children learning braille and computers?

Question

Some blind people where saying computers that read thing for you, disavantage children with learning to read braille.
But they still need to read braille like totilet doors in public and food label.

Answer 1

The real issue isn't signs in public--simply having raised letters is usually sufficient.

This issue dates back about 25 years. When the first speech synthesizers came out, educators of the blind enthusiastically adopted them as an easier way of teaching children--and given the emerging "imformation economy" clearly blind people would soon use these instead of braille in daily life and work.

It was a disaster. Only about 12% of the children taughtthis way were even minimally litrate. The reasons--from a technical/phsychological standpoint--are a bit complicated. But here is the essence. LIteracy is not the physical act of reading or writing--it is the development of a crucial cognitiv skill: being able to readily correlate the informal structure of verbal communication with the more formal structure of the written language. And the medium isn't the key--whether its visual (printed) letters and writing with a pen or reading the tactile Braille alphabet ad using a stylus or Brailler to make the letters. The point is to develop the thinking skills that go with handling the physical symbols we use tfor writing.

And computers don'tdo that. Children only listen to speech--and didn't actually learn to recognize and use the symbols. And ended up functionally illeterate. This problem was reversed--and in many states the law now requires totally blind children to be taught braille. Unfortunately, given the miserable state of special education in our schools and the prevalence of school discrimination against children with disabilities, they are often not getting this instruction to the extent they should--as they used to in the specialized schools for the blind.

NOTE--that's nothing against computers with speech output (I'd be pretty hypocritical to say otherwise--I'm using it to type this answer!). In everyday life they are usually easier and far more practical than Brailly for most purposes. But blind children MUST develop the thinking/cognitive skills--and Braille is an essential tool for doing that.