[Ohio-Talk] Pleas Read this inspiring post about the winner of the Jennifer Baker Award!

[Suzanne Turner]

Ohio,

 

I thought I would share this post that I read. It is so inspiring and shows
self-determination!

 

Suzanne

///

 

 

Melissa Lehman Riccobono is feeling proud with Nfb Maryland
<https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100004074219306&__tn__=C-R>  and Mark
A. Riccobono <https://m.facebook.com/mark.a.riccobono?__tn__=C-R> .

November 9 at 9:37 PM
<https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3919647634720266&id=10000025204
2342&__tn__=-R>  . 

This past Saturday, Oriana received the Jennifer Baker Award from the
National Federation of the Blind of Maryland. We are very proud of her for
this accomplishment. Below is the text of the speech given to introduce
Oriana, which gives the background as to why she is the award recipient this
year. I have also included a video of Oriana reading the speech she gave to
thank the NFBMD for this award. Take a break from politics and enjoy! The
Jennifer Baker award is given by the National Federation of the Blind of
Maryland each year to a person who has overcome obstacles and yet become a
braille reader. This award is given in honor of Jennifer Baker, who, in her
short life, despite having a variety of disabilities which many people
thought would prevent her from learning to read braille, became an excellent
braille reader and enjoyed brailling books for children.

The recipient of this year's Jennifer Baker Award is Oriana Riccobono.

Oriana's journey to becoming a braille reader has been a complicated one.
Despite having two blind parents who understand the necessity of braille,
and have advocated for her to learn braille from the time she began school
at age four, Oriana's braille instruction has been somewhat spotty. Like
many blind children, Oriana has some useable vision. Because of this, she is
classified as a "dual media reader"-both print and braille. On the surface,
this seems like a fine approach. A dual media reader can learn print and use
it when it is efficient, and also learn braille in order to use it when it
is most efficient. Unfortunately, what often happens when a child is
classified as a dual media reader is print is focused on most of the time
during the school day, and braille is only focused on during the time the
teacher of blind students works with the dual media reader. Despite many
meetings, suggestions about how to incorporate braille into the classroom,
and how to work on both braille reading and writing, Oriana received very
little quality braille instruction which correlated directly to skills her
classmates were learning in the classroom. Also, for some reason, much of
her braille instruction was given outside the classroom during reading time
in pre-k and kindergarten. This meant although Oriana was practicing letters
in braille, and writing words in braille, she was missing out on important
strategies in order to build a strong foundation in reading.

By first grade it was clear Oriana was extremely behind in her ability to
read both print and braille. Even with a fantastic first grade classroom
teacher, and nightly practice at home, (practice which was agonizingly slow
and sometimes ended in tears) Oriana ended first grade four reading levels
below where she should have been when entering second grade. She continued
to struggle in second grade, but was slowly beginning to make progress. She
ended second grade only one level below where she should have been, which
was a fantastic gain in one year.

Third grade started out reasonably well, but in March of her third grade
year, Oriana received a head and neck injury while playing a tug-of-war game
on the playground with her class. She accidentally let go of the rope and
fell backward, hitting her head and neck against a brick wall. This resulted
in extreme pain, dizziness, fatigue, and sensitivity to light and sound for
the next 10 months.

Oriana finally healed, but it took several doctors, a hospitalization,
acupuncture, nerve blocks, and a chiropractor before the pain was finally
under control. Because of this medical ordeal, Oriana missed much of the
last quarter of her third grade year, and was on Home and Hospital for the
first two quarters of her fourth grade year. She was just beginning to go to
school part time when the pandemic hit, and all school was moved online.

During her time at home due to her injury, Oriana received very little
braille materials, and no braille instruction. Then, when school moved
online, she received no braille materials, although she did have some
braille instruction virtually. Since Oriana was finally in a place where she
was ready to learn everyday-her pain was much less-her parents and a family
friend decided it was high time to begin practicing braille in earnest in
order to make up for lost time.

Oriana has read braille for at least 30 minutes a day for the past several
months. Before this time, Oriana had never finished a chapter book in
braille. She has now finished five of the books in the Meet Samantha
American Girl series, and may be done with the sixth book by the time of
this presentation. She has been motivated by the Library for the Blind and
Print Disabled Summer Reading Program, where she won prizes for reading, a
family friend, Karen, promising to take her to dinner if she read all but
three days over the summer, and a trip to the American Girl Store with Karen
when she finishes the final Samantha American Girl book. (She also earned a
Samantha American Girl doll by finishing the first book in the series.)
Oriana is also motivated because she is enjoying the stories she is reading,
and she is noticing that she is able to read faster and more fluently the
more she practices her reading. She also enjoys reading weekly with her
Aunt, Jennifer, her grandma, and she has even had the opportunity to read
with our National Rep, Miss Pam, who is without a doubt one of her very
favorite people!

Oriana has recently entered the Braille Readers are Leaders contest and
looks forward to seeing how many braille pages she can read between December
1 and January 18. She's hoping to win some cool prizes!

Although Oriana's parents are still fighting ridiculously hard to insure she
has hard copy and electronic braille materials daily in school, and access
to the training she needs to gain the skills to work with JAWS and her
braille display to read and complete school assignments, neither of these
things are happening regularly yet. Despite this, Oriana is still making
progress in braille everyday. She is using braille in order to read and
complete math assignments, something she has never done before. Oriana
realizes her vision is not the best way for her to get all of her
information. She realizes there are some things which are hard to see on her
computer screen, that her eyes get tired when she has to read print for too
long, and that braille is the one thing which she can always feel and never
makes her eyes tired. Despite all of the obstacles Oriana has faced, she is
succeeding in braille, and this success will only lead to more successes for
Oriana in her future.