please be aware there are different versions for XP uses and Vista/Windows 7 users

For specific advice as to which assistive technologies will suit your specific learning difficulties

 please contact Sandy Russo at SPELD SA 8431 1655

 

“MyStudyBar is a tool which helps overcome problems that students commonly experience with studying, reading and writing. The tool consists of a set of portable open source and freeware applications, assembled into one convenient package. Easy to install, simple to use, handy and effective, MyStudyBar provides comprehensive learning support at the desktop, where it is needed. And if this is not already attractive enough, a further eye-catching feature of MyStudyBar is that it is completely FREE to download and free to use.

MyStudyBar has been produced by the same team at RSC Scotland North & East which created the award-winning AccessApps software suite. Although MyStudyBar is designed to support learners with literacy-related difficulties such as dyslexia, the toolbar can offer potential benefits to all learners.

Features of MyStudyBar

 MyStudyBar puts a whole range of individual and essential tools at your fingertips. Together, these have been designed to support the complete study cycle from research, planning and structuring to getting across a written or spoken message. MyStudyBar has 6 sections; each has a drop down menu offering personal choice, flexibility and independent learning, particularly for those learners who require additional strategies to support their learning. With over 15 apps to choose from, MyStudyBar is the perfect study aid.

The webpage provides step-by-step tutorials to get you started with the applications on MyStudyBar

Examples include: Xmind for planning and organization; T-Bar for customising font and colour backgrounds; Lingoes for when you need a talking dictionary; LetMeType for help with text input, and Balabolka for converting text to audio. And if all that’s not enough, there’s even a speech-to-text app which allows you to talk to your computer.

You can use MyStudyBar straight from a USB stick (if, for example, you are using a machine that is not your own) or you can install it directly to the desktop. (Technical staff in colleges or universities also have the choice of installing it on the network for everyone to use). “