A Pilot Study The Use of Braille and Access Technology Among Young Adults Who are Blind: Practices, Tools, and Attitudes

1. A Pilot StudyThe Use of Braille and Access Technology Among Young Adults Who are Blind: Practices, Tools, and Attitudes Frances Mary D’Andrea July, 2008

2. Why Braille? Why Technology? • Changes to educational practice related to braille reading and writing. • New technology increases access to print and electronic information. • Paper braille (also referred to as “hard copy” braille) more available than ever before.

3. Research Questions: • What kinds of literacy practices do young adults who are braille readers engage in? • How did they learn those practices? • How do young adults use braille, print, and electronic materials? • What are their attitudes towards paper braille and toward access technology?

4. Grounded Theory • A theory-building process • Does not test a hypothesis, but seeks to understand and explain phenomenon • Uses focused interviews to gather data • Themes emerge as data are coded (Glaser, 1978 & 1992; Dick, 2005)

5. Participants in Pilot • S1: early 30s, AT and braille user, AT instructor • Telephone interview • S2: 16 years old, AT and braille user, high school student • Face-to-face interview

6. Main Interview Questions • What kinds of AT do you use? • What do you remember about learning to read & write braille? • How do you use paper braille now? • How do you use technology for reading & writing? • What do you think paper braille is useful for? • What do you think technology is useful for? • What advice do you have for students/teachers?

7. Emerging Themes • Having choices about practice and devices • Convenience, access, availability • Metacognition • Formal and informal learning contexts • Learning from school/teachers • Self-taught • Learning from peers who are blind • Learning from trusted others who are sighted • Attitudes & preferences about practices and devices • Generally articulated strong preferences • Recognition of advantages and disadvantages

8. Quotes about Choice • “Well, I use a Braille Note religiously, a Braille Note 32.” • “Every blind person, whenever a new screen reader comes out, we want to get our hands on it because we want to see how accessible it is and compare it to WindowEyes, JAWS, or whatever.” • “And it’s a quick and easy and portable way, I mean, I can take that to a meeting and if someone says, ‘Hey, what’s your schedule next week?’ I can easily look at that,” • “I read the same book in braille and then I read it in audio and I understood it better in audio for some reason.” • “if I’m giving a speech or a presentation--a lot of times, not all the time, but a lot of times I will print it out in paper braille or put it on a paper braille.”

9. Context Quotes • “I started learning braille . . . I believe I was in first grade and I had a teacher at the school for the blind” • “I went and figured it all out from there. Just messed with things and saw what they did.” • “Actually one of my friends that I was talking to online said something about it.” • “I had a professor who was really interested in, you know, using Windows and just how a blind person would use Windows.” • “We didn’t really start doing that until about, I want to say 6th or 7th grade because that’s whenever our computer teacher at the middle school was, um, starting to do that.”

10. Quotes Expressing Attitudes & Preferences • “I had borrowed a Braille Lite a couple of times and just didn’t find them, I don’t know, just didn’t find them as useful and as convenient as a Braille ‘n Speak.” • “if I’m ever doing a complex math problem and I need to line something up or look at something in math, um, I’ll do that, I’ll write that out in paper braille.” • “There I would use braille [for Spanish class] because it’s, that would be hard to do in audio.” • “I haven’t really found any [disadvantages to braille]. Except for the part where it takes up many boxes and teachers are about to faint whenever you take all those boxes in the room.” • “Uh, well, a disadvantage to me is--it’s technology and technology never works 100% of the time.”

11. Emerging Themes (in pilot) • The degree to which AT users are self-taught • The importance of informal learning contexts for building AT skills • The recognition that braille and technology are equally important, but perhaps for different tasks • The importance of choice to match methods to goals of activity

12. Next Steps • Interview more students ages 16-21 using piloted interview protocol • Analyze data using open coding to build categories & themes • Ask more specifically about the ways that TVIs were helpful in the learning process for AT skills

13. Future research • What impact does the use of technology have on access to the general curriculum? • Are there “best” ages for introduction or is it always going to be an individual decision? • Do strategies such as the use of speech and electronic braille have an impact on further development of braille fluency skills?

14. References • Dick, Bob (2005) Grounded theory: a thumbnailsketch. [On line] Available athttp://www.scu.edu.au/schools/gcm/ar/arp/grounded.html • Glaser, Barney G. (1978) Theoretical sensitivity: advances in the methodology ofgrounded theory. Mill Valley, Ca: Sociology Press. • Glaser, Barney G. (1992) Basics of grounded theory analysis: emergence vs forcing. Mill Valley, Ca.: Sociology Press.