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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/graphic-organizers

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App Organizers Popplet Lite - Great for brainstorming, organizing, mind mapping. Easy to use. SimpleMInd + - mind mapping app Chrome Extensions Mind Mup - Easy to use mind mapping/brainstorming tool, offers Google Drive or Dropbox storage Lucid Chart - collaborative diagrams for mind mapping,

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As an educator it is necessary to give students the materials they can interact with. It is important to have correctly designed materials for each lesson to navigate their knowledge.

Checkpoint - Methods for Response: Students again learn differently within school as well as learning to navigate their physical environment. To create an equal ability for all students have learning interactions, teachers must provide multiple means for control and navigation.

Checkpoint - Access to tools and technologies: As educators we must not only provide the tools necessary to do a task but explain how to use them.

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It is important for students to have various ways to express themselves, whether that be story telling, writing, etc. Not only does this create a even field for all learners it allows student to learn more efficiently.

Checkpoint - Media for Communication: It is important to provide your students with various materials to achieve the goal unless certain media is required.

Checkpoint - Multiple tools for construction and composition: Schools typically use traditional tools rather than contemporary. Contemporary ones are more flexible and accessible

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So called "executive functions”, are considered the highest human capacity to act skillfully.  The capabilities within these functions found in the prefrontal cortex, is what allows short term reactions, overcoming impulse, set, plan, and execute short-term plans.

Checkpoint - Appropriate Goal-Setting: you cannot assume students will set correct goals for their work, but it is important students develop a skill for goal setting.

Checkpoint - Planning and Development: After setting a goal students plan, think about the tools needed to reach the goal, and reaching the goal.

Checkpoint - Managing Information: Working memory is a limitation of executive function. Often students can be disorganized, forgetful, and unprepared, but it is important to make sure students have various organizational aids.

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As educators is extremely important ALL information is perceptible to ALL learners. This can be achieved by providing the content in various ways, visual, auditory, touch.

Checkpoint - Display of Information: It is important to adapt information based on how students need it to be able to absorb the content. For text reading as example, font, text size, color, images with the reading, etc. For readings being read to students, volume, rate of speech, visuals while being read to.

Checkpoint - Hearing content is considered to be a very affective way to present information to learners. However, this may not be ideal or work for all students. Providing written form of content while the information is being told, ASL, pictures to go with the reading, etc.

Checkpoint - Many students learn best seeing the information. But again, this is not ideal for all students. Some times, visuals are complex, with meanings and how to interpret. It is important to provide description of the visual, touch equivalents, auditory ques, etc.

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Another important strategy when providing information to students is ensuring there is alternatives for clarity and comprehensibility.  Because not all students learn the same or comprehend information the same, it is not correct to present information one form.

Checkpoint - Vocabulary & Symbols: To be able to ensure learning for all students, it is necessary to provide information through, symbols, label icons, key vocabulary linking to the actual meaning of the information. This is another adaptation to help students make conclusions and learn.

Checkpoint - Helping Students Decode text, math, symbols: Students learn as different rates, but it is still important to help students process this information. Such as symbols in text, algebraic expressions, Braille, etc. It is very important to provide options that help limit problems that may arise with unfamiliar content.

Checkpoint - In classroom paper readings and materials are most common although this does create problems in more why than one. Students often have text and language disabilities and text can heighten these issues.

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Creating and using knowledge that assists in future decision-making, “information processing skills” Which is achieved by presenting the information that uses prior knowledge, categorization, memorization, etc.

Checkpoint - Background Knowledge: When content relates to prior knowledge, it is often more accessible. There is of course issues when students may not have that prior knowledge or may not realize that the content goes with that prior knowledge.

Checkpoint - Processing Information: The most successful process of information most occurs when use of cognitive or meta-cognitive strategies apply. Most often students to don't understand this. It is the educator's job to present well-designed materials to assist learning in these ways.

Checkpoint - Applying the Information: All learners regardless of age need to be able to apply what they have learned to other areas. Student age and knowledge varies on how much they can transfer, but with support they can accomplish this idea further.

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As a teacher it is your responsibility to engage and get your students attention in learning. But, a problem with that is students learn differently and therefore have different interests. So, not all students will be engaged or have interest in each lesson. Again, as a teacher it is our job to have various ways to intrigue students.

Checkpoint - Having a Choice: One way teachers may be able to achieve various ways to keep students' interest is allowing students to choice. With this comes having appropriate choices and an appropriate amount of freedom in their choice.

