What's in your toolbox

What's in your toolbox

The Braille Monitor

July

2002

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What's

in Your Toolbox?

by David Evans

David

Evans, cane in one hand and the bugle he sounds at convention in the other.

From

the Editor: The following article appeared in the Spring 2002 issue of the Florida

Federation Focus, a publication of the NFB of Florida. David Evans is a

member of the NFB-F board of directors. Sometimes it seems to me that people

are just looking for excuses not to begin learning Braille. I am certain that

they do not enjoy the frustration of functional illiteracy. Of course learning

the code brings with it frustrations of its own. The difference is that the

pains associated with learning any new skill have about them an aura of the

constructive. In the same way, a person who is in poor physical condition experiences

pain climbing to the eighth floor when the elevator is out of order and also

when beginning a rigorous exercise program. Both activities hurt, but one is

healthy and positive while the other is simply unmitigated misery.

David

Evans offers some great reasons and a fine role model for those who wish things

were different in their own lives. This is what he says:

Braille will be around as long as

paper and ink are. As long as the sighted use paper and ink, there will be a

place for Braille. I am not very good at it yet, but I am trying. I think that

the hardest thing for me to overcome was the mental image of me trying to read

big books in Braille.

What helped me was this thought: the

most important person I have to communicate with is myself. I needed some way

of writing down small, short personal messages and the ability to read them

back anywhere and at any time. Pocket tape recorders work well for some things,

but what do most sighted people do in the same situation? They write it down

on a piece of paper and put it in their pocket. Well, if writing things down

on a piece of paper is the most common and practical technique for the sighted,

then using Braille on paper should be a very good way for the blind.

I decided that I could picture myself

reading information on a three-by-five-inch card written in Braille. So I decided

to learn Braille, or at least enough to write those personal messages, and,

if I went no further than that, at least I could copy down a person's name,

address, phone number, an appointment time or date. I tried getting someone

from DBS [the state agency for the blind in Florida] to teach me, but I will

just say that this person did not work out.

Then,

while I was attending a national convention, a friend told me about the Hadley

School for the Blind. I called its toll-free number, (800) 323-4238, and explained

what I was interested in learning. They sent me a test to take about the rules

of the school and then sent me my course, called "Relevant Braille"--all

free of charge. This was an at-home course in Grade I Braille using a slate

and stylus. They sent me directions on tape that were easy to follow and broken

up into sections that explained everything. I followed the instruction to do

at least one card or fifteen minutes a day. Being the impatient type, I did

all of the lessons at once and was writing and reading Grade I Braille in about

three weeks. By this I mean that I was using a slate and stylus to write all

of my personal communications down on three-by-five cards and using them to

keep my life organized. I did eventually get around to finishing and sending

in my course materials and getting my certification in Grade I Braille.

I think that learning to write and

then read using a slate and stylus is the best way to learn. This teaches you

to write Braille right-to-left and to concentrate on dot position. Most people

I have met who learned on a Brailler seem to have a hard time making the switch

to a slate, but those who learned on the slate do not have any problem going

to a Brailler for greater speed.

I like the slate because I can carry

it anywhere, and now I am rarely without one, even though I do most of my note-taking

on a Type 'n Speak. I found that the trick to learning Braille is just learning

the first ten letters. Once you learn them, you repeat the letters in order

while adding dot three at the bottom. Then you do the same thing again, adding

both dots three and six at the bottom until you have all twenty-six letters

of the alphabet.

The only oddball is "W"

because Braille was invented by a Frenchman named Louis Braille, and at that

time the French did not use the letter "W" in their alphabet. The

Hadley course also teaches the numbers and punctuation symbols. Learning the

first ten letters also gives the student the ten digits when paired with the

number sign. Last year I went back to the local Lighthouse and began learning

Grade II Braille, all 200 contractions of it. This is where you get faster with

Braille. Grade II turns Braille into a form of shorthand that speeds up both

writing and reading. I am still very slow, mostly because I do not practice

enough and because I have diabetes, but I am still using Grade I Braille because

speed is not the most important thing; the ability to read it is.

I believe that, like all people, blind

people need their own toolbox--special tools and skills that help get the work

done. It is wise for all of us to include in our toolbox any and all tools we

think may help us to do the job. And as with any collection of tools, they should

be kept sharp, in their proper place, and available whenever they can do the

best job. By the way, the friend who gave me that tip about Braille and the

Hadley School was Doctor Jernigan. He could read over 400 words a minute in

Braille. The average sighted reader reads between 225 and 250 words a minute.

Who

says that reading Braille has to be slow?

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