ASL-to-Speech Glove: Converting Signed Letters into Speech
CSEF · 2026 Electronics & Electromagnetics (Junior Division)
Overview
The purpose of this project is to create a wearable glove that can detect specific American Sign Language (ASL) hand signs and convert them into speech using a computer. The goal is to reduce communication barriers between hearing people and those who are deaf or hard of hearing. Millions rely on ASL every day, but most hearing people cannot understand it, making education, healthcare, and public services more challenging. By designing a low-cost glove that interprets hand gestures, this project shows a practical way to improve communication and make technology more accessible. The glove was built to recognize six ASL letters, including A, C, D, Y, L, and V, and convert real-time hand movements into spoken words. This project adds new information by testing the prototype’s accuracy, response time, consistency, and false positive rate. The design involves attaching flex sensors to a glove, connecting them to an Arduino, programming it to read sensor values, sending the data to a Python script, and generating speech output. Performance tests showed the glove reliably detected the letters, with accuracy ranging from 80% to 100%, average response times under 0.5 seconds, mostly stable readings for consistent hand positions, and a low false positive rate of 10%. Overall, the project shows that a simple glove can successfully recognize and speak a limited set of ASL letters. This proves that the idea works and provides a foundation to expand the system in the future to include more letters, the full alphabet, or additional hand gestures.
Competition history
- CSEF 2026
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Source: California Science & Engineering Fair public projects