CALL Scotland Blog

SQA Answer Booklets in Word format are now available

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:11:19

One of the requests from the staff who attended the Digital Papers Focus Group meeting in October 2011 was for SQA to provide answer booklets in Microsoft Word format. While answer booklets have been provided as PDF documents, some staff felt that the Word format would be more suitable for some candidates. You can now download answer booklets in Word / DOC format from the SQA web site.

The main advantage of using PDF answer booklets with Adobe Reader is that candidates can use the same program to access both question paper and answer booklet. However, disadvantages of the PDF answer booklets are:

Each page contains a separate text box for the answer and the candidate's text does not automatically flow from one page to another.
The font and size are fixed, and formatting is basic.
Inserting symbols, formulae and equations is awkward.
Drawing tools are basic.
PDFaloud text-to-speech software does not highlight the text in the answer booklet as it reads, and it reads the whole page - you can't just read a sentence, word or paragraph.

Using answer booklets in DOC or Word format does mean using one program to read the paper and a different one to type answers, but the advantages are:

Word is a much better word processor than an Adobe Reader text box! The candidate can change fonts, sizes, styles, use formatting etc etc.
Symbols, formulae, equations and diagrams can be easily inserted.
A wider range of text-to-speech programs can be used to read out your answers, including the free WordTalk reader.
Speech recognition can be used to dictate into Word, including the free Windows 7 speech recognition software.
Support tools for mind-mapping, spellchecking and word prediction (if permitted by SQA) tend to work better with Word than Adobe Reader.

Thanks to the team at SQA for listening and acting!

Brilliant Ideas for Using ICT in the Inclusive Classroom

Allan Wilson — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 14:45:19

We've just added 'Brilliant Ideas for Using ICT in the Inclusive Classroom', the new book by Sally McKeown and Angela McGlashon to the CALL Library.

It is an excellent book, consisting of 50 'Brilliant Ideas', followed by 20 'Brilliant Starters'. The brilliant ideas include such topics as:

- getting smart with the versatile Smartboard

- words on the move with CapturaTalk

- creating a communication-friendly environment with symbols

- iPads: next-generation technology

- meeting all of a pupil's writing needs.

The brilliant ideas are presented in the form of short (one or two pages) case studies, illustrating how they have been used in schools throughout the UK. Many teachers will already be using some of the approaches described in the book, but there is sure to be something new for everybody. The 'Starters' are similarly short guides to completing a particular task in commonly used programs such as Clicker, PowerPoint, GarageBand and I Can Animate.

The book (ISBN 978-0-415-67254-2) is published by David Fulton and available through Amazon for £20.19.

New Quick Guide - Calibre and the Kindle

Allan Wilson — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 12:20:20

Most people who use a Kindle simply download the books they want from the Amazon web site. But what can you do if you want to read something else on your Kindle? The Kindle recognises Kindle (.azw), Text (.txt) and Mobi (.mobi) files and can also view (but not read out) PDFs. It cannot currently handle E-Pub files, so if the book or resource you are looking for is only available in E-Pub format, you need to convert it, using a program such as Calibre.

Calibre is a free eBook management program that you can download from the Calibre web site. It is a very comprehensive program that allows you to search for and download eBooks from the internet, view them and manage your collection. It also allows you to convert between the various file formats used by different eBook readers, so that you can read your eBook on, for example, a Kindle. Calibre also allows you to download online editions of newspapers and magazines from all around the world.

Some aspects of Calibre are a little quirky and it does not have built-in text-to-speech, though it links well with free TTS programs, such as NaturalReader and Ivona Minireader. Nevertheless, it is a very useful program for anybody using digital books.

CALL have now produced a Quick Guide to Using Calibre to Read E-Books and Convert E-Pub Files for the Kindle, which can be downloaded from the Quick Guide section of the CALL web site, under Books for All.

More 'Books for All' Quick Guides

More than 30 further Quick Guides are available in this section covering many different aspects of finding and adapting books for learners with a print disability. Titles include:

- Accessible Formats from Local Authority Library Services

- Accessing Books for All Scotland Database via Scran

- Copyright and Books for All

- Creating interactive digital resources with Adobe Acrobat Professional

- Free eBooks-eTexts and audio files from the Internet

- How to navigate to the Books for All Scotland database from within Glow

- Kindle for PC Accessibility Plugin

- Making Accessible Digital Reading Books

- Making Maths Resources

- Scanning into Word with FineReader 10

Windows 7 Ease of Access Centre Guide free to download

Craig Mill — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 16:18:49

Ease of Access Centre Guide

Microsoft has included a range of accessibility features (Accessibility Options) in its operating systems since Windows 95.

Windows 7 incorporates several improvements such as a change of name from 'Accessibility Options' to 'Ease of Access Centre'. These features provide a valuable but often overlooked method of supporting learners with additional support needs.

The Ease of Access Centre, found in the Control Panel, brings together all the accessibility options and adds some new features.

You can download the Ease of Access Centre Guide from the CALL website - for free.

Windows 7 On-Screen Keyboard video tutorial

One of the new built-in features is the On-Screen Keyboard which offers word prediction to help with typing speed and accuracy. The following tutorial highlights some of the key features.

CALL Annual Report for 2010 - 2011 now available online

Allan Wilson — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 16:46:02

The CALL Scotland Annual Report for 2010 - 2011 is now available online.

Some highlights of the year include:

Closer links with key players in Scottish Education, including the Scottish Government, HM Inspectorate of Education and Learning and Teaching Scotland (now Education Scotland), the Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA), Scottish ICT Dvelopment Group.
Partnership Agreements with 13 local authorities.
Input into development of new Scottish Government policy for Augmentative and Alternative Communication.
2,000 requests for digital papers in the 2010 diet of SQA exams.
915 items listed on the Scottish Books for All Database, accessible through Glow and SCRAN.
69 Hodder Gibson text books made available in accessible format from the CALL Books for All web site.
15,042 downloads of the WordTalk utility to add text-to-speech to Microsoft Word.
190,866 visits to the CALL web sites.
81 pupils with additional support needs provided with assessment and support.
99 support sessions delivered to schools.
635 teachers provided with on-site training in local authorities.
128 teachers attended courses in CALL.
519 enquiries received and given a response.
294 items added to the Loan Bank.
142 new equipment loans made to children and adults with disabilities in Scotland.

Read about all this and more in the CALL Scotland Annual Report!

iBooks 2, iBooks Author and digital textbooks

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 12:15:57

Yesterday Apple launched iBooks 2, a new version of the iBooks app for iThingys; iBooks Author, a program for the Mac which is for writing and designing iBooks, and a range of interactive textbooks. The video about the interactive textbooks video a well worth a look - very promotional but also inspiring, and particularly relevant for those of us involved in supporting students with print disabilities.

Coincidentally, yesterday we ran a course for the first time on eBooks, Kindles and iPads. Preparing for it was an educational experience for Stuart, Sandra, Craig and I, and we learned a lot about the features and also limitations of Kindles, iPads and commercial eBooks.

A few observations, just from this one course:

Over half the teachers on the course owned a Kindle.
A teacher from a Primary unit for pupils with visual impairment has 6 Kindles and she says she's almost stopped using paper large print completely - she emails the materials to the Kindles and the pupils use large font sizes on the devices instead. It saves a lot of paper, printing and therefore money, and the pupils prefer the Kindles to most (not all) of the paper large print books (books with large colour diagrams might not be that good on the Kindle screen). It's also a lot quicker - printing out 800 pages of 36 pt text takes a long time, whereas emailing the file to the Kindles takes seconds.
Another teacher on the course has a son who is dyslexic. He used to need coloured overlays to read books and was never a great reader, but he can see the Kindle screen display: she says he now spends hours reading books on the Kindle whereas before he never read for pleasure.
Participants generally felt that the Kindle, iPad, iPod etc have a considerable 'cool' factor, which is of course a big issue. And because they are mainstream devices, you don't look that different if you use one to read books.
The eBook formats and readers are definitely becoming more accessible - bigger range of fonts, options to change colours and font sizes, better access with text-to-speech software.
Some public libraries (Edinburgh, Dundee and South Ayrshire, at least) are now offering eBooks on loan. You can borrow a book and read it on your computer, iPod, iPad, Android device etc.
The most exciting thing, for me, is the huge increase in the availability of books and materials - as well as Kindle, we have iBooks, WH Smith, Google Book store. Although the commercial eBook formats and readers may not give us everything we want in terms of accessibility (yet), they are getting there, and we are already seeing how the technology can give print disabled pupils access to learning materials in a way that is quicker, cheaper, easier and more independent than what we had before.

PS If you've not seen this fine example of a new page-turning technology, take a look - it's fun.

Orang utans and iPads

Sally Millar — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 12:18:32

Well - the iPad is truly everywhere these days. Watch these fascinating videos - turns out that orangutans also like iPads!

They like to watch videos, paint, play kids' Apps, watch other orang utans via Skype, ebooks etc.

I have always been very interested in primate language studies and I'm now intrigued by how the situation has evolved. It started with having the primate brought up as child in a psychologist's home with the careful teaching of sign language over many years - with interminable Behaviourist teaching & analysis of language 'performance'. Now people are just using technology as a day to day tool for stimulation - and the animals don't get ANY 'rewards', just the pleasure of intercting and playing with the device (take that, Skinner!)

And for communication, now just sticking photos on an iPad under its nose and saying "show me the 'x' "(hang on to the end to see iPad use).

Not too sure what to make of it all, though. Next step, it seems, may be social networking?...(I can only fantasise about orang utans themselves signing up to Avaaz and all the online petitions against habitat-grabbing for palm oil plantations!)

Communication Champion's Final Report

Allan Wilson — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 15:10:22

Jean Gross, Communication Champion for Children, has produced her final report as she steps down from office. Although her remit was restricted to England, 'Two Years On: final report of the Communication Champion for children' reflects on issues that are also very relevant for people with communication difficulties in other parts of the United Kingdom - and probably many other countries.

She was appointed to the post following the Bercow Review of 2008, which found that services for children and young people with speech, language and communication needs (SLCN) were highly variable across England.

The report highlights a number of areas where there have been measurable improvements in services since 2008, but expresses concern about the actual provision that will be available for children with SLCN for the immediate future. There have been cuts to front line speech and language therapy services and to specialist advisory teaching services at a time when there has been a 58% rise in the number of children with SLCN.

Jean Gross spoke about the report on BBC Radio Four on 16th January, highlighting a number of issues.

The Report can be downloaded from the Communication Matters web site.

Including All Children in the Scottish Children's Book Awards

Robert Stewart — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 10:16:50

The 2011 Scottish Children's Book Awards is an innovative nationwide reading project in which children and young people from every corner of Scotland read and vote for their favourite Scottish children's books of the year. Votes MUST reach Scottish Book Trust by 5.30pm on Friday 27th January 2012 to be included in the final count.

Last year:

over 40,000 children registered and an amazing 17,000 votes were cast;
children and young people from every local authority in Scotland, from Aberdeen to Dumfries; Shetland to Arran, took part;
nearly 1,000 accessible copies of the books were provided to young judges by RNIB and CALL.

The awards were originally set up by the Scottish Arts Council in 1999 and are now run by Scottish Book Trust.

Children can vote for their favourite book, from a shortlist in each of three categories, either as individual readers or as part of a reading group in a school, library or bookshop. The shortlisted books are:

Early Years (0 - 7 years)

Dear Vampa by Ross Collins
The Loon on the Moon by Emily Golden
Apple Pie ABC by Alison Murray

Younger Readers (8 - 11 years)

Zac and the Dream Pirates by Ross MacKenzie
There's a Hamster in my Pocket! by Franzeska G Ewart
The Case of the London Dragonfish by Joan Lennon

Older Readers (11 - 16 years)

Wasted by Nicola Morgan
The Blackhope Enigma by Teresa Flavin
The Prisoner of the Inquisition by Theresa Breslin

But what about disabled children who can't read the books?

CALL Scotland has worked with the Scottish Book Trust and the authors and publishers to create accessible digital versions of the nine shortlisted books. The idea is that children and young people with physical, visual and reading or dyslexic difficulties, who can't read or access the paper books, can read the digital books instead and take part in the awards. For example:

children with spinal injury, cerebral palsy or other physical impairments can click a switch or press a key on a computer, to turn pages and read the books by themselves;
dyslexic readers or children with visual impairments can change the font size and/or colours on screen, or use text-to-speech software to read the books;
the books can be read out by the computer using "Heather", the high quality Scottish computer voice that is available free for schools and pupils from CALL Scotland's The Scottish Voice web site.

The books are available free of charge. Readers and schools can request accessible digital copies of the book(s) they wish to read via the Books for All website or phoning 0131 651 6236.

Using Google to Search for Apps

Allan Wilson — Wed, 14 Dec 2011 14:15:30

The Teaching All Students site has an interesting Blog about using Google to search for Apps (iPad and Android).

Slowing Down an Audio Book

Allan Wilson — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 12:27:59

We were recently asked how to slow down the reading of text on an audio book by a teacher some of whose pupils have reading difficulties. She was using Barrington Stokes books, accompanied by audio on CD as her pupils found it easier to follow the printed text if they could listen to the audio recording at the same time. Unfortunately, the text was read too quickly for some of her pupils to follow easily.

If you are using Windows Media Player to play the audio recording of the book, it is possible to slow down the play back speed.

Begin playing a file.
Click the arrow below the 'Now Playing' tab, at the top of the screen, point to Enhancements, and then click Play Speed Settings. (see image, right)
Move the Play Speed slider to the speed at which you want to play the content, or click the Slow, Normal, or Fast link.

The full instructions are available online at:

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-GB/windows-vista/Change-playback-speed-in-Windows-Media-Player.

Can you use an App on multiple iPads?

Robert Stewart — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 10:22:06

A question I was asked recently is how many iPads (or iPod Touch and iPhone) can you put an App on? The answer to that would be as many as you want. However, that doesn't mean that these devices can then be used by a clasroom of pupils at the same time if only 1 licence for that App has been purchased. Some points from the Apple App Store Terms and Conditions for the use of a single licence App are highlighted at the foot of this blog post.

What it looks like you can do is:

Sync the App to as many devices as you wish;
Use the App as an individual on all of those devices;
Use the App as a group of individuals on one of those devices;

What you are not allowed to do is give each of those devices to students and allow them to use the same App (single licence) at the same time. If you wish to do this then you need to purchase the App for each of those devices.

In the US there is an Apple Volume Software Licensing scheme available for education but this has not been made availble to the UK.

Apple App Store Terms and Conditions

(i) If you are an individual acting in your personal capacity, you may download and sync an App Store Product for personal, noncommercial use on any iOS Device you own or control.
(ii) If you are a commercial enterprise or educational institution, you may download and sync an App Store Product for use by either (a) a single individual on one or more iOS Devices used by that individual that you own or control or (b) multiple individuals, on a single shared iOS Device you own or control. For example, a single employee may use an App Store Product on both the employee's iPhone and iPad, or multiple students may serially use an App Store Product on a single iPad located at a resource centre or library. For the sake of clarity, each iOS Device used serially by multiple users requires a separate licence.
(iii) You shall be able to store App Store Products from up to five different Accounts at a time on a compatible iOS Device.

New text-based communication aid from Toby Churchill

Sally Millar — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 13:45:23

Toby Churchill Ltd. are preparing to launch a new communication aid, the Lightwriter Swift - a pocket sized dedicated text-to-speech communication device - reportedly the smallest device of its type in the world.

You can see the new device on it's UK Launch Tour, in Edinburgh, at the Corn Exchange on 7th February 2012. Get the date in your diary now.

Sign up ASAP for a free morning, afternoon or evening (6pm) seminar - or just drop in to the 'Swift Cafe' between 10 am and 8 pm.

Games and Toys for Christmas?

Sally Millar — Mon, 28 Nov 2011 11:38:26

At this time of year, therapists and teachers often get asked by parents and grandparents for ideas about toys, gadgets or software that might make a suitable Christmas present for their family member who has access or communication support needs.

Without wanting to promote one supplier above any others, and with no commercial interest, we note that Liberator Ltd. has recently added some nice switch toys to their range, is selling a switch operated digital camera cheaper than some competitors, and also has just opened their 'Christmas Store' with a range of toys, switches and low tech communication aids, many at special 'Sale' prices.

For professional use, I liked the 3 for 2 low tech communication books

New Video and Quick Guide index on the Books for All web site

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 18:11:39

We have added a new section to the Books for All web site which gathers together all the quick guides and also the new video guides on the Education Scotland web site, into separate pages. It should be much easier to navigate and find the resources you need.

We'll be adding to these in the coming months and if you have any suggestions for topics that need covered please add a comment or let us know.

Does Dragon Naturally Speaking 11 run on a netbook?

Robert Stewart — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 15:36:44

CALL recently carried out an experiment to see how well a Toshiba netbook would cope with Dragon Naturally Speaking 11 (Dragon). Dragon is a speech recognition software package developed and sold by Nuance. The netbook used was a Toshiba NB250 which offers reduced computing power when compared to a full-sized laptop and Nuance don't recommend the software for use on a netbook.

Dragon seemed to run fairly well on a netbook and so we've uploaded the video of the Dragon software testing to YouTube which shows how well the netbook coped and also a comparison between running Dragon on a 1Gb and 2Gb RAM netbook.

If you're interested in speech recognition then you may also like to see a report produced by CALL entitled 'Speech Recognition software in SQA Assessments'.

Nook Study - Another Text-to-Speech Option for PDF Files

Allan Wilson — Tue, 22 Nov 2011 15:31:25

Barnes and Noble's Nook Study was designed for downloading and reading eBooks purchased from Barnes and Noble, but it can also read PDFs. You have to register to download the software, but it is free to use. Simply use the Add Item facility to copy the PDF from your computer to the Nook Study library. If you open the document, it will appear with its PDF formatting intact in the Nook Study reader. Individual words are highlighted with an orange block when they are read. It uses the default voice on the computer - Heather in the case of my laptop.

CTRL-ALT-S activates speech, then the following commands are available:

H - Help
Space - Start / Stop Reading
P - Start Page Over
A - Go Back one sentence
S - Restart current sentence
D - Skip to next sentence
R - Last phrase
W - Currently focused element

Far from perfect, but a lot better than the Adobe Read Outloud facility, for reading PDFs if a school / parent hasn't got Read and Write Gold / PDFaloud / ClaroRead.

I had hoped that it could be used for digital exams, but the facility for typing into forms seems to have been disabled, though you can type into sticky notes.

Adobe Reader X and PDFaloud 3.0 - don't bother

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 16:20:01

When Adobe Reader X first appeared we tested it and said that it worked with PDFaloud 3.0 (see previous blog). This was true, on my ancient Windows XP laptop. However, we've now been using it for some months on a range of different machines and operating systems and it simply hasn't been reliable. On Windows XP, the Reader X/PDFaloud combination seems to work a lot of the time, but it's definitely bad news on Windows 7: I just got a new laptop and it doesn't work at all.

As previously reported, TextHelp are not going to upgrade PDFaloud 3.0 and have stopped selling it through Learning and Teaching Scotland.

TextHelp say that their latest Read and Write Gold 10 includes a version of PDFaloud which does work with Adobe Reader X, but Read and Write Gold is a lot more expensive than PDFaloud was (£1995 for a secondary school site licence).

So our advice is: stick with Adobe Reader 8 or 9; don't upgrade to Reader X. If you have to have Reader X, take a look at some of the text to speech tools listed in the previous blog.

iPads and specialised communication aids

Sally Millar — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 11:06:52

Words of wisdom from the wonderful Jane Farrall, SLT at Spectronics in Oz. Everyone needs to read this. Keep reading into the second half of this short article. In summary, the iPad is fabulous but it is NOT necessarily the miracle answer to every aspect of all children's communication needs. Thanks Jane!

Jane's words reflects my own experience. It's really not an 'either / or' scenario. These days I often find myself recommending a complex specialised communication aid for school and as the 'main' resource for developing language and communication AND - yes!, why not? - a lovely iPod / iPad (which often parents have already bought or are happy to buy themselves) for use at home/ for fun / in social situations/ out and about / when travelling etc.

But I get scared and angry when I hear about someone who has apparently recently 'advised' Scottish Government and local authorities that nobody needs an expensive communication aid any more, because an iPad and free or cheap Apps can do it all. This is an over-simplified and dangerously misleading approach that is not in the best interest of vulnerable children and adults who cannot easily speak up for themselves. People with complex communication support needs require the most appropriate and the best solution(s), not just the cheapest / most fashionable.

Tarheel Reader Books on iPad

Sally Millar — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 10:32:59

Jane Farrall in Melbourne Australia has just published on her blog a really useful step by step instructions for how to get a free book from the Tarheel Reader site into an iPad. Good way to make appropriate materials available without having to make them yourself. (You could also run the book online, which would be even quicker and easier, but downloading it as a powerpoint into iBooks means it can be always available and stay there for the child to enjoy again and again.

If you don't know about the TarheelReader site, go and have a look. There are many short and very simple stories there, freely useable and downloadable, made in Powerpoint, all with picture and speech support, one line of text, ideal for our emergent readers and learners with complex additional support needs. For example , see here, 'my cat is fat' (choose a voice on top left and off you go). (The quality can be a bit variable, so you do need to check before you select a book for a pupil. Some are a bit too 'American- mind you, there's nothing to stop us uploading our own books to the site, good idea!)

Story Sequencer

Sally Millar — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 19:17:48

Haven't tried it yet, but this NASEN Award winning product, the Story Sequencer, looks like a usefully flexible (and pretty cheap) tool.

Copying from BoardMaker Studio

Sally Millar — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 18:32:37

I have been weaning myself - slowly - off BoardMaker 6 and on to BoardMaker Studio. I love many of the clever new 'gadgets' for interactive use, though it's taking me a while to get to grips with some of the more complicated ones. I'll post a more comprehensive evaluation soon.

BUT the most annoying thing is how hard it's getting to simply copy and paste a symbol!

• In BoardMaker 5 you just did a straight COPY from the Symbol Finder, and then PASTE into another document (nice transparent background)

• In BoardMaker 6, you have to click the symbol out of the Symbol Finder and then, from the drawing screen, Copy and then Paste it elsewhere. In the process, you lost the transparent background and acquired a white square background.

• But in Studio, you have to do all of the following:

File Menu > SetUp and Options > Symbols & Language > Symbol Manager > find the symbol you want > Edit in Image Editor (Paint) > select all > Copy. then Paste (or Save As) elsewhere (again, no transparent background).

(Or has anyone else found a better / quicker way to do it??? Please tell me!)

Having to follow so many steps means it's a real pain to try and share visual information to communicate with parents or colleagues about which symbols are being taught and used etc. and to adapt existing materials (eg. in Word) to be more Communication Friendly and Inclusive.

You have to wonder if Mayer Johnson have done this on purpose - they can't just have forgotten to include a Copy & Paste option!

Mind you - frustrated beyond words with this - on another occasion I ended up making my 'presentation in BM Studio instead of in Powerpoint, and it was very nice because it was actually quicker and easier to populate with symbols and other images, and also spoke (in the Scottish voice). So I learned to change my mindset (creak!) at least for that activity.

Which I suppose is the kind of solution that Mayer Johnson are aiming at..... (But doing 'everything' in BM Studio will be hard for staff in schools that maybe only have one or two computers with it on.)

So - I'd say Yes - buy BoardMaker Studio and go for it! Newcomers to BoardMaker certainly seem to love it. But don't upgrade ALL your copies - keep a secret copy of BM 6 somewhere in school. I'll be sticking with BM V6 for any graphic intensive work, for fast, detailed and fully independent symbol editing control.

Black Light - Coloured Screen Filtering for the Mac

Allan Wilson — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 16:20:43

Low Cost / No Cost Software

We occasionally give advice and talks on free / low cost software that can be used to help people with reading and writing difficulties, or other disabilities. While we would never advise somebody who needed a commercial package to make do with free software that has less functionality, there is certainly a place for free software, particularly for home use, or where a person only needs a couple of accessibility features to enable them to make effective use of a computer. These talks usually focus on the excellent AccessApps and MyStudyBar suites of free software, or on a collection of Windows-based programs, including WordTalk and Natural Reader, as described in our Quick Guide on Low Cost / No Cost Software to Support People with Dyslexia.

Mac Options

When we give these talks, we are often asked about similar options for Apple Mac computers. Unfortunately, although the Mac has been designed to be accessible for users with disabilities, the range of software to enhance accessibility is quite limited. We recently produced a Quick Guide on Free Text to Speech Options for the Mac, and will try to provide information on other options as we find them.

Black Light is the free Mac equivalent of ssOverlay, which allows a coloured filter to be placed over the computer screen. Such filters can be very useful for people with Meares-Irlen Syndrome / Scotopic Sensitivity, and also for people sensitive to glare from a computer screen. It is a little more difficult to find your desired colour with Black Light, compared with ssOverlay, but the program has some additional useful features, including an option to invert the screen colours so that you have white text on a black backgrounf, instead of the usual black on white.

Black Light provides a filter that covers the whole screen - if you need an 'overlay' that can be configured to only cover the portion you require (like T-Bar), a Mac user would, as far as we know, have to purchase a program like the ScreenRuler Suite from Claro Software.

Technology and ASN: Information Day for Parents 12 November

Stuart Aitken — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 11:57:10

There are still a few places available for any parent interested in coming along to Saturday's Parent Information Day on 12th November 2011. You can find out about and try many of the specialised technologies available to support children and young people with additional support needs. Following on from our everpopular annual Family Fun Technology Days, Saturday 12th November will have a similar format but this time it's just for parents.

The day will run 10.00 to 2.00pm at CALL Scotland and will be a mix of displays, presentations, hands-on and a chance for one-to-one sessions with CALL Scotland staff and, of course, meet other parents. Cost is £10 and a light sandwich lunch is provided.

Presentations

After consulting with parent members of National Parent Forum Scotland we’re running short presentations covering:

Overview of CALL services
Digital Question Papers
Apps for iPad, iPod, iPhone - we're delighted that parent Kate Farrell agreed to run this session and be available on the day
Books for All
Low tech to high tech communication aids
AccessApps / MyStudyBar / Windows 7 speech recognition

Workstations

Running in parallel with the presentations we'll have a range of workstations to try things out, discuss issues, have your questions answered. Topics include:

Software for dyslexia including NaturalReader, ClaroRead, Dragon Naturally Speaking, as well as information about Reading Pens
Digital question papers or digital exams - find out how many schools are using them, what teachers are doing to support their use and how successful they're proving with pupil in helping them to become independent, successful learners and confident individuals
Books for All - how this can help schools and authorities meet their duties under the Equality Act 2010 to provide information in accessible alternative formats
Apps for iPads, iPods, iPhones for symbols users, reading books, writing and a host of other education applications.
AccessApps, MyStudyBar and speech recognition directly into PCs running Windows 7
Low tech as well as high tech communication aids - from symbol communication books, Personal Communication Passports through to dynamic screen display systems
Alternative access to computers - switches, switch interfaces, adapted mice, keyboards and much much more

To find out more download the timetable for the day and you can book a place online.

New Equipment in CALL: Alternatives to the Mouse

Allan Wilson — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 17:03:31

Some people struggle to use a standard mouse on a computer, so various alternatives have been devised over the years, including track balls, joysticks and trackpads. The CALL Loan Bank of Equipment and Resources includes many examples of these alternatives. Additional funding from the Scottish Government recently gave us an opportunity to update and expand our stock of equipment for people who "hate those meeces to pieces"! Here's information about some of the new devices that we now have available for loan:

Single Button Mouse

Teachers of young pupils with additional support needs sometimes come to us looking for a solution to suit a pupil who keeps hitting the right-button of a PC mouse, by accident or design, potentially causing major disruption to an activity. There are various solutions, including 'surgery' to remove the micro-switch beneath the right-button, and various software solutions to disable the button. These can be awkward if different people use the computer and some want to be able to access the right-button. In the past we would sometimes recommend the use of a Mac mouse (the original iMac mouse was particularly suitable) as they only have one button, but in recent years the Mac mouse has become more complicated with the addition of a scroll button and other features. The Chester Single Button Mouse is a simple, small mouse with a single button, designed specifically for young children who can benefit from a simplified mouse. It has a USB connector which allows it to be quickly plugged into the computer and removed when no longer required.

