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083 - ADJ Electronics, South Africa
CONTACT
ADJ Electronics (pty) ltd
Mr. Jaco Rademayer
South Africa
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+27 21 855 3595
OVERALL GOAL /MISSION
The goal of the Bellen Speech Visualizer project is to enable d/Deaf students to improve their speech production, by
providing visual feedback / cues to enable the student to visualize their speech patterns. It effectively enables them to
see what they are pronouncing, and to adjust their voice output to match a given example speech pattern. With
repeated use, this allows the student to improve his/her speech, which allows for better inclusivity for those d/Deaf that
want to interact more with the hearing community. The project was initiated after a request from the National Institute
for the deaf (RSA) and the primary and complete focus was on d/Deaf students. It also involved some of the hearing as
well as d/Deaf persons working at the National Institute for the Deaf.
THE SOLUTION THAT HAS BEEN DEVELOPED
The project addresses the need that some persons with hearing loss have to being able to communicate verbally with
hearing persons. This is especially helpful to children who are still learning to communicate, and the software can assist
with phonetic learning – on a visual basis, helping to improve literacy. This software provides the student with a target
of a word/ sound and shows him/her what the correct word / sound would look like. It then allows the student to
progressively train him/herself to reach the target pronunciation via a visual feedback loop and an auditory feedback
loop.
COUNTRY IN WHICH IT WAS DEVELOPED: Republic of South Africa
COUNTRY/ COUNTRIES IN WHICH IT IS OPERATING: Republic of South Africa
FACTS ABOUT SIZE AND SCOPE
1. 600,000 d/Deaf persons in South Africa
2. Currently only 276 students have access to only 22 speech visualizers
3. 11 schools with d/Deaf students reached during pilot study