Checkpoint - Activities that Align with Students Goals& Interests: Another way to keep students interested is doing activities that align with them as individuals. This may not necessarily mean their "life goals" or even interests outside of school, but maybe lessons that evolve a fictional science book opposed to a non fiction science book for a particular lesson.  This being simply because the student learns better and enjoys fiction books more.

Checkpoint - A Safe Place: Lastly, as teachers it is import to create an appropriate safe environment for your students. Meaning but not limited to, limiting distractions, noise level of classroom, class routines, assisting sensory needs, etc.

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/literacy-tools

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MITS Freedom Stick - "The MITS Freedom Stick is a portable, use-anywhere accessibility solution. Install this software package on any 4gb USB Flash Drive (full) or 2gb USB Flash Drive (lite) and you create a set of tools for your students that they can carry in their pockets which will make any Windows computer highly accessible."

My Study Bar - a comprehensive set of portable open source and freeware applications to support learners with literacy difficulties. MyStudyBar is similar to popular commercial programs which use a floating toolbar to support literacy. The toolbar includes a range of tools to support inclusion such as mind mapping, screen masking, word prediction, talking dictionary, text-to-speech, Save as MP3 and voice recognition. PC Only. (Speech recognition only works in Vista or Windows 7) Step by Step Guides

Synonym Support - Need a thesaurus? Right Click (on Mac - CTL + Click) on any word and then click on Synonyms for a list of alternative word choices. You must show this one to your students to help them with word choice. (Students with spelling issues will frequently use words they feel confident spelling. Unfortunately, this may limit the words they choose as their vocabulary is not reflected in the written product. It is essential we show students how to easily access Synonym Support).

Ginger Software - awesome spell checking tool

Google Docs/Drive - Google has an Intelligent Spellchecking feature. Looks at the context and offers one choice, "Did you mean,,,,?" More robust and accurate than the spell checking feature in Word although it doesn't flag capitalization error.

Grammarly- Online Grammar Checker, instant reports with no log-in necessary

Writing Reviser - Chrome Extension for editing support

Rhyming Support Tools - RhymeZone and PoetryforKids. Type a word and rhyming choices appear!

Spelling City - insert the week's spelling list and students can play games, finish worksheets, and complete other interactive activities.

Doorway Speller - Online tool for Look, Say, Cover, Write, Check

Writing Checklists - generate customized checklists, develop these with your students. Great for K-12

Writing Tools - engaging tools to reach reluctant writers
In addition to the tools suggested below, it is important to rethink writing alternatives. Writing is often used as a method for demonstrating learning, but there are many other options. Think about what portable, tablet technology offers. Here are a number of apps to consider:

Screencasting Tools such as Screen Chomp, Show Me, and Educreations

Journal tools such as Emotionary, My Wonderful Days Lite

WriteReader - especially good for beginning readers/writers

Little Bird Tales

Story Creation Apps such as Story Creator, Little Story Creator and Story Kit

Lark by Storybird - Make and share beautiful, art-inspired poetry

Online Tools

Gone Google Story Builder - a fun Google Tool for beginning writers. Learn more here.

StoryBoard That - Fun, storyboard creation site. Add scenes, props, characters with facial expressions and poses. Plan and organize your writing with this interactive graphic organizer. Teacher Guides and Resources here.

Story Jumper - Story building tool with scenes, props and text with spell check support. Can add your own photos. Also allows you to publish your work for a fee. You do not need to sign in to create a book.

Little Bird Tales - story building tool, records audio/allows narration. very easy to use! Excellent for younger students

Storybird - collaborative storytelling, beautiful graphics.

Storybird Quick Tour from Storybird on Vimeo.

Comic Master - Create your own Graphic Novels!

Wacky Web Tales , Ambleweb Crazy Story Machine - online "madlib" tools, use to teach parts of speech or with reluctant writers. Everybody loves a silly story!

Bookr - create your own storybook using Flickr images. very easy to use, view examples in the archives.

Suessville StoryMaker - Use characters from Dr. Suess' Horton Hears a Who to write a short story. When you are done, the story is played back.

Writing Fix - Interactive Writing Prompts

Read/write/think- Interactive digital activities (click the interactive links - there are many to choose from)

Story Starter, Jr. - Sometimes, determining where to begin is the obstacle. Story Starter, Jr. offers 729 one line story starters for students. Click the link, get the starter, copy and paste and you are good to go!

OurStory - online timeline tool

Scholastic: Story Starters for Grades 1-4 Story Starters is a bank of writing prompts. Student spins the lever to get a writing prompt. To allow for even greater creativity, the student can spin wheels to change any part of the prompt.

