Technology is growing at an exponential rate and an overwhelming number of tools are available to support students who struggle with reading and writing tasks. Here are a just a few inexpensive or free options that can help school students achieve greater success and better prepare them for college or university.
 | Evernote is free and the benefits are endless. We use it for both personal and work related tasks everyday. Evernote is like a huge filing cabinet that can be used to capture and save almost anything (audio, video, information from websites, etc.). It works on any device, so you can access the notes on your computer or iPhone and work with them later on either device. Here are just a few of the possibilities: keeping track of assignments, making text or audio notes or sketches, creating flashcards, recording lectures, saving images or information from websites that contain text, audio or video files. The information can be shared with instructors, friends and family. |
   | bubbl.us and Popplet are free and relatively simple to use tools for creating mind maps, flow charts and brainstorming diagrams online. iPad users might also want to check out the popplet lite app available in the iTunes store. Voice Cards Are Not Flashcards “are an innovative way to study and a replacement for all the flashcard/notecard apps out there!! Create a voice record of your questions/answers and play them back in different ways.” This app is available in iTunes and can be used with Quizlet. Students who are auditory learners or like to study while working out or traveling to and from school like this option. |
 | Dragon Dictation is a free app that comes with an iPhone or iPad. This voice recognition software removes some of the obstacles that prevent our students from getting their thoughts onto paper. Students sometimes prefer this to other more expensive speech to text software. |
  | Ginger is a powerful proofreading software designed primarily to help people with dyslexia. Since it’s highly accurate in correcting spelling errors, we like to recommend this grammar and spell checker for students with learning disabilities. We suggest starting with the free basic software, but students may want to upgrade to the premium version that includes text to speech. Unfortunately, a Mac version isn’t available yet, but Mac lovers can add their name to the notification list. A LiveScribe smartpen records as you write. Simply tap on your notes to replay what was said. Notes can be saved to your computer, searched for key words and shared with others. |
 | Dropbox is a tool that saves all your documents, photos, and videos in the ‘cloud’ so you can access them anywhere. It’s easy to share files with others or work collaboratively on one document. |
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