Need an app to help you tackle those 2025 fitness goals? Here's 8.

For Makenzie Gilkison, spelling is such a struggle that a word like rhinoceros might come out as rineanswsaurs or sarcastic as srkastik.The 14-year-old from suburban Indianapolis can sound out words, but her dyslexia makes the process so draining that she often struggles with comprehension. I just assumed I was stupid, she recalled of her early grade school years.But assistive technology powered by artificial intelligence has helped her keep up with classmates. Last year, Makenzie was named to the National Junior Honor Society. She credits a customized AI-powered chatbot, a word prediction program and other tools that can read for her.I would have just probably given up if I didnt have them, she said.Artificial intelligence holds the promise of helping countless other students with a range of visual, speech, language and hearing impairments to execute tasks that come easily to others. Schools everywhere have been wrestling with how and where to incorporate AI, but many are fast-tracking applications for students with disabilities.Getting the latest technology into the hands of students with disabilities is a priority for the U.S. Education Department, which has told schools they must consider whether students need tools like text-to-speech and alternative communication devices. New rules from the Department of Justice also will require schools and other government entities to make apps and online content accessible to those with disabilities.There is concern about how to ensure students using it including those with disabilities are still learning.Students can use artificial intelligence to summarize jumbled thoughts into an outline, summarize complicated passages, or even translate Shakespeare into common English. And computer-generated voices that can read passages for visually impaired and dyslexic students are becoming less robotic and more natural.Im seeing that a lot of students are kind of exploring on their own, almost feeling like theyve found a cheat code in a video game, said Alexis Reid, an educational therapist in the Boston area who works with students with learning disabilities. But in her view, it is far from cheating: Were meeting students where they are.Ben Snyder, a 14-year-old freshman from Larchmont, New York, who was recently diagnosed with a learning disability, has been increasingly using AI to help with homework.Sometimes in math, my teachers will explain a problem to me, but it just makes absolutely no sense, he said. So if I plug that problem into AI, itll give me multiple different ways of explaining how to do that.He likes a program called Question AI. Earlier in the day, he asked the program to help him write an outline for a book report a task he completed in 15 minutes that otherwise would have taken him an hour and a half because of his struggles with writing and organization. But he does think using AI to write the whole report crosses a line.Thats just cheating, Ben said.Schools have been trying to balance the technologys benefits against the risk that it will do too much. If a special education plan sets reading growth as a goal, the student needs to improve that skill. AI cant do it for them, said Mary Lawson, general counsel at the Council of the Great City Schools.But the technology can help level the playing field for students with disabilities, said Paul Sanft, director of a Minnesota-based center where families can try out different assistive technology tools and borrow devices.There are definitely going to be people who use some of these tools in nefarious ways. Thats always going to happen, Sanft said. But I dont think thats the biggest concern with people with disabilities, who are just trying to do something that they couldnt do before.Another risk is that AI will track students into less rigorous courses of study. And, because it is so good at identifying patterns, AI might be able to figure out a student has a disability. Having that disclosed by AI and not the student or their family could create ethical dilemmas, said Luis Prez, the disability and digital inclusion lead at the Center for Accessible Technology.Schools are using the technology to help students who struggle academically, even if they do not qualify for special education services. In Iowa, a new law requires students deemed not proficient about a quarter of them to get an individualized reading plan. As part of that effort, the states education department spent $3 million on an AI-driven personalized tutoring program. When students struggle, a digital avatar intervenes.More AI tools are coming soon.The U.S. National Science Foundation is funding AI research and development. One firm is developing tools to help children with speech and language difficulties. Called the National AI Institute for Exceptional Education, it is headquartered at the University of Buffalo, which did pioneering work on handwriting recognition that helped the U.S. Postal Service save hundreds of millions of dollars by automating processing.We are able to solve the postal application with very high accuracy. When it comes to childrens handwriting, we fail very badly, said Venu Govindaraju, the director of the institute. He sees it as an area that needs more work, along with speech-to-text technology, which isnt as good at understanding childrens voices, particularly if there is a speech impediment.Sorting through the sheer number of programs developed by education technology companies can be a time-consuming challenge for schools. Richard Culatta, CEO of the International Society for Technology in Education, said the nonprofit launched an effort this fall to make it easier for districts to vet what they are buying and ensure it is accessible.Makenzie wishes some of the tools were easier to use. Sometimes a feature will inexplicably be turned off, and she will be without it for a week while the tech team investigates. The challenges can be so cumbersome that some students resist the technology entirely.But Makenzies mother, Nadine Gilkison, who works as a technology integration supervisor at Franklin Township Community School Corporation in Indiana, said she sees more promise than downside.In September, her district rolled out chatbots to help special education students in high school. She said teachers, who sometimes struggled to provide students the help they needed, became emotional when they heard about the program. Until now, students were reliant on someone to help them, unable to move ahead on their own.Now we dont need to wait anymore, she said.The Associated Press education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find APs standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.Heather Hollingsworth, Associated Press

