Does your school have any software for pupils that can't speak English?

[Garacesh]

Our S.E.N. department recently procured (thankfully, for free) a device that works in conjunction with specially-made books from a company called Mantra Lingua but unfortunately, it doesn't want to play nice with Smoothwall. We're using Kerberos here and the software keeps throwing up 407's (but has no changeable configuration at all). Go figure. They're also rather disappointed that the books don't seem to have any convention of language.. It just seems to be "Whatever translator we could get hold of at the time.".. Some books have a varied range of languages, English, Czech, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish, etc, whereas others are sorely lacking.

 

The child in question (currently) is Albanian and doesn't speak much English at all, but they reasonably expect this situation will occur again, most likely with other languages. I know some users here work in schools that have very large S.E.N. departments so I was wondering if you guys have any recommendations? There is an inspection-of-sorts at the end of February to find out what they're doing about foreign students with language barriers, usual red-tape stuff, so we ideally need something in place by then.

[maark]

Most useful thing we have is a couple of cheap ipods with google translate on - will translate writing and speech.

[Garacesh]

Hm, good point. The SEN dept. do have a suite of iPad's, so apps on there would also be sufficient, I reckon. It depends on if this Albanian child goes to usual lessons or not? The iPad's stay in the SEN room, so that might not be a practical solution. Then again, this software was only due to be installed in the SEN department anyway, so worth looking into.

 

Any apps recommended? Or do you just go to translate.google?

[Ephelyon]

Could this be useful?

 

Language packs - Microsoft Windows

[Garacesh]

@Ephelyon I think the issue is more about teaching the children English as an additional language, rather than accommodating their primary language.

[Ephelyon]

True, but sometimes it helps to work in phases.

[Oaktech]

That mantra lingua thing is of limited use in schools and the support is appalling. It refuses to play nice with anything but unfiltered domestic broadband connections.

 

Maybe 2 years ago I had a blazing row with a guy called Chintra from there who was unbelievably rude and refused to accept that it was his company that was at fault for designing software for schools wouldn't play nice with proxies/filtering/security systems and not my school for using it.

 

For the sake of your blood pressure I would stay clear.

[Garacesh]

@Oaktech, this is what I've said to the lady who was pushed on the training for it. Our LEA has struck a deal with them about getting this pushed out. For now I told her that if we don't get it sorted and the lady that comes to inspect gives her flak for it, she's to parrot the sentence "The software doesn't work as it does not accommodate the web filter we are legally required to have."

 

I e-mailed them for support.. (Names have been removed)

 

Subject: Error 407: Proxy Authentication Required

Hello,

We have been given one of your PENPal devices and a book to test the software within our S.E.N. department.

Our on-site proxy uses a transparent proxy - the credentials used are directly linked with users on our domain. Proxy settings are set automatically.

 

However, your software throws up multiple 407 Proxy Authentication errors upon launch and use, eventually causing the program to crash. I tried to find a way to set the proxy settings manually but there seems to be none, nor any configuration settings at all.

 

Have you any advice on the matter?

Subject: Error 407: Proxy Authentication Required

Hi,

 

Apologies for the inconvenience. Taken from our Help page, please try these solutions:

 

There are two ways to fix this

1) You can go to FreeLINK Live and download the files you wantwww.talkingpen.co.uk/freelinklive . You will need to register seperately here.

Or

2) if you want the software to do all the download management.

1) Get the IT department to add exception to these sites Mantra Lingua EAL MFL Resources, Billingual Books, TalkingPEN. and TalkingPEN UK. Bring Sound to any source. Possibilities are endless. |.

2) Proxy settings are obtained from Internet Explorer, so make sure all the proxy settings are in place in Advanced > LAN Settings.

3) In case you have Internet connection filtered by council, please request an exception to the two sites Mantra Lingua EAL MFL Resources, Billingual Books, TalkingPEN. and TalkingPEN UK. Bring Sound to any source. Possibilities are endless. |

 

Hope this helps.

 

Kind regards

Subject: RE: Error 407: Proxy Authentication Required

I have already reviewed this information.

 

I can see in the proxy logs that your software is encountering our proxy as expected. Neither of the sites are being blocked by domain name. The error is 407: Proxy Authentication Required. The issue is that your software is not providing the credentials of the currently logged-on user. Your software does not also seem to have any kind of modifiable configuration that allows us to specify credentials for it to use.

Subject: Re: Error 407: Proxy Authentication Required

Hi,

 

I'm afraid I have no further information about our software with this issue. I am forwarding your case to my superior. Apologies for the inconvenience.

 

Please use our web version instead: http://www.talkingpen.co.uk/freelinklive

 

Kind regards,

 

Not exactly impressed so far.. Bit of a bummer that you say you've used them before and they were terrible.. Given that the LEA has done a deal with these guys, it looks like our SEN dept. are going to get flak for not using it, which is a shame. They're nice people

Edited January 26, 2015 by Garacesh

[Oaktech]

@Garacesh They shouldn't get flak, it's not their fault. It's a terrible product by people who don't understand their market.

[Garacesh]

They shouldn't, but I'd imagine they probably will if they're expected to be using this software and they're not doing. Stupid red-tape and all.

[X-13]

It's a terrible product by people who don't understand their market.

 

What is "educational software"?

 

 

We have the Mantra pens here. [2 sets, because 1 set was "lost".]

 

Our proxy doesn't require authentication, so we haven't had any issues with that... But I don't think anyone really uses them.

 

 

As for using google translate... YOU HAVE GOOGLE TRANSLATE UNBLOCKED?! You realise you can use it to bypass the filters, right?

[rad]

We have an albanian student. Google Translate is rubbish, I did a few words only for student to reply and say they dont make sense.

 

We dont have a translation software, only what is available via the internet

[Ephelyon]

@Garacesh, if you're using SmoothWall, can you whitelist those sites (not just unblock) and also make them authentication exceptions? That should fix the problem of authentication being required (we're using the same method to support e.g. automatic activation of SureLock on Android tablets).

[Oaktech]

I've just had a chat with our multilingual HLTA - yes, we have one of those. We are using Emas UK - EAL Resources and Tools for Schools which is handy because it deals with a lot of EAL issues including translation which tends to be more context savvy than google translate.