Systems and methods for dynamic reading fluency instruction and improvement

• US 7,455,522 B2
• Filed: 10/04/2002
• Issued: 11/25/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 10/04/2002
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Fuji Xerox Company Limited (Xerox Holdings Corp.)
• Inventors: Polanyi, Livia, van den Berg, Martin Henk
• Primary Examiner(s): Jones; Scott E
• Application Number:
  US10/263,834
• Publication Number:
  US 20040067472A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,244 Days
• Field of Search: 434156-185, 704/251, 704/258, 704/243, 704/275
• US Class Current: 434/178
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 17/00 Teaching reading teaching lip-reading G09B21/00
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 19/06 Foreign languages with audible presentation of material to be studied G09B5/04
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 5/02 with visual presentation of the material to be studied, e.g. using film strip
• CPC Class Codes: G09B 7/02 of the type wherein the student is expected to construct an answer to the question which is presented or wherein the machine gives an answer to the question presented by a student

Abstract

Techniques for dynamic personalized reading fluency instruction and improvement are provided by determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud session of a text that has been evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences. One or more reading fluency improvement aids are provided to the user based on one or more of: determined user-specific reading fluency deficiencies, user-personalized information responses and user class-specific reading fluency deficiencies as determined by the reading fluency improvement system.

Claims

1. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences to a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text; and

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level,

wherein determining the user reading fluency level includes determining user prosodic measures from the one or more spoken responses and comparing the user prosodic measures to prosodic measures of speech by fluent readers or determining user intonation measures from the one or more spoken responses and comparing the user intonation measures to intonation measures of the speech by the fluent readers.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one comprehension aid comprises one or more of:

visually-provided improvement aid, audio-provided improvement aid, or a combination thereof.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining one or more subsequent user reading fluency levels after at least one comprehension aid is provided to the user.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein the at least one comprehension aid includes one or more of a graphic icon, an animation, audio information and video information.

5. The method of claim 1 further comprising recording the one or more spoken responses provided by the user during the one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the text is evaluated based on at least one of a Discourse Structures Theory, a Linguistic Discourse Model, an Information Structure Theory, a Rhetorical Structure Theory, a Systemic Functional Grammar and Tagmemics.

7. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences to a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text;

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level; and

displaying a grammatical tunable text summary based on the determined reading fluency level.

8. The method of claim 7, further comprising displaying salient information from the grammatical tunable text summary based on at least one of:

a user request, determined reading speed, determined comprehension level.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein at least one comprehension aid is associated with at least one portion of the grammatical tunable text summary.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the at least one comprehension aid is a human sensible concept explanation for at least one of the portions of the grammatical tunable text summary.

11. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text; and

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level,

wherein determining the user reading fluency level comprises;

determining one or more user speech prosodic measures provided in the one or more spoken responses; and

comparing the determined one or more user speech prosodic measures to one or more fluent readers speech prosodic measures.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein determining one or more user speech prosodic measures comprises determining one or more user speech prosodic measures using a speech analysis system.

13. The method of claim 11 further comprising determining a speech prosody match that approximates the one or more user speech prosodic measures to one or more fluent reader speech prosodic measures.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the one or more fluent reader speech prosodic measures are selected from a predetermined group of fluent readers speech prosodic measures.

15. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text; and

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level,

wherein determining the user reading fluency level comprises;

determining one or more user speech intonation measures provided in the one or more spoken responses; and

comparing the determined one or more user speech intonation measures to one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures.

16. The method of claim 15, wherein determining one or more user speech intonation measures is performed using a speech analysis system.

17. The method of claim 15 further comprising determining a speech intonation measures match that approximates the one or more user speech intonation measures to the one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures.

18. The method of claim 15, wherein the one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures are selected from a predetermined group of fluent readers speech intonation measures.

19. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences to a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text; and

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level,

wherein determining the user reading fluency level comprises;

determining one or more user speech prosodic measures provided in the one or more spoken responses;

determining one or more user speech intonation measures provided in the one or more spoken responses;

comparing the determined one or more user speech prosodic measures to one or more fluent readers speech prosodic measures; and

comparing the determined one or more user speech intonation measures to one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures.

20. The method of claim 19, wherein determining one or more user speech prosodic measures comprises determining one or more user speech prosodic measures using a speech analysis system.

21. The method of claim 19 further comprising determining a speech prosody match that approximates the one or more user speech prosodic measures to one or more fluent reader speech prosodic measures.

22. The method of claim 19, wherein determining one or more user speech intonation measures is performed using a speech analysis system.

23. The method of claim 19 further comprising determining a speech intonation measures match that approximates the one or more user speech intonation measures to the one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures.

24. The method of claim 19, wherein the one or more fluent readers speech intonation measures are selected from a predetermined group of fluent readers speech intonation measures.

25. A method of dynamic reading fluency instruction, comprising:

providing a text evaluated for discourse structure and information structure of sentences to a user;

determining a user reading fluency level based on one or more spoken responses provided by the user during one or more reading aloud sessions of the evaluated text; and

providing at least one comprehension aid based on the determined reading fluency level,

wherein determining a user reading fluency level comprises displaying salient information from a grammatical tunable text summary based on at least one of a user request;

determined reading speed; and

determined comprehension level.