Recording devices

What are they?

Recorders and players have moved from the large two or four-track tape machines to minidiscs and digital recorders. The latter may produce very clear speech output but can be too small and fiddly for students with dexterity difficulties.

Digital recordings can be downloaded onto computers and portable players as audio files. The dictation of a speaker trained for a speech recognition package can be recorded and downloaded for instant transcription into text.

Recording notes can help many students, including those with visual and hearing impairments, writing difficulties and specific learning difficulties.

How are they used?

Note taking can be enhanced by recordings that clarify the notes. Some students find it hard to write and concentrate on what is being said at the same time, so a recording may act as the main source of information.

Recorders can also be used for memos, revision, practising presentations and dictating assignments.

Tape and digital players are useful in reading from audio books. These books have good navigational guides to allow particular chapters to be read as required.

Any issues to be aware of?

Some recorders are dependent on external microphones and others need to be placed near the speaker.

If you can, make a clear statement at the beginning of each new section in a lecture or discussion. This can help the student organise their listening times when playing back the recording. Going back over recordings takes time, but key elements that have been picked out during the lecture can be used as markers.

It may be necessary to request a professional recording of a textbook, or a scan of text to convert to audio format. Both methods take time but the former is often preferred as synthesised speech from a scanner or computer is not as pleasant to listen to as digitised real speech.