Speech-to-text intervention to support text production among students with writing difficulties: a single-case study in nordic countries.

Studies report that speech-to-text applications (STT) may support students with writing difficulties in text production. However, existing research is sparse, shows mixed results, and lacks information on STT interventions and their applicability in schools. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate whether a systematic and intensive assistive technology intervention focusing on STT can improve text production. A modified multiple-baseline across-subject design was used involving eight middle school students, four Norwegian and four Swedish. Their STT-produced narrative texts were collected during and after the intervention and the productivity, accuracy, and text quality were analysed. Keyboarding was the baseline control condition. The results demonstrated that seven of the eight students increased text productivity and that the proportion of word-level accuracy was maintained or improved. The use of punctuation progressed in participants with poor baseline skills. Most students' STT-produced texts had at least a similar ratio of meaningfulness and text quality as keyboarding. However, the magnitude of the changes and development patterns varied, with three students showing the most notable impacts. In conclusion, this study's intervention seemed beneficial in initially instructing STT, and the progress monitoring guided individually adapted future interventions such as balancing productivity and formal language aspects. Removing the spelling barrier with STT provided an opportunity for students to improve their higher-order skills, such as vocabulary diversity and overall text quality. Furthermore, visible progress, such as the ability to produce longer texts, might motivate continued STT usage. However, such development may not always be immediate.

Speech-to-text (STT) may be an effective tool for developing text production in students with severe reading and writing difficulties. For example, enhanced text length can provide teachers with more material for feedback, guiding students towards improved text production.Text-to-speech may further enhance the usefulness of STT in text production by facilitating the revision process through listening to produced sentences and texts.By continuously monitoring students' STT usage and text production, teachers can tailor the content for further interventions to address individual needs such as sentence construction and text planning.Early STT intervention seems beneficial, allowing more time to practise advanced skills in text production when bypassing spelling.

Dyslexic students' experiences in using assistive technology to support written language skills: a five-year follow-up.

PURPOSE: This study presents several accounts of user experiences with assistive technology (AT). Although previous studies on dyslexic students reported promising results from using audiobooks, text-to-speech (TTS), and speech-to-text (STT), qualitative research is relatively sparse and short-term, and little is known about adolescents' long-term experiences of using AT in schools. Therefore, this five-year follow-up study aimed to describe dyslexic students' experiences of AT. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Nine students with dyslexia were interviewed using a semi-structured framework and a descriptive pattern-based thematic analysis. The students had previously participated in an AT intervention in Sweden. RESULTS: Three main themes are reported: Contextual factors: facilitators or barriers; Emotional responses in the learning environment; Developing meaningful strategies. The results align with previous research findings that audiobooks are beneficial throughout the school years, while STT is of mixed utility. TTS was mainly used in learning to decode texts. Continued AT use is discussed thematically, concretising experiences connected to schools' multilevel support. CONCLUSIONS: This study can contribute to the development of AT academic practices enriched by users' views. The findings reveal factors enabling or hindering students' continued AT usage. Contextual factors in schools concern organisational elements rather than AT accessibility. Students' emotional responses (using AT in the classroom) are influenced by dyslexia self-acceptance and AT attitudes. Students' understanding of how and why to use AT may limit the development of meaningful strategies. Implications and suggested further research are provided to improve dyslexic students' AT experiences and success in school.IMPLICATIONS FOR REHABILITATIONUnderstanding the organizational factors that enable or hinder continuous assistive technology (AT) use can help teachers support dyslexic students' development in text-based learning throughout schooling.Ongoing attention to the emotional aspects of AT use in the classroom may be a valuable support in conjunction with systematic AT training.Listening and text production strategies with AT may need ongoing support to develop both lower-order and higher-order skills.

Effects of assistive technology for students with reading and writing disabilities.

BACKGROUND: Assistive technology has been used to mitigate reading disabilities for almost three decades, and tablets with text-to-speech and speech-to-text apps have been introduced in recent years to scaffold reading and writing. Few scientifically rigorous studies, however, have investigated the benefits of this technology. PURPOSE: The aim was to explore the effects of assistive technology for students with severe reading disabilities. METHOD: This study included 149 participants. The intervention group received 24 sessions of assistive technology training, and the control group received treatment as usual. RESULTS: Both the intervention and control groups improved as much in 1 year as the normed population did. However, gains did not differ between the groups directly after the intervention or at 1 year of follow-up. CONCLUSIONS: The use of assistive technology seems to have transfer effects on reading ability and to be supportive, especially for students with the most severe difficulties. In addition, it increases motivation for overall schoolwork. Our experience also highlights the obstacles involved in measuring the ability to assimilate and communicate text.Implications for rehabilitationsAssistive technology (AT) can be useful for children with reading disabilities to assimilating text as well as boosting their reading.Children with reading disability using AT increased reading performance as much as a norm group, i.e. the students enhanced their reading ability despite no training in traditional reading remediation.Children's and adolescents' motivation for schoolwork can be boosted when using AT as a complement for those with reading and writing disabilities.