Speak & Math
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The Speak & Math was a popular and revolutionary electronic toy created by Texas Instruments in 1980. Speak & Math was one of a three-part talking educational toy series that also included Speak & Spell and Speak & Read. The Speak & Math was sold in both the United States and in Europe; it was originally advertised as a tool for helping young children to become better at mathematics. The Speak & Math had a distinct gray with blue and orange color scheme.
The unit could utilize either 4 "C" batteries or 6 volt DC power adapter. The display resembled a vacuum fluorescent display, not unlike an LED display. The Speak & Math used a TI TMS5110 chip for voice synthesis.
Speak & Math had five distinct learning games: Solve It, Word Problems, Greater Than/Less Than, Write It, and Number Stumper. Solve It is the classic math problem-solving game where the participant must solve ten math problems to the best of their ability. The Speak & Math, like the earlier Speak & Spell, also had the ability to expand its memory using expansion modules that plugged into a slot near the battery compartment.
External links
- The Texas Instruments Speak & Math page (http://www.99er.net/spkmath.html)
- The Chip Collection at the Smithsonian - TI Speak & Math (http://smithsonianchips.si.edu/texas/ref434.htm)