Trackballs

A trackball can be seen as an 'upside down' mouse, with the ball on the top of a solid base. The ball is usually moved by the fingers or the hand, though it can be moved by whichever part of the body the user is best able to control it with. The most frequently borrowed trackball that we have is the KidTRAC / MaxTRAC. The KidTRAC has coloured coordinated buttons, including a 'drag lock' button which makes it easier to move objects about on the computer screen. It is possible to replace all or any single button with a switch to separate the 'cursor movement' and 'button press' activities, reducing frustration for many users with poor motor control. We purchased additional units with USB connectors to increase their availability.

We have also added a BIGtrack and the IT Roll Starter Pack to the Loan Bank. The BIGtrack is an upgraded version of the old KidTrack, now incorporating sockets allowing switches to be used in place of its buttons. It has a large (3" diameter) ball and is aimed at young children.The IT Roll is a wireless trackball, with accompanying receiver, which would be particularly suitable for use with an interactive whiteboard.

Joysticks

A joystick can be a useful alternative to the mouse, particularly as many children are used to using (or seeing) a joystick to control a wheelchair or a computer game. (Note that you can't use a 'games' joystick to replace a mouse without a lot of fiddling with specialist software.) A number of specialist joysticks are available. The one that we have found most popular in the past is the Roller Joystick II, so we've added a couple to the Loan Bank. It comes with a choice of handles - a standard joystick, a T-bar, or a sponge ball.

We've added an Optima Joystick and a Mini PointIt joystick to the Loan Bank. The Optimax is a wireless joystick, similar to the Roller Joystick, though with a lower profile. The Mini PointIt is a small, accurate joystick, suitable for somebody with limited movement, but fine motor control.

Digitising Pad / Tablet

The digitising pad is a device with a smooth reactive surface that can be used to control the mouse pointer by finger (like the pad on most laptops) or with a finger. Finger control can be suitable for someone with limited movement, while the use of a stylus can sometimes help a person with RSI-related conditions arising from overuse of a mouse. The Wacom Bamboo Fun Pen and Touch Tablet can be used with either a finger or a stylus.

Other Options

This article has focused on some of the new additions to the CALL Loan Bank. Go to the CALL Equipment Bank and search for 'Mouse or Alternative' to see some of the other options that we have available. If you are looking to find out about commercial options currently available, we suggest looking at the Inclusive Technology, QED and Keytools web sites.

Using the CALL Equipment Bank

The CALL Loan Bank contains a wide range of equipment that can be used to support the communication needs of people with disabilities. Equipment available for loan includes:

simple communication aids
complex communication aids (note that in some cases these can only be borrowed if adequate speech therapy support is available for the loan)
switches, interfaces and mounting systems
specialist mouse and keyboard alternatives
reading and writing aids
switch-accessible toys

Loans are made for evaluation purposes and generally last for up to two months. There is no charge for loans. Most loans are made to Scottish schools for use by pupils with additional support needs, but the loan bank can also be used to support adults with disabilities in the community in Scotland. Further information is available in the Equipment Bank section of this web site.

Hello from Craig!

Allan Wilson — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 11:59:03

Hello!

I’d like to introduce myself. I’m Craig Mill and I recently started working for CALL Scotland as an Assistive Technology Officer. I’ve always admired and respected the work of CALL so having the opportunity to work alongside knowledgeable, skilled and experienced colleagues is a real privilege and a great pleasure.

For those of you who don’t know me I’m probably better known for developing the free and open source portable programs such as AccessApps, MyStudyBar and Create&Convert which make up the EduApps suite of software.

Breaking down barriers

Like my colleagues at CALL I have a love and passion for technology. It still amazes me how technology can break down barriers to learning and provide real opportunities for learners with additional support needs to learn and live as full and independent lives as possible. And the good news is that technology is ever-changing constantly improving and helping to break down barriers for those who embrace it.

As everyday technology such as mobile phones, tablets and e-books become more powerful, affordable, and increasingly ubiquitous with integrated accessibility features as standard, inclusive and universal design are set to become the standard. What was once seen as ‘assistive’ or ‘accessible’ technology is gradually converging into mainstream.

These are undoubtedly exciting times for all who work in education and technology. Set against a backdrop of economic cuts they are also challenging. While I’m a fan of commercial software I’m also acutely aware of the role that open source and free alternatives can play. Working at CALL will provide an opportunity to explore and develop the role and benefits that open source and free alternatives can offer to schools on tight budgets. You can see an exmaple of how schools are already using open source and free alternatives on the Education Scotland website.

Apps, Apps and away...

Another area of change is the multitude of cheap and affordable ‘apps’ for both the iPad and Android platforms. Apps, iPads and Android tablets also offer both opportunities and challenges; particularly in the way devices and apps are managed, integrated and used within the curriculum. This is an area which still requires a great deal of research.

As you can see, there is much to do but ultimately my role is to support you in any way I can. If you’d like to discuss any of the issues I’ve highlighted or would like to find out how CALL can offer a range of support – then don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Craig

Confusing Labels!

Allan Wilson — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 10:46:50

There was an interesting presentation by Professor Amanda Kirkby from the University of Wales at the Dyslexia Scotland Adult Conference 2011 held earlier this week. She made the point that 'labels' given to a child following a diagnosis of a condition such as dyslexia, dyspraxia, autism or ADHD can depend on who carries out the assessment. A teacher may suspect that a pupil has ADHD, but an educational psychologist may diagnose dyslexia and an occupational therapist may diagnose dyspraxia. Three different labels for the same child - all very confusing! In reality, the child may have all three conditions.

A study of a large group of children diagnosed as having dyspraxia (developmental coordination disorder) showed that 27% presented only with dyspraxia. 19% had dyspraxia and dyslexia, while a further 19% were eventually assessed as having dyspraxia, dyslexia, ADHD and autism. The remaining 35% were considered to have various other combinations of the four possible conditions.

Professor Kirkby's presentation is available from the conference web site.

A quick way to get Stuart to work with PDFaloud

Paul Nisbet — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 16:29:12

Following on from the previous post re PDFaloud not offering you Stuart, Robert here in CALL has written a script which finds all the PDFaloud safe voice lists on your Windows computer and adds Stuart to them.

Here's what to do:

Install Stuart first.
Save the file to your computer.
Find the file (it's called install-stuart-to-safevoices.zip.), double click on it to open or unzip it, and then double click on "install.cmd"
It will then update the PDFaloud safe voices with Stuart.
Restart Adobe Reader and PDFaloud should offer you Stuart.

Free Text to Speech Options for the Mac

Allan Wilson — Mon, 10 Oct 2011 16:04:44

We've updated our quick guide to Free Text-to-Speech Options for the Mac. Rather than trying to cover all of the available options equally, the main focus is on the use of the built-in Apple text-to-speech system and on the free version of NaturalReader. Both of these programs will speak any text that you can select with a mouse. In the case of the Apple system you select the text to be spoken and press a key that you define to speak it. NaturalReader can speak text as soon as you select it, or when you press a button on its MiniBoard. NaturalReader can highlight text as it is spoken - changing the colour of the text as it is read out.

We've been finding that NaturalReader is prone to crash under Mac OS 10.7. Has anybody else been experiencing this problem?

We also look in a little more depth at the use of the Read Out Loud facility in Adobe Reader 10 for reading text in PDFs. This has improved compared with earlier versions of Reader, which offered options to read the whole document, or the current page (and was often very random in selecting text to be read!). Reader can now read out a single paragraph of text if you click in it. There is no highlighting so it is not always easy to see what is being read, but this is still a significant improvement on earlier versions. The program also seems to have a problem with reading text with a web link, just skipping the text and the link and moving on to the next word. Unfortunately Adobe Reader 10 cannot be used with older Macs with a PowerPC processor.

Download the Quick Guide from here.

New Equipment in CALL: Keyboards

Allan Wilson — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 15:48:03

Some people struggle to use a standard keyboard, so there are a number of alternatives available to support a variety of potential users. The CALL Loan Bank of Equipment and Resources includes many of these alternative keyboards. Additional funding from the Scottish Government recently gave us an opportunity to update and expand our stock of keyboards. Here are some of the new keyboards that we now have available for loan:

Jumbo Keyboards

There has always been a demand for keyboards with big, 'chunky' keys, with large lettering that are accessible for children with low vision, learning disabilities, or who have a physical disability that makes targeting difficult on a standard keyboard. Jumbo keyboards have been aiming to meet this need for a number of years, initially positioning themselves to compete with the more expensive Big Keys keyboards. The Jumbo has most of the keys present on a standard keyboard, only missing the numeric keypad, the Print Screen key and a couple of others; the Function keys are present, but have been reduced in size. The standard keys are enlarged, measuring 2.5 cm at the base, tapering to just under 2 cm at the typing surface. In some models, the letters (available in UPPER and lower case script) fill the space available, making them easy to read. Keys are colour coded, with consonants in green, vowels in purple, numbers in red, punctuation in yellow and the 'modifiers' in blue. Unlike some other alternative keyboards, there are Shift keys on both sides, allowing the user to attempt to use the 'correct' fingering for typing, though the size of the keys makes it unlikely that anyone could use the keyboard for 'touch' typing.

We have a number of different models available for loan:

White keyboard and keys, with black UPPER case lettering
White keyboard and keys, with black lower case lettering
Black keyboard, coloured keys with white UPPER case letters
Black keyboard, coloured keys with white lower case letters

We also have keyguards for a couple of the keyboards. A keyguard is a rigid sheet of clear Perspex (for the BIGKEYS) or non-transparent metal (for the Jumbo) fitting over the keyboard, with holes cut to match the position of the keys. Some peoole think the non-transparent keyguard is less distracting, visually. A keyguard isolates individual keys, making it easier to hit the right key without mistakenly hitting others en route, and also allows the user to rest their wrists / hands on the keyboard while they find the key they want.

Large Print Keyboards

We have also added to the range of Large Print keyboards that we have. Large Print keyboards are standard keyboards, but with the lettering on each key using a bold font and filling the space available. (The lettering on a standard PC keyboard typically uses only a quarter of the space available.) Different colour combinations are available, including white lettering on black keys; yellow on black; black on yellow. Similar effects can be achieved using keyboard stickers, but it can be less hassle to use a pre-printed keyboard, avoiding problems with stickers falling off.

Large Print keyboards are aimed primarily at people with low vision, or who require high colour contrast. They are much more suitable than large key keyboards (like the Jumbo) for somebody to learn to touch type.

Key Needs Special Keyboard

This is a large keys keyboard, similar to the Jumbo, but with a more restricted key set. There are no Function keys and there is only one Shift key. Lettering is in a child-friendly font, similar to Comic. This keyboard is aimed at young children who need enlarged keys, but do not require the added complication brought by Function keys. We have versions with black, upper case lettering on white keys and with white lettering on coloured keys.

Other Keyboards

The keyboards mentioned above were all purchased recently. We have many others that are also available for loan, including:

Compact / Mini keyboards - we have a number of different models, all with a standard keyboard layout, but with small keys positioned close together. They are suitable for somebody typing with one hand, or who has limited finger movement.
One handed keyboards - these are specialist keyboards (like the Maltron, FrogPad and CyKey) designed specifically for use by someone who is only able to type with one hand. While they generally have clever design features and are useful for some people, we generally find that people with physical disabilities prefer the familiarity of a standard keyboard layout, albeit they may consider using a compact keyboard.
Ergonomic Keyboards - these are aimed primarily at touch typists and encourage the user to hold their hands at an ankle most likely to reduce problems of Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI)

Using the CALL Equipment Bank

The CALL Loan Bank contains a wide range of equipment that can be used to support the communication needs of people with disabilities. Equipment available for loan includes:

simple communication aids
complex communication aids (note that in some cases these can only be borrowed if adequate speech therapy support is available for the loan)
switches, interfaces and mounting systems
specialist mouse and keyboard alternatives
reading and writing aids
switch-accessible toys

Loans are made for evaluation purposes and generally last for up to two months. There is no charge for loans. Most loans are made to schools for use by pupils with additional support needs, but the loan bank can also be used to support adults with disabilities in the community. Further information is available in the Equipment Bank section of this web site.

Cartoon Video introducing Assistive Technology

Sally Millar — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 10:08:08

This fun little cartoon video explains much of what is important about assistive technology for disabled users, in a clear and pretty cool way.

Update:

I should clarify. The CALL Scotland team did not make this video, though I would be very proud if we had. We are just passing it on for wider appreciation. It was made by a team led by Jim Tobias of Inclusive Technologies, http://inclusive.com/You can view the original at http://inclusive.com/AT_boogie/at30.swf

Speech recognition and SQA Digital Question Papers

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 11:58:07

A common question we get from staff, parents and students is "Can I use speech recognition software to dictate my answers into the computer in an examination?" and so SQA funded us to spend some time trying to answer this. We've written a report with the results of the tests we've carried out on Dragon NaturallySpeaking, Windows 7 speech recognition, and WordQ+SpeakQ and you can download it from here.

We found that:

The accuracy and reliability of speech recognition software has improved considerably in recent years and all the programs tested were functional and seemed effective when dictating into a word processor. So if you want to use speech recognition to dictate extended answers into Microsoft Word for the Standard Grade English Writing paper, or Higher History, for example, then all of the programs can be used.

However, Windows speech recognition is not functional for dictating into SQA digital question papers, and so we do not recommend it for use in examinations unless the candidate is only intending to dictate into a word processor.

Dragon NaturallySpeaking is the most well known speech recognition program and can be used to dictate into both digital question papers and to a word processor. It is probably the most accurate, is relatively easy to train and use and gives voice control over formatting and over the computer in general. Dragon has text-to-speech for reading back the dictated text, and the Premium version can also play back a recording of the dictation to help with finding and correcting errors. For single user copies, Dragon NaturallySpeaking Premium is available with an educational discount (£68) and the 100-user Professional school license at £895 would seem to be relatively good value for schools who wish to make the software available to a large number of pupils. The educational discounts are availabel through Pugh or Dyslexic.com.

WordQ + SpeakQ is speech recognition software specifically designed for users who have difficulties with literacy. It uses the Windows speech recognition system, but accessed using a different, simpler interface. It has text-to-speech to help get through the training process; it can read back each phrase as it is dictated; it has text-to-speech for proof-reading; and it provides word prediction. SpeakQ can be used to dictate into SQA digital papers and also to word processors. WordQ + SpeakQ is arguably simpler to use than Dragon and the integrated text-to-speech and word prediction does make it a more attractive option for writers with reading and writing difficulties. WordQ + SpeakQ requires use of the keyboard and so it is not suitable for users who wish to control the computer completely by voice. A single user license for WordQ + SpeakQ is £199 and a site licence is £1995 from Assistive Solutions.

Speech recognition software may have considerable potential to enable some candidates to work independently and to rely less on scribes, and we are thinking it would be useful to organise some trials in schools to investigate this potential and to look at the practicalities of using speech recognition in exams. If you are interested please contact us.

Get-together day for People who use AAC

Sally Millar — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 14:30:41

Your communication: Your rights

Where? Edinburgh: The Faith Centre, Gilmerton (directions will be supplied, on booking)
When? Monday 7th November, 10.30 am - 3 pm (lunch provided)
Who? Adults (16+)in Scotland that use AAC; Claire Edwards and Shirley Young, Inclusive Communication in Scotland project; Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland folk (CALL, KeyComm, FACCT, TASSC, SCTCI, Ayrshire and Arran)
Why? To have a nice get-together with AAC friends. To get an update on things that are happening. To give your views on things that are important about communication, out and about in the community.
How? Book your place and your lunch by 24 October - phone, email or return the booking form to: CALL Scotland, University of Edinburgh, Paterson’s Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh EH8 8AQ. Tel - 0131 651 6235, Email – callscotland@ed.ac.uk or book online at the Augmentative Communication in Practice Scotland website (after 23rd September);

See the event flyer for more details. If you need help, in order to be able come, get in touch and ask, we'll do what we can to help.

PDFaloud to be discontinued

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 19 Sep 2011 16:22:43

TextHelp, publishers of Read and Write Gold and PDFaloud, have decided that they will no longer sell PDFaloud as a standalone program. Since 2008, Scottish schools have been able to buy a site licence for PDFaloud for £295 from Learning and Teaching Scotland, under a special licencing deal. We helped set up this scheme because we felt that PDFaloud was a simple and easy to use tool for reading digital exams and other PDFs, and £295 for a secondary school licence we felt was relatively good value. I believe that Education Scotland still have two boxed sets still in stock so contact them quick if you want to get PDFaloud.

So, what are the alternatives if you want to have your digital papers or PDF textbooks read out by the computer? Here are some of the options:

Adobe Reader Read Out Loud

Adobe Reader has a basic built-in free text reader. Click on View > Read Out Loud > Activate Read Out Loud. You can listen to the current page or the whole paper but a better method is to choose the ‘Select’ tool (Tools > Select and Zoom > Select Tool) and then click on some text. Read Out Loud will read the text where you have clicked. It won’t highlight the words, it usually reads a whole paragraph (and you can’t tell it to only read a sentence or individual word) but it’s free and built in to Adobe Reader.

Read and Write Gold

TextHelp's Read and Write Gold includes PDFaloud, and some schools or local authorities already have Read and Write Gold. You need Read and Write Gold 8.1 or later because earlier versions can't read from Adobe Reader 8 or 9. Read and Write Gold can read from anything, not just PDFs, and the program has lots of other tools for suporting reading, writing and studying. However, Read and Write Gold is more expensive than PDFaloud at £320 for a single user licence, £1,150 for a primary site and £1,995 for a secondary site. TextHelp are offering to upgrade a secondary PDFaloud site licence to Read and Write Gold version 10 for £1,350. Read and Write Gold can be installed or run direct from a USB stick.

ClaroRead

The latest version 5.7 of ClaroRead is much better at reading PDFs than previous versions, and it now does a good job of reading and highlighting the text in the PDF as it reads. Like Read and Write Gold, ClaroRead can read from anything including for example Microsoft Word and internet browsers. It also comes with good voices and tools such as word prediction, spellchecking and scanning. ClaroRead costs from £49 for a single user licence and various site licence options are available, e.g. £795 for up to 250 students, £1,050 for up to 1,000 students. ClaroRead can be installed or run direct from a USB stick.

Co:Writer 6

With the latest version of the Co:Writer word predictor you can select some text, click the >> button in the Co:Writer window and choose Speak to have it read out. The text is not highlighted as it is read. Co:Writer costs £39 per licence for Scottish schools, from Education Scotland.

Penfriend XL

The Penfriend word predictor can read text from a PDF. You select the text, copy it, and then Penfriend will read and highlight it in a separate window. Penfriend costs £24.99 per user for Scottish schools from Education Scotland. When you copy the text from the PDF, it adds a paragraph mark after each line, which means that the voice hesitates when it comes to the end of the line. This can be off-putting compared to PDFaloud and ClaroRead, which don't generally hesitate at the end of each line. Penfriend can be installed or run direct from a USB stick.

Free text readers: Natural Reader, IVONA Minireader and Balabolka

There are many free text readers available and we like Natural Reader, Ivona Minireader and Balabolka because they are straightforward and easy to use and work with the Scottish voices. With Natural Reader and Ivona, you select the text you want to read and then click the 'Play' button or press a hotkey. The text then gets read out, but it is not highlighted in the PDF as it reads. Like Penfriend, these programs generally hesitate at the end of each line of the PDF because they think there is a paragraph mark.

Alternatively, you can copy the text to the clipboard and then Natural Reader and Balabolka can read it out, and highlight it, in a separate window. This takes up space on the screen and is not as good as having it read and highlighted in the document itself. There is a 'portable' version of Balabolka which runs from a USB stick. Balabolka is also part of the AccessApps and MyStudyBar suites.

New Equipment in CALL: Handheld Spellcheckers

Allan Wilson — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 11:24:47

Handheld, battery-operated spellcheckers have been around for many years. To some extent they have been overtaken by spellcheckers built into word processors, or web-based systems, such as Spellcheck.net, but the handheld devices can still be very useful in schools, particularly for handwriting tasks. The Franklin devices have always been good at finding the correct word from an incorrect spelling - particularly when a phonetic spelling is involved, but there is always the issue of having to transfer the correct spelling from the device to handwriting.

CALL Scotland has had various Franklins available for loan over the years, but we recently purchased a couple of new devices so that the models we have more closely represent the current market.

Franklin Talking Dictionary (KID-1240) This is a relatively simple device, most suitable for use with primary-age children. Type the word to be checked. If the word is in the 44,000 word dictionary a definition will be offered, to help make sure it is the right word. The definition can be read back - speech is slow, with an American accent. If the word is not in the dictionary, various alternatives will be offered one at a time in a scrollable list. There is no real support for homonyms, other than using the dictionary definition, nor is there a thesaurus. The Talking Dictionary also includes a rhyming word facility and various word games (Hangman, Jumble, Flashcards, Guess that Word and Tic Tac Toe.) The text on the display is large, but there are occasional irritating animations.

Franklin Speaking Language Master (LM-6000b) The Language Master is a more sophisticated device, combining a speaking dictionary with a thesaurus and grammar guide. The screen is bigger than the one in the Talking Dictionary, but the text is smaller, allowing up to seven options to be shown when an incorrect word is typed. The ordering of the list is slightly better than in the Talking Dictionary, for example 'Phone' is first suggestion for 'Fone' in the Language Master, but is second choice (after 'Fawn') in the Talking Dictionary. The Language Master has a 130,000 word dictionary, with 300,000 definitions and 500,000 thesaurus entries. It has 12 built-in games, providing lots of opportunities to experiment with and develop language skills.

Using the Language Master as a Communication Aid

The Language Master can be used as a simple, relatively low-cost, text to speech communication aid. Simply type the sentence to be spoken and press the Say key. Voice quality is not great and the keys are small, requiring good fine motor control, but it could certainly be used 'in an emergency' by somebody with good literacy and typing skills, who may be unable to speak.

Using the CALL Equipment Bank

The CALL Loan Bank contains a wide range of equipment that can be used to support the communication needs of people with disabilities. Equipment available for loan includes:

simple communication aids
complex communication aids (note that in some cases these can only be borrowed if adequate speech therapy support is available for the loan)
switches, interfaces and mounting systems
specialist mouse and keyboard alternatives
reading and writing aids
switch-accessible toys

Speaking with a Scottish Voice

Allan Wilson — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 14:44:42

‘Stuart’, the new male Scottish computer voice was launched today at Hill of Beath Primary School in Fife. The new synthetic voice will allow learners in schools and colleges throughout Scotland to listen to text read from computers by a voice with a realistic Scottish accent. It will also be possible to use the voice in many communication aids, allowing many boys and men with communication difficulties to speak with a local accent for the first time.

Speaking at the launch, Children's Minister Angela Constance said, "Seeing young people use the synthetic voice technology today has been an uplifting and informative experience."

Paul Nisbet from CALL added that „We are delighted that the Scottish Government has funded CALL to work with CereProc to create Stuart. Since 2008, Scottish learners have been able to use Heather, the Scottish female voice, and so it’s great to have gender equality!

„From today, pupils with visual impairment, dyslexia or reading difficulties will be able to have books and learning materials and exam papers read out by Stuart, and boys with speech difficulties who use communication aids will be able to speak with a high quality Scottish computer voice.”

Funding from the Scottish Government has allowed CALL to work with Cereproc to develop and licence the voice for use in schools and colleges in Scotland, and for use by learners with additional support needs at home. ‘Stuart’ complements the female ‘Heather’ voice that was first made available to schools in Scotland in 2008. Both voices are available from the Scottish Voice web site.

Further information about the launch, and a video demonstrating the use of the Stuart voice with WordTalk can be found on the Engage for Education web site.

New 'how-to' Books for All videos from CALL and Education Scotland

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 13:55:24

Earlier this year Stuart and I were videoed finding, using and making books in accessible formats, and the videos are now available on the Education Scotland web site. They provide a quick and reasonably (we think!) straightforward introduction to Books for All, and you can download the videos and the transcripts for CPD. The only unfortunate thing about the videos are the dodgy presenters.

There are also some very illuminating and useful comments from staff and young people about how accessible formats can be used in practice, and why it's so important for learners to have books and materials that they can read and access independently.

Essential viewing!

New! CALL DataBase of Apps for Communication

Joanna Courtney — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 10:20:08

Over the past few months there have been more and more 'apps' available to buy, which could be useful tools for communication for some children and adults. These apps are available for iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad and vary in their features, possible uses and cost.

Some of these apps have synthesised voice output (text to speech) as well as symbols and can be used as comprehensive AAC solutions (e.g. Touchchat AAC); some allow you to record speech along with symbols and photos to create a system similar to a 'communication book' or medium tech AAC device like a Go Talk (e.g. Tap Speak Choice); and some can be used very effectively for 'photo stories' or 'talking books' using photos, symbols and video to create personalised resources like social stories, communication passports, visual scene prompts and interactive photo albums of special events (e.g. Scene & Heard).

CALL has been keeping a keen eye on these developments and has started to compile a database of the apps we have found most useful or show most potential in the field of AAC.

We will be updating the database as new AAC apps come out and are tested out by CALL and will also be including apps for reading, writing and literacy in the coming weeks.

Check out the apps we have included so far on the CALL App Database

Including All Children in the Scottish Children's Book Awards

Robert Stewart — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 12:30:29

over 40,000 children registered and an amazing 17,000 votes were cast;
children and young people from every local authority in Scotland, from Aberdeen to Dumfries; Shetland to Arran, took part;
nearly 1,000 accessible copies of the books were provided to young judges by RNIB and CALL.

The awards were originally set up by the Scottish Arts Council in 1999 and are now run by Scottish Book Trust.

Early Years (0 - 7 years)

Dear Vampa by Ross Collins
The Loon on the Moon by Emily Golden
Apple Pie ABC by Alison Murray

Younger Readers (8 - 11 years)

Zac and the Dream Pirates by Ross MacKenzie
There's a Hamster in my Pocket! by Franzeska G Ewart
The Case of the London Dragonfish by Joan Lennon

Older Readers (11 - 16 years)

Wasted by Nicola Morgan
The Blackhope Enigma by Teresa Flavin
The Prisoner of the Inquisition by Theresa Breslin

But what about disabled children who can't read the books?

children with spinal injury, cerebral palsy or other physical impairments can click a switch or press a key on a computer, to turn pages and read the books by themselves;
dyslexic readers or children with visual impairments can change the font size and/or colours on screen, or use text-to-speech software to read the books;
the books can be read out by the computer using "Heather", the high quality Scottish computer voice that is available free for schools and pupils from CALL Scotland's The Scottish Voice web site.

The books are available free of charge. Readers and schools can request accessible digital copies of the book(s) they wish to read via the Books for All website or phoning 0131 651 6236.

New Video Case Studies on Assistive Technology from ACE Centre

Allan Wilson — Thu, 01 Sep 2011 11:54:10

Our friends in the ACE Centre in Oxford have recently produced a series of short video case studies illustrating different examples of the use of assistive technology to support learners with disabilities. There are 8 videos in the series:

Aroob - The use of an iPod Touch with a communication app to support a mainstream primary pupil with aphasia following a stroke.
Claire - A university student with cerebral palsy who uses a ruggedised tablet computer, accessed with a joystick and switch, to support her studies.
Sandip - An adult with cerebral palsy demonstrates the impact that using a Lightwriter SL40 has had on his ability to communicate.
Tamsin - A pupil in a mainstream primary school uses eye-pointing with a Look2Talk communication book to communicate with her peers and also uses a Tellus communication aid to access the curriculum.
Tiago - A pupil with cerebral palsy uses a Tobii C12 eye-gaze system to communicate with staff and his fellow pupils and to access the curriculum.
Darren - A Proxtalker communication aid finally provides a student with autistic spectrum disorder with an effective communication method.
Kalvin, Mayar and Craig - Three secondary students with physical disabilities and learning needs use switches and low tech communication systems.
Patrick - A pupil in a primary school uses an alternative keyboard and mouse to access the same software as his peers.

New Equipment in CALL: Webcams and animation software

Sandra O'Neill — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 17:25:05

A new item in CALL is the Hue HD Studio which includes a webcam and animation software. The animation software (Zu3D) is available for both Mac and PC and the webcam comes in 5 different colours. The webcam can be bought separately so can be used, for example, with other animation software such as I Can Animate from Kudlian, in videoconferencing (GlowMeet) or even as a (very) cheap visualiser or document camera to share documents, science experiments, pupils artwork etc with the whole class. It plugs into the USB port either directly or for greater flexibility usingthe supplied 1.8m cable, has a good quality picture and an internal microphone which picks up sound well. There is also a button on the back of the camera which brings up the snapshot function when plugged into a compouter using the supplied AMCap camera software (WebCam Monitor on a Mac). This can also be used to record video.

