So, Does 138+ Free or Cheap Tools for Learning Appeal to You?

I'm going to state up front that this is a shameless infomercial.

Having said that, fellow learners of the world, here's the scoop. Once again this winter, I'm teaching Technology for Learning. It's designed to give every student, regardless of major, abilities, or learning style, technology tools they can use to be more effective and efficient. Besides, it's fun! My basic philosophy: if properly chosen, technology tools can make a student's life much easier and improve their grades at the same time. This class is all about finding out which tools will do that for you, specifically. At the end of the class, you'll come out with a personal technology plan that lays out what your goals are, what tools you've chosen, and how you'll implement those tools.

An exciting new addition this time around is the Tech4LearnCourse Wiki. Through the wiki, students will collaborate on reviews of tools, their personal technology plans, a glossary and more. The coolest feature, however, is that your access to the wiki doesn't go away when the class ends! Every student who has taken the class still has access, so you can find out about new tools and contribute to the discussion for as long as you want!

Who should take this class?

• Students returning to college. If you haven't been around academic tools for awhile, there's some new stuff that can really help you!
• Students whose first language is not English. English breaks way too many of its own rules to be easy to learn! Use technology to help you.
• Students who need help in any of the following: reading, writing, math, studying, researching, organizing (yes, I know that's most of us!), or navigating the electronic campus
• Students with disabilities who would like to find more ways to interact with information independently and efficiently
• Teachers of any level who would like to find new tools for their students (and themselves)
• Anyone with an interest in learning new technology tools to make their work more efficient and fun!
  

Today being the first day of registration for winter, I'll also throw in the details - CRN 4309, USEM 199, 2 credits, 1-2 Tuesdays and Thursdays. Very low reading requirements, high play value, and a resource that extends long beyond the class... how can you resist?

Premier AT Home Ending Soon

I've blogged before about some of the great tools available at SOU in the Premier AT Suite. Last academic year, we had a little more room in the AT budget and were able to purchase a subscription to the Premier AT Home service, which allowed students to download as many of the tools in the suite as they liked, for free.

Faithful readers of this blog will know how I like the word "free." It's right up there with "chocolate."

Our subscription will be ending on November 22nd, and, budgets being what they are, we aren't going to be able to subscribe this year. I'm hoping to do it again next year, but it will depend on what the budgetary demands are. In the broader scheme of things, accommodations get funded first - and that's what's happened this year.

Bottom line, folks - if you've thought of downloading the Premier Suite but haven't done it yet, do so before November 22nd. The url, username and password you need are in the Disability Services channel of the MySOU portal.

Coming to a computer near you...

In the three years that I've been with DSS (wow, is it that long?), there have been one constant in an environment of change.

Paper.

Oh, sure, we have a couple of online forms for notetaking and alternate format text, but for the majority of students, paper has been everywhere. Testing requests, checking out alt format or equipment, notetaker contracts, accommodation letters.... it's everywhere! All that is about to change.


Enter AIMS, a totally new way to request and manage your accommodations. This completely accessible, online, 24/7 system will allow you to do many things you've never been able to do before:

• Customize your accommodation letters to each class, showing only the accommodations that you'll need in that specific environment.
• Automatically send those customized accommodation letters to your instructors, and track when you sent them.
• Request all your services at the same time you create your accommodation letter, all online at any time.
  
• Even better, track the status of those requests! No more wondering what's up with your alt text or notetaker!
• Retrieve notes from your notetaker online, any time! No more trudging in to the office to pick them up. Great for the Medford HEC and night classes!
• Schedule and track your test requests online, at any time. (There are some other great changes coming for testing, so hang on to your hats!)
• And much, much more!

Keep your eyes here and on your email (that's your student email, by the way) for updates. We'll be giving you info as soon as we have it.

Questions? Thoughts? Let's hear about 'em in the comments!

Keyboard Shortcuts, Woohoo!

Any readers that are old enough to remember the mouse as a new invention (hey, I got my start on a Commodore 64) will already know that using keystrokes can be far faster than reaching over for the mouse. Many AT users are also heavy keyboard users; a friend of mine "tolerates no rodents" in his computing. All of the above, then, can celebrate the co-creation of Keyboardian and InftyReader... this handy-dandy keystroke list for 234 commonly used applications. The list ranges widely from ubiquitous Microsoft applications to Google's apps and some great open-source apps like Open Office and Firefox.

I do notice that Apple is conspicuously absent, with only Safari and iTunes represented. Hmm. I also noticed that there are no screenreaders in the list. Double hmmm.

If you are one of the mouse-dependent crowd and have no clue why someone would memorize all these keystrokes, think about how much faster using a two-key combination (such as CTRL+C) is than taking your hand off the keyboard, moving it to the mouse, right-clicking, moving the mouse to the Copy command in the context menu, then moving your hand back to the keyboard. There's been some studies done in Denmark, as well, that indicate mousing is harder on your body. For an interesting discussion on mouse vs. keyboard efficiency, check out this article on Slashdot.

Thanks much to Steve Jacobs at IDEAL Group for the heads-up on this one!

If you've got a favorite source for keystrokes, or if you'd like to add to the ever-popular keyboard vs. mouse debate, let's hear from you in the comments!

Speech-to-Text and Vice Versa on the Mac

This week, a colleague on a listserv was asking about AT software for Macs in a college setting. Specifically, he was asking about speech-to-text and text-to-speech programs. With a few cosmetic tweaks here and there, here's my response...

The built-in stuff

• VoiceOver is a screenreader built in to the operating system. Like most screenreaders, there's a lot to learn in using it. For help, check out a tutorial series.
• Speech is a built-in text-to-speech functionality that works really well in TextEdit, though also works in other Mac apps. Go to the TextEdit menu, choose Services, and then Start Speaking. You can customize this in System Preferences. You can also download a script that will make an iTunes-compatible audiobook from a text document.
• Voice control of your computer is also built in to the Mac with Speech Recognition. Lifehacker did a great guide to using Speech Recognition.
  

Other software

• MacSpeech Dictate is a speech-to-text program built on the Dragon engine. Works well, though not quite as fully functional as Dragon (yet - it just came out in April).
• Kurzweil's Mac flavor is as fully featured as the Windows program. It does have a problem reading color files that were generated on a Windows Kurzweil machine (ask me how I found this out!), though Kurzweil tells me they are working on this. However, it's got lovely iTunes integration, if you want to take your text on the road.
• GhostReader does a fantastic job of text-to-speech, with some really nice Acapela voices. Cheap, too, at around $30. I blogged GhostReader earlier, along with some other good, inexpensive Mac apps.

If you know of other good text-to-speech (and vice versa) apps for the Mac, yell 'em out in the comments!