Take a look at how to add Google's new free Speech Recognition
add-on to your Google account!
For those
of you who aren't familiar with Google Read and Write, it is an extension that
can be added to your Google account and one of its basic (and best) features is
text-to-speech! This means when
you are using Google Chrome or Google Docs, you can have the words on the
screen read to you (just like Kurzweil)! If you have a Gmail account, you can
download the full tool bar for free (this includes word prediction,
highlighting tools, etc) but you will lose many of the features after 30 days.
The good news is the text-to-speech feature will remain. If you are an
educator, you will be able to keep the full tool bar indefinitely!
This
video created by Geoff Mortaley, however, demonstrates how to add another cool
feature to your Google account, Speech Recognition. The Speech
Recognition add-on is free and it allows the user to dictate into a microphone
and the text will appear on the screen. It works like Dragon or Siri, and
in our experience, it is pretty accurate. If you, or your student or
child, loves to use Google Docs, this is a great alternative to some of the
other speech-to-text software options out there. Watch how Geoff
demonstrates how to add it to your account and how it works!