Go to the Hue Animation website to see a video of a group of young children exploring the Zu3D software and making their own short video. If you buy the package it even comes with some plasticine to get you started but using plastic models and lego can be quicker to get going. The Zu3D website has ideas for using the software in the curriculum (Learning Tools), a useful video tutorial and a link to download a demo version to try it out.

Quite a number of schools in Scotland already have other animation software such as I Can Animate form Kudlian Software. I Can Animate is available for Mac, PC and as an App on the iPhone and iPad. The Kudlian website has links to a tutorial, a number of resources and a link to download a version that can be used for 5 days before purchase (or removal).

For an opportunity for hands on training CALL Scotland is running a half day of workshops on Saturday 1st October and I Can Animate is one of the sessions to choose from. Go to the CALL Scotland training area for more information.

New Equipment in CALL: Tobii C12 and C15

Sally Millar — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 15:10:02

CALL has recently added the Tobii C12 and the Tobii C15 communication aids to its equipment loan bank. These are both high-end, fully featured PC Windows 7 based communication aids, that can be controlled in many ways, including the built-in touch screen, keyboard, mouse, headmouse, switches, joystick, or the optional eye gaze control unit, the Tobii CEye which slots on to the bottom of the device.

The C12 and the C15 are essentially the same, except for size. The C12 has a 12.1” touch screen and weighs 6.5lbs. (2.9 Kgs), while the C15 is larger, with a 15” touch screen and weighing 8.9lbs (4 Kgs). Both are ‘mountable’ on a table or wheelchair mount, rather than ‘portable’ (N.B. adding the eye gaze control unit increases the weight further and means that the device must be mounted – can’t use the integrated stand.)

Both devices come with Tobii’s own communication aid software installed (Tobii Communicator with Symbol Stix symbols), and the possibility of using the Tobii Sono Suite (for text and computer access). However, CALL has also installed The Grid 2 software, which is more familiar to many users (and has Widgit symbols built-in). PCS symbols can be added. Users can choose which software they prefer to use for personal communication via symbols and/or text. Either software gives access to e-mail, text messaging and chat, internet access and access to other computer applications. CALL has added the Scottish Voices, Heather and Stuart, to both devices.

These devices seem to be proving popular across the AAC community. The Tobii hardware offers: long-lasting hot swappable batteries; powerful processor (Intel Core Duo U2500); shock-mounted hard disk drive (60 GB); silent operation; 4 powerful stereo speakers; and a built-in camera. Infra-red environmental control facilities are also built in. The OS appears to be stable. The devices have a streamlined look, with a moisture-sealed surface, and no buttons on the front to distract the user. There are interchangeable side panels in different colours (though – small gripe – these don’t seem to fit too well, on our C15.)

The C15 might be a replacement for the original My Tobii P10 eye gaze computer, (no longer made) in that the large 15” screen area allows display of more symbols and text - or larger, more legible symbols that are easier to see and select. The large screen also provides more screen estate for running other Windows applications.

(But if you only want to run Windows applications, and don’t want a communication aid, the other P10 replacement you might want to look at is the PC Eye - which CALL has also just bought for the loan bank – see separate CALL Blog item, coming soon!)

The C12 is comparable in size & weight to its nearest AAC competitor, the DynaVox V Max + (which also allows attachment of an eye gaze unit) but for d irect access users, the C12 is significantly bigger and heavier than the DynaVox Maestro or the Vantage Lite.

If a user can access the smaller device, the C12, successfully, it is obviously desirable to have the most compact device possible, and also means the user’s face is not as ‘blocked off’ from communication partners, as it might be by a big device (better for wheelchair driving, too).

As with all CALL’s comp lex communication aids, these devices will be available on loan to CALL assess ment clients (as a priority) and to others who have undergone training in their use. However, these devices are on ‘restricted’ loan in that they will be being used a lot by CALL for assessment, and for demonstrations and training, so not available to people who might just want to ‘have a look’. (NB. The CEye eye gaze control unit is a separate equipment item, and CALL only has one of these, so it can only be attached to the C12 or the C15 at any given time, not both.)

New Equipment at CALL: Tobii S32

Joanna Courtney — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 14:55:02

Tobii S32 Scan

The Tobii S32 comes in Touch and Scan models. CALL has the Scan model, which is more expensive but has more features, so is good for assessments.

The Scan model can be used with direct touch to the buttons and a set of 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 16 or 32 keyguards, which come with it , or by 1 or 2 switch scanning.

The S32 Scan plays back pre-recorded messages, or IR signals and environmental controls and has up to 60 hours of recording time.

It works by using a barcode system, so you can record hundreds of messages or sounds into the device, but it will only play back messages that relate to the overlay that is inserted at the time.

Overlays are made using Tobii SymbolMate software, which comes with the device and has to be used to make the overlays (rather than e.g. Boardmaker), as it prints out a unique barcode along the top of the overlay so that the correct recordings can be recognised by the device.

Symbolmate comes with over 15,000 Symbolstix symbols, but also supports PCS, Widgit and other symbol sets, which need to be purchased separately. CALL's Symbolmate software uses the Symbolstix symbols.

There are a variety of switch access settings and auditory recorded prompts can also be used for those with processing or visual difficulties.

The scan light is a small green light at the top right of the cell, which is not especially clear or easy to follow.

The device does have some nice additional features like 'function cueing' where you can have from 2 to 6 buttons pressed in sequence and then spoken out in full at the end (to encourage sentence building). However, it is a rather expensive for a paper-based recorded speech device and requires getting familiar with new overlay-making software and keeping track of all the overlays which are created.

New Equipment at CALL: Tobii Communication Devices

Joanna Courtney — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 10:19:50

Tobii Communication Devices

Tobii are best known for their 'MyTobii' eye gaze technology, but actually make a range of devices.

the original P10 eyegaze computer
the new C12 and C15 communication aids
CEye eye gaze control unit (for use with C12 and C15)
the PCEye control unit for eye gaze access to a computer
portable communication aid called the C8 (no eye gaze access)
medium tech aid with recorded speech called the S32

CALL have recently purchased this whole range of devices, which are available on 'restricted loan' to assessment clients and will also be used for demonstrations and training.

The following few blogs will give an overview of each of the devices, what they can do and who they may be suitable for.

Tobii C8 communication aid

The Tobii C8 is a computer based communication aid with an 8.4 inch (20.5cm) touchscreen. It is lightweight (1.8kg) and powerful and can be used either as a portable or wheelchair mounted device. It has long battery life ( 6hrs ) and also has hot swappable batteries so you can charge the device without having to turn it off and take it away from the user. The interchangeable coloured side panels make it easy to customise (green, pink, blue, purple) and the two powerful stereo speakers give the C8 great sound quality. It has a stand and a removable carry strap, but no built-in handle.

The main difference between the C8 and the larger C12 and C15 devices is that it has 2 speakers (they have 4) and that while the C8 can be used with a variety of access methods (direct touch, 1 and 2 switch, joystick, etc) it cannot accommodate eye gaze access (whereas the C12 and C15 can).

This device could be suitable for users who need a light-weight portable device with synthetic speech and who would like to use additional Windows based software and Sapi 5 Scottish voices, which cannot be used with designated communication devices at a similar level e.g. Vantage Lite.

The C8 comes with Tobii Communicator Standard edition package, which includes several communication programs allowing communication using text or with over 15,000 Symbolstix symbols. The CALL device includes the upgrade, Tobii Communicator Premium, which includes email, text messaging and environmental control. Acapela voices are included with the device and you can also use recorded speech, if required. The device also has a built-in camera so that the user can take photos and use them on their communication pages.

As the C8 is Windows 7 based, other communication software can also be installed and CALL's C8 has the Grid 2 as an alternative option to Tobii Communicator. Being Windows based also means that Sapi 5 voices like 'Scottish Heather' and the soon to be released 'Scottish Stuart' voice are installed on this device ready for use, as well as on the C12 and C15.

New equipment at CALL: Toshiba NB250 Netbook

Robert Stewart — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 14:33:00

CALL now has a large bank of netbooks and our latest edition is the Toshiba NB250. A good little netbook which is light weight, cheap (£225 via the Procurement Scotland contract), long 8 hour battery life and relatively fast if you are using one or two programs. Note that netbooks are not designed for multi tasking and so wont handle lots of programs running at the same time. This is because of the Intel Atom processor which is limited due to heat output in such a small package. CALL has installed Windows XP on all the netbooks since even Windows 7 (starter) is extremely sluggish due to the type of processor.

Basic specification:

1Gb Ram;
160Gb Hard Drive;
Windows XP Pro;
10.1" screen;
6 cell battery (up to 8 hour batter life);
1.33Kg weight.

They are particularly practical in schools because they:

are small and light and easy to carry around;
don’t take up much space on the desk, so you have room for books and resources;
have a long battery life, freeing you from mains power;
are a bit more cool than AlphaSmarts.

They don’t suit everyone: the keyboard may be too small and cramped for some people and the small 10” screen may be too small for people with visual difficulties.

Cereproc Featured on BBC Radio 4

Allan Wilson — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 09:33:09

Cereproc, producers of The Scottish Voice, Heather were featured in Radio 4's 'Giving the Critic Back his Voice' on August 9th. Cereproc came to worldwide attention last year when they produced a new voice for American film critic Roger Ebert. They have now produced a voice for Aberdeen-based Mike Arnott, who has Motor Neurone Disease and who wanted his children to still be able to hear his 'real' voice if he is unable to speak as his condition develops.

The programme also describes the use of the Heather voice in Scotland. CALL's Joanna Courtney describes the importance of being able to speak with a Scottish voice, like Heather, for children with communication difficulties in Scotland: "Its a lot more of a friendly and familiar sounding voice. What we've found is that a lot of younger children - even boys - would rather have the Scottish Heather voice than the American voice, and especially the very posh English voices that you can get."

Cereproc have recently been developing a male Scottish voice, which should be available in September.

The case against Assistive Technology

Sally Millar — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 18:16:32

Here's a wee film called 'The Case Against Assistive Technology' to get everyone going at the beginning of the new session.

iVona MiniReader - Free Text-to-Speech Program for Windows

Allan Wilson — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 17:06:43

iVona MiniReader is a free text-to-speech program for Windows PCs, very similar to the free NaturalReader program (but without the irritating 'advert' every time you open the program). Like NaturalReader, iVona MiniReader works as a toolbar that floats on the desktop of your computer, ready to be called upon as required. To speak text, simply select it with your mouse and click on the 'play' button on the toolbar. It doesn't provide fancy highlighting of individual words as they are spoken, as provided by programs like WordTalk and Read and Write Gold, but if you are just wanting to listen to a piece of text read by your computer, it is just the job! It is particularly good for reading text from web pages, but will speak any text that you can select with your mouse.

iVona MiniReader is designed to be used by the excellent iVona voices (the British English voices are a bit 'plummy', but the Welsh male voice, Geraint, is particularly good), but can also be used by any SAPI 5 computer voice, e.g. The Scottish Voice, Heather (soon to be joined by Stuart). The iVona voices are currently priced at �39 for one, �69 for two.

The toolbar can be used 'full-size', which includes options to choose the voice, speed and volume, or 'cut down' to display just the Play and Pause buttons. The buttons are smaller than the equivalents in NaturalReader - good if you are looking for a discreet tool, less good if your targeting skills are less than perfect.

Hacking Autism

Allan Wilson — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 15:10:04

Hacking Autism is a web site which brings together a volunteer group of software developers and specialists in autism with the intention of creating apps for iPads and other touch-enabled devices that can be used by people with an autism spectrum disorder.

The site currently contains suggested apps to which children with ASD have responded well. These include Proloquo2go, Pictello, Soundtastic and iReward, along with many more. Parents of children with ASD are invited to suggest features they would like to see in future apps. You can also look at some of the ideas that have already been suggested and comment upon them.

This could be your opportunity to have an influence on the development of forthcoming apps for the iPad and other devices!

PCS (Boardmaker symbols) App coming soon

Sally Millar — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 09:59:13

Aha! Mayer Johnson are publishing an app for iPad and iPod / iPhone, iOS 3.1.3 and above

It's coming 'soon'. It will be free.

It sounds like it will be especially useful for learning new symbols, and for practising, familiarising and and consolidating knowledge of symbols and their meanings. May be especially popular as 'homework' with parents and also sounds like some quite fun games (bingo matching etc.), Could also be valuable as a trainer for working on mastery of that 'iPad flick'.

Autobiography of a person who uses AAC

Sally Millar — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 11:56:36

You may be interested to read the newly published autobiography called Ghost Boy of Martin Pistorius who lost his speech at 12 years old. He uses AAC and has succeeded well in life both personally and professionally.

Daisy Books now on the Books for All Database

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 19:06:25

We are pleased to say that there are now 59 books in Daisy format availlable from the Books for All Scotland Database. These books were produced by Kim Walker and Jamie Cutherbertson and the team at RNIB Scotland Transcription Centre in Glasgow with Scottish Government funding and we are grateful to them for sharing these Accessible Books via the Database. Thanks also to Patricia Carroll, Jennifer MacDougall and Anne Beverdige at LTS for liaising with RNIB to obtain the books.

What are Daisy books are why would you be interested in them?

These Daisy books give you both text and synchronised human narration, so for novels especially, this can be a more pleasant and engaging reading experience than using a computer (even with Heather!) to read the text. Across the Barricades, by Joan Lingard, for example, which is set in Northern Ireland, is narrated by a reader with an Irish accent. The Daisy talking book format was originally developed for people with visual impairment, but Daisy books are also very accessible for anyone with a print disability because they (should) have built-in structure for easy navigation; the reader software has keyboard shortcuts for readers with visual or physical impairments, and readers with visual or learning difficulties or dyslexia can read the books using either the recorded narration (if provided in the book) or text-to-speech.

How can I read the Daisy books?

You can read Daisy books on lots of different devices. On a Windows PC, for example, you can use the free Amis Reader. This gives you control over font size and colours, keyboard control, and it highlights the text as it is read out. Another popular Daisy book reader is Dolphin's EasyReader.Or if you have an iPad, iPod Touch or iPhone, you can use a Daisy book reader such as Read2Go, InDaisy or DaisyWorm to play the Daisy book.

You can also listen to the Daisy audio with a Daisy audio player.

If you want to find out more about Daisy books visit the Daisy Consortium web site. In the meantime, happy reading!

Paul Nisbet receives University of Edinburgh Principal's Medal

Stuart Aitken — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 09:05:40

CALL staff were delighted and proud that Paul Nisbet, Joint Co-ordinator at CALL, was awarded the 2011 Principal's Medal at a special University of Edinburgh graduation ceremony. The award is in recognition of Paul's magnificent contribution for his services to the Scottish education community, and beyond. Sir Tim O'Shea, the University's Vice-Chancellor and Principal is shown presenting Paul with his medal.

In his acceptance speech to an audience of newly qualified teachers receiving their diplomas Paul drew attention to the work of CALL Scotland, contributions to enhance the lives of children, young people and adults with disabilities or who have additional support needs. That work has taken place over many years since CALL was established in 1983.

In addition to his regular work as a leading member of the CALL team, using assistive technology and computer software to support many hundreds of pupils in Scottish schools, Paul has taken a leading role in a number of innovative developments:

In the 1980s he designed the original CALLbox and many other interfaces which allowed children with severe disabilities to interact with a computer for the first time.
He helped develop the Smart Wheelchair, a computer-controlled wheelchair for children with severe and multiple disabilities, now manufactured in the UK by Smile Rehab.
He worked in partnership with the Scottish Qualifications Authority on the introduction of Adapted Digital Exams - digital versions of exams for young people who are intellectually capable of passing, but are unable to use the traditional written format. Hundreds of children have used these digital papers to sit national exams - a world first for Scotland!
He encouraged the development of WordTalk, an internationally-recognised text-to-speech reader for Microsoft Word that helps tens of thousands of people with reading difficulties.
He has led the Books for All developments in Scotland, making books and print materials more accessible for people with a print disability.

Further information on the award can be found on The University of Edinburgh web site.

New Phonics boy on the block

Sally Millar — Wed, 22 Jun 2011 16:06:25

Maybe everyone else already knows about Mr Thorne, but I didn't (Thanks for the tip, Angie McC!!) Wonderful website with videos. It's aimed at teaching / reinforcing synthetic phonics to young children (and parents) but also useful for older children as it's not too babyish (well, OK, giraffe puppet --but cute!) but he's a trendy young guy so acceptable to girls and and a good role model for boys. There are over 200 separate 'lessons' all carefully organised into the appropriate Phonics 'Phase'. Also found in the iTunes Apps store (a range of cheap and useful iPad Apps), on YouTube, iPlayer, DVD and on Twitter. Have a look!

New! Summer ContAACt newsletter

Joanna Courtney — Tue, 21 Jun 2011 14:54:22

The New issue of the ContAACt newsletter is out now!

Read all about:

The 'Hello' Campaign and the National Year of Communication
AAC Events across Scotland
What's New in AAC
The latest on the AAC Campaign in Scotland
The views of people who use AAC

and much more!

Go to /Resources/Newsletters/ContAACt/ to read it online or to download a copy

The Scottish Male Voice is chosen!

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 15:54:57

Well the votes are in and we can now reveal that the winner is....... SPA!

We emailed samples of six male voices out to people who had downloaded Heather, to key contacts in local authorities, FE colleges and Universities, to ICTSLS, members of SICTDG, members of Augmentative Communication in Practice Scotland, and to children and young people who use Assistive Technology.

We received feedback, comments and scores from 82 people. SPA got the highest overall score, and was also the voice that most people preferred as the first and second choice.

SPA went into the recording studio a few weeks ago to start recording about 30 hours worth of reading, and we

understand that he has just finished the recording. It will take CereProc a few weeks to process the recordings and create the voice, and we hope to have it available for download from our Scottish Voice web site by the start of the new school term.

We now need a name... and we might have a vote for that too... so watch this space.

Thanks to everyone who listened to the voices and gave us the feedback.

Paul

Don't Miss ICT and Inclusion!

Allan Wilson — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 17:28:26

You can still book online to attend this week's ICT and Inclusion events in Edinburgh (Wednesday 15th June) and Glasgow (Thursday 16th), though it is too late to be certain of a free lunch! ICT and Inclusion, organised by CALL in conjunction with the BRITE Centre and JISC Regional Support Centre, Scotland North and East, brings together more than 20 of the UK's leading suppliers of software and technology to support learners with additional support needs in schools, colleges and universities

Following a couple of late cancellations there have been some changes to the programme for the days, with a small number of presentations being repeated in Edinburgh:

QED will be demonstrating the new Tobii PC-Eye eye gaze system (also on the Smartbox stand), though they still hope to have a switch-accessible Kindle on display.
Forcetenco will be previewing VOICEYE, a free app for reading documents, that could be a very useful tool for people with a visual impairment, or dyslexia;
Pass IT On / U Can Do IT will be giving away free CDs of public domain software at their talk in Edinburgh.

There will still be 25 stalls to visit in Edinburgh, and 24 in Glasgow - more than ever before.Don't miss the presentations by our guest speakers from Higher and Further Education, and from schools in Glasgow - these presentations are always highlights of the day!

Only one week to go until ICT and Inclusion - have you booked in, yet?

Sally Millar — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 15:18:04

The ICT and Inclusion Day is always a really useful and enjoyable day, so if you can possibly come along, you should! Book now in case it gets booked out. It's completely FREE and you are given refreshments and lunch for nothing. You will see ALL the latest hardware and software and hear practical, information-packed (and SHORT) presentations on your choice of topics all geared towards learners with additional support for learning needs. You can focus on school and / or Further Education. You will meet and network with colleagues and interesting new contacts including presenters and suppliers. Don't miss it.

New Kindle for PC software has text-to-speech

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 31 May 2011 12:57:58

The Kindle for PC Accessibility Plugin is now available for UK customers (and also for users in Australia, Canada and the U.S.). Kindle for PC is free software for reading Kindle eBooks on your Windows PC. The main feature of the new plugin is a text-to-speech tool which means that blind, visually impaired and severely dyslexic readers can listen to the book being read out by the computer. Kindle for PC Accessibility plugin has:

Text-to-speech reading with adjustable voice settings
Voice-guided menu navigation
Large font sizes
High contrast reading mode
Keyboard navigation
Accessible shortcuts

The Kindle reader software can be used to read out the text of the book, and blind readers can use Jaws or NVDA to read the menus and navigation instructions.

The software comes with two American voices - one male and one female - which are OK but not as good as Heather, for example. You can start, pause and stop the speech and read the current, previous or next sentences (see the list of shortcuts below). You can't use other voices on your computer with the Kindle software, and it doesn't highlight the text as it reads.

Like the standard Kindle reader, the font size can be massive (up to about 90pt), and you can change the colours (white on black, black on white, black on sepia).

For keyboard only users, there are keyboard shortcuts to navigate around the software and the eBooks.

The new Kindle reader is a significant step towards making commercial eBooks accessible for readers with print disabilities. There are now over 700,000 books available from the Amazon UK website and so it's a huge source of digital books.

I've updated our Kindle Quick Guide with the new features and you can now download it.

The Dazzling World of Apps

Sally Millar — Wed, 25 May 2011 12:59:55

This is an interesting newsletter (from the USA) that draws together a rich list of resources and provides a useful set of iPad/iPod/iPhone App links but also offers some very sensible words of caution about the risk of being 'swept away' by an unrealistic expectation that iPad Apps can meet every need and solve every problem. A debate that will no doubt be airing a lot in these times ....

Fun Stuff - download Pete Wells' delightfully silly Sensory Stories etc.

Sally Millar — Sat, 07 May 2011 12:27:34

A new website (for Portland College, a special school in Sunderland) provides a convenient new location where you can download a pile of delightfully rude and silly sensory stories created by the one and only delightfully silly Pete Wells. Downloads include a multimedia Powerpoint file and a Word file with a short and easy-to-follow outline of the objects needed and how/when to use these to make the story a fun sensory experience for pupils. An associated set of pupil-centred activities (PC only) includes a counting game (disgusting things to to put in Hagmella's Grot Pot) and "Faye Spook", a story with cautionary tales (plus a quiz) about safe use of social networking sites.

Text-to-Speech for Open Office

Allan Wilson — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 16:21:38

At a time when local authorities, schools and many parents are under financial pressure people look for savings wherever they can, including in the use of computer software. Most schools currently use Microsoft Office as their main software for general use, but licensing can be quite expensive. Open Office is a free suite of software that has many of the same uses as the Microsoft program. Some schools and local authorities have considered using Open Office, but we have advised against it in the past, as it has been lacking some of the key elements available in Word, for example the ability to use WordTalk to read text out aloud.

We have recently found an extension to Open Office, Read_Text, that provides a basic text-to-speech facility. Note that we have found the web site to be VERY flakey! You may have to go to the main Open Office Extensions site and search for Read_Text - even doing this you may have to reload pages several times before you are successful. Email info@callscotland.org.uk if you continue to have a problem with the download.

Read_Text adds a 'floating' button which can be locked to a toolbar on the display. To use the program, simply select the text in your document that you want to read and click on the speech button. The first time you use it, you will be presented with a somewhat 'geeky' window that lets you make basic settings, e.g. choosing a voice and the speed at which you want it to speak, but you can turn this off so that it will not reappear. You can choose any SAPI 5 voice that you have on the computer, including Heather. Unlike WordTalk, Read_Text does not highlight words as they are spoken, or offer additional support such as speech support for the spellchecker, but it does make Open Office more usable for somebody with reading difficulties.

Low Cost / No Cost Software Course

We will be featuring the text-to-speech facility and other potentially useful features of Open Office in a training course on 'Low Cost / No Cost Software to Support Learners with Reading and Writing Difficulties' at CALL on June 2nd. The course will also include the MyStudyBar toolbar, speech recognition in Vista and Windows 7, Google Docs and lots more!

Royal Wedding in (Widgit) Symbols, anyone?

Sally Millar — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 15:48:22

If anyone is planning to follow the Royal Wedding with their class, Widgit's newly published symbol resources may be useful.

Remaking Roger Ebert's Voice

Allan Wilson — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 08:12:03

Cereproc, the Edinburgh-based company who produced Heather, the Scottish Voice, also created a new voice for Roger Ebert, the American film critic who lost his speech due to cancer, which allowed him to commentate on last year's Oscars. Roger gave a very interesting talk on the remaking of his voice at the TED conference in the United States earlier this year. With a little help from his friends, he describes his medical condition and the impact that losing his voice had upon his life. He then goes on to talk about using computer voices and the construction of a new voice by Cereproc using some of his past recordings. He concludes with some powerful comments about attitudes towards people with disabilities.

Definitely worth a watch!

Cereproc are currently working with CALL to produce a new male Scottish computer voice - a 'brother' for Heather.

Family Fun Technology Day, 2011

Allan Wilson — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 17:38:35

Around 150 children and parents attended the recent Family Fun Technology Day, held at CALL. Staff from the various Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland centres and other volunteers were on hand to demonstrate various examples of the use of communication aids and other assistive technology to help children with additional support needs and to lead various 'fun' activities.

Visitors were able to try lots of switch activated toys and games and had a chance to find out about the wide range of communication aids now available, including eye gaze systems. Lots of computer software was demonstrated and parents were able to take away CDs with free software provided by Pass IT On. There were lots of 'fun' activities, including treasure hunts (with prizes!), cake decorating, Smart Wheelchair rides and music workshops.

Parents were able to see how projects like Books for All could bring real benefits for children with additional support needs and were able to ask specialist staff lots of questions about the use of computer technology.

What people liked

Feedback about the day from the people who attended was very positive. This is what people liked:

"Opportunity to chat with professionals and families."
"Kids activities with robots being controlled by Springboard Lite, cake decorating, etc."
"Eye Gaze, Music"
"The whole family had things to do and enjoy. It was perfect."
"Trying new toys and games which we can now consider buying / using at home. Music group was very good."

There are more pictures of the day, and a short video to watch on the Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland web site.

New 'How to Use Digital' Papers guide

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 11:34:15

We have added a new section to the CALL Digital Exam Papers web site, with information on how to use the SQA digital exam papers. There's also a new page where you can download user guides and information sheets on using and making interactive resources in PDF.

Adapted Prelims available from Perfect and P&N

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 13:24:58

Both Perfect Papers and P&N Publications are now supplying digital prelims with answer boxes - the same format and style that is used for the SQA digital question papers. This should make it much easier for schools who use these commercial prelim papers to provide them for students who need adapted digital prelims.

Perfect Papers say:

"Adapted: If you order the adapted version of our papers you will receive the Microsoft Word version, Standard Adobe PDF AND the specially adapted Adobe PDF file for candidates with disabilities and/or additional support needs. If the paper is a "write on" format this will include boxes for candidate responses to be typed or, for papers which are not "write on" this will be a large format master (A3) for large print. For modern language subjects MP3 files of the listening audio are also included.”

P&N say:

„Q: Are P&N papers available as Digital Question Papers to support candidates with additional support needs?

A: All 2010/2011 test papers are available as "ready to go" Digital Question Papers (rights-enabled PDFs with form fields included) to support candidates with additional support needs. Please order your papers in the usual way, but include this request along with a centre-based (school/college) email address and contact name. You will be able to order these directly via our new and improved website which will be launched shortly.”

Funding for a male Scottish Voice approved!

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 07 Mar 2011 14:29:23

We are very pleased to announce that the Scottish Government has awarded us funding to work with CereProc to develop a male Scottish computer voice: a 'brother for Heather'. The funding will also pay for a licence for the entire public sector in Scotland, so that the voice can be used by school-age pupils, further and higher education students, workers in the public sector, and NHS patients.

Heather has been very well received by Scottish learners and pupils and we hope that the new male voice will be just as successful. It should certainly provide a better option for Scots boys with speech and language difficulties who use voice output communication aids, because at present they have a choice of speaking with very adult and very English voices, or one of a few rather low-fi Amercian children's accents, or with a female voice.

