Sight and Sound Technology, the UK’s leading provider of hardware and software for the blind, visually impaired and those with learning and reading difficulties, have begun their training programme with 37 schools in the Isle of Man.
Training will take place in clusters of 5 primary schools and 1 high school, with an aim of training teachers how to use every feature and function of the Kurzweil 3000 computer software for Mac and PC.
This initiative aims to provide a solution to students who require assistance in reading, writing and learning, with the main goal of the initiative being to improve grade attainment and employment prospects of students on the island.
Funded by The Department of Economic Development of the Isle of Man Government, the scheme will also include training teachers on the use of the Universal Library which is based “in the cloud” and can be accessed from any web browser or through an Apple iPad “app”. This allows students, teachers and communities to share Kurzweil documents and content. The iPad application, also allows access to K3000 documents whilst on the move.
Joyce Monroe, Senior Educational Psychologist, comments: “This is a versatile and flexible technology that has great potential for all students. It will be particularly useful for students who have any degree of literacy difficulty, because it will help them to access the content of text by removing the barriers to their learning. This technology fits in well with the Island’s new Dyslexia Policy, which emphasises the need to remove the barriers to learning that text poses for some students.”
Glenn Tookey, CEO of Sight and Sound Technology, said: “We are thoroughly enjoying training teaching staff at the schools in the Isle of Man. We truly believe that this initiative will improve the quality of life for all users. We are looking forward to carrying out our second phase of training very soon and continuing our support to the Isle of Man’s school literacy initiative.”