How Huawei's AI is helping deaf children read
What's the story
For deaf kids, reading and understanding the context of a text can be difficult, especially when their parents lack the required sign language skills to explain things. They can fail to link words with real-life experiences and end up being angry or frustrated. But now, Huawei has a way to tackle the problem - an AI-based app called StorySign. Here's how it helps.
App details
StorySign: How does it help?
StorySign, as Huawei describes, utilizes AI and language learning capabilities to translate the text of a book into sign language. As the text on a page is scanned (from phone's camera), the app recognizes and translates it to produce a realistic avatar called Star. Then, Star uses sign language to explain the context of each individual word being highlighted from that text.
Added benefit
With this, even parents can learn sign language
The app, which is available for free, not just helps deaf kids, but also teaches their parents the sign language they need to know to communicate. However, it is worth noting that the tech is in fairly early stages and only 10 sign languages are supported at the moment. And, for each sign language, only one book is present - Eric Hill's Where's Spot.
Information
Mores books on their way
Huawei has worked with the British Deaf Association and European Union of the Deaf for this feature and has promised to bring "many more books" in the future. However, it might be a while before that happens because bringing more publishers onboard will take time.