CereProc are currently advertising for a voice actor to provide the 'male voice of Scottish education'. A short list of suitable voices will then be drawn up and then the most suitable person chosen. The 'chosen one' then goes into a recording studio and spends many hours reading from texts, and then CereProc's engineers use these recordings to create the computer voice.

We'll keep you posted on progress.

In the meantime, if anyone has suggestions for a good name for the male Scottish voice (Euan? Ian? Hamish? Graham? David? Jimmy? Angus? Rab? Rhuaridh?) why not post a comment to let us know!

Paul Nisbet Awarded University of Edinburgh's Principal's Medal

Allan Wilson — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 11:11:21

Paul Nisbet, Joint Coordinator of CALL Scotland, has been awarded The University of Edinburgh's Principal's Medal for 2010. The award recognises staff or students who, as individuals or groups, have made a significant contribution to support or benefit the wider community.

Paul has been with CALL since 1983 and we are all delighted that his many achievements to the benefit of people with disabilities in Scotland and beyond have been recognised with this award. In addition to his regular work as a leading member of the CALL team, using assistive technology and computer software to support many hundreds of pupils in Scottish schools, Paul has taken a leading role in a number of innovative developments:

In the 1980s he designed the original CALLbox and many other interfaces which allowed children with severe disabilities to interact with a computer for the first time.
He helped develop the Smart Wheelchair, a computer-controlled wheelchair for children with severe and multiple disabilities, now manufactured in the UK.
He worked in partnership with the Scottish Qualifications Authority on the introduction of Adapted Digital Exams - digital versions of exams for young people who are intellectually capable of passing, but are unable to use the traditional written format. Hundreds of children have used these digital papers to sit national exams - a world first for Scotland!
He encouraged the development of WordTalk, an internationally-recognised text-to-speech reader for Microsoft Word that helps tens of thousands of people with reading difficulties.
He has led the Books for All developments in Scotland, making books and print materials more accessible for people with a print disability.

Further information on the award can be found on The University of Edinburgh web site.

Royal Mail Book Awards - the Winners!

Allan Wilson — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 15:46:01

The winners of the Scottish Book Trust's Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children's books were announced on 23rd February at a ceremony at the Tramway Theatre in Glasgow. The winners in each of the three categories were as follows:

Early Years (Bookbug) Category (0 - 7 years): What the Ladybird Heard by Julia Donaldson
Young Readers Category (8 - 11 years): Invisible Fiends - Mr Mumbles by Barry Hutchison
Older Readers Category (12 - 16 years): Grass by Catherine MacPhail

Record numbers of children took part in the awards this year, with over 16,000 children from all over Scotland voting for their favourite books - 1000 more than last year - and almost a quarter of all Scottish schools registering to take part.

CALL Scotland worked with the Scottish Book Trust, the authors and publishers so that children with print disabilities who find it hard to read a standard book could get accessible digital copies of the shortlisted books on CD. CALL received requests for CDs from 57 schools and local authorities, allowing many more children to read the books and vote for their favourite. It is still possible to request a CD with electronic copies of the books in a particular category from the CALL Scotland Books for All web site.

Further information about the Royal Mail Book Awards is available from Creative Scotland and the Scottish Book Trust.

New symbolised Oxford Reading Tree books from Help Me Read

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 21 Feb 2011 15:03:28

A few years ago Aileen MacIntyre, who teaches at Croftcroighn School in Glasgow, produced some 'symbolised' versions of Oxford Reading Tree books for pupils in the school who were struggling to learn to read. Aileen's books and work was featured in Examples of Best Practice in the 2007 Books for All Report. The idea of adding symbols to books intended to help children learn to read might seem unusual, but staff at Croftcroighn have found that the books help children with engage with the text, and they are sure that the books have improved the childrens' reading and word recognition skills.

Teachers might have concerns that children will rely on the symbols rather than learn to read the text, but the exact opposite seems to happen: for example, one teacher at Avenue End primary says:

"It is having a huge impact on their reading. It has helped with their recognition of high frequency words. They can now identify a lot of these words without the symbols. This is improving their reading and is now transferring to their writing."

Another advantage of the books is that they motivate children who are struggling to learn the words. Another teacher remarks that:

"These children were struggling with the reading scheme being used in class and were showing signs of losing confidence. Use of this innovative symbolic approach as an aid to word recognition has helped the pupils regain their enthusiasm for reading with definite signs of progress being made by them.

Aileen has now set up a company called Help Me Read to publish the books, together with worksheets, communication boards and record sheets to support teaching in class. The books are high quality publications, similar to the standard ORT books, and have Widgit symbols printed above the text.

The web site has information about who might benefit from the books, how to use them, an online ordering facility, and examples of how they can be used to support children with additional support needs, reading difficulties or English as a second language.

Most people think of alternative formats as being for example, Large Print, Braille, audio or digital books: Aileen's publications are a great example of how symbols can be used to make books more accessible in a different way.

Asleep on the job?

Sally Millar — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 16:02:12

Well, sometimes this ICT business can just all be a bit too much...

Click Speak not working? - a possible solution!

Allan Wilson — Wed, 16 Feb 2011 15:43:58

In the past we have often recommended the use of the Firefox web browser with the CliCk Speak! add-on as a solution for people looking for a text-to-speech solution for reading text from a web site. It is easy to use, highlights sentences as they are spoken, uses a high quality SAPI 5 voice, e.g. Heather, provided that you have one on your computer and is free!

Unfortunately, Firefox is frequently updated and recent versions of the browser have not been compatible with the version of Click Speak downloadable from the CliCk Speak web site. It appears that the original developer is no longer supporting the program. Fortunately, an anonymous programmer, known as 'Sortadan' has produced a fix for new versions of Firefox. Remove any previous version of CliCk Speak from your Firefox add-ons and download the new version from the Rapid Library web site. You will be asked if you want to install CliCk Speak 1.6.1. If you do this and restart Firefox, when requested, you should have a new toolbar with a working version of CliCk Speak.

Further information is available in our Quick Guide to Installing and Using CliCk Speak.

Scottish Government Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Project

Allan Wilson — Tue, 08 Feb 2011 15:55:05

Stakeholder Views: People who use AAC

The Scottish Government is supporting the development of national guidance for Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC). It will make recommendations on the provision and support for AAC. The guidance, for children and adults, will be directed to all statutory agencies in Scotland: Health, Social Work and Education.

Make your Voice Heard!

If you use AAC, or are the parent or carer of a person who uses a communication aid, you are encouraged to share experiences, and make comments and suggestions related to the question areas. Your comments will be subject to strict confidentiality. If you would like to help, please complete the questionnaire available from the Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland web site and return it to:

AAC Project

Adult Care and Support Division

Primary and Community Care Directorate

2ER

St Andrews House

Regent Road

Edinburgh

EH1 3DG

Alternatively, email: Alison Gray, Project Manager (alison.gray@scotland.gsi.gov.uk).

Franklin Anybook Reader

Allan Wilson — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 17:31:52

Towards the end of last year we heard about the Franklin Anybook Reader, an interesting new device to support reading, and we managed to borrow one from Seiko, with help from Bert Brooks at Scottish Learning Products.

Great for Parents...

The Anybook Reader is a pen-shaped device measuring roughly 16cm x 3-4cm, which allows the user to make and play back a recording of somebody reading the text on a page of a book. This is done by associating a recording of the text, stored in the pen, with a small white sticker that can be attached to a page in the book. The recording is played back by touching the sticker with the tip of the pen. (The sticker can be removed and re-used without damaging the book.) The obvious application of the device would be to allow parents to make a recording of a favourite story book so that a child can listen to the recording of the parent whenever they want as they interact with the book with the pen. Could be useful if a favourite parent is away on a trip!

... and in Schools!

The pen could also be very useful in a school to allow a pupil with a reading difficulty to follow a story in a book. A teacher or classroom assistant would have to read the text on a page out loud into the pen and attach the sticker to the page. Pupils would then be able to listen to the recording whenever they want by just touching each sticker with the pen. Making a recording can seem a bit fiddly at first, but it becomes easy with practice and recording quality is very good. Rather than just use the pen to record the text on a page, the pen could be used to read text describing different objects in a visual scene. The Anybook Reader could also be used to create a simple, low cost communication aid for a pupil who has no speech, provided that they have sufficient manual dexterity to use the pen. Unfortunately, it is not possible to print or draw on the stickers, but a page of symbols could be set up and printed with Boardmaker, or similar software and stickers with appropriate messages attached to the sheet.

The Anybook Reader comes with a set of printed stickers, with pre-recorded sounds (vehicle noises, animal noises, baby crying, etc.). These illustrate what the device can do, but are of limited use. There are 256 blank stickers that can be used for recording and it is possible to buy extra sets, if required.

There are two models, which will both be available from Scottish Learning Products: The DRP-3000, costing £39.99 (+ p & p, + VAT), which gives 15 hours of recording time and the DRP-4000 (£52.50 (+ p & p, + VAT), which has 60 hours available.

We have a DRP-3000, which will be available for loan, though it is often required for demonstrations.

Burns needs a 'barry' voice!

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 25 Jan 2011 15:44:56

Today is Burns Night and so we'll all be reading, reciting and singing songs from the bard. You can even download a free App to help you remember the w

ords and find out what they mean (See An App's an App for a that).

So, I was thinking, what about children who use voice output communication aids? How can they join in the fun?

Well, I suggest they need a decent Scots voice for their communication aid for starters. So girls are maybe OK, because they can get Heather, provided free of charge courtesy of the Scottish Government. So click below to hear Heather reciting the first verse of A Red, Red Rose:

O my luve's like a red red rose,

That's newly sprung in June.

O my luve's like the melodie,

That's sweetly play'd in tune.

Not quite Eddie Reader, but better than some of the alternatives, especially if you want a bloke's voice ....

Here's Microsoft Sam performing the first verse of Address to a Haggis.

Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,

Great chieftain o' the puddin-race!

Aboon them a' ye tak your place,

Painch, tripe, or thairm:

Weel are ye wordy o' a grace

As lang's my arm.

Not pleasant.

Or we could have delightful Daniel assuring us that a man's a man for a' that:

Is there for honest poverty

That hings his head, an a' that?

The coward slave, we pass him by -

We dare be poor for a' that!

For a' that, an a' that,

Our toils obscure, an a' that,

The rank is but the guinea's stamp,

The man's the gowd for a' that.

Hmmm. Loses something I feel.

Culture Minister Fiona Hyslop said:"Robert Burns is Scotland's greatest cultural icon, recognised and celebrated all around the world. His legacy is of incalculable value to Scotland and the country's image abroad."

What we need on Burns Night is a high quality MALE Scottish computer voice! Then boys who use voice output communication aids can have their say too!

Seeing Ear digital library now open to all print disabled people!

Paul Nisbet — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 17:06:21

The Seeing Ear library is a free online library with about 2,300 books in digital format. Until recently only visually impaired or physically disabled people, or staff working them, could join, but Seeing Ear has a new CLA licence which means that it can now be used by any person with a print disability, which includes dyslexia.

This is great news for pupils in Scotland and the UK because the library has files for loads of books by popular children's authors such as Jacqueline Wilson, J.K. Rowling, Eoin Colfer, Michael Morpurgo, and many more.

To join the libary and download books go to the Seeing Ear web site.

Most of the books are 'Plain Text' (.txt) files which can be read using almost anything on your computer, but you'll probably want to open them with Microsoft Word or another word processor like OpenOffice and then change the font and font size to your own preferance. Then read them on screen or print them as e.g. Braille or Large Print.

Protect and carry your iPad

Sally Millar — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 08:57:15

Everyone loves the iPad but three of the (several, actually) things that make it less than ideal as a portable communication aid are lack of a carry handle and the fact that little fingers cannot resist self-distraction by constantly pressing the Home button. Also lack of volume, for loud and noisy environments. Amdi's brand new iAdapter seems to address all three of these with a rubbery protective cover, that includes a carry handle, a slide cover over the Home button and built-in amplified speakers (rechargeable battery). It also comes with a shoulder strap and a plastic stand for table top use. Not cheap, but.... We're looking forward to seeing it, and hoping a UK supplier picks it up quickly, will keep you posted on that.

Report on 2010 digital papers

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 07 Jan 2011 10:58:34

A report on the use of digital papers in 2010 is now available for download. The report contains a lot of interesting (well, to me, anyway) statistics and feedback from staff who used the papers last year.

In 2010, 101 centres made 2000 requests for digital papers on behalf of 675 candidates. Compared with 2009, this represents a 71% increase in the number of requests, a 38% increase in the number of centres, and a 60% increase in the number of candidates. This continues the upward trend since the papers were first trialled in 2006.

While more schools and candidates used the papers for the first time in 2010, the data also shows that most centres which used the papers in previous years made more requests for more candidates. Once a school 'goes digital', it seems the number of candidates increases each year, and the number of digital papers that a pupil uses also increases. This is good news because it shows that the papers are in most cases well received and meeting the needs of pupils.

Centres from 30 of the 32 local authorities requested digital papers, together with 5 colleges and 5 independent schools.

Candidates with dyslexia and specific learning difficulties were the largest group of users (60%) of digital papers, although pupils with a wide range of other difficulties also used them.

Each year SQA send a questiuonnaire to staff who used the papers and Maggie Quinn of SQA has compiled some useful observations which will help SQA and CALL to develop and support use of digital papers.

The report also summarises feedback from a Focus Group meeting held on 29th October 2010, which will also help improve quality of the papers and administration.

The Digital Papers project has been a great success: a really good collaboration between SQA, CALL, schools and pupils. One of the key players has been Sheila Rennie, SQA Manager of Assessment Materials and Publications. Sheila, along with her colleagues Patricia McDonald and Maggie Quinn, has really driven the project along and the uptake of papers is a tribute to her hard work and professionalism. Sheila retired last year and we wish her well.

Ultra mini Windows PCs can be used as communication aids

Sally Millar — Wed, 15 Dec 2010 15:19:35

Portability is generally a key requirement of a voice output communication aid. A few dedicated communication aids come in 'handheld' size, and there continues to be much interest in iPods and iPads (cheapness is another attractive feature!) But amazingly, nowadays, you can buy a fully featured Windows 7 lightweight wifi PC with a 5" or 7" screen. There are touch screen only versions (X70, S5), or tiny clamshell with keyboard and touchscreen (N5). They have a fantastic 'instantly -on' feature and days of standby-time; battery life is pretty good (5-6 hours) but an extra speaker would be needed to give volume adequate for anything other than a quiet environment. The S5 and N5 are pocketable, the X70 is eminently hand-baggable. All are potentially switch accessible.

X70 (weighs 700 grams)

S5 (weighs 395 grams)

N5 (399 grams)

The leading manufacturer is Viliv, and these South Korean ultra mini PCs (UMPC) can be bought directly from the UK supplier, Think4 IT or from various online sources, eg. Dynamism , at around the £450 - £550 mark (ex VAT) depending on version & supplier. With communication aid software, symbol sets and communication vocabularies loaded, they can be bought from: SmartBox with The Grid 2; or Speaks4Me (premium added for software, support and extended warranty etc.). Check it out!

Including All Children in the Royal Mail Scottish Children's Book Awards

Robert Stewart — Mon, 29 Nov 2010 10:11:06

The 2010 Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children's Books is an innovative nationwide reading project in which children and young people from every corner of Scotland read and vote for their favourite Scottish children's books of the year. Last year:

Over 31,000 children were involved and an amazing 15,014 votes were cast;
Over 400 schools and libraries in every corner of Scotland, from Aberdeen to Dumfries; Shetland to Arran, took part;
The 2009 awards ceremony brought 650 young judges from across Scotland together to see their peers act out the winning books.

The Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children's Books were originally set up by the Scottish Arts Council in 1999 and are now run by Scottish Book Trust.

Early Years (0 - 7 years)

What the Ladybird Heard by Julia Donaldson
Love from Louisa by Simon Puttock and Jo Kiddie
Stormy Weather by Debi Gliori

Younger Readers (8 - 11 years)

Invisible Fiends: Mr Mumbles by Barry Hutchison
The Secret of the Black Moon Moth by John Fardell
The Dragon Whisperer by Lucinda Hare

Older Readers (11 - 16 years)

Crossing the Line by Gillian Philip
The Witching Hour by Elizabeth Laird
Grass by Cathy MacPhail

But what about disabled children who can't read the books?

Children with spinal injury, cerebral palsy or other physical impairments can click a switch or press a key on a computer, to turn pages and read the books by themselves.
Dyslexic readers or children with visual impairments can change the font size and/or colours on screen, or use text-to-speech software to read the books.
The books can be read out by the computer using "Heather", the high quality Scottish computer voice that is available free for schools and pupils from CALL Scotland's The Scottish Voice web site.

The books are available free of charge. Readers and schools can request accessible digital copies of the book(s) they wish to read via the Books for All website or phoning 0131 651 6236.

Manfred the Baddie rides again!

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 11:00:25

During November 2010, all Primary 1 children in Scotland will receive a free copy of Manfred the Baddie from the Scottish Book Trust. Manfred won the 0-7 age category of the Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children's Books last year, and over 11,000 children voted in this age group. The books will be delivered to local authorities for distribution to every P1 class in the area. The author, John Fardell, is 'on tour' meeting pupils and will also be taking part in a Glow Meet on Thursday 25th November from 1.45 to 2.45. The Scottish Book Trust web site has more information and also videos and teacher resources and posters.

However, some children won't be able to read or access the books. Some pupils can't hold the book or turn the pages because of physical disability; some pupils with sight loss won't be able to see the book; others, with learning difficulties, will struggle with the text.

Last year we produced accessible digital versions of Manfred so that pupils with these 'print disabilities' could read the book and take part in the awards. Pupils with physical disabilities can press a key, click the mouse, or hit a switch to turn the pages, while children with other difficulties can listen to an audio narration of the story.

If you have any children in your class who won't be able to read the Manfred paper books and you would like a digital version for them, download a request form (PDF format or DOC format) and send it to us, and we'll send you a CD.

Note that these digital books are only for children who can't read or access the paper copy.

The Eyes have IT!

Allan Wilson — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 17:29:20

Eye Gaze Study Day

This year’s Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland Study Day on the use of eye-pointing and eye-gaze as methods to augment communication proved to be very interesting and informative.

Mick Donegan opened the day with a description of some of the eye gaze systems currently available, emphasising that there was no ‘best’ option and that it was important for a potential user to have an opportunity to try different systems. He stressed the need for assessment activities to be ‘failure proof’ and fun. He described his surprise at the number of people who only talked about the pain of using other forms of assistive technology after finding eye gaze to be a relaxing and stress-free method for computer access.

Janet Scott described her experiences of eye gaze with SCTCI. Initially sceptical, she has become a convert and now regards eye gaze as just ‘an expensive form of mouse’. It does not suit everybody, but it shows how technology has finally caught up with the needs of some clients for whom no successful equipment has been available in the past.

After this, there were various demonstrations by suppliers: DynaVox, Inclusive Technology, Liberator, Smartbox AT, TechCess and Tobii.

In the afternoon Clare Latham described the Look to Talk project, which introduced low tech eye pointing as a communication strategy for children with speech and language difficulties to use at home within the family.

The day concluded with a panel discussion covering such topics as funding and support issues; transitions from using low tech eye gaze, or switch access, to using eye gaze technology; mounting issues.

Buy the Book!

A book of the papers presented on the day, along with additional material, is available from the CALL Scotland online shop.

Feedback on the Day

„I loved hearing all the interesting stories. I always find these days motivational and go away with my head buzzing with ideas!” (Comment by a teacher attending the Study Day).

"Excellent day. Thank you! Information gained to assist with eye gaze assessment and selection - very useful."

"A really stimulating day. Fascinating. Thank you!"

Accessible copies of 2010 Royal Mail Award Shortlist

Paul Nisbet — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 17:32:59

We are pleased to say that we will soon be able to provide accessible digital copies of the nine books shortlisted for the 2010 Royal Mail Book Awards. The books have been produced in cooperation with the publishers and The Scottish Book Trust. Last year over 31,000 children were involved in the awards and 15,014 votes were cast. The accessible digital versions are for children with 'print disabilities', who canot read the ordinary paper books.

For example, children with physical disabilities who can't hold the book or turn the pages themselves (because of spinal injury or cerebral palsy, for example) can click a switch or press a key to turn the pages of the digital books.

Dyslexic readers, or children with visual impairments can change the font size and/or colours on screen, or use text to speech software to have the books read out by the computer.

The books will be available on CD, free of charge, from CALL: details should be upon the Books for All web site by the end of November.

RNIB Scotland have also produced Large Print, Braille and audio versions of the books, for children with visual impairments.

New Autumn ContAACt newsletter

Joanna Courtney — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 15:01:52

Issue 4 of the ContAACt newsletter is out now!

Full of AAC news and views from people who use AAC in Scotland!

Look 'In the Diary' to find out what AAC events are coming soon, read about Barry's trip to Barcelona and get advice from the "Speak Out Group" on the best places to go in Dundee!

Why don't you click on Autumn ContAACt newsletter and read all about it!

Speech Bubble - Database of Information on Communication Aids

Allan Wilson — Wed, 10 Nov 2010 08:53:31

Our friends at the ACE Centre in Oxford have now launched their SpeechBubble web site, providing a database of detailed information about almost all of the communication aids and software available in the UK.

You can search for devices that fit into a number of categories, e.g. 'Simple Aids with one Message', or 'Computer-based Aids with Touchscreen', or try to find devices that have a particular feature, e.g. Visual Scanning or Recorded Speech. It is possible to combine search terms to find, for example, a device that can be accessed by using Morse Code, with synthetic speech that can be used for texting. (the DynaVox V and VMax fit the bill!).

This is NOT an assessment tool which parents will be able to use to buy their child a communication aid 'off the shelf', but it will be an invaluable tool for therapists looking for a suitable device for a client with specific requirements, offering suggestions that they might not be aware of.

This is a great resource that will save therapists a lot of time and effort and we would like to thank Mark Saville and colleagues at ACE for the huge amount of work that has gone into this exciting new facility.

2010 SQA Digital Question papers now available

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:37:01

SQA have made all the 2010 adapted digital papers available on the SQA web site. There are over 400 papers covering a wide range of subjects.

These past papers are ideal for revision and practice, for pupils who are going to be sitting prelims with digital papers, or are intending to 'go digital' in the 2011 exams. Subject teachers also find the past papers useful for class teaching: the papers can be shown on an interactve white board and answers typed on-screen.

You can also download digital versions of answer booklets, for use with papers that are not "question-and-answer" format (i.e. most Standard Grade Credit, and Higher and Advanced Higher papers).

WordTalk for Windows 7 (32-bit) now available

Robert Stewart — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 16:50:10

A new version of WordTalk is now available for Windows 7 (32-bit). Unfortunately the Windows 7 (64-bit) version is not yet ready.

WordTalk is a free text-to-speech plugin developed for use with Microsoft Word. It will speak the text of the document and will highlight it as it goes. It contains a talking dictionary to help decide which word spelling is most appropriate.

Siting neatly in your Microsoft Word toolbar it is highly configurable, allowing you to:

Adjust the highlight colours;
Change the voice and the speed of the speech;
Convert text to speech and save as a .wav or .mp3 file so that it can be played back on an iPod or mp3 player.

This new version can be downloaded from the WordTalk website and will only work with Microsoft Office Word 2007 or 2010.

To find out which version of Windows 7 you have:

Click Start, type system in the Start Search box, and then click system in the Programs list.
The operating system is displayed as follows:
- For a 64-bit version operating system: 64-bit Operating System appears for the System type under System.
- For a 32-bit version operating system: 32-bit Operating System appears for the System type under System.

Is sushi on the menu?

Sally Millar — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 18:14:56

Kids with physical disabilities often need to use 'scanning' (and switching) to access their communication and/or writing programs. Scanning is a widely misunderstood word. A good definition was coined by David Colven and Simon Judge in 'Switch Access to Technology'. They say: "It's a bit like a 'Yo Sushi' bar. You can't reach all the dishes from where you sit, and so you have to wait until the one you want turns up in front of you."

I like that! I'd like to bring in a 'restaurant metaphor' of my own. With children who use low tech communication, I often get faced with frustrated staff who say 'he can't even answer Yes or No or make choices'. Then I watch, and see them say things like 'Freddy - do you want mince for lunch? Yes or no?' . At that point I reflect on how I would feel if I went into a restaurant and the waiter said "Do you want chicken balmoral?" I'd say "well maybe - I don't know - what else do you have on the menu, please tell me ALL the options and THEN I'll choose." (And I might think 'what a useless waiter!')

So - except with those few pupils who are known to cope with only one or two alternatives - I often suggest that staff should limit the use of yes/no questions and forced alternative questions (choice from 2) and try using oral/auditory scanning instead. I have seen pupils learn to make successful choices from 3, 4 and even 6 or more items using this method. It's especially powerful for children with visual impairment and really poor pointing ability - no pictures needed, just consistent oral presentation by staff and listening and simple signalling by the child.

Of course, things can get much more sophisticated by introducing symbols and even eye-coding systems to create a full 'partner assisted scanning system'. A comprehensive handout by Linda Burkhart and Gayle Porter is available. And check out this video by Gail van Tatenhove to see how far this can go

Catching up with CALL!

Allan Wilson — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 10:50:33

CALL will be exhibiting at a number of events over the next few weeks:

Dyslexia Scotland Roadshow

Tuesday 26th October - Galashiels - Langlee Complex, Marigold Drive, Galashiels TD1 2LP (3pm - 8pm)
Wednesday 27th October - Hawick - Hawick Learning Centre, Buccleuch Road, Hawick TD9 0EG (5pm - 8pm)
Thursday 28th October - Peebles - Kingsland Primary School, Neidpath Road, Peebles EH45 8HQ (4pm - 8pm)
Friday 29th October - Duns - Berwickshire High School, Duns TD11 3QQ (5pm - 8pm)

These days are all free and open to members of the public with an interest in dyslexia. Further information is available from Dyslexia Scotland.

Augmentative Communication in Practice Annual Study Day

Tuesday 9th November - Stirling - Stirling Management Centre, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA

CALL will be exhibiting as part of the Study Day on the Use of Eye Gaze to Support Communication. See the Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland web site for details.

Dyslexia Scotland's Adult Dyslexia Conference, 2010

Tuesday 9th November - Stirling - Stirling Management Centre, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA

The conference is free to attend, but you must register in advance. See the conference web site.

Scottish Council of Independent Schools' Learning Support Conference

Thursday 11th November - Glasgow - Thistle Hotel, Cambridge Street, Glasgow G2 8DL

You have to register to attend this conference through the Scottish Council of Independent Schools.

Dyslexia Scotland Perth Open Meeting

Thursday 11th November - Perth - North Muirton Community Hall, Argyll Road, Perth PH1 3BZ

This is an open meeting that anyone can attend. See the Dyslexia Scotland Perth web site for details.

Heather the Scottish Computer Voice needs a brother!

Robert Stewart — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 15:08:53

The Scottish Voice has been very well received by the Scottish educational community and we know that she is being used to listen to:

SQA digital exams;
novels;
digital textbooks;
Microsoft Word documents;
resources on Glow.

She is also used by children who can’t speak and who use voice output communication aids.

Heather needs a brother! Some boys have said that they would like to listen to digital resources spoken in a male Scottish voice, and we don’t think that Heather is acceptable for boys who use communication aids. If you were a boy, would you like your voice to sound like Heather, lovely though she is?

We are hoping to raise funds to enable CereProc to create a sibling for Heather. Please contact us if you have any comments or suggestions about where we could get the money, or about a male Scot who has a good voice that we could approach to become the (male) voice of Scottish education!

New in CALL (Issue 27) available for download

Robert Stewart — Thu, 14 Oct 2010 15:33:21

Issue 27 of 'New in CALL', the free news, views and events leaflet is now available for download.

Inside this issue:

Print Disability Licence;
The Royal Mail Book Awards;
iPad or Kindle;
Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland study day;
2010-2011 CPD Calendar.

... And much more!

iPad Apps for Special Education

Allan Wilson — Wed, 13 Oct 2010 08:51:49

Eric Sailers, the American Speech-Language Pathologist who maintains an excellent list of iPhone and iPod Touch Apps for (Special) Education, has now made available a short handout with a list of iPad Apps for Special Education on his blog site, SLP Sharing. The list includes apps for:

Communication
Reading
Writing
Math
Organisation
Storytelling
Music / Songs
Art
Games

The handout also includes information on cases; stands, speakers and other accessories.

Cool Tools for Schools!

