Ann,
Your project sounds exciting. Here's a bit to get you going.
I'm a little confused about what speech recognition (SR) software you tried.
You mention Power Secretary, but then talk about reading "selections," which
sounds more like one of the continuous SR products. Generally, with Power
Sec'y. and DragonDictate for Windows (DDW), the discrete speech programs, they
require reading only single words, and that process does not need to be
completed before the software is quite functional.
If you review just a few of the initial comments here, you'll see that people
have not had good luck so far using continuous SR products (such as Dragon
NaturallySpeaking (DNS) and IBM ViaVoice (IVV)) with school-age kids, although
I hope we will eventually hear some success stories. [In fact, I am using IVV
now with a kid who likes it a lot - better than DDW - although it is nowhere
near as accurate for him as DDW was]. Nonetheless, I am not hopeful in general
for continuous speech because of many issues. I would refer you to the section
of the website "Update on continuous speech" for a discussion of that
technology.
Fortunately, many of us find that DDW works very well, although the presence
of synthesized speech readback is still an issue, and for kids who are REALLY
reading disabled, this can be an issue. We have tried several different
methods to solve it.
1. Use the software with a "talking word processor" such as IntelliTalk,
Ultimate Reader, or Write Outloud. You have to set the word processor to read
sentence-by-sentence, not word-by-word, because of the readback sequence (try
it and you'll see the problem), but the feedback is usually sufficient for
most of the kids I've worked with (and I've worked with some who are VERY
dyslexic).
2. Use the synthesized speech built into DDW (version 2.5 and beyond) to
readback the last word dictated, when there's a question.
3. Use one of the screen reading programs employed by the visually impaired
which can even read back the words in the correction list. Unfortunately, this
solution is adds a lot of expense (the screen reading software costs upwards
of $500) and the increased functionality adds a fair amount of operational
complexity.
Other than the last option, there is no readback in the correction list, but I
have yet to find a kid for whom THAT is the "deal-breaker," in terms of using
the software.
I wrote this earlier to someone else, but forgive me for recapping it here,
because I think it is relevant to the issue of SR and reading:
DDW operates via use of dynamic word lists. We think that poorer readers can
use this software because of the following: when the student wants to write a
specific word, she has a mental image (more or less accurate) in her head of
that word. If she's using speech recognition software like DragonDictate, she
says the word aloud and the software generates a single response in the word
processor. The user can match that image against her mental image of that word
(you'd be surprised how many "non-readers" can recognize words under these
conditions). If she's not sure of the match, she can then look at the choice
list which will present a number of other choices for her perusal. By scanning
these words, which often means paying close attention to word interiors and
endings, she exercises a variety of word attack skills. Eventually, from this
list or subsequent lists, she can usually locate the correct word. However,
choosing the wrong inflection / form of the word is a fairly common mistake,
and the readback often helps correct this.
Anyway, I would look more closely at DDW, which has a very different training
routine, and peruse the website, which has a variety of tips on training,
usage, etc. Our grant may have some beta-version training materials available
for initial testing by the fall, and these might be useful as well.
I have no doubt that we will also see some secondary students using continuous
speech as well, especially if the software manufacturers address certain
interface issues, but I think that the numbers here will be relatively small.
Good luck and please keep us up to date on your work. Visit us here, and let
us know what's happening.
Bob Follansbee
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