Review of TextHelp Read & Write V4 for MAC OS, by Gerry Kennedy, November 2010
by Gerry Kennedy
| Author: | Gerry Kennedy |
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Read & Write V4 Gold for MAC OS is designed to provide literacy support for all Apple MAC Users. It is appropriate for students and adult users who are struggling with literacy or who need help with their reading and writing. The various tools can be used by anyone who is typing, creating or gathering text for study, research or data collection. The software appears as a floating toolbar and is now very similar in appearance and has similar functionality as the MS Windows version.
The software fully integrates with MS Word 2008™ and Safari™ and is a user-friendly, comprehensive toolbar available to assist students with reading and writing difficulties as it offers so many useful tools to help when working with text.
The software can be acquired and purchased in three ways. Students have flexible and portable use on the USB Read & Write 4 GOLD Mobile version. This can be used practically anywhere – at home, school, University, workplace local library or on a friend’s MAC. The Read & Write 4 GOLD for MAC Single caters to those people wishing to install it on a one computer, be it a desktop or MacBook or other model at home or in a fixed location. The networked Site License provides schools, TAFEs, Universities, training colleges and other organisations the option to install it on all of their MACs and have it made available to all faculty, staff and students.
The text-to-speech facility is one of the major benefits and key features, with high quality voices provided. Text-to-speech voices, either male or female, offer an elegant and accurate way to read text in documents, from web sites, social pages (e.g. Facebook, MySpace, Bebo), emails, class and lectures notes and anywhere text can be highlighted. The screen shot reader goes one step further.
The new screenshot reader will read any ‘locked’ PDF document or inaccessible text. The text can be read in the document or cut and pasted into other applications such as MS Word or Open Office Writer. Unlocking PDF files has been quite a challenge in the past as users had to scan a file, or use OCR software to reversion it before it was accessible with a screen reader program or text to speech application. Students now need only to click the screenshot reader icon and then drag their mouse over any inaccessible text they wish to read. It is that simple and easy to achieve something that will open up so many new options!
Texthelp’s selection of human-sounding voices ensure that users can enjoy having the text read aloud back to them, in a number of different empowering ways. The result of this is that students begin to develop their literacy skills, gain increased understanding of context, are likely to comprehend information more fully and in more detail and therefore enjoy greater independence. Each word is highlighted as it is spoken, with a differentiated colour as well to aid in comprehension and to pace the spoken with the matched word onscreen.
Letters, numbers and punctuation marks can be voiced, as well as whole words and sentences if required, as a user types in his or her text. This positive, rich auditory feedback aids in developing confidence in using the keyboard and in creating text in general. It helps increase productivity and also avoids errors.
Students spend a great deal of time on the Internet now, engaged in reading, studying, collecting data, locating information or creating text. Access to text on a web page is simply a matter of hovering the mouse over the desired sentence or paragraph. The words are highlighted as the text is read. This feature saves time, effort and is so quick and easy to perform for students of all ages and abilities.
PDF files are the norm in higher education and are being given to students of all ages in schools. They are an industry standard and many documents on the Web have been created using this format. It can, however, be a hindrance to many people.
PDF Aloud is a plug-in that allows text to be read aloud directly from within the free Adobe reader program. Students can highlight required text and click the ‘play’ icon on the PDF toolbar. Alternately they can use the ‘click and speak’ button. This provides flexible navigation to the exact part of the text they wish to have read back. PDF Aloud is a PDF reader tool that helps students access documents, fact sheets, study guides, class and lecture notes and academic reports. More importantly, PDF Aloud enables students to take tests and sit exams online or when using school generated PDF based documents with the assistance of speech output. It is an appropriate accommodation for students who need to be able to read and comprehend the questions, who may otherwise struggle without this intervention. They can achieve this outcome independently of a scribe or teacher or assistant.
Students need a number of supports and Read & Write has numerous features that provide positive engagement and levels of independence. The Talking Dictionary provides basic and advanced definitions and alternative words. It increases a user’s confidence and capacity, over time, to expand vocabulary and develop writing styles. Students can locate words and read their meaning, or have Read & Write voice the word and or meaning to them, without any other intervention. Students can access definitions from an online dictionary or create their own dictionary definitions and add them to their own custom-based list of new words, with appropriately worded meanings.
Students with learning disabilities, particularly dyslexics, often read slowly and deliberately but find comprehension and understanding quite difficult. It can be laborious and not enjoyable. These students are often very intelligent but struggle to complete tasks, submit projects and assignments and meet critical deadlines. Using the popular Speech Maker tool, they can elect to create an audio file, most commonly in MP3 format. Their reading speed can be increased dramatically by producing an audio file of the text they wish to study, examine or read. Listening to the text on their computer, iPod or MP3 player device can help those with reading or learning difficulties.