Allan Wilson — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 14:04:53

We've recently found out about the Cool Tools for Schools wiki.

This is an amazing resource, with lots of free / online tools that can be used by teachers and pupils (assuming they are allowed access online). Resources are categorised under the following headings:

Presentation Tools
Collaborative Tools
Research Tools
Video Tools
Slideshow Tools
Audio Tools
Image Tools
Drawing Tools
Writing Tools
Music Tools
Organising Tools
Converting Tools
Mapping Tools
Quiz and Poll Tools
Graphing Tools
Creativity Tools
Widgets
File Storage & Web Pages
Other Helpful Sites
Teacher Resources

We'll be incorporating some of this (along with lots of other material) into a course on No Cost / Low Cost Software to Support Pupils with Reading and Writing Difficulties to be run at CALL on 2nd June 2011.

Towards an Autism Strategy for Scotland

Allan Wilson — Fri, 10 Sep 2010 10:15:36

The Scottish Government, working in partnership with the Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) Reference Group, have developed a draft Scottish Autism Strategy. The Strategy sets out what the Scottish Government in partnership with users, carers and professionals proposes to do to meet the needs of people with ASD in response to growing concerns that, whilst much has been achieved in Scotland to date, much has yet to be done.

The draft strategy reviews and builds on existing policies with a number of recommendations under five main themes:

Diagnosis, assessment and interventions
Matching resources to need
Standards and scrutiny
Staff education and training
Research

CALL Scotland's CPD Programme for 2010-11 includes a number of courses that are particularly relevant to teachers working with pupils with autism spectrum disorders:

09.12.10 - Creating Communication Friendly Schools
20.01.11 - Personal Communication Passports
03.03.11 - Multimedia Social Stories

These and other CALL courses can also be run as in-service training in schools and local authorities.

Boardmaker 6 Plus! (again)

Sally Millar — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 15:06:03

CALL has previously alerted folk to the cheap deal on Boardmaker software available through LTS, for Scotland. Since LTS revamped their web site, the page link we gave before has become defunct. Look here for current prices It's rumoured that the deal may 'run out' once a ceiling number have been sold, so if you want it, perhaps best not to wait too long.

Reading Web Pages (Revisited)

Allan Wilson — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 16:39:05

During the early part of 2009 we spent some time comparing different text-to-speech utilities that could be be used to read text aloud from web sites and published our conclusions in our Reading the Web information sheet. At the time, we found the best option was to use the free Click Speak utility with Firefox. There wasn't an option for Internet Explorer that we were totally happy to recommend: Read and Write Gold worked well, but is expensive, while most of the low cost / free utilities had some feature that we were not happy with. There have been a few developments over the past year so it is worth providing a short update here, prior to revising the information sheet.

Firstly, a couple of web browsers now have text-to-speech facilities embedded within the program. On the Apple Mac, Safari users can now access a pretty primitive text to speech facility by highlighting the text to be read and using the mouse to select - Edit - Speech - Start Speaking. The computer will now speak the text using its default voice. There are a couple of text-to-speech extensions for Google Chrome, Read Me Please! and Chrome Page Reader, but we couldn't get either to work!

A Solution for Internet Explorer?

We recently came across a nice little utility, Panopreter, that can be used to read out files in a variety of formats and can also create MP3 / WAV sound files from text. Two versions of the program are available, Basic and Plus. The Basic version is free and can be used to read text files out aloud, or to create MP3 files. Unfortunately, the text files cannot be seen as they are being read, which limits the use of this program. The Plus version, costing $29.95, is much more useful. Text is visible as it is read, with each word being highlighted as it is spoken and the program can even handle PDF files. The Plus version also adds a toolbar to Internet Explorer, which provides options for either an entire web page, or selected text to be read out loud. Individual words are highlighted as they are spoken. It is also possible to use the Panopreter Plus to convert a web page into an MP3 / WAV file that can be played back by an MP3 player. In terms of value for money and ease of use, Panopreter Plus is probably the best option currently available for reading text from Internet Explorer.

Talks on Low-cost / No-cost Software Tools for People with Dyslexia

Allan Wilson — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 14:16:44

Allan Wilson from CALL Scotland will be demonstrating free / low-cost software at meetings of branches of Dyslexia Scotland in Fife and West Lothian in September. He'll start off by demonstrating a few free utilities to make a computer screen visually easier to read and will then move on to look at a number of free, or low cost text to speech programs that can be used with word processed documents, web pages and other text. There will also be chances to see a free speech recognition program and programs that can be used to help organise your thoughts. There will be opportunities to ask questions throughout the presentation.

The meetings are relaxed and friendly and are open to anybody to attend - not just members of Dyslexia Scotland.

Dates:

Markinch, Fife. 7pm, Thursday 2nd September - Memorial Hall, 252 Betson Street, Markinch, Fife KY7 6AA.
Livingston, West Lothian. 7pm, Wednesday 15th September - West Lothian College, Almondvale Crescent, Livingston, West Lothian EH54 7EP.

Communication Matters!

Sally Millar — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 16:25:06

Anybody who is interested in augmentative communication for their pupils, clients or family member needs to be aware of the annual Communication Matters (CM) Symposium. This is a UK-wide conference - actually becoming increasingly international - held every September (26-28 September, this year, in Leicester). It may seem expensive but is actually excellent value considering that all accommodation and food are included.

The programme is relevant for both children and adult clients and always offers a great mix of practical, research, technical and AAC user-led presentations, for all levels of AAC experience. The conference is accompanied by a major exhibition of AAC equipment (free access). It's also a tremendous opportunity to network with AAC specialists. If you are interested, you can view or download this year's Programme.

The Eyes have IT!

Allan Wilson — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 16:50:58

This year's Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland study day, to be held in the Stirling Management Centre on Tuesday 9th November will focus on the use of Eye Gaze as an aid to communication.

Eye gaze has always been a useful technique for helping people with communication difficulties to express themselves, whether by eye pointing at objects, or at symbols on a communication board or book, or letters on an e-tran frame.

Recent years have seen exciting developments in technology allowing some people with severe and complex disabilities to control a computer or a communication aid by eye gaze. But the technology is complex and expensive and it is not suitable for everybody with a communication difficulty.

This Study Day will explore issues surrounding eye gaze within both low tech and high tech communication systems and will help to raise awareness of the advantages and disadvantages of such systems.Speakers will include:

Dr Mick Donegan from the University of East London. Mick was Coordinator of the User Requirements element of the COGAIN project, which led research into the use of eye gaze technology by people with disabilities
Janet Scott, SCTCI, will present a number of short case studies providing a glimpse of some of the people who have worked with SCTCI to use eye gaze as their means of access to communication.
Claire Latham, formerly from the ACE Centre in Oxford will describe their Look2Talk project on learning to communicate by eye pointing to low tech systems.

There will also be opportunities to find out about the various eye gaze systems currently available in the UK during short supplier presentations.

Further information is available on the Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland web site.

Boardmaker Studio

Joanna Courtney — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 10:54:38

Calling all Boardmaker users!

There's a new product about to be released by Mayer Johnson called Boardmaker Studio.

This promises to make creating resources even easier by providing studio starter templates and pre-programmed 'gadget' or function buttons which can be dragged onto a page in any activity. It also has more of a Microsoft Office look about it ( more user friendly?) and doesn't require a CD in the drive!

You can import activities from Boardmaker and Boardmaker Plus! v6 to edit and print out and also download activities directly from 'Boardmaker Share.'

The 'Boardmaker Share' activities and many of the Boardmaker Studio resources have a very American theme to them. When will we see some more UK themed resources available?

Boardmaker studio costs around £250, about the same as buying Boardmaker Plus! as a new product.

What we're now waiting to hear is whether there will be upgrade deals, will Studio be replacing Boardmaker Plus! and will this product make the whole 'Boardmaker Family' easier to get our heads around?

A 30 day trial version will be available from September 7th. We look forward to trying it out!

Is it worth it?

Watch this space.

Dyslexia Scotland Education Conference Saturday 25th September

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 15:24:29

If you teach or support children and young people with dyslexia, you will be interested in the Dyslexia Scotland Education Conference which this year will be held on Saturday 25th September at the Edinburgh Conference Centre at Heriot-Watt University.

The theme of the conference is "Innovative Practice in Dyslexia: A New Decade". The conference is again chaired by Dr. Gavin Reid and speakers include Rob Long (Chartered Educational Psychologist); Laura Ann Currie (HMIe); Fran Ranaldi, Dr Margaret Crombie, staff from Lochaber High School, Jennifer Drysdale (PT Learning Support, Fife) and yours truly. There are also panel sessions and an exhibition.

This conference is always a great event and if I wasn't otherwise engaged talking at the same time, I'd be at Margaret Crombie's session on the new Assessing Dyslexia Toolkit, and the workshop from the Lochaber team, who have created a web site with downloadable audio materials for revision.

To find out more and book, go to the Dyslexia Scotland web site.

Accessible Formats from your local library

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 11:53:36

Forbes Smith, who is coordinating a working group looking at provision of accessible formats in East Dunbartonshire, emailed recently to say that East Dunbartonshire Library Service now has a service for providing downloadable audiobooks. So far they have over 560 titles available for immediate download onto PC, iPod or mp3 player and Forbes says they are adding 30 titles a week. Forbes says he signed up and then within half an hour of returning to his base, he had downloaded an audio book novel. There are an extensive range of materials available including lecture materials for university students.

To find out more, go to the East Dunbartonshire online library site, click on My Account, then on Audiobook Downloads.

Forbes' email prompted me to ask if other library services are doing the same thing, so I've just spent a few happy hours googling and exploring the online library catalogues in all 32 local authorities. I couldn't find many that have downloadable audio books, but almost all of them have audio books on cassette and CD, and also Large Print books.

South Ayrshire has downloadable 'eReads' (eBooks) as well as audio and Large Print, although they are Adobe ePUB format which is OK for readers with a physical impairment who need the book on screen, but not so good for people with visual impairment or dyslexia because the maximum font size is quite small and you can't read the book with text-to-speech software.

I've made up a table with the contact details and we'll add it to the Finding Books page on the Books for All web site.

So, when looking for books in accessible formats, don't forget your local library service!

A Most Curious Detour

Allan Wilson — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 20:17:00

We were recently in contact with a member of staff from an adult day centre in Edinburgh. One of his clients, Stuart Hepburn has just finished writing a book, A Most Curious Detour, which describes his experience of becoming disabled as a result of a massive stroke in 2005. The stroke left him paralysed and unable to communicate. The book describes the impact of the stroke on his life and his encounters with the medical system in Scotland. He also reflects on his past life as a business consultant and describes some of the dreams he has while in hospital. The book can be seen as a Scottish answer to Jean Dominique Bauby's The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and is definitely required reading for anybody wanting to find out more about the impact of an acquired disability on a person's life.

The book can be purchased through the Lulu web site. It is now also available through Amazon. All profits go to charity.

Tah dah! CLA Print Disability Licence is now available!

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 12:25:09

On 28th May we blogged that the CLA announced a new Print Disability Licence to replace the 'VIP' licence, and today we received our copy of this new licence. Why is this good news? Well, the Print Disability Licence is for:

"an educational establishment or a body that is not conducted for profit" who
"wishes to make and to distribute multiple copies of copyright material in a format accessible to persons who could not otherwise read or access such copyright material by reason of visual impairment or other disability where no such format is commercially available."

This means that holders of the Print Disability Licence can now legally make, for example, digital copies of books for pupils with dyslexia, learning difficulties, autism or hearing impairment. Some of the terms and conditions:

You must legally possess an original copy of the book from whch you make the Accessible Copy.
You cannot make an Accessible Copy if one is commercially available in a similar accessible format.
Your Accessible Copy must contain "a statement that it is a copy of the original Work made under a CLA licence for the personal use of an Authorised Person".
Your Accessible Copy must contain the title, name of author and publisher, and the published edition from which you have made your Accessible Copy.
You can add facilities for navigation around digital formats and you can enlarge, reduce or change colour of text or illustrations, provided these changes do not "amount to a derogatory treatment of the Work".
You can give an "Intermediate Copy" to other CLA licence holders. An Intermediate Copy is a copy which you have made as part of the production process - for example, it could be a digital file which you made in order to create a Large Print or a Braille copy.
You must keep records of copies made, and send the records to CLA annually, on 1st May each year. The report should list the title, ISBN, author(s), publisher, edition, format, number of copies created and the date they were created.

This new licence will lead to big changes and developments because the potential 'market' for Accessible Copies is now much larger and more diverse. It means that charities like Calibre can lend all their audio books to dyslexic readers as well as those with visual impairment, that dyslexic readers will be able to download text files of books from The Seeing Ear, that local authority transcription services can share Accessible Copies far more freely than before, and importantly, it also means that all Print-Disabled pupils can download and use Accessible Copies of books from the Books for All Scotland Database.

Consultation on Legislation for Pupils with Disabilities in Scottish Schools

Allan Wilson — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 09:18:01

The Scottish Government has launched a consultation on Secondary Legislation arising from The Equality Act 2010.The consultation seeks views on new rules of procedure for the Additional Support Needs Tribunals for Scotland (ASNTS), to enable them to hear disability claims (discrimination, harassment and victimisation) cases in school education.

Details are available on the Scottish Government web site.

Secure social networking site for people with learning disabilities

Sally Millar — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 14:39:25

Came across Special Friends Online - looks interesting as a way of helping children and adults with learning difficulties to be part of international social networking communities - but safely. They've invented 'Smiley Talk' a way of interacting, on the site, for people who can't spell/use keyboard (or think of what to say), using smiley face icons and preset questions and answers. There are also jokes and games, poems, videos, information and links, online chat, discussion forums, heroes and stars, send hugs etc. The 'Padlock' allows a carer to restrict access and lock user out of certain sections eg. 1:1 messaging or chatroom, for safety.

I've only just joined, in order to explore and evaluate, so not yet 'recommending' this site as such - but let us know how you get on if you have tried this site. Maybe there are other similar sites out there - we'd like to hear of them? Some teachers are also using Glow groups as a way of simulating FaceBook-type facilities securely for pupils with ASN - Susan McCauley of Pinewood school gave a great presentation on this at the CALL's recent ICT and Inclusion event in East Kilbride.

The other great resource, for symbol users, of course, is Widgit's Symbol World with constantly updating symbol stories, news, personal stories, information etc. all in symbols (and also speech feedback, if you download Browsealoud).

ContAACt newsletter issue 3

Joanna Courtney — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 12:44:56

Issue 3 of the 'ContAACt newsletter' is out now!

Follow the link ContAACt newsletter to find out what's happening with AAC users in Scotland (Spring 2010)

The 'AAC Project Awards' on page 1 may be of interest to people wanting to fund AAC events or active participation by a person who uses AAC.

Barry Smith received part of his funding to give a talk at ISAAC in Barcelona this Summer, using his Lightwriter SL40, from this scheme.

Find out more about Barry's story.

In 'Places We Like' on page 4 , you can find out about the best things to do in Perth from local AAC users, who know best!

We'd love to hear more from people who use AAC about what you have been doing in your local area or any other items you'd like to share in the next ContAACt newsletter, due out in Autumn 2010.

Please send your items to enquiries@acipscotland.org.uk We look forward to hearing your news and sharing it with AAC users across Scotland.

Front-End for your BM Plus! boards

Sally Millar — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:47:07

For those of you that have got the interactive V6 BoardMaker Plus! here is a nice 'top tip' on storing boards and how to create a simple and accessible 'front end' to your stored boards so you can present a prepared lesson comprising different boards/exercises smoothly.

Paper materials that talk

Sally Millar — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 14:51:31

Amongst the new things seen at ICT and Inclusion last week were AbilityWorld's new Uni-tech Voice Symbol and Voice Ink. What’s innovative is that the special software prints sound as well as symbols and words on to paper (ordinary paper and normal colour printer cartridge). When the user touches the printed word or symbol on the paper with the special Voice Pen, it speaks (choice of synthetic voices). It can also play music/sound files or recorded voice.

With the Voice Ink software, when the user touches each word (or sentence, paragraph or whole page, depending on how the settings you choose) it speaks out, so you can use it just to check you've correctly read a few 'sticky' words, or to read whole work sheets, etc. A true 'talking book'.

The Voice Symbol communication software lets you make symbol boards or book pages, and record personalised messages, so it is a low-tech system that speaks as well! It also works through laminate.

The system is not exactly cheap, but comparable in price to some other recorded voice communication aids. Once you've got the software you can add more V-pens for more users at a reasonable price.

There is a link on the Ability World website to video clips on YouTube where you can see the Uni-tech system in use (albeit largely in Taiwanese...).

ICT and Inclusion - Latest News!

Allan Wilson — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 10:05:38

It's not too late to book a place at one of next week's free ICT and Inclusion days, run in conjunction with the JISC Resource Centres, though we may not be able to guarantee lunch if you book very late:

Tuesday 15th June - Invercarse Hotel, 371 Perth Road, Dundee DD2 1PG.
Wednesday 16th June - CALL Scotland, Moray House School of Education, Paterson's Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh EH8 8AQ.
Thursday 17th June - The Bruce Hotel, 35 Cornwall Street, East Kilbride G74 1AF.

The Exhibition, featuring many of the UK's leading suppliers of assistive technology and software for pupils and students with additional support needs runs from 9 am until 4pm each day and is accompanied by a series of presentations. Timetables can now be downloaded from the ICT and Inclusion web site, where you can also register to attend.

Late additions

There have been some late additions to the list of suppliers and organisations that will be attending:

Ink Learning are joining the exhibition in Dundee. They will be demonstrating their Primary Steps Maths and Primary Steps Phonics programs that can be enjoyed using a dance mat. Great fun, educational and good exercise!
Ability World and Steljes will be coming to Edinburgh and East Kilbride. Ability World will be bringing their innovative, Uni-tech system and Voice Ink software, which enables you to 'print' spoken words and sounds onto your teaching resources and communication boards. Steljes will be demonstrating their latest Smart Table, which brings a revolutionary approach to group learning, and other products.
Pass IT On / U Can Do IT and the Scottish Sensory Centre will be providing information about their work in the Edinburgh exhibition. Pass IT On provide access to computers for people with disabilities in partnership with U Can Do IT, who provide training. The Scottish Sensory Centre provide training and support for teachers of pupils with visual or hearing impairments.

Partnership Working between Allied Health Professionals and Education

Allan Wilson — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 16:21:18

What's this... a non-techie blog? Technology can often be used to support students with additional support needs in schools and colleges, but there are times when it isn't the answer. Even where it has a significant part to play, successful implementation depends on teachers, parents, speech and language therapists, occupational therapists and other staff working together in partnership to support the student.

The Scottish Government have produced a new publication, Guidance on Partnership Working between Allied Health Professionals and Education, which presents strategies and guidance aimed at improving the quality of partnership working between allied health professionals, education staff and parents. The Guidance outlines different features of good practice and presents a number of short case studies from different parts of Scotland. There's also a useful set of tools that can be used to measure strengths and areas for development in current practice with regard to working in partnership.

Definitely worth a look if you are involved with Partnership Working!

Early evaluation of AAC on iPad

Sally Millar — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 16:33:33

We are all wondering what the iPad is going to do for people who use AAC. Here is a useful early evaluation of Proloquo2Go on iPad, by a person with fine motor difficulties who herself uses a variety of different AAC and computer technology, in her daily life.

Sentence Trouble

Sandra O'Neill — Fri, 28 May 2010 17:22:27

'Sentence Trouble' - Communication Guide for helping troubled young people with dyslexia, autism & other disabilities:

http://bit.ly/doI9Fw

Although not written for teachers or education, this guide has a lot of useful info/advice that some teachers and others working with young people have still to take on board!

New Copyright Licence including ALL print-disabled people is here at last!!!!

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 28 May 2010 16:50:40

We're really very happy indeed to report that today the Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA) launched a new ‘Print Disability Licence’ to replace the old 'VIP' licence. The new licence has been extended to include all people with a 'print disability' - the previous licence was restricted to people with visual impairment or physical disability. This was clearly inequitable (as we pointed out in the 2007 Books for All Report) and so we are delighted that the new licence addresses this inequality. It means that dyslexic people are now covered under the licence.

Basically, the new licence allows not-for-profit organisations to make Accessible Copies of most published, copyright works and provide them to people with print disabilities who cannot read or access the printed copies. The Accessible Copy may be, for example, Large Print, Braille, audio (synthetic or recorded), digital (with or without text to speech), etc. The licence is free.

We've been waiting for the new licence for quite some time but now that it's here, it means that for example:

books on the developing Books for All Scotland database can be downloaded for any print disabled pupil, not just those pupils with visual impairment or physical disability;
books that we, or any other VIP licence holder has made, can be freely shared across the UK provided they are for use by print disabled readers;
schools and local authorities in the 15 Scottish local authorities who hold VIP licences will be able to make and share their accessible copies with a much larger and wider range of pupils.

For children and young people in schools with dyslexia, learning difficulties, hearing impairment, or who may be on the autistic spectrum, this is very good news.

The new licence is the result of a lot of work by CLA, the Right to Read Alliance (of which CALL is a member) and the publishers' Accessibility Action Group.

Read more about the new licence in the CLA press release.

Chuffed!

(Right, let's get sourcing, adapting, making and sharing these Accessible Books.....)

New guide for teachers on how to create accessible resources

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 24 May 2010 13:23:24

Accessible Text: Guidelines for Good Practice, is a new publication from CALL Scotland on 'how to' produce accessible resources.

Making your learning materials accessible to pupils with disabilities or additional support needs is not only good practice but is also necessary to meet equality legislation.

Part 1 of the book, written by Fran Ranaldi, looks at the design of resources and covers issues such as the choice and size of font, use of images and colour and the visual layout and design. By following the guidelines in to the book, teachers should be able to create learning resources that can be more easily read by pupils with, for example, dyslexia, visual impairment, or learning difficulties.

Part 2, by Paul Nisbet, look at how resources can be made accessible in digital formats. Inceasingly, teachers are creating resources which will be accessed on screen as well as on paper, and this part of the book shows how digital accessibility can be built in when writing the material, with relatively little effort.

You can download the book for free from CALL Scotland's web site. Altenatively, order print copies (£10) from CALL’s online shop.

Fran Ranaldi is an experienced teacher who has worked for HMIe on the Review of Education for learners with dyslexia, the Scottish Government on Accessibly Guidelines and within her education authority on several projects for dyslexia and accessibility across the curriculum.

Paul Nisbet is Joint Coordinator of CALL Scotland and works directly with pupils with additional support needs and takes a lead role in current projects to help pupils access curriculum resources, such as Books for All, SQA digital exam papers, and The Scottish Voice.

Preparation and dissemination of the book is funded by the Scottish Government Schools Directorate.

Does your BoardMaker Plus! speech not work properly??

Sally Millar — Tue, 18 May 2010 10:07:02

Many people have recently upgraded to v.6 Boardmaker Plus! Unlike the old Boardmaker, this version speaks and so can be used by pupils for both school work and as a personal expressive communication support (or even perhaps as a full scale AAC system). But some people have been experiencing problems getting the voice to work properly - it seems to 'skip' to the end of the message without speaking it out fully - with both SAPI 4 and SAPI 5 voices. Mayer Johnson's technical support team have released the following 'fix' to correct the problem (which apparently only affects PCs with Windows XP and earlier):

To correct the problem you need to reduce the hardware acceleration on the sound card:

Open the Control Panel and double-click Sounds.
Click on the Audio tab.
In the Sound Playback box, click on the Advanced button.
Click on the Performance tab (Win 2000/XP) and Troubleshoot tab (Win 98).
Move the Hardware acceleration slider to None. Click on the Apply button, then click on OK.
Restart BoardMaker and check the speech.

Gate those joysticks!

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 12 May 2010 17:05:46

We’ve been looking at methods of computer access for a young boy (age 7) with athetoid cerebral palsy, and he’s evaluated quite a few options. The most promising method was an old Interface Designs switched joystick connected via a USB Mouse Mover interface, which he controls with his right hand. He clicks with a head switch. ‘Billy’ (not his real name) has been using this in school since January 2009 and he is now an expert: he can write using Clicker (both with a word bank and an on-screen keyboard); he can draw and paint with 2Simple Paint; he can access the internet; he can get navigate folders, use the Start menu to start programs, choose menu items, and adjust settings. I'm not quite sure how he manages it, but he does, and very quickly and accurately too.

The problem with this joystick is it’s no longer made, so I wanted to find an alternative that we could actually buy. Most joysticks are not like this one though - most are smaller, analogue (i.e. the more you push the stick, the faster the mouse pointer moves), and ungated.

So why does this stick work for him compared to, say, a Roller Joystick, which doesn’t, at all? I think there are three reasons:

The joystick is large and clunky with a ‘gate’ – slots for forward, back, left and right. Billy has difficulty with fine motor control which means the Roller Joystick is almost impossible, whereas he can push the Interface Designs stick in the correct approximate direction and then the gate guides it into place.
The stick has a long handle which he manages with relatively gross movements.
The Mousemover interface has adjustable acceleration, which means the longer Billy pushes the stick, the faster the mouse pointer moves. This gives him really very good accuracy by pushing the stick for a short time and then releasing it, yet also quick movement around the screen by holding the stick on.

A few weeks ago I made a plastic gate for a Roller Joystick and Billy tried it out. It was much, much better than an ungated Roller Joystick but still not quite as fast and accurate as the Interface Designs/MouseMover combination – mainly I think because there is no control over acceleration (the Roller moves at full speed because Billy can’t do anything other than push it all the way).

I’ve been involved with lots of people like Billy over the years who can successfully control a gated stick but who struggle with an ungated, standard analogue stick and so this blog is to remind us all that Gates are Good (and could manufacturers please offer gates for their joysticks and/or come up with something similar to the Interface Designs device.)

Emergency Communication Boards

Sally Millar — Tue, 11 May 2010 19:43:27

Not wanting to invoke any disasters! But during any emergency, communication is vitally important. The Institute on Disabilities, Temple University, Philadelphia, moved by the recent Haiti earthquake disaster, offers for free download a double sided sheet called Emergency Communication 4 ALL (picture symbol and letter/word versions available). It's a very basic communication board and Passport in one. There is also a sheet of Tips for Communicating with Someone Who Needs Assistance. AAC services might use these for ideas to create their own version, or even just print it as is and perhaps provide to local community emergency responders such as firefighter services.

another iPhone app for communication

Sally Millar — Tue, 11 May 2010 16:00:37

As expected, yet more apps are appearing for the iPhone. The latest one is called iComm, and it seems to have hit the media headlines, which is a good advert for AAC.

iComm is designed by a parent as are some of the others discussed in earlier blogs and in the CALL review paper. It seems pretty similar in many ways to some of the others reviewed, such as iCommunicate. It comes with some photos in it and you can upload your own photos, and record yor own voice to make it fully personalised. Content is organised into categories (20). When you choose your category, it displays 4 items per page. When you make a selection it offers a confirmation Yes/No step (useful for users of eye pointing). The points to note about iComm for now are:

It is on SALE right now, at £1.79 (usually £15.99). You get the free version first (limited features), and then click to upgrade to the full version, which you pay for.
it will ONLY run on an iPhone, not on an iPod Touch. The Daily Mail says it works on the iPad, but I would want to check this. It may only work on the WiFi + 3G version, and not the cheaper WiFi only version??

Tap to Talk for iPod, iPhone and iPad

Sally Millar — Wed, 05 May 2010 15:57:39

Interestingly, the little communication program Tap to Talk that was brought out originally for Nintendo DS and DS Lite, is now available also as an App for the iPhone, iPod Touch and/or iPad. This may get round some of the sound volume issues, and also as multiple Tap to Talk albums (ie vocabularies) can be stored and accessed online, it may prove to be useful for working with a number of different users at once (whereas other communication Apps are totally personal). The app is free via the App Store, but you need to be subscribed to the web-based Tap to Talk Designer.

Haven't tried it out yet - will keep you posted...!

New Bookshare online introduction to accessible formats

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 04 May 2010 12:55:27

Bookshare has a new online learning module for people who want to learn more about accessible digital books and resources. It has a US focus, but has good examples, with video and audio clips, of why some pupils need books in accessible digital formats and why it makes a difference to their education.

Bookshare is a huge US database of over 70,000 titles in Daisy 3 and BRF (Braille) formats: it shows what you can do with $32 million over 5 years of federal money. Memo to Victoria Quay: any chance of similar funding for the Books for All Scotland Database?

