Research shows that assistive technology can improve reading and spelling aptitude of students, among other skills, helping them to reach their full potential.
Increasing a child’s self-reliance and confidence, assistive technology can aid students to experience success by working more independently.
The ongoing evolution of AI-driven technologies has enabled the development of artificial vision technologies, which is particularly relevant for assisting dyslexia and related conditions.
Scrambled letters, blurred words, moving text and letter reversals require tedious concentration for students, especially with long-form texts that become more common as education progresses.
As a result of the effort required, students with dyslexia or other learning challenges, may find themselves fatigued, nauseous and experiencing headaches on a regular basis.
Until recently, the only tools developed specifically for learning, reading and comprehension difficulties were found on computers, which are not ideal when moving between teaching locations and completing home learning.
To ease this challenge, OrCam Technologies has introduced the OrCam Learn, a voice-activated handheld device, with intuitive web and mobile apps, and informative analytics and reporting that keep parents and educators fully informed on the student’s progress.
The OrCam Learn is a “personal AI-device” which empowers students, including those with learning difficulties such as dyslexia and ADHD, to effectively read and learn, resulting in enhanced comprehension, reading fluency and overall confidence.
It also has newly added ‘Translation’ and ‘Dictionary’ features to further enrich the OrCam Learn’s ability to support learners throughout their studies.
The solution has a simple point and click operation to “capture” and immediately read out loud a full page, paragraph, or single word of text – of the student’s choosing – from books, smartphones, classroom handouts, and virtually any source of printed or digital text.
Moon Hall School is an early adopter of the OrCam Learn in the UK and is currently engaged in an OrCam Learn pilot programme with devices that include the new features.
Michelle Catterson, Executive Headteacher at Moon Hall School, and Chair of the British Dyslexia Association says:
“The OrCam Learn is fantastic – it’s designed specifically to cater to the unique needs of individuals with learning challenges. No matter what their reading ability, students can all access their educational resources in lessons. Using the OrCam Learn has really helped our pupils’ independence in their learning experience. They find it fun, engaging and really easy to use.
“One of my targets for our pupils is that they are as independent as possible and a key to that independence is being able to access assistive technology. If they don’t have access, or are not confident using it, then they are reliant on an adult. Something our older pupils especially do not feel comfortable with.
“Instead of scanning line-by-line like other devices we’ve used, with the OrCam Learn, you can very easily just take a picture of any book or computer screen and it reads it back to you. The student can even ask questions about the text and the school can measure and give feedback on the pupil’s learning and improvement.”
From each reading session, OrCam Learn generates a comprehensive analysis of the student’s progress – and identifies areas requiring additional attention – for teachers and parents to review. Delivered via web and mobile apps, the reading evaluation reporting incorporates a variety of metrics that help evaluate reading performance, including those commonly used by learning specialists, such as text difficulty, reading fluency, and total accuracy.
The new Translation and Dictionary capabilities have been added to enhance OrCam Learn’s ability to support and encourage students throughout their education journey. Offering Translation was partially in response to input from many schools in the UK which specifically requested the feature to help address the needs of non-native English-speaking students – including having Ukrainian as a supported language for school-age refugees.
At OrCam, we are driven to level the educational playing field for a wide range of students who can benefit from OrCam Learn’s unique technology and features – enabling them to develop and maintain critical reading and learning skills, gain confidence, and thrive. To find out more about the OrCam Learn please visit here or contact us directly at orcam.uk@orcam.com.
Your thoughts