[log in to unmask] wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I am pretty sure that this has been discussed before, but ... I'd like to
> know what people do for school. I have a hearing impairment in addition to
> CP. I have a notetaker, but I have found that not everything is being written
> down so I want to get a tape recorder to tape the lectures and would love to
> be able to find a way for a dictation software to convert all of this into
> text for me. Has anyone been able to do this successfully or not?
>
> Thanks for any help anyone can give,
>
> Dina
>
>

Dina,

Have you spoken to the professors? Most of them should be accomodating if
you tell them what you need and how they could help you.

I remember one student who told me he needed to see my lips, so I tried to
be careful about that, and of course, he reminded me a few times (usually by
waving a hand or something like that) when I forgot about it. He relied on
notes by collegues, + blackboard stuff and completed the information with a
few one-on-one sessions (usually short ones: other students seemed to need
more help than him!).
BTW, I was teaching engineering subjects (with lots of blackboard use for
formulae, graphics...), in 1980-1986... long before notions like "special
services" existed.

As for software, I imagine something could be done with some Dragon
software. You would need to input the text through the mike correction and
have it processed like if you were dictating texts. Even under the best
circumstances, word prediction software isn't up at par with typing (except
for those who have problems with typing). With classroom-ambiance recordings
that have a lot of profs using quite a few accents (let alone foreign
accents), plus noise and pick-up problems compounded by distance, I'm not
sure you would be able to understand anything from the transcript.

You'll have more luck comparing your notes with your collegues' notes (and
it will take _less_ time), or listening to your tapes at home (if you can
hear, that is).

Regards,

Michel Gagnon