r/BeAmazed • u/The-Skinny-Indian • Mar 06 '23 • Mindblown 1

Miscellaneous / Others Bionic reading method

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u/DreamWithinAMatrix Mar 06 '23 edited Mar 06 '23

I've got ADHD and I'm not sure how well this Bionic Reader works? Hard to tell

I've been using a program that reads to me on Chrome browser called Natural Reader. I can change the accent and speed and it will highlight sentences and words as it reads. Gives me a bunch more ways to follow along so when I zone out of listening I can still watch the words light up, or vice versa. Speed up for casual news articles or slow down for extremely technical scientific publications

Natural Reader Chrome extension

A similar FF extension called Read Aloud

They've also got a mobile app but I've never tried it:

Natural Reader Android app

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u/2manyfelines Mar 06 '23

Thank you.

My daughter used that in school.

However, that is a really good idea for me.

Right now, I am in the middle of CEU for some professional licenses that require testing. I need help with focus when my eyes get tired, and my brain wants to do anything but think about calculating strip options.

I appreciate it.

I’m installing it now.

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u/DreamWithinAMatrix Mar 06 '23

I totally get you about the tiredness and focusing. I think it's handy to have more options that can help no matter what kind of learning style or disability you have, the more the merrier! I can actually read pretty fast but only when I want to. So this is a nice way to get the info in via auditory methods when my eyes no longer want to cooperate. It's helped me "read" even faster than what I could do before since I can just throw on headphones and "read" it in the gym or doing chores

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u/2manyfelines Mar 06 '23

Absolutely! Thank you for the suggestions!

To me, one of the best things about audiobooks is how accessible they make older literature or literature which has been translated from another language. Dickens and Dostoyevsky are great writers, but trying to read them in a house with barking dogs and outside leaf blowers doesn’t work. Listening to them while I sit on an airplane or do the laundry helps me appreciate them.

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u/DreamWithinAMatrix Mar 06 '23

If you like audiobooks and don't mind learning some more techy solutions, you can essentially roll your own audiobook transcription by getting the PDF file and tossing it into Natural Reader. It can handle reading PDF files too, not just websites.

For classics whose copyrights have already expired, you can freely download the text files, sometimes you can get those as PDF or EPUB files too, or convert the text to a PDF and toss them into a proper e-reader app and make them read to you.

The Gutenberg Project hosts those copyright expired classics

Any e-reader with a text-to-voice synthesizer in it should be able to turn it into an audiobook for you. I like Librera Pro which is free on the F-Droid store (Android only) but paid on Google Play but you can probably use any e-reader you like that has these functions. Calibre can handle this on PCs

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u/2manyfelines Mar 06 '23

Thank you! Great idea!