AT Reading Software

     As discussed in previous posts, I have discussed a variety of  text-to-speech software's. These software's are very beneficial for students who have reading disabilities. There are multiple software's that provide similar accommodations that effectively get the text across to students to understand their readings. The webinar I watched on AT Reading Software was very helpful. The webinar started out with these principles of a text reader vs. a screen reader:

Text Reader                                                                        Screen Reader
Software programs that read all the text                       Screen readers read ALL the text 
in any given document or application.                            elements on the screen.

Most often used for students with a reading                 They provide access to program 
disability, but with adequate vision.                               navigation and written text. Most often                                                                                                     used for students with visual                                                                                                                 impairments.

Some of the programs described in the webinar included Kurzweil 3000, Premier Literacy Productivity Pack, Read and Write Gold, SOLO, WYNN, Natural Reader, and WordTalk.

The presenter focused on the features of these programs and how beneficial they may be for students with a reading disability. These features include the following: 

• Choice of High Quality Voices
• Modify text interface 
• Ability to control rate
• Dictionary 
• Highlight and extract key information 
• Ability to insert/create/modify Scaffold for reading
• Can read files directly from bookshare.org
• Can OCR documents
• Consistent format for Internet and other Reading 
• Convert to MP3
• Language translator 

If you are interested in learning more about these programs, visit the webinar AT for Reading