The Importance of Live Audio with Leveled Readers

by | Nov 29, 2018 | Digital publishing, Education

New E-books on Science and Social Studies
We just completed two series of illustrated readers for a K-12 publisher: three on science topics and three on social studies. The books will be available in print and digital formats, and the latter includes audio tracks recorded by live actors, not text-to-speech.
Audio Enhancements

Many websites and e-readers use machine-generated text-to-speech (TTS), which is easily perceived as “robotic” and not as natural as human narration. TTS may be OK as a last resort to handle a large amount of text that is frequently updated; but its use is becoming out of favor.

Don’t Settle for the Wrong Technical Solution

At the end of the day, TTS is a compromise, a short cut, and does not deliver a quality recording. Machine recordings do not provide learners with natural syntax or the accurate pronunciation of proper nouns. For example, automation usually botches the pronunciation of dinosaur names, many cities, and exotic locations. What do you think the national fish of Hawaii, the humuhumunukunukuapua’a, sounds like coming from a robot?

Check out this Youtube link and you’ll find out. https://lnkd.in/eWnzQYv
Put Learners First
Our students deserve better, and quality publishers are providing them with real learning aids that are fact-based, accurate, and fun to both read and listen to. E-books with audio are getting more popular by the day because they provide an important educational element–and make the written word come alive. The books pictured, produced by Ross & Associates and A+ Media, will be “playing soon at a classroom near you!” Spread the (written and spoken) word.