[nabs-l] Learning to learn faster

Sun Mar 2 23:11:56 UTC 2014

Hello,
I find there is no comparison between when one reads Braille or print 
and when one listens to audio.
I rarely spend time "reading" But I finish between 5-10 books a week on 
average with a very good retention rate using one of my audio book 
readers. This means that I spend more time downloading books from 
different places than I do "reading" When I listen to books I'm doing 
other things like cleaning, walking to school, eating, cooking or doing 
anything that only requires a small percentage of brain power. It is 
true one needs to be able to hear what is going on around them, but I 
have found that I can hear just fine with a TTS talking through my 
headphones than I can when listening to music or a badly recorded audio 
book. For that reason I stay away from Bard, Learning Allie and audible.
I sometimes feel rather lonely when my friends are given a book by 
another friend and I finish it in one day, then the next time I see that 
friend I have finished all the books the author has written while 
neither friend has even finished the second book.
Constantly I ask my parents to use their IPhones with VO to read text, 
Kindle or blio books but no one has taken me up on my offer. I find it 
really sad and I wish there was some way to make using TTS voices more 
attractive. I will be the first to say that some people have a hard time 
remembering audio they heard. I am a completely visual learner, so it 
took me a very long time before I could increase my reading speed enough 
to where I could remember nearly everything. But compared to a sighted 
person I should be at an 8th grade reading level. I started listening to 
TTS books as a freshman in high school when I got the first bookport. 
Before that I had read the Hobbet on the Voice note in 6th grade and 
nothing else. I remember the hobbit taking me a good month where as it 
takes me maybe 3 days at most now.
But a Freshman in college is what, 14 and I am now 22. So 8 years to go 
from 40 words a minute or level 3ish on the voice note to around 16. I 
am not the only one either, there are many people who read with their 
Apex maxed with full comprehension.

Granted reading in Braille and print has its place, but not for reading 
books. If you like reading books in Braille, have fun doing it, I read 
books in Braille to increase my reading speed too.
But I think what this topic needs is a psychologist *coff* to be doing a 
study, giving the results of print reading on paper, Braille reading on 
paper, Print reading on an E-reader, Braille reading on a note-taker, 
audio reading using audio books and audio reading using TTS books.
This is a very hot topic in the Blindness community and the sighted 
community doesn't even know this is an issue. But if a study was 
published and sent to different publishers and newspapers, I think it 
would bring this topic more into the public eye and that would generate 
more interest in developing avenues for the general public to explore 
the different reading options.
I feel that not being able to use a TTS for reading is a major crippling 
disability, but of coarse most people don't view it that way, so it must 
not be. Just like I don't think blindness is a disability, but most 
people think it is, so it must be.
I guess we are dealing then with the same problem facing young retinal 
blind kids today. Will they take the cure or not? Will they choose to 
see or remain blind? For a sighted person the answer is obvious. The 
same goes for us TTS readers. Will sighted people learn to use a TTS and 
increase their knowledge exponentially or remain unable to read half as 
many books as they would like to. For me, the answer is obvious. I wish 
sighted people or non-tts users to understand this.
So the first step in my opinion is to make sighted people aware of their 
disability, then they can choose the cure or not based off an educated 
guess. As a person who will need to make the choice weather to take 
sight or noght, the response will be very revealing.

For those who don't think not being able to read very fast is not a 
disability equal to being blind, consider:
walking vs driving a car
reading captions vs seeing a picture
looking at print music vs hearing music

everyone I have ever met agrees that the second option is always the 
more used choice. The first choice has its uses, but not always. As 
someone who reads using a TTS, I am able to converse on a great many 
subjects knowledgeably and I will be the first to agree that I know very 
little. But when I talk to "professionals" in that field, I am often 
surprised their academic knowledge is miles below mine when I only read 
maybe 200-250 books on the subject, a half year's fancy. They are of 
coarse much better in their field at practical use, but our whole 
educational system is completely based off the Prussian system which 
glorifies and totally utilizes book learning.
There are problems one starts to face when they only read books and 
don't really have practical knowledge to back up their learning and when 
there are so many books one has read, but that is another topic.
Sorry on my little essay, but I really feel that a firm study needs to 
be used to quantify results on each reading style.
Thank you,