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MITS Freedom Stick - "The MITS Freedom Stick is a portable, use-anywhere accessibility solution. Install this software package on any 4gb USB Flash Drive (full) or 2gb USB Flash Drive (lite) and you create a set of tools for your students that they can carry in their pockets which will make any Windows computer highly accessible."

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It is key for students to learn to self-regulate and have self-determination. As a teacher it is necessary to include activities that enhance and build these stills. Such as, independent activities.

Checkpoint - Reminding Students of the Goal: For some students they need help remembering and being reminded often during the lesson of what they are doing or "what's next". You can accomplish this by presenting the directions in various places and for younger students words and pictures, demonstration, explaining the short and long term goals.

Checkpoint - Challenges of Motivation: Just like students vary as for how they may learn, they vary by what motivates them to complete something. As an educator it is important to take that into consideration as preparing lessons and how they remind students to complete assignments. This can be accomplished by possible alternatives to the tools/instruction, level of freedom to complete the assignment, etc.

Checkpoint - Collaboration: As individuals we have developed the need to discussion and collaboration among peers. And of course, some students require more or less of this, as an educator it is important to apply this to lessons. You can accomplish this by group activities, allowing discussion among peers, educating how to ask classmates and teachers questions or for help.

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It is important as teachers to help educate and explain the importance of self-regulation, it is just as important to know how to accomplish that on the student's own. This can be such as regulation of emotions and reactions.

Checkpoint - Finding Motivation: To even begin, students must acknowledge what motives them, what they find interesting, etc. It is also important for students to be able to cope with the anxiety and frustration of this.

Checkpoint - Coping Skills: Often when giving student a model for these skills are not beneficial. beneficial ways to implement ways for students gain the self-regulatory skill are often best as checklists, reminders, etc. These allow for students to process and adapt when managing emotional responses.

Checkpoint - Reflection: It is important when learning self-regulation students learn how to assess their emotions. Often, it is rewarding and extremely motivational for students to see they are making process and getting closer to their goals, such as checking off things on a check list.

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/study-skills-tools

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High School Study Skills - a sequential approach to improving Study Skills for High School students. Study Skills Tools (including Electronic Flashcard apps) Quizlet - Added smart study features. Check it out here "largest flash cards and study games website" Quizlet Mobile Brainscape - free and

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/research-tools

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Sweet Search - Search engine for K - 12 students, "every website in Sweet Search has been evaluated by our research experts."

(see additional search engines below)
Scaffolding Methods for Research Paper Writing Research Tools
Diigo - Social Bookmarking tool with highlighting and annotations features.
ReadWriteThink.org Lesson Plan Eight ways to use Evernote as a Research Tool
Great article that explains how to use EverNote as a Research Tool

Bib Me - Bibliography Maker

EasyBib - Bibliography Composer

Research & Documentation Online Download sample papers (MLA & APA styles) with Hacker & Fister's well-known guide

NoodleBib MLA Starter

Citation Machine >

Zotero - Open source citation manager, with syncing, collaboration, and an easy way to collect references (browse to a page with citation information and click a button). Uses plugins for Firefox, Open Office, and Microsoft Word. Generates inline citations and bibliographies in any style with the click of a button.

For documentation

For note-taking

Alternate search tools

Search engines for Kids

Library resource portals

News, Magazines, more

Important (very!): Your state or provincial library likely provides a collection of valuable subscription databases providing access to articles, ebooks, video, and more! These resources include materials written at developmentally appropriate levels. The Internet Public Library offers a list of these resources by state. Find your state and ask your librarian for passwords!

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Sweet Search - Search engine for K - 12 students, “every website in Sweet Search has been evaluated by our research experts.”
(see additional search engines below) Lesson Plan Scaffolding Methods for Research Paper Writing ReadWriteThink.org Lesson Plan Instructional videos ( all content areas

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/math-tools

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Free Math Apps Some students struggle with organizing their written work and forming numbers and symbols. These tools compensate for mechanical issues:

Number Navigator - A program that assists those with fine motor problems to set out columnar arithmetic, without the need for a spreadsheet

Big, Simple Talking Calculator - "The Big Simple Talking Calculator application was designed to be a full screen calculator with large buttons that covers the following basic functions: +, -, *, /, x^2, x^y, 1/x, %, square root, memory store and memory recall."

FunctionVisualizer - Online Function Visualizer - displays the graph of arbitrary F(x) function.

