[blparent] Teaching your child Braille

[Bridgit Pollpeter]

Gloria,

I'm a firm believer in that there can be many ways to one destination.
Having said that though, studies do seem to show that learning Braille
with sleep shades if you have any level of vision is more productive and
leaves students more knowledgeable than learning without them.

Having said that, since your daughter is sighted, I think teaching her
Braille is a great idea, but since she will probably not use it much, I
don't think the method has to be the same as it would be for someone who
will use it as their main source of reading and writing.

Our nephew and niece were very interested in Braille when they were
younger. Our niece actually picked up a few things. She was able to
write uncontracted Braille with both a slate and stylus and Perkins
Brailler.

We started by using a six-cup muffin tin and tennis balls. The tin
represents the Braille cell, and the balls are used to demonstrate dot
positions. If you don't have tennis balls, you can simply crumple paper.

She may use her eyes to read it, but you can also encourage the use of
her fingers as she reads it. As she feels a Braille cell, she can
connect what she feels with what she sees. Studies have shown that we
learn Braille with the visual part of our brain even if totally blind,
so I wouldn't think there would be a problem with a sighted child
learning both by sight and touch.

I don't think this a fruitless endeavor as many children are encouraged
to learn more than one language nowadays. Braille is not a different
language, but it is a different method in which to read and write, and
just like a child learning Spanish, French or Chinese as well as
English, you never know when a skill will be handy, no pun intended,
grin. And this is the age to develop multiple skills in children.

And if nothing else, it's a great bonding time, and your child will grow
up to appreciate how mommy does things.

Bridgit
Message: 1
Date: Tue, 2 Apr 2013 18:04:37 -0500
From: "Gloria G" <gloria.graves at gmail.com>
To: "Blind Parents Mailing List" <blparent at nfbnet.org>
Subject: [blparent] Teaching your child braille
Message-ID: <14D0B3E2ED5F4FBFA3F0DA185905EED4 at Gloria>
Content-Type: text/plain;	charset="iso-8859-1"

Hi all,
I am a first time mom and wll have my daughter in early July. I am blind
and am a braille user. I am planning to purchase twin vision books to
read to my daughter when she comes and up through her early years.
Because I am a blind parent I thought it would be nice to teach my
daughter braille. She will most likley be sighted, but thought it would
be nice to at least teach her the basics, meaning the alphabet and
numbers in braille. I thought it would just be something extra she could
have under her belt. My question is, have any of you taught your sighted
children braille, and if so, how did you go about doing this? I learned
braille with using my fingers, but because she will be sighted, I am
wondering how this will work because I have heard that many sighted
people read braille with their eyes. Thanks for any suggestions or
advice in advance. Gloria