Children at 10 rural area schools of Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Karachi, operated by Developments in Literacy, have a new companion in school. This Reading Companion takes the shape of a friendly animated character that comes to life in the computer lab and helps children with their English reading skills. Reading Companion is IBM’s (NYSE: IBM) global literacy initiative that was introduced in Pakistan very recently in partnership with Developments in Literacy (DIL), a renowned local non-profit organisation that is working on making education available to underprivileged students. Reading Companion, accessible online to students and teachers, will be available to around 10 schools managed by DIL with approximately 1,500 enrolled students.
The goal of the Reading Companion grant programme is to help children and adults around the world to gain English literacy skills by using IBM’s voice recognition technology over the web. The Reading Companion software ‘listens’ and then provides immediate audio feedback on pronunciation and accuracy. Reading Companion will further be offered to selected schools throughout 2012. This will make way for IBM to expand on its mission of providing education to Pakistani children especially in the more disadvantaged communities.
