Read&Write
Read&Write is a collection of tools to support reading and writing. Read&Write is a toolbar which can be used with a range of applications, such as Word and webpages. One of the key tools is the text-to-speech reader.
You can access Read&Write on campus. Launch it from the AppsAnywhere webpage which will automatically open in the browser when you logon to a student pc.
Text to Speech
Listening to Word documents.
- Place your cursor in the Word document where you want to start listening from.
- Press the Play button. The synthesized voice will read aloud and highlight the text and each word as it is spoken.
- Press the Stop button to stop the voice reading.
Listening to webpages
- To listen to webpages make sure you have the Read&Write extension added to your browser.
- Select the text you want to listen to with your cursor and use the Play button to listen back.
Listening to PDFs.
- To listen back to a PDF download it onto your computer first.
- Press the PDF Reader tool in the Read&Write toolbar
- You will be prompted to locate and open the PDF.
- The file will open in Read&Write's own PDF Reader. Click to Speak is on by default. Click anywhere in the document text to hear it read aloud.
- Click away from the document or press the Stop icon in the toolbar to stop the audio.
Using the Read&Write browser extension
- The Read&Write extension can be used on campus. If it does not appear in your browser extensions, you can add it from the Chrome webstore or Edge add-ons.
- Activate Read&Write by selecting the icon in the extensions, this will activate the floating toolbar which you can use with most webpages where there is text available.
- Highlight with your mouse where you would like the reader to start and press the play button.
In both tools you can convert text into portable MP3 audio files, which you can listen to on your own device, away from the pc.
In the Read&Write settings, you can choose different voices, (AI enhanced natural sounding voices are available in the extension version), Adjust reading speed and train the software how to pronounce subject-specific vocabulary, abbreviations or non-dictionary words. You can also pick highlight colours that work best for you.