[Blindmath] Verbalizing Math

[Debbie Willis]

Thank you very much for this current reference, Susan.  I will review the original Nemeth Mathspeak for future use.
Debbie

-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Susan Jolly
Sent: Wednesday, April 22, 2009 4:34 PM
To: blindmath at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Verbalizing Math

This is the new link to the original Nemeth Mathspeak which I think is
clearer than Larry's Speakeasy but I know that different people have
different opinions.
http://people.rit.edu/easi/easisem/talkmath.htm

If the teacher actually understands math, it shouldn't be very difficult for
him or her to understand when spoken math is ambiguous and what needs to be
done to avoid this.  For example, in speaking a times b + c it isn't
necessarily obvious whether the a multiplies just the b or the sum of b and
c.  However, if the teacher always consistently says something like a times
the term b + c for the latter then when the phrase "the term" is omitted, it
is understood that the factor a only applies to the b.

When you are listening to math you only hear one thing at a time, in other
words, it is a linear stream just like braille.  So you need additional
clues to show the relationships just as you do when you are entering a
formula into Excel or something similar.

Here is an introductory article about Nemeth for sighted persons:
http://www.dotlessbraille.org/readnem.htm

I would suggest that if the math teacher and the blind student were to
discuss the possibilities, they could quickly arrive at the optimal solution
for that particular student.  Like Neil said, we aren't talking rocket
science here.

HTH,
SusanJ



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