My daughter has a number of complex learning issues that have really gotten in the way of her ability to perform in the school setting. This summer I am trying a text to speech program (Natural Reader) to increase her ability to read independently. How helpful can such a program be? If it is successful, what documentation should I be keeping to provide to the school that such a program is necessary for more academic success?
Yes, she’s had assistive tech assessments, but mosty for writing. The district has never suggested a text to speech program for reading as she has been resistant to auditory books.
not the case
In her case, it is not a matter of not having vocab or comprehension skills. She has worked extensively with an SLP and reading specialists on an individual basis for over 5 years. She has dyslexia, irlen syndrome and auditory processing issues but is very verbally articulate. The Irlen Syndrome was not diagnosed until 1 year ago when she had continued to fail to meet any of her reading goals with intensive support and 1:1 instruction. Since then she has made some progress (3 years worth in 3 months but has since leveled off again) but would like to be able to read independently. The text to speech program will only be used to give her words she doesn’t know or has some trouble figuring out. I did purchase the AT&T voices with the program after having let her determine if she could understand them. She can now change the background color of the text for easier reading, along with having her monitor brightness/contrast settings specific to her needs. Also the ability to change the font size will be a plus. Its my hope that the combination of verbal and visual will help increase her ability to read.
Thanks for the tips on the documentation. I’ll be keeping track of her progress to see what happens.
Issues with Auditory Books
Well, the biggest one was they were “boring”. The speed of the audio went to fast for her to follow the printed version visually. Often the books chosen were too “young” and didn’t appeal to her. Basically, with her combination of learning differences, it just wasn’t a good fit.
She is just now starting to somewhat enjoy reading. We are reading The Giver together so she can get lots of help with the words she still has trouble with, however she can’t read for a long period of time without getting a headache. This is improving but slowly.
Re: Text to speech
I have had a great deal of success with text-to-speech programs. I’m so glad you clarified that the difficulty was due to the speed of the audio books. The beauty of text-to-speech is that you can customize the voices (AT&T voices are good, try out NeoSpeech Kate and Paul available at www.nextup.com for about $25.00. You can listen to them at this website before you decide to purchase them.)
You can also adjust the rate of the voice as well as the pitch so it can be totally customized for your daughter. Let her adjust the speed and choose the quality of the voice. A student with whom I worked recently adjusted the rate to 70wpm and said that it was just right. My inclination was not to go to such a slow rate but I gave him the power to choose what worked for him. He follows along in the book or textbook and feels much more successful.
This past year I worked with a ninth grade student who used text-to-speech and he converted the books to MP3 and listened to them on his iPod as he followed along in the book. One of the books was To KIll A Mockingbird. If he had to read it on his own, he’d still be reading it (fluency is an issue). But this way, he was independent and could work on grade level vocabulary. He believes that his reading has improved because he has been exposed to grade level vocabulary through participation in his English class as well as the opportunity to read it.
BTW, students who benefit from text-to-speech often get used to the voices. Those of us who don’t require a multisensory approach (auditory and visual) have a harder time with computerized voices. In my ten years in the AT field, the quality of the voices for Windows OS has greatly improved.
Ask the IEP team to consider AT again so that the curriculum will be accessible for your daughter.
Thanks!
I appreciate your input KTJ. Its good to hear of someone having some success with this type of program. I will be documenting her use of the program for the IEP team. She’s pretty excited about trying it on her computer. Don’t know if she will ever try the MP3 but its something to consider.
Whatever reasons she has for resisting auditory books will also apply to text-to-speech.
Many visual learners struggle with verbal information whether they see it or hear it. Text-to-speech is also a computer-generated voice, and therefore doesn’t have the natural intonations that a well-done audio book has.
I have not had much success at all getting my text-to-speech software used in this college computer lab. It simply doesn’t meet many students’ needs.
One way to document whether it’s effective or not is to have her read something and summarize it orally for you as well as she can, and then do the s ame with text-to-speech.
If her language skills are the core of the problem, though, then text-to-speech does not address that. If she does not have the vocabularyl and comprehension to make meaning out of the words, it doesn’t matter how they’re delivered; specific instruction in those skills is what can help there.