What is the best alternative to Read&Write for education?

The Read&Write app offers instant literacy support for students with learning disabilities. It uses text to speech (TTS) technology as an effective method of learning through listening. However, several other types of literacy software apps offer the same. If you’re looking for alternatives to the Read&Write app, keep reading to learn the best apps.

How Read&Write works

Read&Write by Texthelp is a solution to help students with learning disabilities and those in IEPs with comprehension, engagement, and expression. Its features are designed to develop learning independence and to motivate students. The stand-out features include text to speech, text and picture dictionaries, and talk&type to aid in studying, revision, research, proofreading, and more.

Students are encouraged to study smarter and learn through support in expressing themselves with fluency and confidence. Read&Write is compatible with Chromebooks, Macs, Windows iPads, and Android tablets.

Texthelp offers other assistive technology apps to help students and those in the workplace with learning challenges to “communicate with accuracy and fluency.”

Benefits of Using TTS Apps for Education

Here are some of the main benefits many TTS support tools offer to aid reading and learning difficulties

• They support multisensory learning by employing visual (text highlighting) and auditory input, which helps with deeper understanding.
• They support engagement and comprehension when listened to in a natural-sounding voice—the less robotic, the better.
• Information is more accessible since web-based online learning material can be converted into text, in addition to a screenshot of text and most file formats.
• They are especially beneficial for students with decoding issues. An auditory presentation of words can allow students to focus on their meaning instead of pronunciation.

Best alternatives to Read&Write for education

Speechify

Speechify is a top-ranking text to speech reader and an excellent alternative to the Read&Write app. It’s an ideal aid for studying, e-learning, language learners, and those with learning challenges. Speechify has focused on making listening to text as fun and engaging as possible with a wide selection of natural-sounding and celebrity voices and a variety of accents. It doesn’t matter what you listen to. You can make it even more enjoyable with Snoop Dogg or Gwyneth Paltrow reading it aloud, among other celebrities.

Speechify highlights the words as they’re read to support multi-sensory learning, which is effective for dyslexia and other reading disabilities. It can convert your documents, including Microsoft Word, Excel, PDFs, and images of text into audio. You can even use it for easy multitasking without the need of a screen to listen to web-based text from your social media accounts.

Speechify will simplify how you use TTS technology, as its interface is one of the easiest. You can access the service using a Chrome extension, Safari, Firefox, or the mobile app for iOS and Android.

Read Aloud

Read Aloud is for people who prefer to listen to text instead of reading and people with learning disabilities. It uses (TTS) to read aloud web page content, including blogs, articles, news sites, publications, textbooks, course material, and school and class websites. You can have your Google Docs, PDFs, Amazon Kindle, and EPUB formatted content read aloud from the comfort of your favorite device.

It supports over 40 languages, and you can choose the reading voice. TTS voice options include those provided natively by the browser and TTS cloud providers like Amazon Polly, Google Wavenet, and Microsoft.

Kurzweil 3000

The Kurzweil 3000 is an award-winning software platform. They develop research-based tools to help students with literacy challenges, including dysgraphia and dyslexia. Its built-in features support writing, reading, and study skills to help students keep up with peers and achieve their full potential.

The TTS feature offers 31 natural voices and over 18 languages. It uses OpenDyslexic font and magnifies text for users with visual impairments. For comprehension, it provides a talking dictionary, sticky and voice notes, vocabulary study guides, and more. The word prediction, writing path, and speech to text features can assist in note-taking and help develop writing skills.

The Kurzweil 3000 platform is available via subscription, which includes family access and free 30-minute tutorials with the Kurzweil team.

Easy Speech2Text

Easy Speech2Text is simple audio recognition software to transcribe your voice or MP3 into plain text and vice-versa. It offers high-quality male and female natural-sounding voices and recognizes multiple languages. Easy Speech2Text is powered by Google and other cutting-edge TTS/SST technology for guaranteed quality.

NaturalReader

The NaturalReader program allows students with decoding challenges to focus on understanding text. It enables you to turn written text into audio for effective learning through repetition for better fluency, comprehension, and confidence. Including auditory aids with textbooks or written notes has proved highly beneficial for ESL/ELL, ADHD, and dyslexic learners.

NaturalReader is compatible with Microsoft Windows, Mac, and Google Chrome. It can also be used via a USB stick or any external device.

Get started with Speechify today

Speechify is rated the number one text to speech app in the App Store, with over 20 million downloads and over 150,000 five-star reviews. It brings your content to life for an enhanced learning experience with various natural-sounding and celebrity voices in multiple languages.

Join the millions of happy Speechify users by trying Speechify today for free. Get started by installing the Chrome plugin or mobile app for iOS and Android and offline access.

FAQ

Is Read&Write free for students?

Read&Write offers a free and premium version. The premium version is free for teachers and $99 for a yearly subscription for students.

How good is Read&Write for education?

Read&Write is ideal for supporting SEN learners, students who speak English as their second language, or people with mild visual impairment.

Is Speechify better than Read&Write as a TTS service?

Speechify creates a more engaging learning experience with a wide variety of natural-sounding and celebrity voices. In education, engagement is essential for holding students’ attention and helping them digest information.