About 5,000 of the Bookshare titles are available to readers and schools outside the USA - see the Bookshare UK and International Membership pages. Most of the books are fiction titles and so it's worth doing a search on the database (use the Advanced Search button and look for "Books available worldwide") to see if there are books which you want. If there are, you might want to join Bookshare. The cost of international membership is $25 initially plus a $75 annual fee; organisations such as schools and libraries and I think also local authority services can pay for individual pupils (at the individual membership rate), or by the number of books you want to download (30 books for $300, 60 books for $450, 100 books for $600).

Membership also gives you free access to software for reading the Daisy books - Victor Reader Soft, which is probably best for readers with visual impairment, and Read OutLoud Bookshare Edition, which is designed more with dyslexia or reading difficulties in mind. With the BRF files, you can print out Braille copies.

Dolphin Webinar - Monday 10th May

Allan Wilson — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 17:55:47

As part of our series of free supplier-led Software Information Days, we will be hosting our first Webinar, featuring a presentation by Simon Kitchen from Dolphin Computer Access, from 3.30pm until 4.30 pm on Monday 10th May. Register on the Dolphin web site to take part.

Dolphin Computer Access has been providing computer access to people with visual impairments internationally since 1986. Dolphin SuperNova opens up a whole new world of accessibility, allowing visually impaired computer users to access their favourite IT applications in any combination of speech, magnification and Braille.Dolphin also offer a range of alternative format software solutions, dedicated to making text accessible for people with visual impairments, dyslexia and other specific learning disabilities. Dolphin EasyConverter allows you to create MP3, DAISY talking book, Large Print, Braille and plain text formats from Word, PDF and scanned paper-based materials.

The webinar, which you can attend by logging on to a computer at your own base, will give a brief overview of key features and benefits of Supernova, EasyConverter and EasyReader. Dolphin are using the 'WebEx meeting center' to conduct their webinars, you can see a demo meeting on the webex website if you'd like to get a feel for how it works. You will need a phone and a web browser to attend the 'WebEx meeting' which will enable you to watch a software demonstration in real time over the web.

Using the iPod / iPad to Support Reading and Writing

Allan Wilson — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 16:54:00

We have featured a number of apps for the iPod Touch and the forthcoming iPad over the past few months, including apps for communication (see blogs on 18th January and 6th April) and for more general educational purposes (see blogs on 18th January and 24th February). These devices also have potential for use to support reading and writing. The iPod Touch is too small and fiddly for extended writing, but it can be used for taking notes either by typing, or by recording voice. The iPad has greater potential as a writing tool, with apps such as the Speedscribe word bank system already available.

Apps such as Stanza allow the iPod Touch to be used for reading electronic books, but the release of the iPad, with its greater screen could revolutionise this area, particularly as Apple iBooks and the forthcoming Blio Reader could provide speech output for people with reading difficulties. There are already text-to-speech options for the iPod Touch, such as the built-in VoiceOver facility, Speak It and Talk to Me, but their functionality is limited, though the voices are actually quite good.

I've written an article that delves into this area in much greater detail for the current (Spring / Summer) issue of the JISC Regional Support Centre North and East Scotland's e-Quality newsletter.

AAC study afternoon on 26th of May 2010

Joanna Courtney — Fri, 16 Apr 2010 16:04:13

Come along to the AAC SIG study afternoon on Wednesday 26th of May, at Braidburn School in Edinburgh, from 1.30pm to 4.30pm.

Our guest speaker will be Claire Murray, who will be presenting on ‘Emotional Understanding and Language’ in the context of the 'Growing Confidence Project'.

This should be a really interesting afternoon, with the opportunity to share experiences, thoughts and feedback on this subject with other professionals.

The session is FREE of charge. Please return the AAC SIG flier to the address given, in order to confirm your booking.

For more information, have a look at Claire's webpage

Hope to see you on the day!

Learning to read - structured phonics products [Updated 9/12/10]

Stuart Aitken — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 12:39:24

In the wake of growing evidence in favour of a 'return to phonics' for example from Tommy Mackay's Scottish Executive funded West Dunbartonshire Literacy project, a burgeoning market has emerged that offers a number of products, not just for early readers but also targeted at pupils who have difficulty learning to read. But which product to choose?

CALL Scotland was asked this question recently by someone enquiring on behalf of a pupil with dyslexia. It would have been nice to have been able to give a direct answer but at this stage it isn't yet possible to do that. Understanding why we still need to hedge our bets may offer useful pointers to others who find themselves trying to decide amongst products and suppliers.

Sir Jim Rose's Dyslexia Review established a set of key characteristics or core criteria for a good quality phonics approach to reading which the Department for Education describes when discussing how to choose an effective phonics teaching programme. The site also provides links to a number of products and publishers that certify their compliance with the core criteria. NB A new stricter set of criteria has been produced and publishers are being invited to state whether their products meet the new criteria.

Is that enough? It's certainly a big step forward particularly in light of the fact that views were sought from independent assessors who agreed that they (the products not the assessors) did what they said on the tin. Why then is it not yet possible to state categorically that Product X should be used in preference to all others?

A clue lies in the term self-certification. Before any particular product can be favoured as the best method for delivering structured phonics it would need to meet more demanding criteria. With any 'branded product' we want to know that:

The results showing effectiveness are acquired independently; trials are carried out by people who are independent of the product.
Results are complete, there should be no gaps. If gaps do occur between pre-and post-tests they should be explained fully.
There is a control group. In clinical trials for any new drug, more often than not the control group will receive some treatment rather than none at all. They will often be given the current 'best of the crop', raising the bar for any new product. It would be good to see one structured phonics approach being compared with others.
If at all possible results should come from randomised controlled trials. Often, improvements are reported by showing improvements between pre-test and post-test data. This is helpful but does not allow the same degree of confidence to be placed in the results.
Information should be given on types of reading test used and these tests should be widely accepted.
Reading age scores should be provided as standard scores so that reading age is corrected for shifts in chronological age.
To their credit some suppliers offer links to the data they obtained to support their case for the effectiveness of their product. We welcome this straightforward transparency.
One of the lessons from Tommy Mackay's work was to show just how important it was to have clear step-by-step descriptions of what lessons were given each day and what procedures need to be followed.
It is always good to see evidence collected being presented in peer-reviewed studies.
At this stage the evidence is not quite there to show that any single structured phonics approach should be favoured against the others. Until then the advice remains - caveat emptor.

Free Switch Games

Sally Millar — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 15:42:30

Ever looking for games that are fun for kids that use a switch?

Download a list of free games (online or downloadable) and have a go!

Communication Apps for iPhone, iPod and - NEW - iPad

Sally Millar — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 12:46:40

This blog has mentioned before the growing range of communication Apps for iPhone and iPod Touch.

You can download an updated CALL Information Sheet reviewing different communication Apps, (and even a Nintendo DS app). Times are changing - many of these Apps are (much) cheaper than a roll of Velcro - makes you think!

The week of the US launch of the new Apple iPad seemed a good time to update that list, and some Apps have already been re-versioned to fit the iPad's larger screen. (iPad due to launch in the UK towards the end of April.) The first reviews of the iPad as a possible communication aid are looking pretty positive - apparently the sound output is not bad and might be enough without amplified speakers, and P2Go runs beautifully.

New Barrington Stoke eBooks

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 16:10:18

Barrington Stoke, the Scottish publisher of high interest books for struggling readers, has released eBook versions of six of their titles.

The books are available from the i-Stars web site in Adobe PDF, Microsoft Reader or Zinio Whiteboard formats and you can buy a single home licence (£6.99) or a school licence (£25).

The six Barrington Stoke eBooks are:

Alien;
Gremlin;
Sol Campbell;
Death Leap;
Flint;
Respect!

We have been speaking to Barrington Stoke for some time to encourage them to release digital versions of their books, and so it's great to see it happening. In the wider scheme of things we would rather see publishers selling accessible digital copies of their books at an affordable price, than rely on our collective efforts to scan papers books into the computer and make digital versions.

One great thing about these new books is that they are accessible with text-to-speech: most commercial eBooks can't be read with text-to-speech software because the publisher has protected them to prevent them being copied, which also prevents the text-to-speech software getting at the text to read it. The Barrington Stoke books aren't protected in this way, so you can use text-to-speech to read them out.

The Zinio versions are designed for use on a whiteboard but can also be read on a PC using the free Zinio Reader software.

The Microsoft Reader versions can be opened on a PC or PDA using free Microsoft Reader software and the computer can also read them out if you install the free Microsoft Reader Text-to-speech package. The screenshot on the left below shows a book in Microsoft Reader - the text is being read out and highlighted as it is read.

The PDF books can be read on almost anything - Mac, PC, mobile phone, iPod etc using various versions of Adobe Reader software. The screen shots below shows a PDF book with a clickable index on the left of the screen, and two pages displayed side by side.

We hope that more publishers will follow Barrington Stoke's lead and make their books available in accessible digital formats.

Quick Guide to Free / Low-cost Software

Allan Wilson — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 08:55:53

We have updated our quick guide to Low-cost / No-cost Software Tools for People with Dyslexia. This provides information about a selection of mainly free programs that can help people with reading and writing difficulties to access text on a computer. The guide is not intended to be a comprehensive guide to every program that could be useful, but highlights a few that can support people with a range of specific difficulties. The programs listed include:

Visual support tools: Vu-Bar, RapidSet, T-Bar and ssOverlay
Text-to-Speech software: WordTalk and Balabolka
Reading electronic books: Microsoft Reader and Adobe Reader
Reading web pages: ClickSpeak, CleanPage and NaturalReader
Engaging with text: ScriptVox
Organising your thoughts: FreeMind, XMind, Webspiration and Bubbl.us
Word prediction: Let Me Type
Speech recognition: Windows Vista.

We do not suggest that pupils in schools should be restricted to using free programs purely on grounds of costs, when their needs may be better addressed by a more comprehensive commercial product such as ClaroRead or Read and Write Gold, but if a school is using Microsoft Word and pupils just need text-to-speech support, why not use WordTalk?

PS. Our good friend, Craig Mill from the JISC Regional Support Centre in Edinburgh has recently created a new software tool, MyStudyBar, which brings together some of the programs listed above (and others) to provide a comprehensive package to support literacy skills. Definitely worth a look!

Free Text to Speech Options for the Mac

Allan Wilson — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 12:59:18

We are often asked if there is an Apple Macintosh version of WordTalk, the free text-to-speech add-on for Microsoft Word. Unfortunately, there isn't, and, due to differences in the way that PCs and Macs handle sound, there is unlikely to be a Mac version.

There are a number of free text-to-speech options for Mac users:

The Mac operating system has a reasonable text-to-speech system built in. To use it, go to System Preferences - Speech - Text to Speech. Choose a voice and a key combination to speak selected text. Then just highlight text in any program and press the key combination. It doesn't highlight text word by word as it is read out, or do anything fancy, but it works pretty well and Mac voices are generally quite good.
TypeItReadIt is a free program, aimed primarily at people with a visual impairment, but it can be used more generally by people who want to hear text read out. Unlike the Mac's built-in system, TypeIt ReadIt does not read text directly from an application on the screen. Instead, you have to copy text from your application and paste it into the TypeIt ReadIt window. You can also Open a plain text file and have the contents read out. Note that if you are using a Word file, you will have to save it as plain text to open and read the file. TypeIt ReadIt has options to change the colour scheme and the size of text displayed. Unfortunately, the actual font it uses cannot be changed from Times, which will not suit many of the people who may want to use the program. Earlier versions of the program highlighted words as they were spoken, but this feature has been removed from Version 1.5 as it slowed the program down. This makes little difference for people with a visual impairment, but can make it more difficult for people with reading difficulties to see where they are in a document. There is a reasonable spell checker, but, surprisingly, this does not allow the possible word choices to be read out. One very useful feature is the facility to create sound files (in AIFF format), which can be played in iTunes.
NaturalReader has a free version for the Mac, which will read text directly from almost any application, including Word, web browsers and PDF files. Simply select the text you want to read and it will be transferred to the NaturalReader MiniBoard for reading. Words are highlighted as they are read and the colour of the text is then changed, making it easy to see where you are in your text. Unlike many 'demo' versions of programs, the free version of NaturalReader can be used for as long as you want, but there are a few restrictions, compared with the full program. Firstly, it does not come with a 'voice'. This is not a great problem as there are perfectly satisfactory voices within the Mac operating system. Schools in Scotland can also make free use of the Mac version of The Scottish Voice, Heather. There is also a restriction of 5,000 characters on the length of any document to be read by NaturalReader. Most importantly, the facility to make sound files has been disabled in the free version. If this is an important feature for you, either use TypeIt ReadIt, or get the Personal Version, costing $49.50.

If you require more features than are provided in the free programs, you will have to pay for the extra facilities provided by programs such as the Personal Version of NaturalReader or GhostReader.

Free exhibition: ICT and Inclusion 2010

Robert Stewart — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 15:51:38

CALL Scotland has been organising the FREE annual ICT and Inclusion (originally called ICT/SEN Update) roadshow since 2001. It provides people with an opportunity to see and compare the latest software and technology to support students with additional support needs from most of the leading UK companies.

Location and dates for the exhibitions are:

Best Western Invercarse Hotel, Dundee - 15 June 2010
CALL Scotland, Edinburgh - 16 June 2010
The Bruce Hotel, East Kilbride - 17 June 2010

Suppliers will describe their key products in timetabled sessions and there will also be short presentations by staff from CALL Scotland.

The exhibitions will be open from 9.00 am until 4.00 pm.

Free Lunch! A free buffet lunch is provided at each of the three venues. It is therefore important that people register for the exhibition in advance so we have an idea of numbers before the day. Please indicate when you book a place if you wish to stay for lunch.

To find out more and to book online, go to the ICT and Inclusion web page or telephone CALL Scotland on 0131 651 6235 to book a place.

eBooks becoming more accessible?

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:36:12

eBooks have been around for some years now without making much impact but recently there has been a lot more buzz about them. There are a lot of interesting possibilities with eBooks for people with print disabilities but the main one is access to books: if accessible eBooks could be purchased direct from a publisher then we would no longer have to contact the publisher to ask for a digital copy and wait while they find it, or rely on someone somewhere scanning the book into a digital format. For this to happen, we need accessible eBook readers and accessible eBooks.

The first eBook readers left a lot to be desired in terms of accessibilty, but the new Kindle devices (particularly the larger Kindle DX) looks more interesting. Amazon have been under pressure to improve the accessibility of the Kindle - for example the United States Justice Deptartment has agreed that three Universities will not buy or recommend the Kindle unless it is fully accessible.

On the new Kindle DX, it seems the text size can be up to about 20 point, and Kindle claim they are going to add a new font in the summer which will double this size (i.e. 40 point). Of course the Kindle can also read the text out using text-to-speech software: the voice is provided by Nuance and so it should be quite good (albeit American). A major limitation is that it can only read 'unprotected' eBooks, and most of the commercial books are protected to prevent them being copied. RNIB and others are lobbying for publishers to find a way to protect their interests and also make their books accessible, so we hope to see an improvement here.

The new Apple iPad also looks interesting because Apple says it can read out eBooks using 'VoiceOver', the iPad screen reader, and you can change the text size and also the font. We don't know yet if it will be able to read commercial eBooks, or if this function will be restricted, like the Kindle. To read more about the iPad accessibility features go to the iPad features web page on accessibility.

So it looks like things are moving fast in the world of accessible eBooks.

If you want to keep up to date with developments I recommend Denise Dwyer's Print for People blog. Denise is a Development Officer with RNIB and her blog is a really helpful up-to-date summary of accessibility developments in the publishing world.

'The Language Stealers' video about AAC in schools

Sally Millar — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:21:34

Inventive and thought provoking video on Youtube to make the point about augmentative communication (AAC) in schools (or not...) made by a project by/with/around a young lad in County Durham. Michael Reed.

Check it out!

Using Cooliris to Switch Control YouTube

Robert Stewart — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:50:45

YouTube is a popular video sharing website on which users can upload and share videos. However, due to it's design and abundance of links its very hard to access using just switches. Not to worry though since there is an application called Cooliris which when used in conjunction with Facebook will allow access to this huge library of videos. You don’t just have to use Facebook since the slideshow can be hosted on other social networking sites such as Bebo or Twitter. Or, if you prefer, create a web file (.html) which can be run from your desktop or web space.

A new Quick Guide called 'Using Cooliris to Switch Control YouTube' is now available for download which explains the process of creating your own switch accessible YouTube slideshow!

Saving a Youtube video to your computer

Sandra O'Neill — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 08:42:19

At a meeting recently there was a question about saving useful Youtube videos. Many local authorities do not allow access to Youtube as some of the content is unsuitable for schools but there are also many videos that would be useful for a teacher to access for use in school. In the Spring 09 New in CALL newsletter there was an article about how to do this. It had been found that the easiest way to do this was to use KickYoutube.

In order to use this the word 'kick' is typed in after the 'www' and before 'youtube' in the adress line eg http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sNdijknRxfU&feature=related becomes http://www.kickyoutube.com/watch/?v=sNdijknRxfU&feature=related. This particular link is to a video about a couple of chemical reactions that help illustrate the reaction of alkaline metals in water. As these experiments may get done only once in class (and with less reactive metals due to safety issues) a Youtube video could be used for illustration, for revision, for pupils absent on the day, for pupils in hospital or at home due to health or social issues.

Once a suitable video has been found and opened in KickYoutube you will now have a series of rectangular buttons across the top of the video with a number of different alternative formats. Probably the most appropriate one to use will be MP4.

To convert the video :

check that MP4 is selected
click on the green 'Go' button - button then changes to a blue 'Down' button
on a PC - right click on the blue 'Down' button
on a Mac - control click on the blue 'Down' button
on a PC - select Save target as ...
on a Mac - select Save linked file as ....
.... and locate where to save the file eg pen drive if wanting to use on a different computer
give file an appropriate name and save
the saved file can be played using iTunes or QuickTime, both free and available for PC and Mac.

NB On a Mac works in Safari but not Firefox

New in CALL (Issue 26) available for download

Robert Stewart — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:16:03

Issue 26 of 'New in CALL', the free news, views and events leaflet is now avaiable for download.

Inside this issue:

Books for All Scotland Database;
The Royal Mail Book Awards;
Mainstream Devices for Communication;
AAC Adult Discovery Day;
New DynaVox Xpress;
2010-2011 CPD Calendar.

... And much more!

Signing stuff

Sally Millar — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 12:56:14

Thinking about how raise awareness and enthusiasm for signing?

Did you know that there are lots of terrific little videos on Youtube of signed songs? Just Search on 'BSL signed song'.

Lee, and Duckingquackers are particularly impressive performers, and - my personal favourite - BenGee143

There are some very funny ones, and some that are just plain brilliant. All good! also some stories.

There are signing Apps coming out for iPhone / iPod Touch but so far these are only ASL. For BSL so far there is only the sign alphabet - but they'll be coming.....

Also - bit behind the times, but I just spotted this clip re creation of a new digital BSL sign dictionary.

Training on BoardMaker 6/BoardMaker Plus!

Sally Millar — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:08:41

Hopefully everyone will now be aware of the cheap deal on BoardMaker software offered through LTS.

Please note that there is a training course on BoardMaker 6 and the new BoardMaker Plus! features in CALL on 25th March, and places are still available. Could be just the thing to get you started! Find out more and book

Guide to Pictures and Symbols for Communication 2010

Sally Millar — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 15:14:02

A new Information sheet called A Guide to Pictures and Symbols for Communication 2010 is now available for download or can be viewed along with the collection of other Information Sheets in the Resources section of this website.

It is a completely revised version of a similarly titled paper that was up on the CALL website before, but with buggy graphics now fixed and information added about a number of newer symbol and pictures resources.

TapToTalk app for Nintendo DS

Joanna Courtney — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:07:25

TapToTalk is software created for the Nintendo DS Lite, DSi or DSi XL, and is comparable to a handheld dynamic screen communication aid.

The user simply taps the chosen picture on the DS Lite's lower touch-screen to make it speak the word or sentence represented by the picture and appear on the upper screen. The DS Lite has 3" screens. You need to have fairly good fine motor skills to access the screen and also some of the DS control buttons to navigate. It costs $99.95 for a home yearly subscription. There are different rates for home (1 child) Pro (2 or more children) and Agency (for 5 or more children)This could be off putting to people who like to buy a 'one off' product. However, there is a 30 day returns policy giving people the chance to try it out and see if it works for them.

The software comes with a large bank of pictures, and can be fully customised to contain the user's own pictures, photos and messages. If you want to use symbols, you need to either subscribe online to SymbolStix or import your PCS/Widgit symbols as jpegs. Sets of pictures, or 'albums' are customised on 'TapToTalk Designer' (accessed via the Internet), and then transferred to the DS via an SD card. You cannot programme on the device itself for quickness, but can easily download the latest version if the DS gets lost or broken, whilst the DS itself is affordable to replace.There are many advantages of this software: Tap To Talk is low cost, fully customisable and the fact that it works on the DS range means that the user is likely to feel less self-conscious about using it as it has a 'cool' factor. The DS itself is fairly robust, suited to small hands, and has a decent battery life of 19 hours. It can also be used whilst charging from the mains.

However, its volume is not loud enough for functional communication. The DS Lite requires external speakers such as 'DS Lite Grip Speakers' to make the voice output audible for everyday use. The sound quality when you record your own messages for the device is particularly poor. Also, the 'Tap to Talk Designer' software is not very intuitive for those used to conventional communication aids.Tap To Talk can also be put on the DSi, which has a built-in camera, mic and five brightness settings. It is also slightly larger with 3.25" screens. The latest version - DSi XL - has 4.2" screens, and a larger ‘pen sized’ stylus. Both of these are marginally more expensive but promise 'enhanced sound.' To find out more visit the TapToTalk website.

An Information sheet called Using the 'TapToTalk' app on the mainstream Nintendo DS range is available for download.

Creating Accessible Information with symbols

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 17:51:06

Many people think that 'alternative format' means things like Large Print, Braille, audio, Daisy etc, but it also includes symbolised materials. Widgit software, who publish software for creating and using symbolised resources, are running a FREE day on symbols here in CALL on Wednesday 3rd March. Go here to book a place.

Widgit have pioneered the use of symbols in learning and communication for over 25 years and their software and services are used worldwide to create symbol-supported materials in print, onscreen and online. Information augmented by symbols can be helpful for people with learning, language and communication disabilities, dyslexia, those with English as a second language and students with literacy difficulties.

The first part of the day will look at incorporating symbol based information in a variety of communication media. There will be a focus on the importance of this for educational establishments such as schools, colleges and universities to provide accessible information as part of their learning and teaching, on their websites, as part of their general marketing strategies and within other services such as libraries, design units etc.

The second part of the day will provide an opportunity to have hands on experience of using the software and will provide delegates with the chance to try out different Widgit products including Communicate in Print (symbol dtp software to create books, worksheets, newsletters and posters etc) and Communicate Symwriter (a symbol and grid supported writing tool).

What you'll learn:
Incorporating symbol based information in a variety of communication media;
hands on experience of using Widgit software.

50 Educational Apps for iPod Touch

Sally Millar — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 15:55:36

Well, here's some more Apps to consider for classroom use, if you are iPhone /iPod Touch active. Free!

Bespoke voices for your voice output communication system

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 15:45:42

Heather, the Scottish Voice, which can be downloaded free from CALL's Scottish Voice web site by anyone in Scottish schools, is a product of CereProc, an Edinburgh based company. CereProc make 'custom' voices by recording and synthesising human speech, and one possibility is to create bespoke computer voices for people who are likely to lose their speech as a result of illness or disability. CereProc have created a synthetic voice for Robert Ebert, an American film critic, who lost his voice after surgery. The voice was created by analysing the recordings made for Robert Ebert's TV series. This is fine if you are a well-known (in the USA) TV broadcaster, but not so good if the sum total of the recordings of your voice consists of a few warbles from your childhood or speeches at weddings and the like. Nevertheless, it's good to see progress like this because better synthetic voices, greater individuality and more personalisation all improve the communicative experience with voice output communication aids. Certainly, the response we have had to Heather, the Scottish Voice, has been extremely positive both when she is used for communication and also when reading out digital books, learning resources and exam papers. To find out more about the voices visit the CereProc web site.

AAC users invited to Technology Discovery Open Day at CALL

Sally Millar — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 15:10:31

Please remember about the Saturday event on 13th March, the Technology Discovery Day for adults (and teens 15/16+ years) who use augmentative communication.

More details and booking available from the Technology Discovery Day web page. Phone (0131 651 6235) or email CALL if you have any questions.

It will be fun, please come!

Good Deal on BoardMaker software

Sally Millar — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:52:34

Hurrah! At last Mayer-Johnson UK and LTS have got their act together and brought out a cheap deal on BoardMaker for Scotland.

CALL has been pushing for this. BoardMaker purchasing information has been pretty muddled lately, so the new clarity is welcome, as well as the discount.

The offer is only for the latest version, BoardMaker Plus! V6, which is the ordinary print-based BoardMaker 6 plus some new interactive features (see below). In case you are unclear - here's a few basic questions and answers.

I've got BoardMaker 5 - why might I want V6?: Lots of nice features such as 'Swap Button', easier photo importing, easier resizing, and the magical 'symbolate as you type' tool.
Why can't I just upgrade my print-only BoardMaker?: A marketing decison by Mayer-Johnson, it seems. The old paper only version looks set to fade away quietly. (You MAY still be able to get it through third party suppliers, for now.)
I don't want to pay for extra features I'll never use!: I know, it's really annoying! But this LTS deal may take some of the pain out of it. And you never know, you may change your mind later and see a use for the new interactive possibilities of BoardMaker Plus!
I've got BoardMaker 6 - why might I want the Plus! version?: Well, it's not necessary IF all you ever want to do is make print-based symbol materials. But the Plus! version is also interactive - it talks, kids can use it themselves - drag and drop and switch access - brilliant on interactive whitboards or large plasma screen - you could make symbol quizzes, language activities, on screen work sheets, homework exercises etc. - could be just the very 'next step you were waiting for, for your pupils...
I'm new to all this. Why might I want to buy BoardMaker Plus! at all?: Well it is a really valuable tool to help you make the educational environment visual and supportive, useful for ALL pupils actually, but especially early years, additional support needs, those with language or literacy difficulties. It's not the only tool - (CALL is not wanting to 'advertise' as such or to promote one symbol software above all others, but we do believe almost everyone can benefit from using symbols more, and BoardMaker is a tried and tested old warhorse). There's a good overview and comparison (and free trial) on the Mayer-Johnson website Also there are more and more free downloadable resources coming out all the time through the Adapted Learning website - a bit like the Clicker Learning Grids (only in symbols)
I like the sound of the free downloadable resources. Are they only for the Plus! version?: No, they are mixed. Many are for V6 print version but these will also play in V5. I suppose in time more of them will become more Plus! oriented
I've got an ancient Mac version - does the upgrade apply to me?: Yes, to ANY/ ALL old versions - but you'll get a PC version V6, there is no Mac BoardMaker Plus! (If I were you and I still use Mac, I'd keep my old Mac BoardMaker that will run in any machine without the CD in the drive AND buy the new PC one at the discounted price)
I hate upgrades! I love my old BoardMaker because it is so simple! Will the new version look all different and complicated?: No actually, it looks and behaves pretty much exactly the same as the older version, it's just got the new features added in. You don't see the new interactive features unless you double click and go looking for them.
What is the BoardMaker Plus! Player?: It means you can set a symbol exercise and get a pupil to complete it on ANY computer, without needing the BoardMaker Plus! CD in the drive. Interesting possibilities here for homework perhaps
What are the Symbol Addenda and why would I want them?: This is a one CD pack of ALL the new PCS symbols that have come out since 2000. (There were 5 editions - 2000, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2008). Everyone is always muddled about which symbols they did or didn't buy - whether they installed them - how to tell which Addenda are or aren't installed and so on. It's confusing to see symbols in some materials that you then can't 'find' in your BoardMaker. The Addenda are where many of the symbols particularly useful for autism materials are. So frankly I'd advise everyone to get this pack unless you are 100% certain that you already bought and installed all of those Addenda at the time (and still have the CDs...) Ensuring that ALL classes / schools have the same full set of Symbol Addenda is a valuable step forward in preparing to make your school or authority Communication Friendly. The symbol Addenda will work with all versions, including older ones.
I use BoardMaker with my communication impaired clients, but I'm not in a school - can I buy at the LTS discounted rate?: As far as I know, yes, if you are in Scotland.

