Teaching Efficient Hand Movements in Braille Reading

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Teaching Efficient Hand Movements in Braille
Reading

• Diane P. Wormsley, Ph. D.
• Brenda Brodie Endowed Professor
• North Carolina Central University
• February 22, 2008

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Learner Objectives

• Identify the most efficient method of moving the
  hands in reading braille
• Identify the various braille reading
  characteristics and their implications
• Indicate which pattern would be best for
  beginning readers
• Understand how to teach accuracy and proper hand
  movements simultaneously

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Differences between Print and Braille Reading

• Differences in how the two media are read
• Mechanics eyes vs. fingers
• Perception sequential vs. all at once

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Pauses

• Visual The eye does not move smoothly.
• Tactile Pauses are rare fingers read through
  movement.

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• Movement
• Visual No perception of words and letters
  occurs during movement because movement is too
  rapid.
• Tactile Perception occurs only through movement.

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Pause Time

• Visual 92-98 or reading time is spent in
  pauses.
• Tactile Pause time is minimal.

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Number of Pauses

• Visual As reading skills improves, the number
  of pauses declines.
• Tactile Better readers have smooth movements.

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Span

• Visual Covered three to five words (Japanese
  subjects.)
• Tactile Not relevant

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Locations of Pauses

• Visual Pauses occur irrespective of meaning,
  grammar or rhetoric, or length of a sentence in
  lines.
• Tactile Pauses occur rarely they are found
  near word intervals or at beginnings of words.

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Functions of Pauses

• Visual Readers perceive during pauses.
• Tactile Pauses are halting points, rallying
  points for understanding.

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Functions of flying movements

• Visual Links between pauses.
• Tactile Of paramount significance perception
  occurs through movement.

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Methods of Perception

• Visual Several letters or words are perceived
  all at once in pauses.
• Tactile Letters are perceived successively
  through the movement of the fingers and become
  grouped in perception.
•  

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Word Cues

• Visual The average reader reads sentences with
  the help of small cues, such as the size and
  shape of letters and words.
• Tactile The average reader uses the first and
  second and sometimes the third braille character
  in words as cues to predict or anticipate the
  remainder of the word.

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Dominant and subordinate letters

• Visual Word recognition depends on context and
  letter shapes.
• Tactile The first three characters or letters
  are dominant, along with some characters that are
  also tactilely characteristic or peculiar

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Sensory channel

• Visual Both eyes work together involuntarily
  without conscious knowledge of the activity.
• Tactile Both hands are entirely under voluntary
  control, especially in the early stages of
  learning braille.
• Adapted from Kusajima, T. (1974). Visual Reading
  and Braille Reading An Experimental
  Investigation of the Physiology and Psychology
  of Visual and Tactual Reading. New York
  American Foundation for the Blind.

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• i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty
  uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal
  pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a
  rscheeearr at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't
  mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are,
  the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and
  lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can
  be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit
  a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos
  not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as
  a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot
  slpeling was ipmorantt! if you can raed tihs
  forwrad it.

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Other Differences Between Print and Braille

• Differences in the extent of the literacy media
  in the environments of the readers
• Braille in the environment Harry Potter is in
  braille!
• Quantity of literature
• Numbers of role models for reading/writing

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Other Differences Between Print and Braille
(cont.)

• Differences in the ability to get cues for words
  from the pages of the readers (print readers have
  pictures to help with words).
• Differences in the number of symbols used in the
  literacy medium (contracted braille) and when the
  students are introduced to them.

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Other Differences Between Print and Braille
(cont.)

• Differences in redundancy in print and braille
  relates to confusability of characters.
• The problem of confusability applies to some
  extent to all braille characters because they
  lack the redundancy of print characters, and
  consequently the salient features that redundant
  dimensions produce. (Millar, 1997)

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Redundancy in Print

• It was nearing midnight and the Prime Minister
  was sitting in his office, reading a long memo
  that was slipping through his brain without
  leaving the slightest trace of meaning behind.

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Redundancy in Print

• The more he attempted to focus on the print on
  the page before him, the more clearly the Prime
  Minister could see the gloating face of one of
  his political opponents.

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Redundancy in Print

• The more he attempted to focus on the print on
  the page before him, the more clearly the Prime
  Minister could see the gloating face of one of
  his political opponents.

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Redundancy in Print

• Middles, ends or beginnings absent.
• W-at a mar- - ous opponity!
• Lob- wen- strai--- to th- grandmoth -
• -obo as so enous hat e dnt ait or ttle
  ed
• Would this hold for braille reading?

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Redundancy in Print

• Vowels Absent
• -nc- -p-n t-m- th-r- w-s h-nds-m-
  ---ng w-lf n-m-d L-b-.
• Consonants Absent
• -o-e-i-e- a-- -o-o - -i-- -a- -i-e-e o--
  -a- -e
• Does this hold for braille reading?

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Redundancy in Print

• Vowels removed completely
• Ths dmnstrts tht txt s stll mr r lss lgble whn
  th vwls hv bn rmvd.
• Would this hold for braille reading?
• (examples from Weaver, C., 2002, 91-98)

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Other Differences between Print and Braille
Readers

• in the ability to learn concepts essential for
  reading and writing
• in whether family and friends use your literacy
  medium
• in attitudes towards the literacy medium
• in when a child begins to learn his/her literacy
  medium
• in general cultural knowledge of the literacy
  medium with the population at large

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Impact of Reading Sequentially Developing Skills
of Anticipation and Prediction

• Why is this necessary?
• Differences between print and braille reading
• Braille is read character by character
• Good braille readers use context plus information
  from the first two or three characters of a word
  to anticipate what that word will be allows for
  faster braille reading.

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How do you develop this skill?

• Provide for immersion in language.
• Read to children/let them listen to taped
  storybooks.
• When reading aloud to children, ask them to
  finish sentences for you.
• Play games that provide children with information
  about their ability to predict.
• Provide opportunities for vocabulary and concept
  development.

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Creating Flash Cards

• Use at least 3 x 5 inch cards.
• Cut off top right hand corner.
• Use dots 2-5 lead in line space word space
  dots 2-5 lead out line
• Create numerous cards for same word
• Have children who are capable make their own word
  cards.

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Using Flash Cards

• Provide as much exposure to words as possible.
• Let students look at cards over and over again
• Give them a stack of cards with the same word on
  it to look at
• Watch for fingers numbing out

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• Video demonstrating various hand movement
  patterns and hand movement characteristics.

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Hand movements/Mechanics

• Patterns of hand movement usage two handed
  method is most efficient and used by best
  (fastest) braille readers
• Perception of braille characters is dependent
  upon whether braille is felt as global shape or
  through dot density
• Scrubbing

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Implications for Teaching Braille Mechanics

• Teaching hand movements
• Teach the use of both hands together initially
  teach lateral scanning with both hands
• Eventually teach students to separate hands at
  the ends of the lines if they dont do it
  automatically.
• Teach the use of all four fingers of both hands
  maintaining contact on the braille line.

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Hand movements/Mechanics (Cont.)

• Posture/Positioning
• Furniture Fit
• Use of hands
• Finger strength and dexterity
• Hand strength and dexterity
• Best practice non-slip surface under braille
  materials and brailler

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The Susie Video
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Question and Answer