[nabs-l] Math-to-Speech technology project

Thu May 26 16:36:04 UTC 2011

Just wondering, might this project deal with more advanced Math, such as
Statistics, in the future?

Serena

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From: nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf
Of Loew, Ruth
Sent: Thursday, May 26, 2011 12:28 PM
To: nabs-l at nfbnet.org
Subject: [nabs-l] Math-to-Speech technology project

New Math-to-Speech Technologies to Help Blind and Visually Impaired Students
Master Mathematics

Princeton, N.J. (May 24, 2011) -
Educational Testing Service (ETS) and Design Science have announced they are
working jointly to modify MathType(tm) and MathPlayer(tm), so that classroom
materials, tests and other documents containing mathematical content may be
clearly spoken by computers. This new math-to-speech technology will provide
students who are blind or have other visual impairments the tools they need
to learn, practice, and take math and science tests on a more equal footing
with their classroom peers.
Some of the country's leading subject-matter experts and developers of
assistive technology for students who are blind or visually impaired will
assist on the project which begins July 1, 2011, and is supported by a $1.5
million Institute of Education Sciences grant.
"Existing assistive technology that provides synthetic speech for electronic
text does at best a limited job of making math accessible for this group of
students," explains Lois Frankel, an ETS Assessment Specialist and the
leader of the effort. "The current technology falls short because it
generally does not 'know' how to describe mathematical expressions,
especially in a way that provides access to their nonlinear structure.
"ETS and Design Science will work together to enhance MathPlayer, the tool
that voices the math encoded in MathML, so that it sounds more like what
students - particularly those in Algebra I - are used to hearing," Frankel
says. "We also plan to work on a number of customizations to MathType,
including a feature to allow teachers and other users to select how
mathematical expressions are described. For example, they could select
whether the machine says 'four over five' or 'four fifths.' Another
customization we plan to add is keyboard navigation that allows blind or
visually impaired users to go back and replay voiced segments in
mathematically meaningful 'chunks.' Our goal is to provide students and
teachers with a better system for voicing mathematical notation that
includes some truly useful functionality."
"It has been a long-term Design Science goal to make math accessible, and
our team has been working hard at it for over six years," said Neil Soiffer,
Senior Scientist at Design Science. "It's a great opportunity to be
partnering with an organization the stature and importance of ETS, to push
the state-of-the-art forward."
Working with Frankel and Soiffer on the effort are ETS Assessment Specialist
Beth Brownstein, Research Scientist Eric Hansen, and Senior Research
Scientist Cara Laitusis. Among the other organizations and consultants who
will take part in the project are:

*

De Witt & Associates, specializes in accessibility training, learning
systems and support, and will provide advice on the implementation of MathML
accessibility tools and assist in the development of training modules for
students and teachers.
*       GW Micro, a leading firm in the adaptive technology industry, will
modify its Window-Eyes screen reader software to work seamlessly with the
tools developed by the project.
*       Jim Allan, the accessibility coordinator and webmaster for the Texas
School for the Blind and Visually Impaired.
*       Maylene Bird, a teacher of mathematics to visually impaired students
at the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired.
*       Christine Hinton, a Program Development Specialist for the New
Jersey Commission for the Blind and Visually Impaired, will help recruit
student participants from inclusive schools in New Jersey.
*       Gaylen Kapperman, a professor with a visual disability, with
specialization in research and development projects pertaining to
mathematics instruction and assistive technology used by individuals who are
blind or are visually impaired.
*       Abraham Nemeth, the author of The Nemeth Braille Code for
Mathematics and Science Notation and a blind expert in making mathematics
accessible to blind individuals.
*       Susan Osterhaus, a secondary mathematics teacher and statewide math
accessibility expert at the Texas School for the Blind and Visually
Impaired.
"The criteria for success in this project will be three-fold," explains
Marisa Farnum, Vice President of Assessment Development at ETS. "First, will
students using the tailored tools over the status quo be better able to
solve algebra problems at an appropriate level? And, are they better able to
correctly identify the structure of algebra-level math expressions when
using the tools? Second, will math teachers be able to use the authoring
tools developed by this project to quickly and easily create math materials
that are accessible to their students with visual impairments? And finally,
do the teachers and students who participate as subjects in these
development efforts find the tools provided usable and convenient?"
About ETS
At nonprofit ETS, we advance quality and equity in education for people
worldwide by creating assessments based on rigorous research. ETS serves
individuals, educational institutions and government agencies by providing
customized solutions for teacher certification, English language learning,
and elementary, secondary and post-secondary education, as well as
conducting education research, analysis and policy studies. Founded in 1947,
ETS develops, administers and scores more than 50 million tests annually -
including the TOEFL(r) and TOEIC(r) tests, the GRE(r) tests and The Praxis
Series(tm) assessments - in more than 180 countries, at over 9,000 locations
worldwide. www.ets.org<http://www.ets.org/>.

About Design Science
Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Long Beach, California, Design Science
develops software used by educators, scientists and publishing
professionals, including MathType, Equation Editor in Microsoft Office,
MathFlow, MathDaisy and MathPlayer, to communicate on the web and in print.
For more information please visit www.dessci.com<http://www.dessci.com/>.

Ruth C. Loew, Ph.D.
Assistant Director
Office of Disability Policy, ETS
phone: 609-683-2984
fax: 609-683-2220

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