Syftet med studien var att studera hur ett samtal om gemensamt beslutsfattande går till när en patient, Case manager och professionella träffas enskilt eller i resursgrupp och samtalar med varandra om vårdplanen. Det var en etnografisk studie där samtal inom en psykiatrisk verksamhet representerade det fält som studerats genom metoden deltagande observation. Resultatet visade att plats, form, tid, tempo, och rytm hade betydelse för samtalets kvalitet liksom att det fanns en ansvarsfördelning i samtalet som bland annat karaktäriserades av att bli bemött med förståelse för en livssituation som innebar ett lidande. Andra faktorer som påverkade kvalitén var hur de professionella ställde frågor, inväntade svar och avslutade samtalet. Men även vad som händer när samtalet brister och att inte kunna berätta och fråga under samtalet. Det fanns dock situationer där personen kunde berätta och uttrycka sig i samtalet och med stöd av samtalsmatta kunde uttrycka egna åsikter, önskningar och behov. / The purpose of the study was to establish how a collective decision can be made when the individual and the case manager meet with the technical experts, either by themselves or as part of a wider focus group, to discuss the treatment plan. It was an ethnographic study conducted by observing psychiatric conversations. The findings of the study confirmed that the location, format of the meeting and the pace at which the meeting was conducted, directly influenced the quality of the discussion. It was also important for the participants to be sympathetic towards the individual’s personal situation and understand the difficulties faced by the individual on a daily basis. The questioning technique used by the technical experts and how the discussion was concluded, was also important. Also, what happens when the conversation goes off track and when the individual is unable to give information and ask questions. There were examples of situations where the individuals could express themselves constructively, using the talking mat, and could give their view and confirm needs and desires. In order to make their voices heard, they need to be clear what they want and must be able to argue their case.

Excerpt: In a 1988 essay published in the book “Country: The Music and the Musicians,” music scholar Nolan Porterfield observed: "Music historians and others fond of dates and places have a special weakness for 'Bristol, August 1927.' As a sort of shorthand notation, it has come to signal the Big Bang of country music evolution."

<p>Syftet med det här arbetet var att undersöka om och i sådana fall hur tre pedagoger använde sig av högläsning i sina barngrupper. Jag ville även titta lite närmre på om högläsning kan hjälpa barnen att få bättre språkförståelse samt om miljön spelar in på något sätt för att läsro ska uppnås.</p><p>Mitt resultat visade att alla tre pedagogerna arbetar ganska mycket med högläsning i verksamheten men att de jobbar på olika sätt med det. Samtliga anser dock att högläsning är oerhört viktigt för barnens språkliga utveckling, eftersom man i samband med att man läser pratar om ord samt händelser i boken. En annan sak som framkom i undersökningen var att pedagogerna ansåg att det var viktigt att det skulle finnas en speciell plats i rummet som barnen kunde förknippa med berättande och läsning. Det här var tyvärr något som inte uppfylldes riktigt i allas dagliga verksamhet, men det visar ändå på hur betydelsefullt de ansåg att det var. Beträffande miljön så ansågs den spela en ganska stor roll men det som framförallt framhölls var vikten av att den som läser högt för barnen verkligen ger sig hän sitt uppdrag så att barnen blir intresserade av att lyssna på det som läses.</p><p><strong>Nyckelord:</strong> Högläsning, språkutveckling, läsmiljö</p> / <p>The purpose with this work was to investigate if and in that case how three pedagogs use reading aloud in their work with the children. I also wanted to look a little closer if reading aloud can help children to improve their language proficiency and I also wanted to see if the environment plays a role in any way to achieve reading peace.</p><p>My results showed that all three teachers are working quite a lot with reading aloud in their activities but they work in different ways with it. All of them, however, believe that reading aloud is extremely important for children's linguistic development, since when reading aloud they talk with the children about words and events in the book. Another thing that emerged from the survey was that the teachers felt it was important that there would be a special place in the room that the children could associate with storytelling and reading. This, unfortunately, was something that was not met really in everyone's daily activities, but nevertheless it shows how important they felt it was. Regarding the environment, so it was considered to play a fairly important role but what was especially emphasized was the importance of that when reading aloud to children you really need to devote yourself to the mission so that the children will be interested to listen to what is read.</p><p><strong>Keywords: </strong>Reading aloud, language, environment</p>