Jinjiang Group, a contractor for Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD, said on Thursday Brazilian authorities portrayal of their employees as enslaved was inconsistent with the facts and that there were translation misunderstandings.Brazilian labor authorities had on Wednesday said they found 163 Chinese nationals working in slavery-like conditions at a construction site for a BYD-owned factory in Brazils Bahia state. BYD said then that it had cut ties with the firm that hired the workers and was working with authorities.Being unjustly labeled as enslaved has made our employees feel that their dignity has been insulted and their human rights violated, seriously hurting the dignity of the Chinese people. We have signed a joint letter to express our true feelings, Jinjiang said on its official Weibo account.Their statement was reposted by Li Yunfei, general manager of branding and public relations at BYD, on his own Weibo account. He accused foreign forces and some Chinese media of deliberately smearing Chinese brands and the country and undermining the relationship between China and Brazil.A BYD representative directed Reuters to Lis Weibo post when asked about Jinjiangs comments and the situation. Jinjiang did not respond to a request for comment from Reuters.BYD has been building the factory with an annual capacity of producing 150,000 cars initially in Brazil, the Chinese EV giants largest overseas market, as part of plans to start production there in 2024 or early 2025.Brazil is poised to hike tariffs on imported EVs to 35% in July 2026 from 18% currently.On Wednesday, Chinas foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said the Chinese embassy in Brazil was communicating with Brazilian counterparts to verify the situation and handle it.Jinjiang said there had been translation and cultural difference issues that had led to the situation, and that the questions from the Brazilian inspectors had been suggestive. It also posted a video showing a group of Chinese workers in front of the camera with one of them reading out a letter that Jinjiang said the workers have jointly signed.The letter said, for instance, that 107 workers had handed their passports to the company for help with applying for a temporary ID certificate in Brazil. The Brazilian labor inspectors had said that the workers had had their passports withheld by the company.We are very happy to come to Camacari to work, an unidentified Chinese male said in the video.We have been complying with laws and regulations, working hard during the period with a hope that the construction of the biggest new energy vehicle project in Brazil could be completed as soon as possible, he added.Beijing and Shanghai newsroom, Reuters

