Help for Dictation

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Instructions

First listen to the recording once and then go to the large text entry box below. Within the box, you can use shortcut keys to play individual pieces of the recording. Typically you play one part using the ‘>’ key (right angle bracket) and type what you hear. Then you press the ‘>’ key again to play the next part and type it too, and so on until you reach the end of the recording.

Then you can use the evaluation keys to evaluate the whole text.

Pay special attention to punctuation and case, since these cause most of the problems when evaluating your answer. Type all the sentences as you hear them, using the appropriate punctuation character and one space after each sentence. No space is allowed after the last sentence.

Note: Of course, you can replay the recording as many times as you need in order to understand it, although two attempts should be enough for a well performing student.

Shortcut Keys

In all the exercises where you fill in the text into a text-box you can use the two shortcut keys described below.

Enter
Use this key within the text-field to evaluate the current answer. You hear a sound response and in case of an error, the cursor is moved to the position of the first incorrect character within the text. This way you can locate the error, fix it and evaluate again. When you don't know how to fix an error, you can use the ‘hint’ key described below.
Ctrl-Space
This function is called a ‘hint’. It helps you in case you don't know the answer or you don't know how to fix an error in your answer. Just press the key combination (holding the Ctrl key, press the spacebar) and one letter of the correct answer will be filled in automatically. If you have already entered some text, the cursor will be moved to after the last correct character and next one will be inserted. This also means that if there is some text after the cursor, there is at least one error in it. Try to locate this error and correct it. Then you can evaluate your answer using the ‘Enter’ key (see above) or use ‘hint’ again, until you find the complete answer.

Also, in the dictation exercise text box, you can use the following keys to control the playback of the recording:

> (right angle bracket, greater than sign)
Play next piece of the recording.
< (left angle bracket, less than sign)
Play the previous piece of the recording.
Ctrl-Enter
Replay the current (last played) piece of the recording once again.

Indicators

The indicator panel below the exercise shows the following values:

Result:
Displays the result of the last evaluation (evaluate your answer by pressing the ‘Enter’ key or by the ‘Evaluate’ button below the exercise).

Control Panel

The control panel below the exercise contains the following buttons:

Evaluate
Evaluate the entire exercise. If an error is found, the cursor is moved to the first incorrect answer. Within a text-box, the cursor is also moved to the first incorrect character of your answer.
Fill
Fill in the whole exercise with the correct answers.
Reset
Reset all your answers and start again.

Answer Sheets

The Answer Sheets contain all the correct answers for all the exercises. You can access them from the Course Index, or more conveniently, you can use the ‘?’ (question mark) link after each task. This link takes you directly to the corresponding answer in the Answer Sheet.

Version 2.0 (2011-12-07 01:30 CET)