It is nearly two years since I first wrote here about WordTalk.  Since then, I have worked hard to promote this powerful free text-to-speech plugin for Microsoft Word.  WordTalk turns the Windows version of Microsoft Word into a talking word processor that highlights text as it is read.  It includes a  wonderful talking spell checker, and it can be accessed either with a mouse via icons on a toolbar, or with keyboard shortcuts.

I believe the learning supports provided by WordTalk ought to be available to ALL learners.  So, I was delighted to learn yesterday from Karen Janowski that a new more feature rich version of WordTalk has been released recently by CALL Scotland.  (Communication, Access, Literacy and Learning).

[Sadly, WordTalk works only in Windows versions of MS Word, and I have been unable to find a Mac alternative for WordTalk.  If you are aware of anything that conveniently provides text-to-speech in any Mac word processor, please leave a comment here.]

WordTalk 4.2 is a free add-on for Microsoft Word that povides convenient text-to-speech.  This offers powerful editing support for writers who can listen to what they have written.  The talking spell checker is extremely helpful for writers who have difficulty identifying the correct spelling of a word from those listed in a typical spell checker.

WordTalk reads aloud any file open in Word, and it works in all versions of the program from Word 97 through Word 2007.  I have successfully used free OCR software to scan text into Word in order to have it read aloud with WordTalk.  With one of the new features in version 4.2, WordTalk will also convert text to  either .wav or mp3 audio files, for use on audio players away from the computer.

WordTalk’s features can be accessed via buttons on a toolbar or with keyboard shortcuts.

Toolbar in MS Word 97, 2000, and 2003

Toolbar buttons, or associated keyboard shortcuts, allow text to be read continuously, by paragraph,  by sentence or by individual word.  Any selected text can also be read.  The user can choose from a range of preferred settings–colour of highlighting as text is read, reading rate and volume,  and whether or not WordTalk will echo letters/words/sentences as they are typed.  Now there is also the option of having words spoken when double-clicked and of spell-checking a word with a right-click.

Some of the options mentioned above are new in Version 4.2.  Also new is the ability for a user to save his or her settings. It is noteworthy that the new version is a little easier to install than the original. WordTalk offers extensive and very helpful documentation and online support.

So far, I have been unable to load version 4.2 of WordTalk into MS Word 2007 running on XP.  I believe that the issue is that I am not running 2007 in Vista; and I am hoping that this glitch will be resolved soon.  The screenshot below shows the WordTalk toolbar in Word 2007, where it opens from the ‘Add-Ins’ tab.