[nabs-l] Learning to learn faster

[minh ha]

Hello all,

I use a combination of braille and e-text materials to complete my
work. I agree that I pay more attention and retain information better
when I read in braille, but I just don't have the time during the day
to devote myself to reading all my assignments in braille. I'm a
sociology major at a catholic college so we do a lot of reading for
philosophy and theology and I don't know about you guys, but these are
not subjects that you can just skim over and read selected paragraphs.
My average reading load is about a hundred pages a night and I am
heavily involved with organizations on campus,so realistically,
reading all my materials in braille isn't a viable option, even if I
read about 100 words per minute. I think as college students, we need
to find ways to maximize our time and figure out how to be efficient
with our studying. In a perfect world, I would love to be able to just
spend as much time as I need using braille because I'm a huge
proponent of it, but if I want to keep up with my classes and stay on
top of things, I have to listen to my books with jaws.

Minhjaws

On 2/24/14, Koby Cox <kobycox at gmail.com> wrote:
> Courtney,
> Can you please email me off-list? My email address Is as follows:
> kobycox at gmail.com.
> Thanks,
> Koby.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nabs-l [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Courtney
> Stover
> Sent: Monday, February 24, 2014 2:21 PM
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Learning to learn faster
>
> Antonio,
>
> I'll return with more thoughts later tonight when I've properly read
> the article, but I thought I'd answer your questions, because they
> interest me on a philosophical level.
>
> This is one of the ways that, frankly, my life experience simply
> hasn't jived with NFB philosophy.  NFB philosophy emphasizes the
> importance of fast Braille reading, which I agree with; practice
> absolutely must be maintained.  However, they also seem to strongly
> insist on Braille textbooks, which I don't get behind so much.  Doing
> college-level reading; I have never had to consume material as quickly
> as I am right now.  And, at least for me, reading textbooks in Braille
> is simply impractical, even if that Braille has shifted to electronic
> instead of hardcopy.  I can read loads faster, even with something
> like RFBD and the Bookmarks function on my player to find important
> material again, than I ever thought about with Braille, particularly
> because I can quickly skim over superfluous material like map
> descriptions, vocabulary I already remember, or excerpts from outside
> documents that are meant to enhance the readings, which are always
> located at the end of the page, by simply going to the next one with
> the press of a button.  With books read by a screen reader,
> particularly if they're from somewhere like Bookshare and have Daisy
> navigation, this is even more true.
>
> I think your point is very true, about Braille readers only reading at
> the pace of sighted ones.  I went in recently to take a test in
> Braille (the one reason I keep my Braille skills sharp; my test
> performance plummets when I have to have a reader), and was noted as
> one of the fastest Braille readers the proctor had ever seen.
> However, someone was taking the same test with a screen reader, and
> was finished in half the time I was.  So, learning to take tests with
> screen and human readers is something I wish to become proficient at.
> After all, I may have Braille accommodation now, but I doubt a
> workplace, such as a call center, that has a training process before
> proper work begins, is going to allow me to have a Braille display.
>
> Now, this says nothing about leisure activities, in which I vastly
> prefer Braille to audio, save in rare cases.  If I'm going to read a
> book, I want to actually be reading it.  Also, any proofing task would
> be made immensely more difficult without the use of Braille.
>
> I hope this at least provides an interesting perspective on your
> questions, as you certainly provided a very interesting article I'm
> looking forward to diving in to.
> Warmly,
> Courtney
>
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-- 
"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty
recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity:
but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on
their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible." T. E. Lawrence