By Tom Shull | Tuesday, April 15, 2014
After years of planning, discussion, revision, and building, the beta version of the new DailyCues is ready to be tested. Our premise is an editable website/ repository of Cued Speech information and related resources. Unlike other sites, DailyCues allows registered users to add and revise content.
DailyCues aspires to be a true community site that evolves with the knowledge and values of its members. The original site first launched in 2004 by Tom Shull as a place to answer questions commonly asked by his students. Third-party games and quizzes were added to provide practice and test preparation
This new site is vastly different from its predecessor. Driving several features is a lexicon of words with pronunciations and how each is cued. This online Cued Speech dictionary was created by Brad Buran. Rather than entering items by hand, he wrote a program that knows how to cue. His approach allows DailyCues to draw from nearly 140,000 pronunciations of English words and displays them in cue notation. Examples can be also be embeded in pages with pop-up windows displaying how they are cued (see below). Additionally, the site begins with over 2,000 examples cued on video. The developers intend to add more video as the site grows.
DailyCues also includes an online wikipedia called the iQpedia with interrelated articles created and maintained by users. These will allow community members to pool their collective knowledge on topics related to cued language. Members can also add events, news and announcements, and links.
One uniquely innovative feature is the Word List Generator, which creates word lists for users based on any combination cues they specify. Instructors can use this tool to devise a curriculum of words by the order in which cues are taught. Likewise, new cuers can make practice lists specifically tailored to their needs. Need to practice side movements? There are over 3,000 word in English that only use side movements (e.g., aroma, assumption, Parmesan). The Word List Generator will show you all of them.
Updates to the site based on initial feedback will continue for the next few weeks.