[Social-sciences-list] Handwritten pages, accessibility, and confidentiality

Sat Oct 10 17:08:43 UTC 2015

Wait.

Arielle, you are saying the kid is in therapy?

What are the therapeutic goals?

Could you perhaps include increased disability awareness in his treatment
plan?

    RC Weintraub, MSW, MScEd
 USA phone: 631.351.3435
Canada phone: 250.358.6808
  <www.critdesign.info> <http://www.critdesign.info> <
www.arcologycentral.net>

On Fri, Oct 9, 2015 at 4:11 PM, Arielle Silverman via Social-sciences-list <
social-sciences-list at nfbnet.org> wrote:

> Hi Kaiti. I think handwriting is one of the final frontiers when it
> comes to accessibility. As far as I know there is no good
> technological solution unless your vision is good enough to read
> magnified handwriting. I too was thinking that having him read lyrics
> to you would be most practical, but I can understand how this process
> would be time-consuming given his specific impairments. My best
> solution would be to use a professional human reader to write down the
> lyrics for you between sessions if possible. This should be a very
> quick task for a human reader, and if you get the lyrics ahead of
> time, this person could do it on their own time. You could ask a
> friend or classmate to do it in exchange for a meal or something of
> that sort, but in a professional context it is probably best to hire
> an assistant for this and other paperwork tasks (or to request a
> certain number of hours of support as an ADA accommodation in the
> workplace). I can empathize with the desire not to depend on others,
> but I just don't think our accessibility is yet to the point where we
> can eschew human readers completely. Further, if you are paying or
> otherwise compensating the person, then you are not burdening them any
> more than you are burdening your hairdresser, taxi driver or anyone
> else you pay to give you a service. These are just my thoughts.
> Best, Arielle
>
> On 10/9/15, Kaiti Shelton via Social-sciences-list
> <social-sciences-list at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> > Hi all,
> >
> > I previously posted about this issue on the human services list but
> > have not gotten any suggestions for how to handle this challenge that
> > suit my needs.  I got similar answers from a group of blind music
> > therapists, but as both groups tend to be comprised of older folks I'm
> > hoping I might get some more satisfactory answers here from people who
> > know more about technology or why I might not want a reader other than
> > just being a stubborn whippersnapper.
> >
> > I am a music therapy student and for my practicum this semester I am
> > working one-on-one with a young man who has Down Syndrome.  We have
> > developed a great therapeutic relationship over the past few weeks,
> > and the theoretical models I've used have worked wonderfully.
> > Reciprocity is one of the core values of the format, which is great
> > because it allows for him and I to help each other, and for him to
> > take some of the responsibility and gain self-affirmation and success
> > from that.  (Music-centered, client-centered, and resource-oriented
> > music therapy are the principles I'm using in case anyone is
> > interested).
> >
> > In one of our sessions this week the client brought in a spiral
> > notebook with some handwritten song lyrics that he had composed
> > himself.  It was clear that he was seeking musical support and wanted
> > me to work with him to shape the songs into musical works.  My role in
> > this case would be to help him by forming the melodic material and the
> > chord progressions for the harmonic structure, but that was extremely
> > difficult for me to do without access to his lyrics.  I think he did
> > feel like he got something out of it because he did a bit of
> > directing, but it would be nice to really shape the song into
> > something unique (he identified that he wanted a pop sound and chose
> > to sing it along to the harmonic structure of "Fight Song," with my
> > supervisor and I playing in addition to the recording of Fight Song to
> > back him up).
> >
> > In the following session the client agreed to let my supervisor make
> > coppies of the notebook pages, and she took pictures of them using a
> > scanner app on her phone and sent them to me as image PDFs.  OCR won't
> > work on these since they're handwritten, so I'm still somewhat stuck
> > in accessibility.  The real catch comes in how to make them accessible
> > since I am not quite sure what the terms of the informed consent are
> > (the degree coordinators handle that as this is still fairly early in
> > my practicum sequence) and I also don't know what I can do on my end
> > to be ethical.  I don't know if going through disability services or
> > robo braille is an option because I can't guarantee that the files are
> > destroyed once I get my coppies of them.  My professor suggested that
> > we wave the usual requirements of not sharing more than superficial
> > information between clinical teams and have a classmate read the
> > lyrics to me so I can write them down, since I need to get them
> > somehow.  However, I think this is something I need to figure out how
> > to handle on my own because I may very well have this situation crop
> > up in the professional world and may not be able to run to classmates
> > or colleagues busy with their own work to do that.  Additionally, call
> > me stubborn, but I'm the type of person that avoids readers at all
> > costs because I want to be independent and not bother other people
> > with my workload, especially peers.
> >
> > That aside, when I emailed this to the human services list I received
> > one response in which the clinician lectured me on how I should have
> > the client read his lyrics to me so I can write them down in an
> > accessible format, and I can use it as a way to educate him on how I
> > adapt, how self-disclosure can be beneficial for the therapeutic
> > relationship, etc.  I am well aware of these facts and have strived to
> > self-disclose my blindness in ways that are beneficial to my client.
> > We talked about it in the first session I had with him and he receives
> > reminders of why he needs to tell me what he's pointing to or say what
> > he wants as needed.  He has even read lyrics of songs I've printed out
> > for us to work on for me a few times so I can find where he is looking
> > on the page and guide him to the right spot.  He has heard voiceover
> > and understands what it does for my phone on a basic level, as well as
> > seen my cane and notetaker before.  I think considering his level of
> > cognitive functioning that he understands it as well as he can and
> > with reminders that I've been giving him will understand it possibly a
> > little more as we continue working together.  On another note, I'm not
> > willing to sacrifice valuable session time which could be used to
> > address our goals for him to read to me.  This is because although
> > give and take is very important in our relationship, I think that
> > would be overdoing it.  It takes him longer to process and read things
> > out loud, and sometimes I have to clarify what he says because his
> > speech isn't always clear.  I think we'd at least sacrifice the
> > majority of a session if not more with just getting the information
> > into my computer and checking that it is correct, and that is not
> > something I'm willing to do-to sacrifice a client's treatment for my
> > own accommodations.  That's a principle I think I would stick to in
> > the professional world, so I'm really looking for something that will
> > allow me to independently and effectively get accessible versions of
> > his song lyrics while maintaining professional and ethical standards
> > of practice regarding confidentiality.
> >
> > Any suggestions or methods any of you have used for navigating these
> > issues would be appreciated.  With fall break my next session isn't
> > until Wednesday, but I'd like to have time to look over the lyrics to
> > see how I can best be of support.
> > --
> > Kaiti Shelton
> > University of Dayton-Music Therapy
> > President, Ohio Association of Blind Students 2013-Present
> > Secretary, The National Federation of the Blind Performing Arts
> > Division 2015-2016
> >
> > "You can live the life you want; blindness is not what holds you back!"
> >
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