Dictionedit

Dictationedit is an app for practicing the pronunciation of foreign words. You produce a target word and the app uses Siri to transcribe your speech. Then it applies a metric called the string edit distance to compare the produced word and the target word. This tells us how close you are to the target. It also records which letters you get wrong and this can help you to figure out which sounds are difficult. By practicing with this tool, you can improve your pronunciation.

The start page allows you to select the language and test file that you want to use. This tool was developed for Japanese students learning English, so it comes with Set1, which has words that Japanese people have trouble pronouncing correctly. After clicking start, you will see target word at the top. Press and hold down the Record key while saying the word. If the system can transcribe it, it will tell you how close you are to the target in edit distance. The statistics page provides counts of how many errors you made on various sounds.

Dictedit comes with files for practicing English, Japanese, French, and Spanish. It is also possible to generate your own personal list. The program can transcribe any language that siri can recognize (e.g., Chinese, Hungarian, Hebrew, Thai, Turkish)