Phillip Schofield missed watching his own show to launch a new app which will help deaf children learn to read with their parents.
The ‘This Morning’ presenter and Tess Daly were among the stars at Winterland in South London on Tuesday night (04.12.18) to introduce Huawei’s StorySign app, which uses the telecommunications giant’s AI to instantly translate selected children’s books into sign language, opening up the world of books to deaf kids.
Phil admitted he is a huge fan of new technology, and was missing his latest programme, ‘How to Spend It Well at Christmas’, to launch the amazing app.
Speaking alongside Tess at the StorySign launch, he said: "We were talking earlier on. I love new tech, in fact I’m on the telly with new tech in about 20 minutes time. I’ve missed my own show!
"I love new discoveries, and I’ve been learning about the app for the past few days and learning what it can do.
"When we had our little girls one of the greatest times of the day was story time, and we would sit together, all of us, and read a book.
"I just didn’t realise that was so difficult if your child was deaf. Because it just doesn’t translate.
"You have to be much closer to the deaf community to understand something like that.
"This evening, we’ve sat with the children and their parents and watched them utterly entranced as storytime suddenly came to life in front of them.
"Their faces were so fabulous. It was utterly magical.
"This really is something really special – so we are really proud to be here today."
Tess said: "This is such an important moment for deaf children in the UK. Learning to read is such a huge part of growing up.
"It’s amazing to be a part of helping make that a possibility for more children and bring story time to life for the whole family."
Several other stars, such as retired rugby union pro Ben Cohen – who is profoundly deaf – and Love Island’s Jack Fincham, as well as key figures from the British Deaf Association (BDA), were also in attendance at the event.
Ben’s wife Kristina Rihanoff has admitted she is so amazed how he managed to take part in ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ – where they first met – considering he couldn’t hear the music.
She wrote on Twitter: "Great app from @HuaweiMobileUK and I know how much it means to @RugbyBenCohen who’s profoundly deaf and who achieve so much in sport ! Still can’t believe he did @bbcstrictly and couldn’t even hear the music … but of course it wasn’t mentioned then …. #Huawei #MobileApp (sic)"
Pioneered by Huawei, StorySign, with the help of friendly avatar Star, uses the power of Huawei AI, to translate the featured book into perfect sign language page by page, delivering a seamless user experience.
StorySign can be downloaded for free from Google Play Store and the Huawei App gallery.
Donations can be made via the StorySign campaign hub on the Huawei website throughout December and all money raised will support deaf child literacy projects across Europe, with a percentage invested in to more books for StorySign.
Phillip Schofield ‘proud’ to launch StorySign app to help deaf kids
