[Blindmath] How important is tactile access to graphs (discuss) ; )

[Amanda Lacy]

I also would not trust most transcribers to make that judgment as to whether 
or not a figure or graph is important. Many graphics have proven to be 
crucial for my understanding. Since I did not have access to them, my 
professor drew many of the diagrams on my arm or onto paper with a tracing 
wheel to convey concepts I could not pick up from the text.

Amanda
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Birkir R. Gunnarsson" <birkir.gunnarsson at gmail.com>
To: "Blind Math list for those interested in mathematics" 
<blindmath at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, July 15, 2011 10:20 AM
Subject: [Blindmath] How important is tactile access to graphs (discuss) ; )


> Hey gang
>
> Last topic for discussion for awhile.
> Since they have been so lively I want to weigh in on this topic, which
> probably will not have any exact answers.
> I certainly appreciate the increased possibilities for tactile
> exploration that machines like the Iveo are offering, but I wonder how
> important access to every graph in a book is to a blind student, one
> that is not used to thinking visually and, perhaps, is better served
> by other means.
> I am not suggesting that graphs should be taken of the table
> altogether, quite on the contrary, but I wonder whether intelligent
> sifting of graphs in a text book might not be a better idea, at lesat
> until technology has moved to a point where SVG is more commonly
> accepted as part of HTML5 and graph production is less costly and
> problematic.
> Even then, to what extent have people here relied on tactile graphs.
> Have you felt you needed access to every graph in the book. Has
> exploring a graph tactilly helped you understand concepts, theories
> and shapes, and made your life over-all easier?
> I know there is an ever-increasing emphasis on visual clues and aides
> in text books, starting pretty much in the first grade, but I wonder
> to what extent tactile access will benefit blind kids.
> Again, I want to stress that I am pleased to see this possibility
> becoming more and more realistic with the work of ViewPlus mainly, I
> am merely wondering if we can deploy this technique in a most
> efficient manner by a better understanding of what graphs will be most
> beneficial to reproduce, and thereby limiting the cost of graph
> convertion and avoiding the production of graphs that do not really
> add much to the student's ease of learning.
> (appologies if there are typos in this email. Since my latest Windows
> update yesterday, Jaws has stopped functioning in edit more in IE, I
> am trying to figure out why this is and will submit as a bug if I find
> no explanations).
> -B
>
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