What a wonderful year 2024 has been for investors.U.S. stocks ripped higher and carried the S&P 500 to records as the economy kept growing and the Federal Reserve began cutting interest rates.The year featured many familiar winners, such as Big Tech, which got even bigger as their stock prices kept growing. But it wasnt just Apple, Nvidia, and the like. Bitcoin, gold, and other investments also drove higher.Heres a look at some of the numbers that defined the year. All are as of Dec. 20.1998Remember when President Bill Clinton got impeached or when baseballs Mark McGwire hit his 70th home run against the Montreal Expos? That was the last time the U.S. stock market closed out a second straight year with a leap of at least 20%, something the S&P 500 is on track to do again this year. The index has climbed 24.3% so far this year, not including dividends, following last years spurt of 24.2%.57The number of all-time highs the S&P 500 has set so far this year. The first came early, on Jan. 19, when the index capped a two-year comeback from the swoon caused by high inflation and worries that high interest rates instituted by the Federal Reserve to combat it would create a recession. But the index was methodical through the rest of the year, setting a record in every month outside of April and August, according to S&P Dow Jones Indices. The latest came on Dec. 6.3The number of times the Federal Reserve has cut its main interest rate this year from a two-decade high, offering some relief to the economy. Expectations for those cuts, along with hopes for more in 2025, were a big reason the U.S. stock market has been so successful this year. The 1 percentage point of cuts, though, is still short of the 1.5 percentage points that many traders were forecasting for 2024 at the start of the year. The Fed disappointed investors in December when it said it may cut rates just two more times in 2025, fewer than it had earlier expected.1,508Thats how many points the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose by the day after Election Day, as investors made bets on what Donald Trumps return to the White House will mean for the economy and the world. The more widely followed S&P 500 soared 2.5% for its best day in nearly two years. Aside from bitcoin, stocks of banks and smaller winners were also perceived to be big winners. The bump has since diminished amid worries that Trumps policies could also send inflation higher.$100,000The level that bitcoin topped to set a record above $108,000 this past month. Its been climbing as interest rates come down, and it got a particularly big boost following Trumps election. Hes turned around and become a fan of crypto, and hes named a former regulator whos seen as friendly to digital currencies as the next chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, replacingsomeone who critics saidwas overly aggressive in his oversight. Bitcoin was below $17,000 just two years ago following thecollapse of crypto exchange FTX.26.7%Golds rise for the year, as it also hit records and had as strong a run as U.S. stocks. Wars around the world have helped drive demand for investments seen as safe, such as gold. Its also benefited from the Feds cut to interest rates. When bonds are paying less in interest, they pull away fewer potential buyers from gold, which pays investors nothing.$420Its a favorite number of Elon Musk, and its also a threshold that Teslas stock price passed in December as it set a record. The number has a long history among marijuana devotees, and Musk famously said in 2018 that he had secured funding to take Tesla private at $420 per share. Tesla soared this year, up from less than $250 at the start, in part because of expectations that Musks close relationship with Trump could benefit the company.$91.2 billionThats how much revenue Nvidia made in the nine months through Oct. 27, showing how the artificial-intelligence frenzy is creating mountains of cash. Nvidias chips are driving much of the move into AI, and its revenue through the last nine months catapulted from less than $39 billion the year before. Such growth has boosted Nvidias worth to more than $3 trillion in total.74%GameStops gain on May 13after Keith Gill, better known as Roaring Kitty, appeared online for the first time in three years to support the video game retailers stock, which he helped rocket to unimaginable heights during the meme stock craze in 2021. Several other meme stocks also jumped following his post in May on the social platform X, including AMC Entertainment. Gill later disclosed a sizeable stake in the online pet products retailer Chewy, but hesold all of his holdings by late October.1.6%, 3.0%, and 3.1%Thats how much the U.S. economy grew, at annualized seasonally adjusted rates, in each of the three first quarters of this year. Such growth blew past what many pessimists were expecting when inflation was topping 9% in the summer of 2022. The fear was that the medicine prescribed by the Fed to beat high inflation high interest rates would create a recession. Households at the lower end of the income spectrum in particular are feeling pain now, as they contend with still-high prices. But the overall economy has remained remarkably resilient.20.1%This is the vacancy rate for U.S. office buildings an all-time high through the first three quarters of 2024, according to data from Moodys. The fact the rate held steady for most of the year was something of a win for office building owners, given that it had marched up steadily from 16.8% in the fourth quarter of 2019. Demand for office space weakened as the pandemic led to the popularization of remote work.3.73 millionThatsthe total number of previously occupied homes sold nationallythrough the first 11 months of 2024. Sales would have to surge 20% year-over-year in December for 2024s home sales to match the 4.09 million existing homes sold in 2023, a nearly 30-year low. The U.S. housing market has been in a sales slump dating back to 2022, when mortgage rates began to climb from pandemic-era lows. A shortage of homes for sale and elevated mortgage rates have discouraged many would-be homebuyers.