For further information about the LTS deal, available from 22nd February 2010, see software pages on LTS website or call Jonathan Cairney (Commercial Licensing Manager) on 0141 282 5000.

£50 cashback when purchasing a Toshiba Netbook

Robert Stewart — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:08:36

Procurement Scotland have negotiated a good price on the Toshiba NB200 Netbook (Procurement Scotland quick guide is available) for purchasers in Scottish public sector organisations. There is a 3G (allows you to connect to the internet via a mobile SIM card) and non-3G version being supplied with the same specifications:

1Gb Ram;
160Gb Hard Drive;
Windows XP Home;
10.1" screen;
6 cell battery (up to 9 hour batter life);
1.33Kg weight.

The units are being sold at £199 (excluding VAT) and £269 (excluding VAT) respectively but for the month of February you get £50 cash back via the Toshiba website on the non-3G version!

New books on the Books for All Scotland Database

Paul Nisbet — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 17:10:18

Another 54 books were added to the Books for All Scotland Database today.

There are 23 new books in PDF which have been produced by CALL Scotland. LTS funded the production of these books, which are scanned PDF copies of third and fourth year textbooks from various publishers including Heinemann, Leckie and Leckie, Hodder and Pulse. The books were originally produced for a pupil with physical disability and they have structure for easy navigation. They have been OCRd so that most of the text is readable with text-to-speech software, but some parts of books with very complex visual layouts are not accurate - the OCR process just doesn't work with squint text or low contrast text on coloured backgrounds.

There are also 31 new 'Classic' titles such as Frankenstein, Heart of Darkness, Kidnapped and Oliver Twist in PDF and Microsoft Reader format. Most of these books were produced by the participants on the Books for All course in Stirling last term: thanks to Anne Beveridge at LTS who checked, amended and collated these titles.

The new books can be used by pupils with visual or physical impairment - pupils with other print disabilities should not use them (yet) because the CLA licence under which they are made does not yet cover other disabilites (but we're told it will, any minute now...).

Teachers can access the Books for All Scotland Database via the Finding Books page or by going direct to the Database itself. To log in to the Database and download books you need a Scran password (all teachers in Scotland have one - someone in your school or local authority will know it) or you can log in via Glow.

Teach reading, use alternative formats, or do both?

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 13:38:45

The Books for All programme is about learning resources in accessible, alternative formats for people who cannot access standard printed books.

Sometimes this is due to, for example, severe dyslexia, visual impairment, blindness or physical impairment. In these case it is self-evident that the reader can't read a paper book because they either can't see, can't hold the book and turn pages, or just can't read.

But there are also many children and young people who have problems with reading when the cause is less obvious. Maybe they have a language difficulty, or a visual-perceptual problem, or maybe English is not their native tongue.

Or maybe they have never been read to as a child, never been comfortable with print, and have not had enough practice to become a fluent reader. (I read somewhere that you need to practice reading for 5,000 hours to become fluent.)

In these cases, should we try and teach the pupil to read, or should we use, say, audio books or digital books that can be read out by the computer? If we persevere with teaching literacy, will the pupil get frustrated and fall behind in class because they cannot read independently? By introducing books in accessible formats maybe we can prevent this frustration, help the reader be more independent, and at least give experience of language and literature. Maybe if we can encourage pupils to read books in accessible formats it will help motivate and develop general literacy and actually help develop reading skills? Maybe the opposite is true: if we give books in accessible formats, will they ever learn to read standard print?

Or should we try to both teach reading and also provide accessible formats so we have the best of both worlds - access to the curriculum and also development of reading skills?

This is a long introduction to a short blog to say that Pearson Education have published some interesting case studies and research reports about their Rapid Reading intervention programme which they say is "an award-winning, Wave 3 reading intervention programme that's been proven to deliver more than twice the normal rate of progress." Of course, there are many programmes and methods which make similar claims (see Dr. Chris Singleton's comprehensive review of teaching methods Interventions for Dyslexia) but the Rapid Reading videos and reports are interesting and well worth a look.

(And if anyone has answers to the questions posed above we'd be really keen to hear them....)

SQA 2009 Adapted Digital past papers are now available

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 14:02:05

SQA have put up the 2009 adapted digital past papers on their web site for anyone to download. They cover all levels from Intermediate through to Advance Higher with a wide range of different subjects. This means you can now download papers from 2007, 2008 and 2009 for revision and practice.

In response to comments from centres, SQA have added 'tick boxes' to Part 1 of the Standard Grade Chemistry paper. Previously, you had to use the Comment/markup tools to draw a circle or mark the answer from the multiple choice, but now you just click with the mouse, which should be faster and simpler.

In 2009 there were 1,167 requests for Adaped Digital Question Papers from 73 centres on behalf of 422 candidates. To find out more about digital papers visit CALL's dedicated web site http://www.adapteddigitalexams.org.uk/Home/, SQA's Assessment Arrangements site, or come on a CALL Scotland training course.

Technology Discovery Day: 13th March 2010

Robert Stewart — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 16:28:24

For People Who Use Augmentative and Alternative Communication

Time: Saturday 13th March 2010, 11am - 4pm

Location: CALL Scotland, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh

Webpage: Technology Discovery Day

It's FREE and refreshments will be provided. Drop in, or stay all day!

The day is run by expert staff from Ayrshire and Arran AAC Resource, CALL Scotland, FACCT, KEYCOMM, SCTCI, TASSCC and other specialist centres and funded by Augmentative Communication in Practice: Scotland.

Try out new computers, software, websites, music, communication aids, environment controls, and games and technology for fun and communication! (Remember to bring YOUR communication aid!).
Make new friends and contacts. Get help and ideas from specialist professionals from AAC services and other centres across Scotland.
You’ll need to arrange your own transport and bring someone along to help you and join in the fun!
Refreshments (eg. sandwiches, tea, coffee, juice) will be provided. If you have special dietary requirements, please bring what you need.

Registration

If you would like to come:

Visit the Technology Discovery Day and read more about it and use the online form to book your place;
OR telephone CALL Scotland, 0131 651 6235 to book a place;
OR fill in a paper copy of the booking form and return it to: CALL Scotland, Paterson’s Land, Holyrood Road, Edinburgh EH8 8AQ.

Free Books for All CPD!

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 12:54:05

Another opportunity to learn how to make Books for All!

Learning & Teaching Scotland, on behalf of the Scottish Government, would like to invite you to send a representative from your local authority to attend Books for All CPD event at Stirling Management Centre. This free CPD is a four day training course, developed and delivered by CALL Scotland and is aimed at practitioners who currently produce books in alternative formats (such as large and adapted print, digital books and audio), for pupils with print disabilities as a result of visual, physical or learning impairment.

The course information is detailed below:

Day 1 & 2 – 10th & 11th February 2010
Day 3 & 4 – 25th & 26th March 2010

The venue for all training is Stirling Management Centre and overnight accommodation and refreshments (if required) will be paid for by the Books for All Database project.

Some of the topics that will be covered at the training include:

Sourcing accessible resources
Scanning papers resources into digital format
Making publisher PDFs accessible
Making "intermediate" files
Converting intermediate files to different alternative formats
Copyright

If you are interested and would like someone from your authority to attend then please let Gayle Monteith at LTS know by Monday 25th January. Please note that places are limited on this course and will be allocated on a first come, first served basis.

If you are unable to attend the training, you can join the books for all user group on Glow. We have formed a user group of experienced practitioners who, as part of their practice, create and use these types of resources. The aim of the group is to share information, materials and practical strategies to support their use.

If you would like to know more about Books for All in general go to http://www.booksforall.org.uk/ and to find out more about the Books for All Database go to http://www.booksforallscotland.org.uk/.

Once you have confirmed your interest in this course, LTS will confirm if a place is available and send you a booking form for the training.

If you have any questions about the venue, funding or arrangements please contact Gayle Monteith at LTS. If you have any questions about the course content contact Paul Nisbet or Stuart Aitken at CALL.

iPhone / iPod Touch Apps for Communication, Education and Access

Allan Wilson — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 10:59:11

Were you lucky enough to get an iPhone or an iPod Touch for Christmas? Perhaps your school was able to scrape together funds to buy one?
In addition to all the music and videos that you can download from iTunes, you'll find a bewildering array of apps that you can use, covering everything from tuning a guitar to tantalising your tastebuds with a Jamie Oliver recipe.
There is an increasing number of excellent, low-cost apps available to support children (and adults) with additional support needs or disabilities.

Sally Millar blogged last year on the excellent Proloquo2Go, which provides a full AAC system with over 7,000 symbols and high quality voices. There are now additional apps to support communication, including:

iConverse - a simple app combining speech and symbols with a focus on expressing basic everyday needs. It costs £5.99.
Look2Learn - AAC, a basic, low cost (£14.99) app that combines the use of photographs with pre-recorded speech to help someone express their wants and needs.
MyTalk - Another low-cost (£21.49) communication app combining symbols with speech output. Pages can be created and stored online, using a public image library with over 1,000 symbols.
Speak it! - this is a basic text-to-speech app, costing £1.19. It can read out text as it is typed into the device, or can be used to read out existing text, e.g. from a web site
Voice4U - this comes with 130 pre-loaded icons and high quality speech output. You can add your own photos and icons to personalise the system. It costs £17.99.

These apps all come from a comprehensive list of 'iPhone and iPod Touch Apps for (Special) Education' by Eric Sailers, an American speech-language pathologist. The list contains over 150 apps categorised under the headings Communication; Organization; Reading; Writing; Math; Music; Songs; Art; Games; Assistive Technology.

One interesting app that Eric missed from his list is iMocon, an App that allows an iPhone/iPod Touch to be used as a remote control for a computer by emulating the mouse. It costs £1.79.

I am so proud of these AAC users

Sally Millar — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 13:30:33

WOW - I have received two emails this week that make me feel a bit old but massively proud! Both were from young women in their early twenties who use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) - at opposite ends of Scotland - that I have known since they were very young. I've known both since they entered Primary school (one from Nursery actually), when they were referred to CALL for assessment. Both have cerebral palsy and no functional oral speech, and were amongst the first ever Scottish users of voice output communication aids. Both were members of the first ever generation of children with complex disabilities to go through their education from Nursery to Secondary in their local mainstream school.

When I first met and started to work with those wee tots in the late 1980s /early 1990s, it was certainly my vision - but only a distant dream - that one day technology could help them to communicate freely, so it is really exciting to see it come true in this way.

This sudden burst of pride and excitement prompted a somewhat deeper 'round-up of the year/ decade / century' reflection, and some darker thoughts rose to the surface. I realised that what has been achieved has mainly been through the efforts of these determined young people, themselves. Sadly, in both cases, the girls were rather let down at school. Well, OK, it was all new then to staff in mainstream schools. Individual staff did their best. The curriculum seemed both a straitjacket and a set of blinkers. 'Communication' seemed to mean only 'literacy'. 'Inclusion' all too often meant little more than just being present in the room.

The girls' experiences with FE in Scotland seem to have been no better, overall. One had to go to England, and one has struggled to access any relevant courses locally, not to mention the battle for funding to allow her to attend at all.

On a positive note, we have now moved a long way from those days and we are committed to getting it right for every child, active learning, pupil participation and listening to the child's voice, and the rest. We are signed up to delivering a Curriculum for Excellence that promises to create effective contributors, successful learners, responsible citizens and confident individuals. Well, clearly none of these outcomes are possible without effective communication skills. Dare I hope that the next generation of AAC users are set to receive an appropriate, child-centred outcome-focused education that recognises the importance of communication skills as a fundamental underpinning of all learning?

I salute the two young women who emailed me with Christmas greetings and offers of voluntary help for younger AAC users coming up behind them. They HAVE turned into effective, successful, responsible and confident individuals - but largely in spite of, not because of, their educational experiences.

Lochaber High School Audio Revision Project

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:26:09

The Audio Revision Project at Lochaber High School is a really good example of how learning resources can be provided in alternative formats. The project is a collaboration between Dyslexia Lochaber, who raised the funding and organised some volunteer narrators, and Lochaber High School. Revision materials (some produced by staff, some commercial publications) were recorded and made available as podcasts on the school web site and the end result of the project is a set of revision materials for Standard Grade and Higher courses for all the subjects offered by the school in audio format. Pupils can listen to the revision materials online or download them to their own computers or audio players. Have a look at the project site and listen to what's been recorded.

Spoken Ink short audio stories

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 11:59:25

Spoken Ink is a new web site offering downloadable audio short stories by authors such as Roald Dahl, Angela Carter, Julian Barnes, Margaret Atwood "and a host of new and unknown talent." Most of the stories cost 99p to download and you can listen to them on your computer, MP3 player, mobile phone etc.

Moray House PGDE ICT Conference 2009

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 10:56:36

Last Friday we gave a couple of talks on assistive techology and AAC, to students on the Moray House Primary Postgraduate course, and here's the powerpoint presentation. It is a whistle-stop tour through Communication, Access, Literacy and Learning. The presentation is a PDF and the notes for each slide can be seen by pointing with your mouse to the organe speech bubble in the top left hand corner of each slide.

Scottish Schools Browsealoud trial

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 18:08:51

This is a chance for you to help improve the accessibility of Glow. If Glow is to fulfil it's aims it needs to be accessible to every pupil in Scotland and one way of helping many pupils with visual or reading difficulties is through 'text-to-speech' software, so that pupils can have material on Glow read out to them by the computer. There are many text-to-speech programs for reading different types of digital text, such as:

Rod Macaulay's WordTalk (which you can download free from CALL), can read out Word documents, for example, or
TextHelp's PDFaloud, which can read PDFs such as digital textbooks or SQA exam papers,

but we also need a program for reading text from the web itself.

Again there are several options (see Allan's Reading the Web guide at http://www.callscotland.org.uk/Resources/Publications/Information-Sheets/) , and one of them is Browsealoud from TextHelp Systems. Browsealoud is a free program that reads 'speech-enabled' web sites and also Word and PDF files on the web sites.TextHelp have agreed to 'speech-enable' the CALL Scotland and LTS web sites and also Glow until the end of January 2010, for us to evaluate. CALL’s speech-enabled web sites are:

All LTS web sites (http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/) and also everything accessed through the Glow portal are speech-enabled.The pilot Books for All Scotland Database at http://www.booksforallscotland.org.uk/ is also speech-enabled.To read the web sites with Browsealoud you need to download it from http://www.browsealoud.com/page.asp?pg_id=80004.Jennifer MacDougal from LTS has agreed to set up a discussion forum for the Glow users and so once you have tried out Browsealoud on Glow, go to My Glow Groups > ASN Group and add your comments about it to the discussion. The direct URL for this is https://portal.glowscotland.org.uk/establishments/nationalsite/Additional%20Support%20for%20Learning/Lists/Pages/Discussions.aspxBrowsealoud is essentially a tool for reading web sites with text-to-speech software. It can help pupils with visual impairment, dyslexia, reading and learning difficulties or pupils who are not fluent English readers access information on web sites. It can speak using a number of different voices including Heather, the Scottish voice. To take part in this trial, download and run Browsealoud and then test it on Glow or on the CALL or LTS websites, and then log any comments or issues on the Glow group. If you can’t access Glow send an email to CALL at callscotland@ed.ac.uk. LTS are currently looking at how the accessibility of Glow can be improved, and a text-to-speech facility could be extremely useful, if not essential, for thousands of pupils in Scotland (not much point in having a national intranet if it isn’t accessible to all pupils in Scotland). Browsealoud is only one option for reading the web and so you might also like to look at some others such as Click Speak, a free add-on for Firefox, but it is really important that we all have a chance to test this particular tool to find out if it does what we all want. Please comment on whether you think Browsealoud would help pupils access Glow, as well as any problems that you come across. Take a look at the video tours and user guides on the Browsealoud web site as well – see http://www.browsealoud.com/page.asp?pg_id=80006We’re aware that you won’t have much time before the end of term, but no doubt some keen people will be unable to resist the temptation to play with Browsealoud over the break, and there will be a few weeks at the start of next term for you to try it.Best wishes for Christmas and the New Year

Creating digital files from printed materials

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 11:12:54

Lots of teachers, pupils and parents are interested in scanning books into the computer, converting it readable text, so that for example:

pupils with physical disabilities can press a key on the keyboard, or click a switch, to turn the pages, or
dyslexic pupils can have the text read out with text-to-speech software, or
pupils with sight loss can use text-to-speech software or magnify the text to read the book.

There’s a good article by Jim Kauppila on making digital files from printed materials in the latest issue of Closing the Gap. Jim's project has scanned hundreds of books and thousands of pages and in the process has gathered a lot of experience. You can read the article by signing up for a 14 day trial of Closing the Gap. Jim advocates a similar process to the one that we covered in the recent Books for All courses at Stirling, which involves:

Scanning the book
Converting the scanned image to text using FineReader Pro optical character recognition (OCR)
Checking and editing the text with FineReader Pro.
Saving from FineReader as PDF (which makes a digital book that looks like the original) and Plain Text or RTF (for further editing in Word, say, if you want for example a Large Print copy)
Saving from RTF/Plain text/Word as MP3 audio.
Adding structure to the PDF with Acrobat Pro.

The nice thing about this workflow model is that it generates several different types of accessible format for lots of pupils with different literacy support needs.

Lightwriter SL40 Connect

Robert Stewart — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 10:40:08

The SL40 Connect is a new addition to the Lightwriter SL40 product range which replaced the much loved SL35. As well as providing text-to-speech communication capabilities through face to face communication or by Short Message Service (SMS) texting, it also now gives the user the ability to make mobile phone calls. This is achieved by using the voice synthesiser whilst making phone calls.

A hand, neck and waist strap can now also be attached to the SL40.

Available from: Toby Churchill.

Free Resources for you at the Plasma Screen and Whiteboard Room

Sally Millar — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 10:45:29

Just a reminder about another source of great and FREE resources! Have a look at the Plasma Screen and WhiteBoard Room created and managed by the Advisory Unit Computers in Education, which offers freely downloadable "Whiteboard resources for pupils with SLD, PMLD and ASD". Most of the resources are in Powerpoint, some are for SMART notebook (free player downloadable). They are all designed for interactive use on a large screen (doesn't mean you couldn't also use on a small PC) The resources are organised under curriculum headings and include a number of very basic activities for learners with complex additional support needs. also links to other useful blogs and websites with resources. This is one of those websites I keep forgetting about, but whenever I remember and look at it, I think WOW, that's GREAT!

CALL helps the University of Edinburgh celebrate 40 years of commercialisation

Paul Nisbet — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 16:13:33

The University of Edinburgh celebrated 40 years of commercialisation with an exhibition and reception in the Playfair library on November 16th 2009. The Smart Wheelchair was Mr (or should that be Miss?) 1987 - the year when we started work on the first protoype. The event was attended by His Royal Highness (HRH) Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, who had a narrow escape from being run over while watching the Smart Wheelchair following the track around the stand. The Duke remarked that a big problem with wheelchairs is the low height of the seat, which he said is a bit of an issue at cocktail parties: I'm not sure there's much of a market for a cocktail-shaking Smart Wheelchair with powered elevating seat but who knows, I'll add it to the wish list....

The DVD and booklet produced to mark the occasion feature the Smart Wheelchair and also CALLTalk, the communication vocabulary developed by Sally Millar and Janet Larcher. Thanks to Derek Waddell, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) from Edinburgh Research and Innovation Limited (ERI), for inviting us to the event. A video report is available and CALL's work was also featured in the latest edition of Infinite, ERI's annual review.

Splatz: new funky non-slip switch holder

Robert Stewart — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 14:33:25

Get rid of all that Velcro! This is a unique holder designed specifically for the Jelly Bean and Buddy Button range of switches. The bottom of the holder keeps the switch in place on the desk or wheelchair tray by stopping it sliding around. There is a hole in its side so you can thread through the switch cable.

They are made from a washable floppy rubber and are available in 4 colours: blue, pink, green and yellow.

They can be purchased from QED.

The 2009 Royal Mail Book Award winners

Robert Stewart — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 09:58:27

The 2009 Royal Mail Book Award winners were announced yesterday, 24th November, and they are:

Early Years 0-7

Manfred The Baddie by John Fardell.

Younger Readers 8-11

First Aid for Fairies and Other Fabled Beasts by Lari Don.

Older Readers 12-16

Ostrich Boys by Keith Gray.

Voice Notes / Comments in Microsoft Word 2007

Allan Wilson — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 16:36:55

Many pupils with writing difficulties can benefit from the use of Voice Notes in Microsoft Word to record their answers to questions in a worksheet. Rather than type an answer, a pupil can speak it into a microphone and have the recording saved with the document for the teacher to review later.

CALL produced a free quick guide, Creating Voice Notes in Word (PC), which explains how to do this with Microsoft Word 2003 and Windows XP.

Voice Comments in Word 2007 with Windows XP

It is also possible to use voice notes (also known as voice comments) with Word 2007 on an XP machine. There's a short video that shows this on the Jing Screencasts web site. Basically, you have to add a Voice Comment icon to the Quick Access toolbar at the top of the screen.

This is done by going to Quick Access Toolbar - Customise - More Commands - Choose Commands from.. Commands not in Ribbon - Voice Comment - Add - OK. The icon will now appear on the Quick Access toolbar. If you place your cursor in a document, e.g. on the line below a question, and then click on the Voice Comment icon, the Windows Voice Recorder will open and you will be able to record an answer to the question.

But what about Vista? Try Sticky Notes!

The procedure for Voice Comments in Word 2007 for Vista looks as if it should work exactly the same way - but it doesn't! The Voice Recorder in Vista is different from the equivalent in XP and will not open in Word. Instead, when you click on the Voice Comment icon you will be asked to create a 'Package' from an existing file - whatever that means! It appears that the useful facility to create a Voice Comment in a Word document is no longer possible in the Vista operating system.

Is there another way to add a voice comment to a Word document? Yes! Fortunately, all versions of Vista (except Home Basic) have a utility, Sticky Notes, which can be used to add voice comments to a Word document. Sticky Notes is located in All Programs - Accessories - Tablet PC - Sticky Notes. We suggest that if you want to allow voice comments in a Word document in Vista, you run Sticky Notes, set it so that it is 'always on top' (Tools - Options - Always on Top) and reduce the size of the Sticky Notes window so that only the menu bar and the recording bar are visible, as shown.

To record an answer, click on New Note, then the red Record button and record your answer into a microphone. When you have finished, click on the Stop button, then click on Play to hear your answer. If you are happy with your answer, copy and paste the recording into your Word document. Do this by clicking on Tools, then Copy in Sticky Notes and then clicking in your Word document where you want the comment to go and finally, Paste. This will paste a sound icon into your document, which you can play by double-clicking on it. The icon is labelled with the date and time.

Spellcheckers and digital papers

Paul Nisbet — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 17:02:08

Staff, parents and pupils often ask us for advice on whether a spellchecker can be used with an SQA Adapted Digital Paper, so this is what we think is the situation. If you are in any doubt, contact the SQA Assessment Arrangements team.

Question. Can I use a spellchecker in the examination?

Answer: SQA’s policy is that "all software such as spellchecks, predictive software etc, must be disabled, unless it has been approved by SQA." [1]

If your candidate is eligible and wants to use a spellchecker (or any other technique that may help the candidate with spelling, like word prediction or speech recognition), you must request it using the standard Assessment Arrangements Request system. Use of a spellchecker is regarded as a type of Assessment Arrangement.

Spellcheckers should only be requested for candidates who have a particular spelling difficulty due to, for example, dyslexia, and where their poor spelling is likely to impact on their ability to demonstrate their skills and knowledge. Spellcheckers can be requested for candidates who "potentially have the ability to achieve the national standards" , but are "unable to do so using the published assessment arrangements". [2] A candidate who does not have an identified difficulty with spelling should not use a spellchecker. You will of course need to have evidence that the candidate’s spelling difficulty means they cannot demonstrate their skills and knowledge in the examination, and why and how a spellchecker should help. A spellchecker should not be requested if it won’t help the candidate, or if it will give the candidate an unfair advantage over other pupils sitting the examination.

You can request to use a spellchecker in almost all subjects apart from the writing papers in Modern Languages and , Gaelic (Learners) and Gaidhlig. The Writing papers for these subjects assess spelling and so spellcheckers are not allowed for any candidate.

Question. So how do I disable the spellchecker in Adobe Reader when I use an Adapted Digital Paper?

Answer:

Open Adobe Reader, click Edit > Preferences
click Spelling in the list at the left, and then untick Check Spelling while Typing

Mis-spelled words in the answer boxes will no longer be marked with a red wavy line. From 2010, SQA will supply two versions of each Adapted Digital Paper: one version will let the candidate use the Adobe Reader spellchecker, and the other won't (even if you have the spellchecker turned on, it won’t work in the answer box). The presenting centre has responsibility for loading the correct version of the paper on the computer, i.e. make sure the spellcheck-enabled paper is only given to candidates who have permission to use it.

Keep up to date with the latest communication aids + Free Lunch!!

Sally Millar — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 10:28:59

Act NOW and book a place at one of the forthcoming Scottish Communication Matters Road Shows. It is completely free, and you get a free lunch as well! Choice of three venues (all 9.15am - 3.30pm, or 'drop in'):

Tuesday 1st December - Edinburgh (Murrayfield Stadium, with CALL)
Wednesday 2nd December - Aberdeen (Pittodrie Football Stadium, with TASSC)
Thursday 3rd December - Glasgow (Hampden Park Stadium, with SCTCI)

This is THE opportunity of the year to find out about all the equipment and software available to support people with complex communication support needs. Suppliers of communication technology exhibit their wares and highlight any new products. As well as each giving a short presentation - you choose which you wish to attend - product experts are on hand all day to answer any questions you may have, demonstrate equipment, supply catalogues and literature, give you mini 1:1 tutorials. Unlike with visits from one particular company, you get the chance to 'compare and contrast' systems. Staff from the local specialist AAC services in Scotland are on hand to help to point you to local sources of informaiton and support, and you will also be able to 'network' with like-minded colleagues. Hope to see you there!

To find out more and to book online, go to Communication Matters Road Shows. Or, you can email Communication Matters or ring 0845 456 8211, giving your name, full address with postcode and contact telephone number. You will receive an acknowledgement of your booking.

You are also always welcome to contact CALL for further information, on 0131 651 6235 or 0131 651 6236.

Halloween Tips for switch users

Joanna Courtney — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:36:23

Here are a few spooky switch ideas for you!

Dress up your switch operated toys in Halloween costumes e.g. witch's hat, black cape etc.
Then, make a simple (e.g. decorated cardboard box) 'Haunted House' for them to walk into, with spooky sound effects on a 'BigMack' or 'Step by Step' switch!
Put a small switch adapted light inside a pumpkin and have your children turn on the spooky glow!
Make 'witches brew' or 'yucky potions' using your PowerLink and blender!
Use a PowerLink and fan to operate spooky wind chimes or blow dried leaves!

Have fun!

Free Internet Resources

Allan Wilson — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 10:43:10

There are some incredible resources available free on the internet these days. (We like to think we have some pretty incredible resources available on our web sites, too, e.g. WordTalk and The Scottish Voice.) Here are a couple of American sites that I have come across recently and which are definitely worth looking at:

Wisconsin Assistive Technology Initiative (WATI)

WATI was funded by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction until 2009 and is now run as a volunteer network of assistive technology consultants in Wisconsin. They have chosen to make some great free resources available from their web site:

Assessing Students' Needs for Assistive Technology. This is a massive (500+ pages) reference providing useful information on assessing a student for assistive technology. Chapters cover such topics as 'AT for Seating, Positioning and Mobility', 'AT for Communication', 'AT for Computer Access', 'AT for Mathematics', 'AT for Writing', 'AT for Reading' and much more. Materials can be downloaded in PDF, Word and PowerPoint versions. The assessment strategies are generally based on the SETT (Student, Environment, Tasks, Tools) approach, that is popular in the USA, and which can easily be transferred to the UK.
Assistive Technology Supports for Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder. This provides checklists for assessing a student's needs and abilities and suggests strategies for identifying the most suitable assistive technology and resources for a student. There is a particular emphasis on the use of augmentative and alternative communication.
DESK (Designing Environments for Successful Kids). This book looks at the design of a suitable environment for children with disabilities at different stages of their educational development.

