School Reflection

Speech Recognition for Dyslexia in classrooms

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Students diagnosed with dyslexia and some ELL students often have trouble with putting their thoughts and ideas into writing. My class’s own dyslexic student has trouble (and by no fault of his) focusing and doing writing work because it is hard for him get started and he is always pages behind everyone else. It is also taxing on the teacher’s part to either coax the student to do work or to make a compromise adaptation every single time.

Technology has a possible solution through speech recognition software and the example we will look at is the Dragon speech recognition. This software turns a student’s voice into text thus eliminating the need to for spelling and writing. Students speak into a microphone and their voice appears as words on the screen. The technical requirement to run such a software are a Windows based computer, a proximity microphone (one that doesn’t pick up background noise) and a word processor such as Microsoft Word. In the video by Rhodders (2007), the software also has the function to read aloud to the user what was typed, making proofreading that much easier for students who has trouble reading text.

The downside of implementing this type of technology in the classroom is firstly the cost. The software is not cheap at over $100 per license, the laptop itself with the software will also likely be used by the dyslexic student only so that’s another cost in the school‘s budget. This software does require good speaking skills in order to work and students who had trouble to read in the first place will need a lot of help in training before they can comfortably take advantage of this. Rhodders’ video explained that the student’s dad had to read him a passage over and over again for him to repeat it into the computer.

I am curious and would love to further explore the potential of this software’s ability to potentially help dyslexic students for as long as cost can be kept low. I do not like the idea of having a laptop bound to a student without some level of expectation that it is a privilege and not a right. I also have a class that is very active and tends to be loud when working, I do not feel that it is a good community builder to have a student potentially leaving the room constantly to work somewhere quiet by himself.

 

Reference

Freedom of Speech Ltd. (2014, April 2). Helping Bethany’s dyslexia at school using Dragon speech recognition software [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tj85zQT184o

Rhodders. (2007, April 23). Demonstration of speech recognition: For Westminster eForum [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXHawlHLmtI

Makerspace and inquiry learning

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Today I observed the progress and the process my students have made since two weeks ago. Today they have managed to run the Raspberry Pi by themselves from the power of Google searching, completed the props for stop-motion videos and are almost ready to make a presentation of their leanings. After some debrief with my SA, I was able to put meaning to my observations more than ever in relation to fostering a connection with my students. I have witnessed those who can come up with new ideas, those that need to cling on to someone and those that think in black and white. These students behave accordingly to their nature such as those who are willing to try new ideas, those who don’t venture outside their comfort zone and those who derail easily. It’s made me realized I don’t really know my kids that well and am barely scratching the surface. In the morning I have trouble remembering their names after 2 weeks and I wish I can be there more just to learn more about them. But this is exactly what my inquiry is about, to throw challenges at students that can be solved with the aid of technology. This also affords for them to connect with me and at the same time allowing them to connect to the world. This actually expands my original intent and actually answers my question to what is “Meaningful” use of technology. It’s a shame that I cannot be there every time it happens and see the full result of student progression but I am glad to get a glimpse of it. I can make some sense of what I have seen and see the potential of meaningful technology in a classroom. I now need to start thinking about the objectives and big ideas for lessons involving technology and what opportunities they will provide. After that I can start thinking how to be able to come up with my own activities or use of technology in lessons so that it could be very meaningful and goes along with my teaching philosophy and inquiry question.

References

Martinez, S. L., & Stager, G. (2013). Invent to learn: Making, tinkering, and engineering in the classroom.