TECHNOLOGY TOOLS FOR WRITING

1
TECHNOLOGY TOOLS FOR WRITING

• What are his/her specific needs?
• What are his/her strengths?
• How interested and skilled is she in using
  technology?
• Where will it be used - home, school, work, or
  social settings?
• Will it need to be used in more than one place?
• How easy is it to learn about and operate?

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Word Prediction

• Word prediction programs reduce the time, effort
  and frustration for individuals with spelling
  difficulties to produce written work by providing
  an on-screen list of possible words to use in a
  piece of writing. The student types a letter or
  two and the program provides a list of words
  beginning with that letter(s). If one of the
  choices is a word the student wishes to use,
  he/she selects it. If not, the student enters
  another letter that produces a new set of
  choices.
• Co-Writer
• Word prediction, www.donjohnston.com/catalog/cow40
  00d.htm

3
Talking Word Processor

• Talking Word Processor is a word processor
  software program that has built-in text to speech
  features providing auditory feedback of letter
  (character), word, sentence or complete
  paragraphs. Any selected text can also be spoken.
  These programs can help students with their
  writing. They also offer the multi-sensory
  experience of hearing the writing while seeing it
  on the screen.
• WriteOutLoud (PC/Mac) www.donjohnston.com
• Type and Talk 4 (PC/Mac) www.texthelp.com
• ClarisWorks/Appleworks/Simpletext (Mac)
• IntelliTalk (PC/Mac) www.intellitools.com
• DraftBuilder (PC/Mac) www.donjohnston.com/

4
Talking Web Browsers

• Talking Web Browsers are web browsers (e.g.
  Netscape) that have built in text to speech (TTS)
  features. Speaking a whole page may not be
  desirable. User control by selecting the desired
  text for auditory feedback is an important
  consideration.
• WeMedia Talking Browser (PC Freeware)
  http//www.dyslexia.com/helpread.htmwemedia
• My Kidster (PC Freeware) www.code-it.com/download
  s (Internet Explorer 4 required)
• Web Talkster (PC Freeware) http//www.code-it.com/
  downloads (Internet Explorer 4 required)
• ICab (Mac Freeware) ICab Company
  http//www.icab.de

5
Voice Recognition

• Factors to Consider before Recommending Voice
  Recognition
• Works better with some students than others
• Staff training is critical
• Student need to be trained one-on-one
• Small groups don't work
• Good vocal skills - clarity, consistency,
  fluency
• Good personal skills - maturity,
  self-discipline, comfortable with technology
• Dragon Dictate (PC) http//www.dragonsys.com/
• Dragon Naturally Speaking (PC)
  http//www.dragonsys.com/
• IBM Via Voice (PC/Mac) http//www-4.ibm.com/softw
  are/speech/

6
Keyboards

• They can be used in place of computers, to
  complete writing assignments or practice
  keyboarding. Although usually used for word
  processing, data can be entered into other
  applications, such as spreadsheets and databases,
  too. The small screen usually displays 4 or 8
  lines at a time, sometimes up to 16. Longer text
  will scroll. Editing can be done spell checking
  is built-in. They store 40-100 pages of text.
  Although data can be sent directly to a printer,
  it's usually transferred to a word processor for
  further work.
• www.alphasmart.com/
• http//www.keyboardinstructor.com/