by Joe Lonergan

On a recent Talking Technology podcast we spoke about the Talking Calculator app on iPhone and iPad.

David Redmond gave a description of it and a brief demonstration of what it sounds like specifically after he programmed his own voice into the app. That’s right, he put his own voice into the calculator, so as you can imagine as well as being a calculator it can be fun to use for kids and adults.

It is a comprehensive featured calculator designed for adults and primary school kids. This calculator has large colourful buttons, optional high contrast, and full VoiceOver support. As well as being good for VoiceOver users, it is useful for people with development delays.

You can choose from two user interfaces, standard calculator or Ultra simple which is ideal for young children as it reads answers, entered numbers, and formulas aloud. As mentioned on the show you can add your own voice, there is a recording studio section and script to add your own voice and it only takes between five and ten minutes. Recordings can be transferred between devices using Bluetooth.

It speaks numbers very naturally and is easy to listen to. Recording your own voice helps people who have difficulty with certain dialects and accents and also makes it more fun for kids who want to experiment with funny voices. Some kids might prefer to have their tutor’s voice or parent’s voice on a calculator, a familiar voice can help them learn and take in information better. Low vision users have a high contrast mode, black on yellow, as well as many customisable options for each level of vision to add to large clear buttons with optional speech.

The Talking Calculator app costs €1.99 on the iOS App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/talking-calculator/id424464284.

If you are looking for more advanced versions of this calculator you will have to search for the Talking Scientific calculator, or if you are looking for a statistics version you will have to search for the Talking Statistics calculator on the App Store.