The Speech Maker facility is very useful for making audio books of texts created by the user or downloaded from eBook sites, such as www.gutenberg.org . They can listen to lesson, textbook, study and revision notes, news services, CD or DVD content, word documents, online social or sports pages or articles from a blog or newsfeed or an entire newspaper – from any country! Speech Maker converts any text that users highlight, in any context whether in a document or web page or email, and converts it into a sound file. Users can listen to it immediately using their favourite media player on the MAC or later, portably, on their iPod or MP3 player. The most critical aspect is that it is so beguilingly easy to use and master. Students can elect to save the audio to text conversion into either AIFF or MP3 file format.
There are a number of alternate file formats from which to choose, with MS Word being the most commonly used and accepted document type for formatting and presenting text and mixed media. Daisy Reader format is particularly useful for people who are blind or who have vision impairment. Equally it is useful or those students who struggle to read text, particularly long or involved passages of text. The Daisy Book reader makes it possible for Daisy Books to be read aloud. Students with literacy deficits benefit from Texthelp’s dual colour highlighting, as it is a technique that has proven to increase comprehension levels among struggling readers.
Within the Daisy Reader it is possible to adjust the read back using the available settings. There are a number of user selectable speech options in Read & Write 4 GOLD FOR MAC. The text or book can be voiced by word, by sentence and by paragraph or set to continuous reading mode. The DAISY format is increasingly becoming a popular format in education.
OCR (Optical Character Recognition) technology converts paper-based documents, newspapers, journals, magazines and posters as well as PDF documents into electronic text, all at a simpler click of one button. ABBYY Fine Reader is a high quality and very accurate OCR engine as it translates text images and even text embedded in photos into readable text. Once the readable text is imported, the student can access it using all of the tools included in the Read & Write Gold. Paper based and printed hard copies can be scanned into alternate formats including MS Word, HTML, PDF or text. After scanning the text, it can be enlarged, have a more suitable font or colour assigned, brailed or converted into an MP3 file or Daisy format using Read & Write or other products.
In addition, the program offers full Homophone Support. There are over 18,500 homophones or confusable words. Spell checkers do not identify them as being incorrect as they are correctly spelt words – as they are commonly used in the wrong context by some students. The Homophone tool identifies and highlights words that sound similar or the same as other words that can entirely different meanings and connotations. This handy tool suggests audible definitions and replacements, helping the student to apply the correct usage of a word. Read & Write 4 GOLD FOR MAC checks part of or an entire document and highlights all of the homophones in a designated colour. Homophones are displayed in the preferred colour that is set by the user. The definitions can be voiced and meanings checked.
Homophones can be checked automatically as a user types his or her text or users can elect to check the entire document once typing is completed. Simply press the Homophone button and the process commences. This is yet another tool that allows users of all abilities to gain confidence as they determine the correct words in their documents and thus provides for increased autonomy and helps in completing writing tasks more accurately and with fewer errors.
To support all of these features and tools is the advanced phonetic spell checker that has been developed by educators and dyslexia experts. It has been improved and upgraded from previous versions and is more accurate.
Corrections are based on the students’ spelling patterns (if they log on and have their own profile settings). A log of errors and attempts, with their corrections, is kept and this can be investigated by the users or parents, educators and therapists. It can also be saved or printed. 
This ability to monitor errors made by an individual student is so powerful and useful. The error log records mistakes the students make, what they were replaced with, the type of error made and the date it occurred. It assists in identifying patterns and the type of spelling errors that are taking place (missed consonants, phonetic errors or reversed or missing letters). It certainly helps identify common and frequent mistakes and shows how the spell check options in this program can be tailored for maximum efficiency.
Automatic corrections can be invoked on words that are consistently misspelled and this saves editing time for older students who know that they have spelling problems. It is linked to the Dictionary definitions and all words and their meanings are voiced, if a user requires this function.
Word prediction works on frequency and recency and can assist students with physical disabilities as keystrokes are minimized. It is similar to that of the technology now employed in most mobile phones and portable devices.
It also caters to students, who can identify words if they are presented to them, but may not be able to successfully formulate or type them. Prediction suggestions are based on the letters typed by the user and also on previous words and phrases used. The software learns prediction patterns from new, correctly spelt words and also from text copied to the clipboard. Text can be entered as single words of lists of thematic; curriculum or work related terms or jargon. It can predict one word ahead, and, over time and continued use, intuitively learn curriculum-based vocabulary. The software is designed to help with accuracy whilst reducing the number of key strokes that are required. Version 4 has faster phonetic prediction and will generate more accurately and quickly.
Students can also check the meaning of any word by simply clicking on the dictionary icon. The suggested word can be inserted into the document by clicking on the Text Transfer icon. By clicking ‘speak’, users can listen to the word and/or its definition. Having voiced feedback ensures that they can be more confident in selecting and using appropriate words.
Word Prediction aids in improving sentence structure and flow, in decreasing errors in spelling, increases the variety of words and terms and promotes the correct use of word endings. Less overall mistakes improve editing time and helps avoid frustration in creating text. Word prediction, though, is not for everyone and students need time to gain skills and understandings in how best to utilise it.