National Centre on Universal Design for Learning

The National Centre, based in Maine, was set up to promote the idea of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), i.e. a flexible approach to curriculum design that offers all learners full and equal opportunities to grow. Much of the work on UDL is echoed by recent legislation in the UK, including the Disability Discrimination Act and requirements for local authorities to have Accessibility Strategies in place for school education, covering not just physical access, but also access to the curriculum, and improved communication within the school. The web site provides detailed guidelines, backed up by research, based on three primary principles for Universal Design for Learning:

Provide Multiple Means of Representation;
Provide Multiple Means of Action and Expression;
Provide Multiple Means of Engagement.

The Principles are broken down into Guidelines and then Checkpoints, with detailed resources and examples provided for each Checkpoint.

Making Books for All CPD at Stirling Management Centre, 29 and 30 September

Paul Nisbet — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:12:39

Paul Nisbet and Stuart Aitken have developed a comprehensive 4 day course that attempts to cover techniques for making learning resources in accessible formats. The course is split into two sections and the first half was held on 29/30 September, at Stirling Management Centre. It was attended by colleagues from across the country - from Shetland to Dumfries and Galloway, and was very successful. It was great to have a meeting of minds both geographically and also in terms of remit - there were people who make Large print, Braille and audio books for pupils with visual impairments and also staff who make digital books for pupils with other print disabilities due to physical impairments or dyslexia. This mix made the two days very stimulating (and hard work).

Over these first two days we covered:

where to find and source accessible formats;
accessibility of different formats for different groups of print-disabled pupils;
how to add structure to digital books and make 'Intermediate Files' using Microsoft Word;
how to convert these Intermediate Files to different audio, print and digital formats;
adapting digital files from publishers.

The second part of the course will be on 19/20 November and will cover scanning and OCR, making interactive resources, uploading accessible books to the Books for All Database, and copyright issues.

We hope to repeat the four day course in February/March 2010 initially, and also in summer 2010 and/or the 2010/2011 session.

These courses are funded and organised by Learning and Teaching Scotland (LTS): attendence was FREE for participants. If you would like to find out more, contact Gayle Monteith at LTS (G.Monteith@LTScotland.org.uk).

Including All Children in the Royal Mail Scottish Children's Book Awards

Allan Wilson — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:15:10

Book Awards

The Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children’s Books is an innovative nationwide reading project in which children and young people from every corner of Scotland read and vote for their favourite Scottish children's books of the year. Last year:

Over 18,000 children were involved and an amazing 9,541 votes were cast;
Over 350 schools and libraries in every corner of Scotland, from Aberdeen to Dumfries; Shetland to Arran, took part;
The 2008 awards ceremony brought 550 young judges from across Scotland together to see their peers act out the winning books.

The Awards were originally set up by the Scottish Arts Council in 1999 and are now run by Scottish Book Trust. More information is on the Scottish Book Trust web site.

The shortlist

Children can vote for their favourite book from a shortlist in each of three categories:

Early Years (0 - 7 years)

Manfred the Baddie by John Fardell;
Pink by Lynne Rickards and Barbara Chamberlain;
Stick Man by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler.

Younger Readers (8 - 11 years)

Dino Egg by Charlie James;
The Eleventh Orphan by Joan Lingard;
First Aid for Fairies and Other Fabled Beasts by Lari Don.

Older Readers (11 - 16 years)

Crash by J A Henderson;
Ostrich Boys by Keith Gray;
The Reckoning by James Jauncey.

But what about disabled children who can’t read the books?

CALL Scotland has worked with the Scottish Book Trust and the authors and publishers to create accessible digital versions of the nine shortlisted books. The idea is that children and young people with physical, visual and reading or dyslexic difficulties, who can’t read the paper books, can read the digital books instead and take part in the awards.

Children with spinal injury, cerebral palsy or other physical impairments can click a switch or press a key on a computer, to turn pages and read the books by themselves. Dyslexic readers or children with visual impairments can change the font size and/or colours on screen, or use text-to-speech software to read the books.

The books can be read out by the computer using "Heather", the high quality Scottish computer voice that is available free for schools and pupils from CALL Scotland’s web site at http://www.thescottishvoice.org.uk/. Accessible digital versions of the shortlisted books are available free of charge from CALL Scotland by completing the 'Request Digital Copy' online form' via the Books for All website or phoning 0131 651 6236.

In a related initiative, RNIB Scotland have produced Large Print, Braille and audio copies of the books.

Tobii C-Series: C8 and C12 communication aids

Robert Stewart — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 12:51:58

Tobii seem to be releasing a lot of new products recently and have added the weather resistant C8 (approximately £4800) and C12 (approximately £5400) to their range. They are both designed like tablet PCs with a 8.4" and 12.1" screen respectively. The C12 can also have the Tobii CEye control system (approximately £4900) attached to it. Both of these devices have an integrated desk stand or can be wheelchair mounted. You can also insert a mobile phone SIM card into each of them for sending and receiving text. Saves all that hassle with connecting up mobile phones! I've been told that it also works well in a wide variety of lighting conditions which will be useful for wheelchair mounting. Keyguards can also be fitted to them.

Both of these devices come pre-installed with Tobii Communicator, however, you are free to choose the communication package (such as the Grid 2) you wish since the underlaying operating system of the device is Windows Vista. I suspect the reason for having Vista (as opposed to Windows XP) installed is the fact that Vista has touchscreen capabilities built-in.

An interesting feature on these devices is the ability to add an extra battery which will take the battery life from 4 to 6 hours on the C8 (no data for C12). Not that remarkable that you can add another battery until you see that they are 'hot swappable'. This effectively means that you can remove (and replace) the secondary battery without having to turn the device off.

They also support interchangeable coloured side panels....a nice feature if the client is particular to a certain colour!

Tobii C8

Touchscreen: 8.4"
Attach CEye control system: no
Dimensions: 213 x 200 x 38mm
Weight: 1.8 Kg
Memory: 2Gb
Hard Drive: 60 Gb
Battery life: 4 hours
Switch inputs: 2
Mounting: Daessy or Vesa
Integrated desk stand: yes
Wireless: yes
Built in camera: yes

Tobii C12

Touchscreen: 12.1"
Attach CEye control system: yes
Dimensions: 313 x 264 x 46mm
Weight: 2.9 Kg
Memory: 2Gb
Hard Drive: 60 Gb
Battery life: 5 hours
Switch inputs: 2
Mounting: Daessy or Vesa
Integrated desk stand: yes
Wireless: yes
Built in camera: yes

Fast charging battery: 90 percent in 90 seconds

Robert Stewart — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 11:59:21

Toshiba were rumoured to have been initaly planning an April 2009 launch for this new technology but held off because of the recession and market conditions. The super charge ion battery could revolutionise technology and uses nanotechnology to rapidly charge in a couple of minutes (90 percent in 90 seconds) and recharges up to 6000 times (on a laptop).

The battery is planned for use in a variety of other applications and not just laptops. Car batteries are one such application so this could have implications for wheelchair batteries.

So, we shall wait with bated breath for Toshiba to launch this new technology.

Update: 13 May 2010

'Production of the battery, which has been in development for several years, has already begun for the industrial market at the relatively low volume of 150,000 cells per month. Toshiba will increase that to several tens of millions of cells per month at a new factory it plans to build in Kashiwazaki in Niigata prefecture in north west Japan, it said last week. Construction of the factory will begin in late 2009 and production is scheduled to begin a year later, said Hiroko Mochida, a Toshiba spokeswoman'. (Toshiba gears up for fast charging battery, techworld.com, 29th December 2008)

Oska on-screen keyboard

Robert Stewart — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 10:30:36

Another interesting application demonstrated at Communication Matters, Oska is designed to offer a variety of alternative input methods to custom designed keyboards.

The software basicaly allows you to design your own keyboards and attach an input method (such as a switch) to control that custom keyboard. Thus, users are able to operate a PC in a way that suits them. Methods of input range from mouse, keyboard and switch to head and mouth stick. Since the keyboards are custom designed you can have any key perform almost any action; open and close a program such as Microsoft Word or open another custom keyboard specifically designed for an application or game. You can even move the keyboard around the screen if it's in the way. Some great features can be designed into the keyboards and the editor is surprisingly easy to get to grips with. Although, that is from a 'techy' point of view!

The package is free to developers but clients wishing to use the keyboards have to purchase the Oska suite for £159 from Claro Software.

I shall describe 2 methods demonstrated at Communication Matters:

Scroll Wheel Scanning

Using a standard UK on-screen keyboard you can use the scroll wheel on a mouse to operate a switch/scanning system. You scroll (as fast or slow as you wish) the column or row back and forth and click the scroll wheel to select. i.e.

scroll to the desired column using the scroll button;
click to select the column and then scroll to the desired row;
click to select the key you require;
repeat the process.

TenKey Mouse

Using the numeric keypad at the right of a computer keyboard or a keypad such as the Kensington Pocket Keypad. The keyboard is separated into 9 sectors of 9 keys (9 x 9) and you press 1 - 9 on the keypad to select a sector and then 1 - 9 to select a key.

The advantage of this method is that the user could eventually memorise the key presses for every key and no longer need to look at the keyboard to type.

Intel Fizzbook tablet PC as a low cost VOCA

Robert Stewart — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 11:54:29

Peter Keeves (Cornwall Partnership Trust) recently presented a session at Communication Matters on the new Intel Fizzbook Tablet PC and its potential as a low cost voice output communication aid (VOCA). I shall give very brief details on this:

Fizzbook Spin (Standard laptop version is just called a Fizzbook) can be purchased for around £300 which is very cheap for a Tablet PC (Touch screen laptop with rotating screen). It's powered with an Intel Atom processor, 1Gb Ram, 10.1" screen, 160Gb hard drive and Windows XP. It also boasts a carry handle.
Peter suggested purchasing an iWantit IW150 ipod speaker station for under £15 which can then be attached to the back of the tablet (with good strength Velcro). The speaker is then powered via USB from the tablet (you can also use 4 x AAA batteries) and the sound can be turned on or off and adjusted easily with buttons on the top right of the speaker.
Copy of Clicker 5 (with Quickfire grids) can then be purchased for home use at £59.

It should be noted that some basic soldering was mentioned but this was not elaborated on. I’m assuming this is for the earphone cable between the tablet and the speaker.

At less than £400 the finished article was very profesional and the audio fairly loud. I worked out that the total weight was about 1.75 Kg which isn't too heavy.

An added touch is that the user can still attach their iPod to the back of the speaker!

If you wish to know more then you may wish to contact Peter Keeves via the Cornwall Partnership Trust (Peter.Keeves@cpt.cornwall.nhs.uk).

Toshiba NB200 Mini Notebook: 9 hour battery life!

Robert Stewart — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 16:21:05

Yet another mini book (also known as the net-book) hits the market! However, this one is slightly different, as the Toshiba sales Rep claims a 9 hour continuous use battery life from its 6 cell battery.

There is a basic XP Home model for £254 (excluding vat) as well as a 3G enabled model (built-in mobile broadband capability) at £300 (excluding vat). The drawback with the 3G model is a reduction of battery life by 3 hours (if the 3G is used continuously) which just shows you how much power is consumed by mobile broadband.

Update (02/10/09): There is also 3 cell version battery (4 hour continuous use battery life) available in Linux and Windows XP for £218 + vat.

The Toshiba Rep also informed me that it has been designed for school children and so features the usual rugged clips, etc. Didn't mention any drop testing though! Saying that, I've read Toshiba have installed a G-sensor to enable free-fall protection for the hard drive. Whenever excessive movement is detected the drive heads are locked to help protect the hard drive. Since the hard drive is the only mechanical part, it is usualy the most common mode of failure when you drop it! So, this G-sensor will help prevent damage during a fall.

Specification:

Intel Atom N270 processor
10.1" VGA screen
1Gb Ram
160Gb Hard Drive
Wireless

The Grid 2: buried treasure - right click to hear a preview

Sally Millar — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 15:29:02

I like The Grid 2 software for pupils who have really complex communication and writing difficulties. Amongst its many good features, I especially like the symbol supported prediction, for users who really have barely any spelling ability at all, maybe just initial letters - but who still want to speak out and get their thoughts down on paper - and who are building their confidence to bridge from symbols to keyboard and words. (You can do this with Clicker and Penfriend combined but it can be a bit fiddly.) The Grid 2 does everything that Clicker does - and more - in some ways more elegantly and with more versatility. But one criticism I've heard voiced is that The Grid 2 doesn't allow you to do that much-loved Clicker 'right click' trick - ie you 'right click' to get the spoken preview of the word in the cell, to check what it is, before you decide whether to select it or not (and then hear it spoken out 'properly' as it is sent up into the document/message bar.

Well - you CAN!! It's just ridiculously well hidden as a feature, in The Grid 2. Here is how to do it:

Go to User settings
select Input settings>pointer>tooltips
select "right click to speak tooltip" (it may already be selected)

You will also then need to go to Speech Settings, to select a private voice, as this is the speech that will be used on a right click. (I think this is the bit that most people don't know - I didn't!) If you can, discuss with your user whether he /she'd like the right click prompt to speak in the same or a different voice as the left click select.

Also discuss whether the volume should be the same or different. Clicker doesn't allow you to vary these, but The Grid 2 does (so the user can have a quiet little prompt that nobody else can hear). I suggest you set the volume on the Private voice at about 50% (if the volume on the Public voice is 100%) - this can be changed to suit.

Learn more about The Grid 2

New AAC device: Alt-Chat+ from Liberator

Sally Millar — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 15:41:27

We have just had a chance to trial a new device called the Alt-Chat+ developed by the US company Saltillo and marketed in the UK by Liberator Ltd. It is an interesting mixture of two different devices - it has the hardware 'body' of the Springboard Lite (a very popular small lightweight device) and the software 'guts' of the Chat PC4 / Silk handheld device. Retailing around the £3,500 mark (ex VAT) it plops straight into an area where there was a gap before - ie devices that are relatively simple to use, do not have a load of unwanted fancy features, and that are not overwhelmingly expensive, but that - unlike the digitised voice devices - do have a synthetic voice, text and prediction. This makes it of potential interest in the education / school market. Watch this space for more information as we explore the loan device, its prestored vocabularies, and find out how easy it is to adapt and programme.

Update: 04.09.09

Don't want to sound too negative but in spite of some good points we were a wee bit disappointed overall when we checked out more of the inner workings of this device - on the usability front, it may not be the miracle answer we were hoping for ....

FREE switch accessible games and resources

Sally Millar — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 13:32:56

Simple games that can be operated by switch(es) or space bar are important for children who cannot easily access and play 'ordinary' computer games. CALL Family Fun Switch Games will lead you to a huge stock of FREE and fun switch accessible resources (list created by Alan Stewart and CALL Scotland) Enjoy! Do please let CALL know (or sign up as a guest and add your own) if you know of any we've missed!

'Staying on TrAACk' AAC Study Day

Joanna Courtney — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 16:05:22

Special Interest Group-AAC Scotland

This study day is being held on Monday the 26th of October at St John's Hospital in Livingston. It is relevant for Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs), Teachers, Occupational Therapists (OTs), Support for Learning Assistants (SLAs) and all staff who work with people who use AAC. The day costs £20 per person and both coffee and lunch are provided.

As the speakers on the day will be covering topics from both child and adult services , it should attract a wide range of professionals and will be a great opportunity to share ideas and practical approaches to working with clients in the field of AAC!

For more information and to book a place, please download the AAC SIG flier and follow the instructions provided.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Software Discounts

Sally Millar — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 10:35:26

As the new session starts, a reminder to all schools that LTScotland offers a range of educational software at discounted rates, including key software for additional support needs i.e. BoardMaker V6 and Clicker 5. Check out their software promotions for Early Years, Primary, Secondary, or schools in general, and/or their software licensing schemes.

New Communication Aids for summer 09

Sally Millar — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 10:13:08

This has been quite a summer for AAC - no fewer than four new communication aids have recently hit the AAC High Street.

Firstly there is the mindblowing Proloquo2Go, (P2G) software from Assistiveware which runs on an ordinary iPod Touch (only 115gms in weight) or iPhone. It is undoubtedly the ultimate in 'cool'. The fact that it is a wholly 'mainstream' product - bought through mainstream outlets, with the software downloaded as an 'App' from iTunes, and affordable to many families - is such a radical new development that it has the potential to change the face of AAC. It needs additional speaker for adequate volume. It will not suit everyone but it has some interesting new design features from an enthusiastic young developer who really listens to users (and replies), and fabulous potential. No switch access for now anyway.

Secondly, there is the clever but really simple ProxTalker, a sort of talking PECS system, which was featured recently in this Blog, from Logan Technologies. PECS users will be keen to try this easy to use device, which may hold the key to bridging the gap between low and high tech communication aids.

Thirdly there is the new low tech Frenchay Alphabet Board (FAB) from E2L Ltd. It's still a bit beyond me why a piece of laminated paper would not be just as good, for some users anyway, but then again I can see that many hospitals and establishments in the community / public places would prefer to buy a device to have available at all times, rather than rely on having a staff member make one for a particular user. And some users would benefit from the sort of keyguard/guide that helps accurate finger indication.

Lastly, news has just broken of the new DynaVox Xpress which is small enough for pocket or hands, but is a powerful complex device with the familiar DynaVox software/ vocabulary look, and full Wifi connectivity. It has built-in synthetic voices and a 5 inch screen like an iPhone or Blackberry, and unlike the P2Go, it DOES offer switch access. It does not exactly 'replace' the much loved and much lamented DynaMo which featured such endearing simplicity, but joins the competitive field of handhelds and 'quasi handhelds' (NB. no more Palmtop 3 in the UK). It weighs about 700 gms which is about twice the weight of a standard handheld but still pretty portable. The weight is in the built-in amp and speakers which give high volume and excellent quality speech. Look forward to finding out more about it soon.

UPDATE: 20th August: Sorry for misinformation posted in the original version of this blog item - the Xpress offers one switch scanning access.

Text to Speech and Web Browsers - Is CleanPage the Answer?

Allan Wilson — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 16:34:54

Shortly after our recent comparison of text-to-speech utilities that can be used to read web pages, Reading the Web was released, we received an email suggesting that we have a look at the free CleanPage utility, free from ReadonWeb. We had a look at it and liked it, but it wasn't quite right. When you install CleanPage it adds a toolbar to Internet Explorer, which allows an 'uncluttered' version of a web page, without graphics and 'junk', to be created. The font and colours in the uncluttered version can be adjusted to suit the reader and it is also possible to have this text transferred to a separate text-to-speech window straight from the original web page. It seemed great for people with a visual impairment and those who just wanted to have web pages 'de-cluttered' or read aloud, but it wasn't so good for people who needed a little more support. We had three main issues:

Sometimes people need the pictures! If you are looking at a web page with descriptions of various animals, it is helpful to be able to see the pictures while you are listening to the text.
It wasn't possible to select only a part of the text on a web page, so if you only wanted the description of the zebra at the bottom of the page, you had to sit through the antelope, the bear, the chimpanzee, etc.
It wasn't possible to change font and colours for text in the text-to-speech window - either you could have colour options in the uncluttered view, or text-to-speech - but not both.

We outlined our concerns in an email to ReadonWeb. Within 24 hours their President had replied, saying he would ask his team to look at our suggestions. Six days later we received another email saying that our suggestions had been implemented in a new version (1.1.1.6) of the program. Very impressive!

We've looked at the new version - points 2 and 3 have been fully addressed. Point 1 can be met by minimising the text-to-speech window and highlighting text on the original web page so that it looks as if it is being read directly from the web page. It doesn't quite match our ideal - to have text highlighted as it is read direct from the web page - but it comes very close!

For PC users with Internet Explorer, CleanPage should be the first option to consider - it may not suit everybody, but it is definitely the best of the free options. If you are using Firefox on a PC or a Mac, the best option is the free CliCk, Speak add-on.

New AAC device, the Logan ProxTalker

Sally Millar — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 17:55:53

Today CALL was pleased to receive a demonstration and short term loan of voice output communication aid that is new on the UK market, the Logan ProxTalker.

This is a VERY simple-to-use system that is basically a PECS or communication book that can talk. The user's pictures are on little cards with a Velcro backing, stored on Velcro-friendly pages. These can be photos, PCS symbols Widgit, Pics for PECS, plain words, or anything. The user selects the symbol card he wants and places it on the Velcro tag on one of 5 buttons on the device. As he/she presses the button, the card will speak (recorded/digitised speech).

How does it work? The symbol cards are 'smart' tags that are ID coded with unique radio frequencies (like swipe cards for security doors etc.) and the speech message is linked to the code. Messages can be between 2 and 8 seconds each, and the device will hold thousands of messages (on an SD card).

It is really quick and simple to change the recording, increase or decrease volume, check battery function. You can buy it with a core vocabulary of 80 symbols (and 20 blanks) or 100 blanks and make your own set of picture/symbol cards. Extra pages, tags etc can be purchased separately later. The ProxTalker uses 4 ordinary 'C' Duracell batteries that last about 6 months. It comes in grey, blue or pink and can be carried in a neat little backpack, weighing overall about 2.25 Kgs.

We liked the innovative design and the extreme simplicity and robustness of the ProxTalker and can imagine that there will be lots of potential users out there - particularly children with autistic spectrum disorders but maybe others too.

For more information, check it out on proxtalker.com A Proxtalker web site (www.proxtalker.co.uk) is coming soon.

If you would like to see or try this device, get in touch with CALL Scotland, we should have the demonstrator loan machine here until late September and will be keen to find potential users and to get feedback that we can relay to the developers/supplier.

Using Text-to-Speech Utilities to Read Web Pages

Allan Wilson — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 15:13:46

CALL frequently receives enquiries from people seeking advice on utilities that can be used to read text from web pages. Teachers and parents may be using WordTalk to read Word documents and are now looking for something similar to read web pages.

Earlier this year CALL carried out a detailed comparison of over twenty utilities that can be used to add speech output to web pages. A report on the results, Reading the Web, can be downloaded from the CALL web site. We looked at a range of options from free utilities, to the use of comprehensive literacy support packages which included the ability to read web pages among a wide range of features. Many schools may already have a package like TextHelp, or Penfriend, both of which can be used to add text-to-speech facilities to the web, but for parents, or people staring from scratch, we recommended the free CliCkSpeak add-on for the Firefox web browser. At the time, we could not wholeheartedly recommend any single option for Internet Explorer, though Balabolka, NaturalReader and Ultra Hal were all worth considering as free options. TextAloud was a good choice for those with a small budget.

Read on Web's ClearPage

ClearPage is a new option for adding text-to-speech to Internet Explorer. When you install this free utility to a PC (there isn't a Mac version, unfortunately) a new toolbar is added to Internet Explorer, which allows you to create an 'uncluttered' version of the original web page, stripped of graphics and unnecessary text. The uncluttered version can be presented in your preferred font, text and background colours for easy reading, and can also be transferred to a text-to-speech window. This may sound complicated, but it is actually very easy - it is possible to go straight from the original web page to hearing the text-to-speech version with a single keystroke.

Unfortunately the text and background colours in the text-to-speech window cannot be changed from the standard black and white so people with different colour preferences are not able to change to suit their needs. There are also issues with the way in which text is selected and read - if you try to read a single word, the word will be read, but it will carry on reading the following text.

ClearPage is not particularly helpful if you need to see the text in the context of graphical material, or if you only want to read a small portion of the text on a web page, but, despite these reservations, it is definitely a useful utility that is worth considering for getting text-to-speech from Internet Explorer.

A typical web page seen in a standard browser.

The same page in ClearPage's 'uncluttered' view.

The same page in ClearPage's text to speech reader.

Livescribe Pulse pen for notetaking and maybe as AAC device

Sally Millar — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 11:40:23

One of the new devices on show at CALL's recent ICT and Inclusion sessions was the rather amazing Livescribe Pulse Pen.

You can see the product description (with video) at Livescribe.com

It has been designed for note-taking and could be useful to students and older school pupils with memory or writing difficulties of speed, legibility or spelling (or all of these). It's not particularly new to have a pen that records audio (though this one is good quality audio and can pick up teacher talk so long as student is at the front of the room) but this device follows through, so you can also quickly and easily transfer the file to your computer and link the recording to your written notes / diagrams, share notes via email, convert your written notes into a word processor file (with the audio still attached). The special notebook that is part of the pen pack might be an attractive alternative to heaving a laptop around everywhere.

The Livescribe Pulse pen is marketed in the UK, you can find more details at Dyslexic.com It's not unduly expensive at approx. £199

For those with an AAC interest, Karen Janowski from the USA outlines on her Teaching Every Student blog how you could use the Livescribe to create a talking communication book, and links to an interesting article that describes in detail how to do this, see "Augmentative Communication: A Low-Cost and Lightweight Communication Device with Natural Speech."

ICT and Inclusion 2009, Glasgow

Stuart Aitken — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 16:46:03

Janette Graham and Andrea MacBeath, based at the ASL Technology Service in Richmond Park School in Glasgow provided their top ten tips (well at least twelve, really) for supporting literacy. They covered Word Prediction such as using Penfriend or Co:Writer; symbol support using Boardmaker; use of WordTalk and a host of others. Not only that but they kindly offered to share their PowerPoint slides for the presentation with others.

Katie Robinson, a teacher at Middlefield, a school in Glasgow for children with Autistic Spectrum Disorder, presented on her use of the SmartBoard with pupils she works with. She has found that Smart technologies offer particular advantages for pupils with ASD. These include:

being bright and attractive, drawing on the strengths of visual learners
being interactive, pupils really can "Do to learn"
allows the teacher to reduce his or her use of verbal language – free from multiple sub-clauses
easier to focus on, helping when teaching the skills for taking part in a group – such as turn-taking

Katie noted that she had found Education City particularly appropriate software with the pupils she worked with. Problems of positioning the board, using a touch sensitive screen as opposed to the kind that lock you into using a particular kind of pen (options of magic wands, conductor’s batons and such like led to some useful discussion).

ICT and Inclusion 2009, Edinburgh

Sally Millar — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 12:32:47

About 130 people attended here in CALL Scotland, in Edinburgh, for the second very successful CALL Scotland ICT and Inclusion day. It's quite ambitious to try and meet the CPD needs & interests of everyone from staff working with Primary pupils with severe and complex additional support needs, to NHS therapists, to tutors of students with disabilities in Further Education. But somehow our mix of exhibition displays, suppliers' presentations and good practice workshops seems to have pulled it off! Evaluation forms show that participants liked everything a lot, and especially the chance to have 1:1 discussions and hands-on with suppliers, the ideas provided in the practitioner workshops, and information about free software resources.

ICT and Inclusion 2009 Dingwall

Paul Nisbet — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 17:56:05

About 80 people enjoyed a great day at the Ross County Victoria Park stadium in Dingwall yesterday on 16th June. There were 18 presentations from suppliers and practitioners on a wide range of topics as well as a chance to look at software and hardware in the exhibition space. A quick glance at the evaluation forms shows that all the participants found the day useful. Craig Mill's AccessApps and 2Simple software got several appreciative mentions, as did the lunch and the weather. Next up Edinburgh and then Glasgow.

The BBC's new Accessible Newsreader

Allan Wilson — Thu, 14 May 2009 17:15:15

Welcome!

Welcome to the first entry in the new CALL Scotland Blog!

We will be using the Blog to share information about our work, events we are organising and developments in augmentative and alternative communication, assistive technology and education.

The BBC's Accessible Newsreader

The BBC have launched an accessible news service website, allowing switch users to chose news items for reading. People using the site can use a switch to choose stories from Headlines, UK News, World News, Sports News, Animal News and Showbiz and can them have the material read aloud by the computer.

The site has already received positive comment from the United States - see the Teaching Learners with Multiple Special Needs website. We know of a school in Scotland where a class has been making use of this exciting, new resource. One pupil was particularly annoyed to hear about an MP claiming back the cost of a toilet seat on his expenses and expressed herself so well that she was awarded an NVQ pass for expressing her views on a controversial subject!

We think it is great that a major news organisation has made the effort to create a news site that is accessible for switch users. The BBC are already planning improvements to the site and CALL have made some suggestions which will be taken on board as the project develops. Let us know if there are any improvements that you would like to see and we'll pass them on to our contact in the BBC.