香港小學默書通 Dictation Buddy

Every week the teacher writes the dictation scope in your child's handbook, and every evening a parent reads it out loud, word by word. 香港小學默書通 (Dictation Buddy) turns that into three minutes of prep.

Photograph the list. The words and sentences become a dictation paper that reads itself aloud in Cantonese, Mandarin or English. Your child writes on paper — the real medium — and you mark it by hand. Results are kept for the whole term, so you always know which words still need work. Made for Hong Kong primary school dictation (默書), Chinese and English, P1 to P6.

SNAP THE LIST
• Point at the handbook, worksheet or word list; words and sentences are recognised automatically
• Passage crosses a page? Photograph page by page — the text is stitched back together
• Fix any recognition error against the photo, or just type the list instead
• Words and sentences are sorted apart automatically; title, subject and the dictation date written on the sheet are filled in for you
• Share a finished paper with other parents by link or QR code — one scan and they have the same list

REVISE ONLY WHAT NEEDS IT
• On the dictation page, tap the words and sentences to revise, or select them all
• Flash cards, practice and mock dictation can each run over just the ones you picked

FLASH CARDS (認字) — look before you write
• One card at a time, in large Kai script drawn to the Hong Kong Education Bureau's character-form standard
• Auto-advance and auto-read, or flip through by hand and tap to hear it again

PRACTICE (練習) — for the child, alone
• One giant button: play, hear it again, done — next
• No text on screen, so there is nothing to peek at
• Missed words queue into a retry round until everything is right
• Compared only against their own previous run — no grades, no ranking

MOCK DICTATION (默書) — the night before
• Runs by your school's rules: each word read N times, each sentence N times, fixed writing time, no replay once it starts
• Countdown pacing, question after question, exactly like the real thing
• You mark against the paper, and the score is written out in red pen, stroke by stroke
• Corrections: write each missed word three times on paper and tap a square each time, replaying the audio as you go
• Re-dictate just the ones that were wrong

PROGRESS
• Every word shows its last two results, so weak characters are obvious at a glance
• The home screen suggests tonight's step: practise, or run a mock
• Log the real school score when the book comes back; the term average keeps itself
• Optional 8pm reminder the night before a dictation

VOICES
• Chinese: Cantonese or Mandarin, high-quality cloud voices
• English: read aloud on the device, so mixed Chinese/English lists work
• Adjustable speech rate; punctuation can be spoken or skipped

FREE, WITH ADS
The app is free to use, and its running costs are covered by ads. We're sorry for any inconvenience they cause. If you have any feedback or ideas for improvement, please email us at [email protected].

PRIVACY
No account, no sign-in. Word lists, photos and results are stored on your device. Text recognition and Chinese speech need a network connection: the photo and the dictation text are sent to our processing service. The text-recognition provider does not use this content to train models or publish it, but may retain it.

Your child's handwriting is never recognised or auto-marked. A parent always marks by hand.

Note: the app's interface is in Traditional Chinese. A network connection is needed for text recognition and Chinese speech.