This thesis presents work in the area of computer-animatedtalking heads. A system for multimodal speech synthesis hasbeen developed, capable of generating audiovisual speechanimations from arbitrary text, using parametrically controlled3D models of the face and head. A speech-specific directparameterisation of the movement of the visible articulators(lips, tongue and jaw) is suggested, along with a flexiblescheme for parameterising facial surface deformations based onwell-defined articulatory targets. To improve the realism and validity of facial and intra-oralspeech movements, measurements from real speakers have beenincorporated from several types of static and dynamic datasources. These include ultrasound measurements of tonguesurface shape, dynamic optical motion tracking of face pointsin 3D, as well as electromagnetic articulography (EMA)providing dynamic tongue movement data in 2D. Ultrasound dataare used to estimate target configurations for a complex tonguemodel for a number of sustained articulations. Simultaneousoptical and electromagnetic measurements are performed and thedata are used to resynthesise facial and intra-oralarticulation in the model. A robust resynthesis procedure,capable of animating facial geometries that differ in shapefrom the measured subject, is described. To drive articulation from symbolic (phonetic) input, forexample in the context of a text-to-speech system, bothrule-based and data-driven articulatory control models havebeen developed. The rule-based model effectively handlesforward and backward coarticulation by targetunder-specification, while the data-driven model uses ANNs toestimate articulatory parameter trajectories, trained ontrajectories resynthesised from optical measurements. Thearticulatory control models are evaluated and compared againstother data-driven models trained on the same data. Experimentswith ANNs for driving the articulation of a talking headdirectly from acoustic speech input are also reported. A flexible strategy for generation of non-verbal facialgestures is presented. It is based on a gesture libraryorganised by communicative function, where each function hasmultiple alternative realisations. The gestures can be used tosignal e.g. turn-taking, back-channelling and prominence whenthe talking head is employed as output channel in a spokendialogue system. A device independent XML-based formalism fornon-verbal and verbal output in multimodal dialogue systems isproposed, and it is described how the output specification isinterpreted in the context of a talking head and converted intofacial animation using the gesture library. Through a series of audiovisual perceptual experiments withnoise-degraded audio, it is demonstrated that the animatedtalking head provides significantly increased intelligibilityover the audio-only case, in some cases not significantly belowthat provided by a natural face. Finally, several projects and applications are presented,where the described talking head technology has beensuccessfully employed. Four different multimodal spokendialogue systems are outlined, and the role of the talkingheads in each of the systems is discussed. A telecommunicationapplication where the talking head functions as an aid forhearing-impaired users is also described, as well as a speechtraining application where talking heads and languagetechnology are used with the purpose of improving speechproduction in profoundly deaf children. / QC 20100506

The aim of this thesis is to investigate how students in higher education use talking books. This has been inves-tigated through qualitative interviews with nine students. The intention has been to find out how they use talk-ing books and why they have chosen to do it in the way they have, looking specifically on whether there are strategies shared by most of the interviewees. As a theoretical basis of the thesis I have chosen a study, described by Sigrid Hongset, where dyslectic pu-pils tried using printed text and text on tape, as well as both simultaneously. George Kingsley Zipfs “Principle of least effort” will act as a supplemental theory. The interviews show that the students use talking books in different ways. Most read them via a computer, either using a program specifically made for talking book reading or a general purpose audio program. Some used portable players, such as mp3-players. None of them used a talking book player at the time and only a few used several of the special functions that the digital DAISY format offers. All the interviewees used printed books alongside the talking books. Some used them concurrently, while others did not. One thing they had in common was that they had, mostly purposefully, made strategies for how to study with the talking books, but these strategies were vastly different between them. It was obvious that different factors were important regarding their choices of technique. They were working towards as hassle free a use as possible. In this aspect there was a noticeable clash between different kinds of effort. The need not to carry around cumbersome equipment might for example be greater than the need to have all the functions of the DAISY format available. Several of them did not have full knowledge of the functions available in the DAISY format, but they did not appear to view that as a problem. Meanwhile there was a certain amount of frustration aimed towards insuf-ficiencies inherit in the talking book format.