GraphCalc - Online Graphing Calculator

Create A Graph>

e-Tutor Graphic Calculator Graph equations

FooPlot - Online plotting tool

PDF Pad - Create and print graph paper

EfoFex - Higher Level Math - free for students with special needs

Time Tool - Fantastic time telling tool including showing how time passes. Some students have difficulty with that concept.

Time for Time - Online analog clock, can manipulate clock and show the digital time equivalent. Great for Interactive WhiteBoards or touchscreen monitors

Code.org - easily learn how to code with this fantastic website

A Maths Dictionary for Kids " A Maths Dictionary for Kids is an animated, interactive online math dictionary for students which explains over 600 common mathematical terms and math words in simple language." Some students with math disabilities struggle with understand math language, symbols and terms; this site builds understanding. Very cool.

ConceptuaMath - Interactive fraction tools for instruction which align with NCTM standards. The overview video is available here:

Adapted Mind - interactive math activities for K - 8

WebMath - K- Higher=Ed math

Math Playgroundexcellent site for Math activities for K - 8, make sure to explore the Mathcasts. Mathcasts allow students to review math when THEY need to.

Thinking Blocks - a creative, interactive math resource to help students understand how to solve word problems. Watch the video here to learn how to use it.

K-7 Mathcasts Project - Short videos (using VoiceThread) of math concepts by grade level and strand. Great for students to review at home.

AAAmath.com

IXL MATH pre-K through 8th grade activities

**25 Additional Resources for Learning Maths** - based on visual models, not your mother's kill and drill apps. These are awesome; from the Math Learning Center.
Free Training Tutorial - A long list of free online math games. Teachers can select games and create their own specific math lesson.

SumDogMath - 100 Numeracy topics at ten levels. Teachers can upload their class list. Ability to customize specific math such as add numbers up to five, ordering numbers up to 20. Students can log in and save scores. Audio can be distracting for some students (turn it off in the Talent Game activity if that is the case) as can the time pressure.

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Free Math Apps - based on visual models, not your mother's kill and drill apps. These are awesome; from the Math Learning Center. Some students struggle with organizing their written work and forming numbers and symbols. These tools compensate for mechanical issues: Number Navigator - A program

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/audio-books

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Audio books are a great way to increase access in your classroom. Providing a selection of audio books for all students can support fluency, expression, and comprehension.

- a free subscription is provided with proof of a print disability

- Audio books in the public domain with human narration

Signed Stories- free audio books designed for elementary readers that are also signed

60 Second Recap- a 60-second audio/video presentation of classic works of literature. Mute the Ad that plays as soon as you open the link and scroll below that to access a number of videos recapping classic works.

Online Audio Stories- a collection of elementary audio books

Storyline Online - online stories read by Screen Actors Guild members.

The Mother Goose Club has a number of rhymes and songs that provide audio support for the text.

Learn Out Loud - over 2000 free audio and video titles including books, lectures, speeches and interviews.

- free online book library with over 8,000 titles that can be read using any free text reader (tested with Natural Reader).

Nook Online StoryTime - A list of online stories read by the authors (remember to turn on Closed Captioning)

Project Gutenberg- Text of books in the public domain, also available for mobile devices. Attach text-to-speech and can convert to MP3 format

- classic literature in video format, syncs human voiced audio with text. Check out their YouTube Channel.

- an online collection of stories and poems in MP3 format

CAST UDL Bookbuilder- Interactive book maker and reader

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AudioBooks Audio books are a great way to increase access in your classroom. Providing a selection of audio books for all students can support fluency, expression, and comprehension. Bookshare- a free subscription is provided with proof of a print disability Librivox - Audio books in the

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/writing-tools

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My Study Bar - a comprehensive set of portable open source and freeware applications to support learners with literacy difficulties. MyStudyBar is similar to popular commercial programs which use a floating toolbar to support literacy. The toolbar includes a range of tools to support inclusion

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Multimedia and Digital Story Telling Tools

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Multimedia and Digital Story Telling Tools

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/multimedia-and-digital-story-telling-tools

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One of the most amazing things about tablets is the ability to easily create content or creations which offer students alternative ways to demonstrate their learning. There are many free options that take advantage of this capability.

StoryBoard That - Fun, storyboard creation site. Add scenes, props, characters with facial expressions and poses. Plan and organize your writing with this interactive graphic organizer. Teacher Guides and Resources here.

Voice Thread- capture audio for online digital storytelling.This is a great tool for reaching the needs of all the learners in our classrooms, for all content areas from K-12. The pro version is free to K-12 educators. Make sure you watch the excellent tutorials to take advantage of all the features this tool has to offer. A free iPad app is now available which is a fantastic, easy tool. It's a must have

Click the link for some examples to show you how other educators are using Voice Thread for Education.

