Can lipreading be taught with an interactive videodisc based system?

Allao is a computer-based video system developed to provide lip-reading instruction to hearing-impaired adults and teen-agers. This system was designed to assist the speech therapist during a rehabilitation program; it does not pretend to be a substitute. Allao system performs what the therapist cannot do easily or willingly. For a detailed description of the system, refer to Guilliams. Allao system has been used on a regular basis for three years in various experimental centres for lip reading training and testing. Some two hundred hearing impaired people took part in the experiment under the guidance of about twenty speech-therapists. There, the teaching method received a pedagogical and ergonomic validation. These wide scale investigations allow us to conclude that this kind of computer based video equipment is both very interesting and relevant to the teaching of lip reading to hearing-impaired persons.