Most smartphones may have now banished microSD cards from their compact bodies, but these tiny storage devices continue to thrive in other areas. Some cameras are switching over to this smaller version of the venerable SD card, and some laptops now have it as a part of their I/O collection. Every year brings some small improvements in their capabilities, whether its in speed or in durability, ensuring they wont be phased out anytime soon.Although microSD cards are often used to move files from one device to another, they often stay inside those devices for long periods of time. Unlike USB sticks that are relatively easier to pull out and plug in, memory cards sometimes require more than just a few steps to remove them from or insert them inside devices. Thats why theyre often used as semi-permanent storage expansion for devices and laptops, which makes these specially-designed microSD cards a little surprising and perhaps a bit pointless.Designers: Samsung, SEGAThere are many fictional characters whose names are immediately associated with speed, from DC superhero Flash to video game icon Sonic the Hedgehog. The latter has gotten a bit of notoriety after jumping from games to the big screen, splitting fans between those who love the live-action adaption and those who consider it a disappointment. Regardless, that fandom remains solid and strong, at least enough for Samsung to dedicate a few of its memory cards to the franchise.As the name clearly states, the new Sonic the Hedgehog PRO Plus microSD cards combine two things that are supposed to be related to speed. Samsung boats read and write speeds of up to 180 MB/s and 130 MB/s, respectively, making them ideal not just for cameras but for some gaming handhelds as well. Its no surprise, then that Samsung would want to etch the image of Sonic the Hedgehog characters on these cards, whether those claims meet reality or not.Interestingly, these PRO Plus microSD cards are also being promoted for their durability, much like the resilient heroes of the video game franchise. They are particularly boasted to be resistant to water, high temperatures, X-rays, and even magnetic fields, elements that are poison to data storage devices. The cards are also advertised to resist wear out up to 10,000 swipes, meaning you can exchange the card between two devices up to 5,000 times before it starts dying.While the microsSD cards themselves sound quite capable, especially for their price tag, the choice of design is a bit questionable. For one, you basically only have the characters heads printed on the tiny card, barely identifiable at first glance. The other consideration is that youll barely see the markings while theyre inside their respective devices, so theres very little chance to boast your love for the blue hedgehog and his pals. Curiously, the card with the highest capacity (1TB) doesnt have the titular heros face, calling to question who is really the best among these speedsters.The post Samsung microSD cards pay homage to Sonic the Hedgehog in a way youll barely notice first appeared on Yanko Design.

In the 1960s and 70s, he developed the PLATO computer system, which combined instant messaging, email, chat rooms and gaming on flat-screen plasma displays.

William doesn't just work at AppleInsider, he also has a bunch of other writing assignments going constantly. Here's how William juggles not just the demands here, but everywhere else too.That green keyboard toward the back is my newest and quite expensive toy, a Duolingo PianoI'm Deputy Chair of the Writers' Guild of Great Britain and also do some work for a UK charity, so I tend to have whole sets of apps and documents that I switch between. Whatever I've been doing before AppleInsider, I run a Keyboard Maestro macro and all of those apps and documents are closed, then everything I need for AppleInsider is opened.Every day seven days a week starts with the Fantastical calendar and OmniFocus To Do apps on my iPhone. The alarm goes off, those two apps go on, and I'm checking what I must do that day. Invariably the day means being at my office M1 Mac mini or on my M1 Max 14-inch MacBook Pro, and AppleInsider work always starts with Keyboard Maestro. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums

Apple TV+ has hinted that it's planning something for early January, enticing viewers to "see for yourself."Image Credit: Apple TV+On Wednesday, the Apple TV X account posted a cryptic message telling people to "Save the date" and to "see for yourself." The accompanying image, which featured Will Ferrell, also included a date of January 4-5. Save the date. pic.twitter.com/c60xvXY2ZF Apple TV (@AppleTV) December 25, 2024 Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums

If you received a gift card for the holidays or simply want to wrap up purchases for the 2024 tax year, Amazon's after-Christmas sale on Apple products delivers discounts of up to half off.Get up to half off Apple products today - Image credit: AppleThe Dec. 26 deals on Apple devices and accessories provide up to $300 off a variety of Macs, AirPods, iPads and more. Below are 20 top bargains, but there are hundreds more at your fingertips in our Apple Price Guide. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums

Say what you will about 2024 and its myriad failures, especially on the live service front. However, as far as single-player experiences go, weve been stuffed beyond belief. Almost every genre has several acclaimed titles to dive into and lose hundreds of hours, but which all stand above the rest? Check out our picks for the 20 best single-player games of 2024.Silent Hill 2 RemakeTheres something about the second entry in Konamis survival horror series that keeps fans coming back years and years after its launch. Perhaps its the Crime and Punishment-styled plot and how complex James Sunderlands character, ego and all, is portrayed as he roams this nightmare manifest. While concerns arose over Bloober Team adapting the classic (especially given its previous horror titles), it ultimately delivered on its vision of Silent Hill 2.Changes seemed a given, whether the over-the-shoulder camera, new attacks for enemies, a more extensive range of areas to explore or a new voice cast. However, Silent Hill 2 remake is a masterpiece in dread-inducing terror, whether youre walking through its fog-covered streets and watching something scurry nearby or locked in a desperate battle with Pyramid Head. Several sections witnessed significant alterations but didnt hamper the pacing or story-telling, and the presentation, especially composer Akira Yamaokas music, is top-notch. The restless dreams of Konamis classic will likely continue for generations to come, but the remake offers an excellent homecoming for longtime fans.