Exploring Bookshare and Text-to-Speech

http://www.bookshare.org/
http://www.naturalreaders.com/
http://www.ispeech.org
At Bookshare individuals and organizations have access to a library of print materials made accessible to those with print disabilities through various software programs. Membership in Bookshare is available to individuals with qualifying print disabilities and to organizations supporting those individuals, such as schools. As a qualifying student or school the service is free; for all other individuals in the U.S. the cost is fifty dollars annually plus a twenty-five dollar set up fee. One can sign up for Bookshare on the membership page either as an individual or an organization by providing certain basic information. For example, schools are asked to enter the type of school, population density, and percentage of school population that qualifies for the federal lunch program. To search the Bookshare library, one can search for specific books, browse collections, or request a book cannot be found. Some of the general collections include K-12 textbooks, categories, and new books. Among the special collections are Pulitzer Prize winners, Newberry Award winners, and New York Times bestsellers.
I think Bookshare is a very useful resource for most age groups and subject areas. As mentioned above, it allows access to many K-12 textbooks. I think it is more user-friendly for older students who can do more of their own research and exploration of the site. Teachers and parents, however, can certainly support younger children with print disabilities using this site. Bookshare could be used to support students with visual impairments and processing difficulties, ADHD, physical disabilities, other learning disabilities, and English language learners. I would use it in my current placement to support the reading of some of my students in a resource English class. In this setting, Bookshare would benefit my students by allowing them to select from a wider range of text materials accessible by audio. Currently they have an in class library of selected texts and corresponding audio, but with Bookshare they could find more books based on their individual interests and access magazine and newspaper articles.
On the reading tools page there are also a number of text-to-speech programs and other tools, listed according to one’s need, which work with Bookshare books. I tried a free version of NaturalReader, which is text-to-speech software with natural sounding voice options. One can select from a variety of voices and adjust the speed of the reader’s voice. NaturalReader converts written text from Microsoft Word, webpages, PDF files, and emails into speech. It can also be used to convert text into audio files. The program is simple to use with a very basic visual layout. Some people with fine motor challenges may find aspects of the program irritating in that it reads everything the cursor touches. In the 2009 PACER Simon Technology Center’s comparison of text-to-speech programs, NaturalReader was identified as offering all of the features considered including, reading text in original application, reading internet, converting to audio files, and having a pronunciation editor. Although not stated in the PACER guide, NaturalReader is also available for MAC. While the free version that I looked at gives an idea of the program, I was only able to use the cut and paste option to listen to text. Obviously, someone who wanted to integrate the features discussed above into their daily computer use for work, school, or research would want to purchase the complete version.
In considering the benefits of text-to-speech for students with learning disabilities, I searched people’s comments in the Closing the Gap Forums to find what others have to say. Several people commented on the benefit to students with dyslexia. They found that text-to-speech significantly improved students’ understanding of letter-sound correspondence. Some also shared that text-to-speech helped students with visual processing difficulties. In addition, I have found that audio support improves the learning of students diagnosed with ADHD. In general, I have observed that students with different learning disabilities that affect their ability to read, benefit from the help with fluency that text-to-speech offers.