Brandon Keith Biggs

On 2/25/2014 3:28 PM, semi osborne wrote:
> Hi all.
>
> I use a BrailleNote Apex for schoolwork and emails.
> I know that you guys might think that audio is faster than Braille, 
> but I turn off the speech on my BrailleNote so as not to disturb the 
> other kids in my class.
> However, I also use a Victor Reader Stream to listen to books, and its 
> audio qualy, to me, is very good.
> I also use a computer with Jaws installed for surfing the web and for 
> playing games.
> I'm not  sure what my average braille reading speed is, but now that 
> you mentioned it, I'll probably test that and see, although I do know 
> that I'm a fast Braille reader...
>
> Sami.
>  ----- Original Message -----
> From: Mohamed <malhajamy at gmail.com
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list<nabs-l at nfbnet.org
> Date sent: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 15:18:35 -0500
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Learning to learn faster
>
> Hi Helga, me, personally, I  like audio more.  Braille, for me,
> is rather slow.  I have my BrailleNote sped up to the maximum
> speed, rate 16.  I just simply like audio more than braille.
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <helga.schreiber26 at gmail.com
> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list"
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org
> Date sent: Tue, 25 Feb 2014 11:36:07 -0500
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Learning to learn faster
>
> Hi all, this  is Helga! I actually use both JAWS and Braille! But
> I actually
> like braille more than just listening to audio, since I
> comprehend more the
> college material in Braille! But if I have the Braille copy in my
> hand, and
> I have the text of it on the computer I learn the material
> faster! For
> instance, for my Government class I need to learn 19 steps in how
> a Bill
> becomes a Law.  So in that case I use JAWS and the braille copy
> of the steps.
> Thanks so much for listening to me! God bless!
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: justin williams
> Sent: Tuesday, February 25, 2014 8:16 AM
> To: 'National Association of Blind Students mailing list'
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Learning to learn faster
>
> Screen reader; I have my jaws up to more than sixty usually.  I
> may slow it
> down to 55 or so when I am reading; I hae pretty good
> comprehention because
> I read before class.  Also, I use learning ally; I speed it up as
> much as I
> can.  Reading your emails I have my jaws on 65 or so.  If I am
> really
> searching for something on the internet, I may speed it up to 70
> or even 80
> for greater speed.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nabs-l [mailto:nabs-l-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of
> Jamie
> Principato
> Sent: Monday, February 24, 2014 8:02 PM
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Learning to learn faster
>
> How many hours a night must you spend reading in order to keep up
> with and
> be successful in your classes? Are you using Braille or a screen
> reader? I'd
> love to hear everyone weigh in on this.  If you don't read for
> class every
> night, how many hours a week?
>
> Jamie
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Feb 24, 2014, at 5:34 PM, Arielle Silverman
> <arielle71 at gmail.com
> wrote:
>
> I find it easier to skim in Braille than in audio or E-text.
> You can
> skim in Braille by looking for indented text, sliding your
> fingers
> down the leftmost edge of the page looking for spaces where the
> text
> is indented or centered to indicate a new paragraph or section
> heading, or of course, flip to the next physical page.
> Also, I'm not sure speed is  the end goal, at least not all the
> time.
> I think a better goal is to achieve a good speed-to-accuracy
> ratio.
> That is, you want to understand as much  as possible in as
> little time
> as possible.  Anyone can put their screen reader on 500 words a
> minute
> and just breeze through, but if you comprehended less than half
> what
> was spoken, that's not useful at all.  Similarly, carefully
> reading in
> Braille at 100 words per minute but understanding everything you
> read,
> and remembering it later so you don't have to re-read right
> before the
> test, is valuable.
> I'm one of those Braille readers who reads very quickly, and
> I've
> often found, especially as an adult reading denser material and
> having
> less practice with Braille, that I have to force myself to slow
> down
> or I start missing stuff.
>
> Arielle
>
> On 2/24/14, Carly Mihalakis <carlymih at comcast.net> wrote:
> Good afternoon, Sophie,
>
>         Growing up,I admit, I took braille very much for
> granted,
> couldn't fathom those blinks I heard about who, didn't read
> braille.
> Served the Federation's summer program as the braille
> instructor, was
> a devotee of this page slate I have.  Was beginning to learn
> Grade 3,
> the whole bit.  I forgot, in studying Japanese language, I, with
> the
> help of a key my Dad found for me On-line, began teaching myself
> nihongo tenji (Japanese braille) Then, at age 19, I was hit by a
> car
> which caused severe brain damage, a symptom of which has been
> acute
> tactile appraxia which for me, refers to an inability of hand to
> perceive that which is sent to it via the brain.  thus reducing
> braille reading pretty much to a very rich and stimulating  pipe
> dream.  And, It isn't about the spacing of the dots, like you
> see with
> neuropathy people, as if anything was produced in jumbo braille,
> anyway.  I just don't perceive what my finger feels!
> But, I say aoll this to make the point of my also not retaining,
> during the time i did use hard copy braille as well as a Braille
> Light 40 purchased by the school district and, having no
> alternative,
> I have forced myself to learn audotorally on the comput as well
> as
> talking books....  so, it can be possible in case, got help you,
> you
> find yourself in this way.
> for today, Car
> 408-209-3239
>
> Courtney, I have to disagree with you on braille textbooks.  I
> actually find them more useful than audio textbooks.  Granted,
> I'm in
> high school, so I'm probably not moving at as fast a pace as
> college
> students, but still.  If you read a braille book in an electric
> format
> with a notetaker (I use a braillenote apex), you can use the
> Find
> command to search for important keywords if you're trying to
> look up
> something quickly.  You can also move by paragraph and by page
> if you
> wish to skip irrelevant material.  For me at least, I comprehend
> more
> when I read braille.  I do okay with audio, but when I read it
> with my
> fingers, I tend to absorb more of the information, whereas when
> I'm
> listening to it, I occasionally zone out and miss something.
> This is
> more important for some classes than others, but reading braille
> tells us how to spell things.  Braille also allows us to see
> what's
> underlined or italicized, which may be important for some
> lessons.
> These are just my thoughts.  Have a great day!
>
> Sincerely,
> Sophie
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Courtney Stover <liamskitten at gmail.com
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org Date sent: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 14:20:35 -0600
> 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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