FotoBabble examples (Click the Play button to hear the audio):

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UDL Tech Toolkit - Multimedia and Digital Story Telling Tools

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Multimedia and Digital Storytelling Tools One of the most amazing things about tablets is the ability to easily create content or creations which offer students alternative ways to demonstrate their learning. There are many free options that take advantage of this capability. iOS

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/text-to-speech

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Why consider Text-to-speech (TTS)? Two reasons - 1. It is essential for struggling readers; when text is digital it is now accessible and removes decoding issues. 2. it supports the writing process, especially when editing and revising work

iOS Devices have Speak Selection (TTS) with highlighting built in for iPads running iOS 6 or 7. You must turn it on. Settings > General > Accessibility > Speak Selection > On > Highlight Words. Adjust the "Speaking Rate" to what works

For "on-the-fly" immediate Optical Recognition of Text and then use text to speech, check out:

Speechify - developed by a Brown University Graduate who is dyslexic.

Seeing AI - Developed by Microsoft for the dyslexic and visually impaired

Office Lens ---> Immersive Reader Feature, also developed by Microsoft

One of the BEST options is the Read and Write for Google Chrome extension if your school uses Chromebooks. It's the reason to use Chrome. Show every student! They can listen to their work as part of the editing process. AND, it adds a browser add-on which allows you to listen to any text read to you, single words, paragraphs or whole pages. (And the premium version is ALWAYS free for teachers)

Immersive Reader/Learning Tools by Microsoft - This is awesome since Microsoft now offers Office 365 and OneNote free to students and teachers. Many languages and options available.

Speechify - Check this out - developed by a Brown University Graduate who is dyslexic. It is device agnostic and worth exploring. My son, who is dyslexic, loves this tool.

Capti - Explore the free option. Can save an Add to Capti bookmark and then open the text on your mobile device.

Announcify - a Google Chrome Extension which reads any website. One unique feature - it blurs the paragraphs that aren't being read so you can focus on the paragraph that you are listening to.

SpeakIt!-free for the Google Chrome browser. Supports multiple languages

Balabolka- Free text-to-speech download, can also download a portable version that runs off a USB thumb drive.can save as wav or MP3 file.

DSpeech- scroll down for a very cool free text-to-speech AND speech-to-text tool. PC only

My Study Bar - includes text to speech features, PC only.

Natural Reader - another free text-to-speech software program which converts any written text to speech (Word, pdf, websites, emails)

Orato - (scroll to the free download) PC only. allow for color choices, highlighting of words or sentences as they are read.

PowerTalk - free text-to-speech for PowerPoint presentations

Read The Words - Register first, upload file or choose text or website to read, a recording is generated which you can listen to online or download to an mp3 player, upload to a blog, etc. Very Cool tool worth letting your students explore.

Spoken Text - online text-to-speech MP3 converter

ReadPlease- there is a free version and a pay version.

Voki - a free program that allows educators and students to create and share online avatars using text-to-speech technology. Voki works from any and anyone can place a voki in a blog, website, or send in an email. Voki is being relaunched now (late 2010) and is offering more tools for educators.

WordTalk - a free text-to-speech program for the PC that works within WORD and Outlook and highlights each word that is read. Includes a talking spell checker and a talking thesaurus. WordTalk was upgraded in January 2009 and now includes the ability to save, and you can convert your text file to a wav or MP3 file. Makes this free download even more valuable. (Seems to be trickier with Office 2010 and Vista or Windows 7)

Free Speech-to-Text (Speech Recognition)

It is built into Windows and Mac Operating Systems.

It is built into Google Docs. Toolbar > Tools > Voice Typing

It is built into Word for Office 365 which is free for students and teachers.

If your student has a Smartphone, it is built in. When you are connected to wifi, use the microphone key on the keyboard to use it. To turn on speech recognition, go to Settings > General > Siri > ON

With Google Search on smart devices, Google Voice is available - allows you to speak your search.

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Free text to speech Text-to-Speech
Why consider Text-to-speech (TTS)? Two reasons -
1. It is essential for struggling readers; when text is digital it is now accessible and removes decoding issues. 2. it supports the writing process, especially when editing and revising work
Mobile Devices
iOS

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https://sites.google.com/view/freeudltechtoolkit/additional-tools

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Moving Targets - A suite of fun targeting activities in which the targets are progressively harder to hit. Ideal for both assessment and practice. Suitable for almost any direct selection from mouse to IWB. Switch access is also available, with some activities becoming cause and effect exercises,