trying to see
Happened to go through half a day’s training undertaken by Enable
India a few months ago, this is a long procrastinated writeup.
It was a training on training blind people on computer literacy.
Its important to understand the people one is working with.
Training has to be adapted to different types of blindness:
– totally blind
– partially blind
There are different degrees of total blindness:
– people have no light perception at all. Everything is just by touch.
– Little light perception. Can just make out that something is there – something like a shadow.
There are different degrees of partial
blindness:
– can see things but can’t see clearl. They cannot
recognize anything.
– can read very large size font. But cannot read for more
than few lines as this results in eye pain and tears in the eyes
– cannot
differentiate colors
One key feature of partial blindness is that others
cannot recognize that the person is blind.
Braile
– written using
a braile slate
– just 6 dots – represents any language in the world
– its
based on phonetics
There was a
demo of braile as well, there was a slate, with rows of small slots (one
for each character) and each slot having six round dents like those shown
above. A sheet of newspaper was kept on the slate and there was a sound
like a machine gun going on when the the ‘writer’ (or ‘brailist’?)
started writing characters using what looked like a stylus.
Finally the newspaper was passed around to us – which was to be read
on the other side (because punching the newspaper resulted in embossing on the
other side!
Computer Training
– First issue is keyboard orientation
– central
keys have an denification – a slight dent (same with telephone
btw)
JAWS (Job Access With Speech)
One of the main software for training Screen
reading software like Microsoft Narrator – but very sophisticated and advanced.
One of the key features of this is that there’s NO MOUSE!! It has commands to
read the title, to read current para, next para. It has a customizable
dictionary for correct pronounciation.
To learn to correct mistakes: It
requires understanding of cursor behaviour. But how do we explain what that
blinking thing called the cursor is? How do we convey that idea? Can be
done by giving stylus or pen – how the cursor moes to the next position
automatically.
Explaining about menus… and
submenus…
– Use cardboard strips on a sheet of paper to
indicate menu
– Initially the sheet is empty, the student feels the empty
sheet
– then one strip is placed, this represents the main menu (Eg
Dosa)
– (what time of dosa?) Then a sub menu (masala dosa)
– Then a sub
sub menu (benne/butter masala dosa)
– After selection, return the empty sheet
– everything gone, a notepad window opens (if
Programs->Accessories->Notepad was selected in
menu)
Dialog box
A little complicated. In
general, what is a dialog box?
– question and answer
– intereacting
with each other
There has to be a response. Till then, there’s no
end!
JAWS guides the kind of input field.
Giving an idea about a
Dialog Box in the real world:
– by giving a form and explaining about
different input fields
Suppose we have a very large dialog box, and we
need only a small amount of information in it. Then use JAWS cursor. This allows
random access, somewhat similar to a mouse.
If the cursor is far away,
then Root Cursor to PC makes it read from How do we explain file and folder
system?
Give an example of cupboards, and papers in the
cupboards
Anju (PRO for Samarthan) has some interesting
ambitions: she wants to point out flaws in JAWS, wants to develop it
for Linux, among a lot of other ambitions. I really respect the spirit of Anju
when she said she wanted to learn programming and solve such problems
herself!
The most amazing thing is that all the trainers were partially
or totally blind, and gave themselves as examples while explaining different
kinds of blindness.
One interesting incident, narrated by one of the
trainers who was partially blind, and its not easy to make out he’s blind. He
had been on a bus and the conductor didn’t believe he was really blind, and
reprimanded him for taking a false pass. But then he could explain and was very
understanding about the conductor’s behaviour.
Any more info like names
of people whom I’ve forgotten is also welcome.
Drawbacks with JAWS:
– Very *very*
expensive (close to 1000$). A lot of people use evaluation copies but because of
its Trial Limitation forces them to restart the computer every now and then.
However not many equivalent cheaper versions seem to
be available.
– Microsoft Windows specific software – not much support for Linux, etc.
——-
More about Enable
India:
EnAble
India’s mission is to empower people with disabilities. .
The mission is founded on the firm belief that people with disabilities do not
need sympathy – they require the right environment to grow and fulfill their
needs, potential and dreams.
—–
interesting:
4, 1809 – January 6, 1852) was the inventor of braille, a world-wide system used
by blind and visually impaired people for reading and writing. Braille is read
by passing one’s fingers over characters made up of an arrangement of one to six
embossed points. It has been adapted to almost every known language.
eye with a stitching awl from his father’s workshop. This destroyed his left
eye, and sympathetic ophthalmia led to loss of vision in his right. Braille was
completely blind by the age of four. Despite his disability, Braille continued
to attend school, with the support of his parents, until he was required to read
and write.
…
In 1821, a former soldier named Charles Barbier visited the
school. Barbier shared his invention called “night writing,” a code of twelve
raised dots that let soldiers share top-secret information on the battlefield
without having to speak. Although the code ended up being too difficult for the
average soldier, Braille picked it up quickly.
raised-dot system with his father’s stitching awl, finishing at age fifteen.
Braille’s system, “braille”, used only six dots and corresponded to
letters
stiching awl – when that’s how he’d got blinded in the first
place!!
———
everyone in the world including me is blind in some way or the other. Even
though we can see, we’re still engulfed in so much of darkness of
ignorance. Being blind to optical waves is just one way of being blind, and
trivial compared to the blindness of apathy, insensitivity, a long
list…!
Being born with good eyesight is a very great and fortunate gift. Trying to see the perspective of those who do not have this particular gift (but plenty of others) is always a very educational excercise. Whatever questions posed here are almost negligible compared to the ones that come up when one is actually facing such a person. How to communicate the concepts and ideas so familiar in the visual world to one who isn’t familiar with it? How to integrate the two worlds, so that differences are bridged… walls are broken? When can they integrate seamlessly into society… with dignity and equality? And tap their true potential instead of getting bogged down by limitations!
I suppose this would be where
creativity would really come in – to come up with solutions to such really challenging problems!
Working along with individuals or organisations like Enable India/Samarthan, we
could all help each other to see better 🙂
A visually impaired colleague from the US shares his experiences which gives one a good idea of his perspective.
—
This email esp the last line definitely raises serious questions on the direction of the software industry. Something maybe I or hopefully atleast someone will be be able to address some day!
sanjay, thanks for sharing this mail. serious problem, really. wish someone comes up with a solution soon.