Kalbos animacija plačiai naudojama technikos įrenginiuose siekiant kurtiesiems, vaikams, vidutinio ir vyresnio amžiaus žmonėms sudaryti vienodas bendravimo galimybes. Žmonės yra labai jautrūs veido išvaizdos pokyčiams, todėl kalbos animavimas yra sudėtingas procesas, kurio metu žmogaus kalboje atpažinta akustinė informacija (fonemos) yra vizualizuojama naudojant specialiai sumodeliuotas veido išraiškas vadinamas vizemomis. Didžiausią įtaką kalbos animacijos tikroviškumui turi teisingas fonemas atitinkančių vizemų identifikavimas, modeliavimas ir jų išrikiavimas laiko juostoje. Tačiau, norint užtikrinti kalbos animacijos natūralumą, būtina papildomai išnalizuoti vizemų įtaką kaimyninėms fonemoms ir atsižvelgiant į animuojamos kalbos fonetines savybes sukurti koartikuliacijos valdymo modelį. Kiekvienos kalbos fonetika skiriasi, todėl kitai vienai kalbai sukurta animavimo sistema nėra tiesiogiai tinkama kitai kalbai animuoti. Kalbos animavimo karkasas, kuriame realizuojama Lietuvių kalbai skirta animavimo technologija, turi būti sukurta lietuvių kalbai vizualizuoti. Darbą sudaro įvadas, trys pagrindiniai skyriai, bendrosios išvados, literatūros sąrašas, publikacijų sąrašas. Pirmame skyriuje Skyriuje analizuojamos pasaulyje naudojamos kalbos animavimo technologijos. Kalbos signalas yra ir girdimas, ir matomas, todėl jos animacija yra sudėtinis procesas priklausantis nuo pasirinktos veido modeliavimo metodikos, kalbos signalo tipo, ir koartikuliacijos valdymo modelio. Antrajame... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / Speech animation is widely used in technical devices to allow the growing number of hearing impaired persons, children, middle-aged and elderly equal participation in communication. Speech animation systems (“Talking heads”) are basically driven by speech phonetics and their visual representation – visemes. Acuraccy of the chosen speech recognition engine, naturally looking visemes, phoneme to viseme mapping and coarticulation control model considerably influence the quality of animated speech. Speech animation is strongly related with language phonetics, so new“Talking heads” should be created to animate different languages. Framework suitable to animate Lithuanian speech, which includes two new models that help to improve intelligibility of animated Lithuanian speech is used to create Lithuanian „Talking head” „LIT”. The dissertation consists of Introduction, three main chapters and general conclusions. Chapter 1 provides the analysis of the existing speech animation technologies. Different facial modelling techniques are analysed to define the most suitable 3D „Talking head” modelling technique for Lithuanian language. Viseme classification experiments across different languages are analysed to identify variety of viseme classification methods. Coarticulation control models are compared to deside which one should be used to define coarticulation of Lithuanian speech. Chapter 2 describes theoretical framework for Lithuanian speech animation. Translingual visual speech... [to full text]

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of former teen talking circle participant’s experience with the practice of compassionate listening in talking circles and to explore compassionate listening as a form of spiritual activism. This study explored the use and effect of compassionate listening within the facilitator training materials developed and used by the organization Teen Talking Circles as well as the use and experience of compassionate listening within the teen talking circles. For the purpose of this study, I interviewed seven former female teen talking circle participants. Open ended semi-structured interviews were the means of data collection. Data were analyzed thematically and after reviewing the transcripts from all seven interviews, the five strongest themes to come out of the interviews were: increased communication skills, increased awareness, less judgment of self and others, deeper relationships and an increased sense of empathy.

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of former teen talking circle participant’s experience with the practice of compassionate listening in talking circles and to explore compassionate listening as a form of spiritual activism. This study explored the use and effect of compassionate listening within the facilitator training materials developed and used by the organization Teen Talking Circles as well as the use and experience of compassionate listening within the teen talking circles. For the purpose of this study, I interviewed seven former female teen talking circle participants. Open ended semi-structured interviews were the means of data collection. Data were analyzed thematically and after reviewing the transcripts from all seven interviews, the five strongest themes to come out of the interviews were: increased communication skills, increased awareness, less judgment of self and others, deeper relationships and an increased sense of empathy.

Programs to support early literacy development are implemented regularly in the schools without research on their efficacy. This study examined the efficacy of a commonly used program for struggling readers. Twelve kindergarten children who were at-risk for reading difficulties took part in a 10 week intervention program called Talking Tables. Twelve kindergarten children, also at-risk for reading difficulties were the control group, and received no intervention. The children in the intervention group made significant gains in phonological awareness. The results suggest that the Talking Tables is effective as an early intervention in developing phonological awareness skills in kindergarten children that are at-risk for reading difficulties. / Graduate / 0535

DAISY book production at the ONCE, with the digitization and subsequent reformatting of our stacks to the DAISY standard, has pursued two key objectives: to digitize our collection as quickly and efficiently as possible and to lower the production costs of digital talking books in DAISY format. This discussion describes the highlights of that process.