1. On your Chromebook, go to the bottom right corner and select the time

2. Select the settings gear on the top right of the pop-up window

3. At the bottom left, select Advanced

4. Scroll down on the left menu and select Accessibility 

5. Select Manage accessibility features

6. Scroll down and under the Keyboard and text input section, turn on Enable dictation (speak to type)

7. Open your document and click where you want to type

8. Select the microphone in the bottom right corner to begin speaking

9. Once you are finished speaking, select the microphone again to turn off the speech to text feature

This process will only need to be set up once per Chromebook/student

Listening to part of a page

To select specific text on a page to be read to you, turn on Select-to-speak.

Step 1: Turn on Select-to-speak

1. At the bottom right, select the time. Or press Alt + Shift + S

2. Select Settings

3. At the bottom, select Advanced

4. In the Accessibility section, select Manage accessibility features

5. Under Text-to-Speech, turn on Enable select-to-speak

        Tip: Learn how to change the language, voice, and volume for text read aloud

Step 2: Select & hear text

Important: Depending on your keyboard, you can press the Search key or the Launcher key for some shortcuts. Both keys work the same.

Option 1

1. Press and hold the Search key

2. Drag the pointer over an area of text.

Option 2

1. Highlight the text to be read.

2. Press the Search key + S

Option 3

1. At the bottom right, near the time, select Select-to-Speak

2. Drag the pointer over an area of text

        Tip: If you’re on a touchscreen, tap a line of text or drag your finger over an area of the screen.                  

Your Chromebook reads the section aloud and each word is highlighted. 

To stop Select-to-Speak while it’s reading, press Ctrl or the Search key. You can also select Stop.

        Tip: With navigation controls, you can pause and play, adjust speed, and skip lines of text.

Highlight or shade background text

If you are using Select-to-speak, each word will be highlighted as it's spoken. You can turn off highlighting, change the color of the highlighted words, or shade the screen behind the selected text.

1. At the bottom right, select the time. Or press Alt + Shift + S

2. Select Settings

3. At the bottom, select Advanced

4. In the Accessibility section, select Manage accessibility features

5. Under Text-to-Speech, turn on Select-to-speak

6. Select Open select-to-speak settings. Under Highlighting, you can:

     ● Turn on Highlight each word as it is spoken.

     ● Select a color next to Color for word highlights.

        Tip: To get the strongest contrast, we recommend using green or pink, especially if you’re using high contrast mode.

● Turn on Shade background content: This allows you to shade the whole screen, except for the text being spoken.

Step Sheet for the above directions

Chromebooks are powerful. But nobody seems to tell you about some of their best features!

Here are some Chromebook tips you might not know … 

Using the keys above the row of numbers:

Do the browser tab slide!

Put three fingers gently on the touchpad and slide them to the right or left. It lets you switch which tab is active / displayed on your screen. It makes multi-tasking so quick and easy!

To the left, to the right …

You can put two windows side by side in a snap! Drag a window to the top right or top left corner of your Chromebook. It’ll snap to half the size of your screen. Drag one to the right and one to the left and you’ll have equally-sized side-by-side windows right away!

 … get up, get down!

Using two fingers on the touchpad can help you “get up” and “get down” in a couple of ways! Drag those two fingers up and down on the touchpad to scroll up and scroll down. Or, hold Ctrl + Alt + two-finger drag to enable to screen magnifying glass!

Take it to the max — fast!

Double-click the top of a window on a Chromebook to maximize it. Double-click it again to make it smaller and moveable again.

Bookmark like a pro!

Keep your most commonly used websites saved as bookmarks in your bookmarks bar. Ctrl + Shift + B will show/hide your bookmarks bar. Use the star button in your web browser bar to add your current website as a bookmark. Make sure to change its location to “Bookmarks Bar” so it’ll show up in that bar!

Boom — a new window!

Don’t just click a link to open it. Do a three-finger tap on your touchpad to open that link in a brand new window.