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Digital Toolkits for Struggling Readers in Content-Area Classrooms. Cindy Okolo Michigan State University March, 2009 Okolo@msu.edu http://assistive-technology-lab.wiki.educ.msu.edu/. Our mission is to develop complex literacies across the lifespan through multi-disciplinary research.
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Digital Toolkits for Struggling Readers in Content-Area Classrooms Cindy Okolo Michigan State University March, 2009 Okolo@msu.edu http://assistive-technology-lab.wiki.educ.msu.edu/
Our mission is to develop complex literacies across the lifespan through multi-disciplinary research.
Challenges for Kids with Literacy Disabilities/Difficulties Decoding Vocabulary Comprehension Background knowledge* Strategy knowledge & use* Confidence* Motivation*
Challenges for Kids with Literacy Disabilities/Difficulties • Writing mechanics • Handwriting, spelling, writing conventions • Idea generation • Organizing • Revising • Editing
How Can Technology Help? • Support • Reading tools • Organizing • Support for background information • Studying • Scaffolding • Compensate • Bypass reading & writing • Motivate
Mac • Voice Over • Text to speech • Speech recognition • Screen magnification http://www.apple.com/accessibility/macosx/vision.html
Windows • Magnifier • Narrator (text to speech) • Speech Recognition (VISTA) http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/accessibility/default.mspx#EBB
What’s on your Browser? • Firefox (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/) • ADD-ONS • Dictionaries & Language Packs: (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:3) • Bookmarks: (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/browse/type:1/cat:22) • Dictionary: (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/7869)
What’s on your Browser? • Hyperwords (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search?q=hyperword&cat=all) • Accessibar (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/search?q=accessibar&cat=all) • Marking (highlighting or dogears) (http://yellow5.us/firefox/dogears/) • CLiCk Speak (http://clickspeak.clcworld.net/downloads.html)
What’s in your Bookmarks: Digital Books? • Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) • University of Virginia E-Text Library (http://etext.virginia.edu/ebooks/) • Many Books (manybooks.net) • Amazon, iTunes • Bookshare (http://www.bookshare.org/)
What’s in Your Bookmarks: Turn text to speech • Record your own • Audacity (http://audacity.sourceforge.net/) • Spoken Powerpoint books • Have someone else do it: • Spoken Text (http://www.spokentext.net/) • http://www.watchingthenet.com/firefox-tip-convert-web-page-text-to-speech-and-save-as-mp3-file.html • YAKiToMe (http://www.yakitome.com/cgi-bin/input.py)
What’s in your Bookmarks: Reference Tools • Visuwords: online graphical dictionary (http://www.visuwords.com/?word=constitution) • Ghotit (http://www.ghotit.com/home.shtml) • Wiktionary (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/) • Shmoop (http://www.shmoop.com/literature/)
What’s on your Computer: Supporting Thinking and Organizing • Inspiration (www.inspiration.com) • Timeliner(http://www.tomsnyder.com/timelinerxe/)
What’s On Your Computer: Literacy Tools: The Big Six • WYNN (http://www.freedomscientific.com/LSG/products/WYNN.asp) • Kurzweil 3000 (http://www.kurzweiledu.com/) • Solo Literacy Suite (http://www.donjohnston.com/products/solo/) • Read & Write Gold (http://www.readwritegold.com/readwritegoldv9.html) • WordQ and SpeakQ (http://www.wordq.com/) • WriteOnline (http://www.cricksoft.com/uk/writeonline/)
What’s On Your Computer: Literacy Software • Text to speech • Word prediction • Writing Tools • Concept mapping • Templates • Specialized dictionaries • Speech recognition • Revision tools • Study tools • Highlighting • Annotating
What’s Attached to your Computer? • Scanner • Camera