ELR-News

January 2004

Newsletter of ELR Software Pty Ltd

ABN 67 090 738 702
http://www.elr.com.au
news@elr.com.au

ELR Software produces a range of computer programs designed by speech pathologists for speech, language & literacy intervention. Our programs may be used interactively within therapy sessions, to increase efficiency in service delivery, and to improve access to the Internet for people with special needs. We are also available as consultants to clinicians and research projects in the fields of literacy and accessibility issues associated with the Internet.

The aim of this newsletter is to inform you of developments and changes to our major products eLr (Extra Language Resources), Rude Readers, Word Meanings and EIA (Enhancing Internet Access). We welcome the opportunity for feedback and questions, and will be pleased to consider including reader contributions and announcements.

This Newsletter (and previous editions) is available online at www.elr.com.au/news and an email version is sent monthly to members of our mailing list (See Subscribing/Unsubscribing).

Season's Greetings, and we wish you all a safe and happy new year. And special thanks to all to have provided us feedback - always helpful!

In this issue -

  1. Looking Back on 2003
  2. New eLr Materials
  3. Zoo Dads - Featured Rude Reader
  4. Free Downloads
  5. ELR 2004/2004 Calendar

  1. Looking Back on 2003

    This month marks the close of yet another year. I'm amazed that with each year, we all start commenting on "how fast time flies when we're having fun!!" This seems to start in about June. We hope you have all had a rewarding year, and that a bit of break will renew energies.

    eLr was launched in Feb 2000, so that we will soon be four years old. eLr started with 1600 tasks, and at this point it has 5879. During 2003, we added 1026 new tasks. This represents a significant growth in value, and an increase in the range of clients who will benefit from its use.

    Our focus for the first couple of years was to continue to add new material to existing sections. Recently, we have been revisiting some of the earlier sections, and adding revisions. The revisions are based on new information from Professional Development activities, feedback from subscribers, and improvements that have occurred to us as we use eLr.

    In May this year, a new section was introduced - Syntactic Processing. This will be a big section, and currently is in its infancy. Production of graphics and new models are necessary, and we are looking forward to providing new materials in this section within the next few months.

    We are always open to comments, suggestions and general feedback. As more clinicians start to use computers within the therapy setting, and institutions such as schools have better access to computers, programs such as eLr will help to increase efficiency in the way we work. eLr is also an Internet based program, so it also aims to provide a quick and easy way to deliver home and school based programs.

    So, thank you to all our supporters, and in particular to those of you who continue to email suggestions, corrections and general comments. We've even had an email from a student in a Tasmanian school who was delighted that he could email the makers of the program and let us know about an error.

    We wish you all a safe and rewarding year in 2004.

  2. New eLr Materials

    This month the focus has been Phonology - Later Sounds, blends with /s/, and blends with /l/. Our aim is to have a full range of different graphic and text based activities for each of the sub sections, and in some areas games like SpinPic or TicTacPic were missing. So we have added as many of these games as is possible. The difficulty is that for some sounds, the words are abstract and difficult to depict with graphics.

    There have been a total of 85 new tasks using Slide show, PicCards, TicTacPic, SpinPic, MemoryPics, and CluePics. In January, the blends with /r/ section will have been revised to ensure that the above models are well represented in all sections.

  3. Zoo Dads - Featured Rude Reader

    The last of the 5 stories in Volume 1, this is a story of escalating hilarity. Two kids are told to find the funniest animal at the zoo while their dads have a drink and a talk. From thereon, the boys compete to find increasingly funny (and rude) similarities between their dads and zoo animals. They start off smiling and end up laughing until it hurt with nine degrees of hilarity between. It's a nice demonstration of the words that indicate feeling happy. If "My dad farts like an elephant" offends you, then this isn't your RR. But you'll miss a good chance to teach similes. Zoo Dads is not dad-bashing. The kids have a good time and actually find the funniest animals. There's an inferred ending that children enjoy, once they get the joke. Zoo Dads is mainly LARSP Stage III. There's some visual rudeness - the drawings show a zebra peeing and an elephant farting. Bet you can't read this Zoo Dads without smiling.

  4. Free Downloads

    ELR has a number of free or evaluation files available for downloading directly from our website. Please see www.elr.com.au/downloads.htm for specific details. For other supporting materials and documents available for free download, please see www.elr.com.au/support.htm.


     
  5. ELR 2004 Calendar



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Copyright ©2004 ELR Software Pty Ltd

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