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Ergonomics
for the voice
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Speak as naturally as
possible
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Use a normal volume
and tone
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Pronounce words
clearly and be sure to say the ending of each word
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Take BREAKS - stop
talking for a while, stretch, stand if you can
(depending on where you're working...), take deep
breaths and rest for a few minutes
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Drink sips of water to
wet your mouth and throat. Swallowing will
help with relaxing your vocal chords and muscles.
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Sit in a well aligned,
comfortable position with feet rested on the floor,
and rams resting on the work desk, armrests or lap.
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Avoiding
vocal strain ...
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Baseline
testing
When using any new technology or
system, it is important to objectively evaluate the
effectiveness of that system. The work and
perseverance needed for successful speech recognition is
only worth the effort if it can be clearly shown that
there are positive outcomes. In other words, if
using speech recognition genuinely improves your
performance, your speed and accuracy of work, your
volume of output / amount of work, and the overall
quality and quantity of work.
Before
starting speech-recognition training, it is
important to get baseline scores of the
students handwriting and keyboarding speed
and accuracy. During speech-recognition
training it will also be possible to get
scores of accuracy and speed at the
beginning of the basic dictation stage as
well as on an ongoing basis as the student
uses speech recognition. All students, those
with and without disabilities, have the
potential to be significantly faster and
more accurate with speech recognition.
Determining average typing speeds for
students above the third grade is difficult
since there are very wide-ranging
differences. However, a number of different
school districts have set goals for
keyboarding speed. A 2002-2003 study by
Illinois school district U-46 notes that
some researchers have suggested that 10-20
words per minute (WPM) is sufficient in the
later elementary school years (3rd through
6th grade). However, the report also notes
that some teachers named in research set
their goals somewhat lower, at 3 WPM for 3rd
graders and 7 WPM for 4th and 5th graders.
Still others based their keyboarding goals
on a student's handwriting speed: with a
goal of being able to keyboard at 2-3 times
the handwriting rate.
The Utah State Office of Education has a
detailed
web site in which keyboarding speed
requirements are laid out very explicitly:
15 WPM in 3rd grade, 20 WPM in 4th grade, 25
WPM in 5th grade, and 27 WPM in 6th grade.
All of this is with high accuracy. For 7-12
graders, this web site also presents a
keyboarding course in which students are
expected to type at 45 WPM with high
accuracy by the end of the semester.
Custom Typing Training
www.customtyping.com allows for the
measurement of keyboarding AND speech
recognition speed and accuracy. It is
recommended that you test your students'
speed before starting speech recognition
training. This provides a baseline for
setting a speed goal and measuring
improvement. The web site has many
exercises designed specifically for testing
speed, or you can create your own.
A student's ability to
reach well above keyboarding words per
minute is a very real potential for most
students. Many students will be able to
reach speeds of well over 50 wpm using
speech recognition.
As such,
having baseline scores for handwriting and
keyboarding will allow you to effectively
evaluate if speech recognition is truly a
more effective means of input.
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Links
A great
Overview of SR (by Microsoft)
SR for Writing (from Univ. at Buffalo)
It's Not just Keyboarding anymore By
Karl Barksdale Speaking Solutions © 2002
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