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Awesome Talking Library
Improve Reading Skills
By adding a voice to Web pages, children and teens can learn to pronounce words as they read them.  Awesome Talking Library (Awesome Talkster) includes an animated character, providing synchronized highlighting so that children can follow along even more easily.  This multi-sensory approach is a powerful method for improving reading skills. Online books for children and teens to practice their reading skills are available in the Awesome Library.

And More
Awesome Talkster, custom designed by Code-It, combines a browser, directory, search engine, and text-to-voice technology. This allows you to select online text and have it spoken to you. You can also set it to speak entire online articles, pages, or books.

Having an online voice that can speak articles to you has many benefits. For example, the "computer" can speak online stories or books to children while an adult supervises, helping the children learn to read or improve their reading skills. The "computer" can speak news articles to you in one open browser while you are searching for information in another browser window. It can speak online books to you while you (or your children) commute. It can just be more fun to hear what you read as you read it.

Awesome Talkster can also make the Web more accessible to persons with impaired vision or persons with impaired ability to navigate a page with a mouse. It can be navigated with keystrokes.

Awesome Talkster is very fast and has the largest screen area of any known browser.

How to Get the Awesome Talkster
The license to download the Awesome Talkster is free for evaluation purposes, courtesy of Evaluation and Development Institute, Microsoft, Lernout and Hauspie, and Code-It, author of Web Talkster. See the links at the bottom of this page to download the Awesome Talkster. Please read the Help page before installing the downloadable version.

You may prefer the easy installation available for the CD-ROM version, also available at the bottom of this page. The CD-ROM version contains more characters, voices, and languages. The license for the CD-ROM version is $10. Please read the CD-ROM Help page before installing the CD-ROM version. We provide a chart comparing the downloadable and CD-ROM versions for your convenience.

Introduction by Merlin. Assumes you are using Awesome Talkster, but you should be able to see (but not hear) Merlin in Internet Explorer (4.0 and above) without Awesome Talkster. You will not, of course, be able to see the Talkster toolbar with buttons. Merlin may take several seconds to load, but could take several minutes, depending on your version of Windows and your Internet connection.

Voices
Awesome Talkster's female voice is one of the best Web voices available, called "Mary in the Hall." Her voice is similar in clarity to the sample voice called "Crystal," available through ReadPlease. (NextUp.com offers the Natural Voices of ATT as part of a bundle for around $35, if you want voices that are better than Awesome Talkster's.)

Talkster can accept additional voices, such as Spanish and other languages, so it can be very helpful in bilingual education. The voices do not translate into other languages, but they can speak online text written in other languages. Awesome Library is available in other languages (at the bottom of this page) so the language version of text can be combined with the same language in voice. In this way, Talkster can make the Web more accessible for persons who do not normally speak English, persons learning English, or persons learning a second language. See the Help page for assistance with this.

Talkster can accept additional voices, such as Spanish and other languages, so it can be very helpful in bilingual education. The voices do not translate into other languages, but they can speak online text written in other languages. Awesome Library is available in other languages (at the bottom of this page) so the language version of text can be combined with the same language in voice. See the Help page for assistance with this.

Adult Mode, Boy Mode, and Girl Mode
Awesome Talkster starts in "Adult" mode with one of the best Web voices available. In Options, you can change the Mode to Boy or Girl, bringing in cartoon style characters, but not children's voices. The only free voices currently available are adults. Their words are shown in a bubble as they speak them. You can slow the speech, making it easier for children to read along.

Download Awesome Talking Library
This program requires:

133 CPU or better (computers sold within the past three years generally have at least this level)
Microsoft Windows™ 95, 98, ME, 2000 or XP (will not operate on Windows Workgroups)
Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0+ (takes advantage of several .dll files in I.E.)
16 MB RAM Memory (most computers sold in the last 5 years have at least this much)
15 MB free hard disk space
Sound card compatible with MS Windows Sound System and speakers or earphone
Connection to the Internet
FOR WINDOWS XP USERS ONLY, you will also need to download Spchapi.exe into your Awesome Talkster directory and then 'double click' it before restarting your computer.

If you meet these minimal requirements, Awesome Talking Library is available now to Download
for a trial period. The length of the trial is your decision. After you decide to keep it, please Register Here.

It is large (over 11MB), so it can take up to an hour or more for it to load on a 56k modem. See our Help page for instructions to install. The Help page also includes instructions on using the Awesome Talking Library.

The CD-ROM version is simpler to install, more complete, and has separate instructions at CD-ROM Help

For a CD-ROM version, send $18 to:
Evaluation and Development Institute
1626 N. Willamette Blvd.
Portland, OR 97217
Please make checks and money orders payable to Evaluation and Development Institute.
The cost includes $8 for shipping and handling within the USA. Costs for handling and postage for outside the USA are handled on an individual basis. Email us at jadams@awesomelibrary.org for more information or special orders.

We provide a chart comparing the downloadable and CD-ROM versions for your convenience.