NextUp.com TextAloud Text To Speech December 2008 Newsletter

David Kosofsky is a longtime teacher of English as a Second Language (ESL) to foreign-born students in the Western Suburbs of New Orleans. His students are fast learners, and most quickly learn to read English with surprising ease; however even with superb reading skills, many encounter a final hurdle in the language study process -- the pronunciation itself. Even after mastering written English, speaking it clearly and understandably remains a difficult task for many of his students. To teach his kids correct English pronunciations more quickly, and at their own pace, Kosofsky found a unique software tool in TextAloud

"TextAloud is a great way to help my students overcome those pronunciation difficulties," comments Kosofsky. "I have them select a text they find interesting, and that they are able to read and understand. I will then have them read it over to themselves a few times until they feel they have mastered the vocabulary and grammar. Then, I have them simply listen to the text as it is read by TextAloud." This approach enables Kosofksy's students to hear the proper pronunciation of words they are unsure of how to pronounce, and in a way that is easy and allows for infinite repetition.

"The best thing about using TextAloud and Text to Speech in this way is that students are in control," adds Kosofsky. "This way, they're able to highlight sections of the text and repeat them over and over until they have learned the proper pronunciation, and they're able to do so specifically wherever they need the most help, word for word or phrase for phrase." This kind of assistance is something that would be exceedingly difficult for a teacher to do, especially in a live, classroom situation involving multiple students. TextAloud means that each student is able to pick and choose the pronunciation help they need, as needed.

Kosofsky has been in the ESL field for well over a quarter of a century, with a career that has spanned everything from teaching, to training, textbook authorship, and curriculum design. In addition, he has been advising several language schools in New Orleans as well as the Baltimore-Washington, D.C. area. "The capability to render written text as English speech, and with a high degree of phonetic accuracy, is the key to using TextAloud as an ESL tool," he adds. "In addition, the easy switching among different voices with different accents helps students with fine-tuning their ears so they really learn and retain the nuances of the often challenging English pronunciations."

For his own leisure reading, meanwhile, Kosofsky prefers to use his eyes, at least where his native language of English is concerned. But that doesn't stop him from maximizing TextAloud in his personal language studies. "I have found the product enormously helpful and enjoyable when I use it for French," he adds. "French, for me, is a second language that I command with skills roughly comparable to the English skills of the students I currently work with, and using TextAloud, I find that in addition to increasing my listening comprehension, it really helps my pronunciation as well." Using TextAloud enables Kosofsky -- just like his students -- to take careful note of the correspondence between the written language and the way the sounds are produced.

"TextAloud has ultimately made my work easier, while at the same time it has made my students' learning experiences richer and more stimulating," he adds. "As anyone who has taught for a long time can tell you, the current generation of students is totally at home with digital technology, and by integrating it into the classroom, teachers can maintain student interest and also raise the comfort level in a situation -- mastering a foreign language -- that is so often fraught with challenge and insecurity."