Assessing Student's Needs for Assistive Technology (ASNAT)

Chapter 5 – Assistive Technology for Reading, Studying, and Math
♦ Speaking Spell Checkers
The various talking products from Franklin Electronic Publishers are especially helpful for students who
stumble over new words or larger words. As you type in the word, the talking spell
checker/dictionary/thesaurus will pronounce the word. There are a number of these products. Catalogs
are available from Franklin Electronic Publishers. The Speaking Homework Wiz ® also lets you enter a
word list so that a student could scroll down through the word list, looking for the one they are not sure
about and have it spoken by highlighting it. It clarifies homophones such as too, two, and to. And the
phonetic spelling correction lets the student look up a word even if he doesn’t know how to spell it.
♦ Single Word Scanners
A single word scanner can be of great help to an advanced reader who struggles with large, multisyllabic
words. A device such as the Quicktionary II Pen from WizCom Technologies LTD. can be an excellent
tool. It can be moved across the unknown word or line of text either from left to right or right to left. It
scans the word or line of text and translates it with built in optical character recognition, then
pronounces the word or reads the line of text with just the touch of a button. It also provides the
definition if needed. This is not a tool for a young reader, one who struggles with many words in a
passage, or has visual/motor difficulties. However, it is a fabulous tool for the right student.
♦ Electronic Books
Electronic books are exploding on the market. They can help the student struggling with reading by
highlighting and reading the text. Many of these books are entertaining as well as educational. However,
that may not be a plus! Lewis (1999) cautions that without direct supervision students with learning
disabilities spend over 65% of their time “playing” with the non reading features of electronic books.
While hearing fun sounds and seeing things move around the screen may be entertaining, they will not
improve a child’s ability to read.
A series that avoids these problems is the Start-to-Finish Books from Don Johnston Incorporated. All of
the Start-to-Finish Books tell an excellent story without games, sounds, or gimmicks. Some of the
stories in the series are classics that have been rewritten with high interest, controlled vocabulary, (e.g.,
Treasure Island, The Red Badge of Courage). Others are new stories that have been written specifically
for the series. All are very well done and come with a hard copy, tape cassette, and CD. The CD
includes the text in exactly the same arrangement as in the book itself. The Gold Library includes titles
with grade 2-3 readability, syntax and vocabulary of conversational speech, easily decodable words and
a limited number of ideas per sentence. The Blue Library includes titles with grade 4-5 readability,
syntax and vocabulary of more formal English; more ideas introduced into longer sentences with varied
sentence structures. All Start-to-Finish Books feature built –in scanning for single switch users. Each
Start-to-Finish title includes teacher support materials, guided reading levels, lexile levels, PDF files of
activities that include vocabulary and word study, plot and character development activities, cloze
passage and multiple-choice quizzes and open ended question for each chapter. Titles cover history,
literature, science and nature, mystery and sports.
IntelliTools Reading: Balanced Literacy program incorporates guided reading, phonics and writing
through theme based stories including song, rime, and patterned language activities. The Balanced
Literacy program includes nine full-color original storybooks, 142 lessons, 117 letter, pattern and
decodable minibooks, 212 phonics activities, and 27 writing exercises. It also includes 46 colorful,
durable IntelliKeys ® overlays that support IntelliKeys ® users.
Assessing Students’ Needs for Assistive Technology (2004) 113