[Blindmath] Statistics

[Lachenbruch, Peter]

Thanks for the help.  I'll try the website.

Tony

Peter A. Lachenbruch
Department of Public Health
Oregon State University
Corvallis, OR 97330
Phone: 541-737-3832
FAX: 541-737-4001


-----Original Message-----
From: blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindmath-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Munawar Bijani
Sent: Wednesday, March 03, 2010 4:07 PM
To: Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics
Subject: Re: [Blindmath] Statistics

Hi,
First I want to say thanks so much for being so willing to assist your 
student in making the course accessible. As far as the Stats book is 
concerned, you can try checking www.rfbd.org to see if they have the book 
recorded. If they do, the student may have a subscription to the site and 
can download it--it will be audio.

Next, about PDF: math books in PDF aren't a good idea since in math there 
are a lot of symbols, and layout really makes a difference. It will be 
difficult to read with the student's screen reader :). The best things to do 
are either check www.rfbd.org for a recorded book, or hire a reader to read 
the book to the student. I think Brailling it would take too long. The 
reader can just describe the diagrams (for instance, describe what a normal 
distribution curve looks like, where the areas are on the curve, etc.)

Also, when it comes time to use z-score and normal distribution tables, 
these are available online and are easily accessed (I used to use them when 
I didn't have a book back in high school, luckily the college text has been 
recorded in my case though.) Hope this helps!
Munawar A. Bijani

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Lachenbruch, Peter" <Peter.Lachenbruch at oregonstate.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, March 02, 2010 12:13 PM
To: <blindmath at nfbnet.org>
Cc: "Childers, Maureen" <Maureen.Childers at oregonstate.edu>; "Turek,Joan Lee" 
<joan.turek at hhs.gov>; "Kovar, Mary Grace" <mgkovar at gmail.com>
Subject: [Blindmath] Statistics

Dear all,

After many years of teaching, I have a blind student in my class.  I am 
using a text by Utts and Heckard "Mind on Statistics" and want to know if 
there is a Braille edition.  Our disabilities access office is planning to 
convert the text to Braille, but obviously if there's such an edition 
already available, it would be great to know about it.

More generally, the disabilities office mentioned that when they get a pdf 
file of a text, they often must reformat it so their translation software 
can work.  It struck me that some sort of a clearing house for establishing 
standards would be good - and then one conversion could serve for all.  I 
have asked the American Statistical Association committee on Disabilities 
and Statistics to consider this.

I know that some books are read to tape or CD (my neighbor a few years ago 
did this for basic math books).  This would be another option.
Tony

Peter A. Lachenbruch
Department of Public Health
Oregon State University
Corvallis, OR 97330
Phone: 541-737-3832
FAX: 541-737-4001



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