To help with users who need visual support as they may suffer from visual acuity problems, or scotopic sensitivity disorder such as Irlen Syndrome. People have reported that ‘they had distortions beginning to appear on their page, and those distortions prevented them from comprehending the words. All of their energy was going into perceiving the words, holding them on the page, or even just finding them. As a result, many stopped reading. It was just too difficult for them.’ [http://www.dyslexiaservices.com.au/Helen.html ]
Many students who experience this problem are frustrated and often do not how to deal with it. The Screen Masking incorporates unique screen tinting options to suit individual preferences. Screen masking, the ability to block out any text not being read, is also available as a valuable concentration aid. The transparency of the underline and tinting can be adjusted to suit the user’s needs, while the colours can also be defined. These settings can be changed at any time, as can all the features in Read & Write Gold.
Options include:
- Whole screen tinting – tint the screen to block out any text not being read
- Mouse Spotlight – highlight the area under the mouse pointer
- Underline – underline the mouse pointer
The Translator tool translates words from English into four popular European languages including Italian, French, Spanish and German. This is an ideal tool for ESL (English as a Second Language) students or for users who speak and type as their first language. They can work in MS Word or a preferred text entry tool or even on a web page and quickly check the meaning of an English word in one of these languages. The word can be read aloud in the selected language to reinforce meaning. 
To use this feature, the user must have online access. It helps reinforce and promote fluency and word acquisition as well as aids in developing skills and understandings.
To assist in research and study, the improved Study Skills Tools provide a choice of coloured markers to highlight and select the pieces of text. Once selected, the text can be ‘collected’ so as to decrease reading time, create concise passages of relevant and pertinent data from one text, a series of documents, or web sites. The Study Skills Tools can be accessed from Safari, as well as MS Word 2008. This useful learning strategy can be very successfully and quickly applied to web research and data collection Summaries can be generated by students and users of all abilities with the selected text voiced to ascertain relevance.
The Fact Mapper produces a visual representation of ideas online, as a web or a visual representation of data. It is ideal when revising or drafting work. The Fact Map can be illustrated with images from the Fact Mapper image library and when completed, it can be exported from the web browser to MS Word 2008.
Fact Mapping is widely used to brainstorm or map out ideas. It can be used by students themselves or in class with a group of students and is most effective when used on an Interactive Whiteboard. Students are able to quickly generate and create a variety of documentation with images and photos. It aids in helping them organise thinking, start and initiate projects, develop essay plans or compile or study revision notes. The Fact Mapper is now available as an online application in Version 4.
Please note that when users are not using MS Word 2008, text can be transferred from a preferred application into the Read&Write 4 GOLD for MAC ‘Application view’ and edited in this dedicated window. This is achieved by using the Text Transfer button. Once the text has been transferred, users can utilise all of the other features of the software, such as the Dictionary, Homophone Support and Spell Checker within this environment. It is not as seamless or flexible as within MS Word but the functionality and tools are all available to the user at all times.
A Calculator button on the toolbar provides easy access to the MAC built-in talking calculator. It is not an add-on tool as in the Windows version of the program.
Hardware Requirements
The following are the minimum requirements needed to operate Read & Write 4 GOLD for Mac and include the Intel Core Duo 1.8 GHz processor running MAC OS 10.4 (or a later version) with at least 512 MB RAM (although 1 GB is strongly recommended). To install and store the application requires 1.5 GB of free hard disk space and a DVD player is required for installation purposes. As the MAC has built in sound and audio visual functionality, no additional devices are necessary. A set of headphones might prove to be useful, though. Recommended scanners that have been found to be reliable and work well with Read & Write include Canon and Epson models.
In Summary
Read & Write is a simple to use and simple to access toolbar. It is intuitive and can be customised to meet an individual’s needs. Its appearance and performance can also be modified to cater to cognition and ability, subject matter or task as well as to accommodate a user’s preferences. The entire set of tools and features works consistently with any other software on the Mac. Having one reliable spell checker tracking and recording all spelling attempts, with dictionary and text-to-speech support across all applications ensures that a user will progressively be more confident in reading and writing and that it becomes less of a chore. Success can be built in to all literacy tasks as the toolbar is always ready and waiting to be used for a number of contexts and situations.
Although the term ‘students’ has been used extensively in this review, the software is not only relevant to struggling writers and readers in school settings. Read & Write caters to:
- Workers in industry who are face difficulty with text, who require spell check and dictionary supports
- Elderly citizens losing their sight and need text-to-speech facilities as well as other editing tools
- Students in higher education who have dyslexia or misdiagnosed literacy disorders
- New arrivals or people who have English as their second language
- International students studying in Universities and TAFE and training institutes
- Prisoners with low literacy who wish to study and learn new skills
- Apprentices who are studying part time and learning a new trade, with all of the technical terms and jargon
- Anyone who wishes to improve their reading and writing skills, of any age and ability i.e. mainstreamed use.
Email: specmelb@bigpond.net.au Ph: 03 9894 4826 Mob: 0411 569 840Author: Gerry Kennedy © November 2010