[stylist] The ponder to take to another level

[Bridgit Pollpeter]

I think this is a travesty that kids aren't learning exactly what
sighted kids are learning. Clumped together, we all learn at different
paces with different methods, and we all have an individual
comprehension level, but at most sighted kids (and there are exceptions
to this) but in general, sighted kids are learning together at the same
time, receiving the same information with the same material. Blind kids
are often not afforded the opportunity to access said material at the
same time or in the same way. Kids who need Braille but don't receive
instruction or proper instruction, are expected to learn either verbally
or via computer, or perhaps both, but they don't have the opportunity to
pick up information in the same way as their sighted peers. Kids who
have some level of vision are expected to use this vision, and for many
it's difficult and tedious, leading them to develop a learning delay and
worse, giving up. And it's the education system insisting upon this
disgrace. Regardless what people think, this states that blind kids
aren't worth the extra effort, and that they don't qualify for the same
opportunities in life as nondisabled kids. I wrote a paper on this at
university, but it's such a complicated issue that begins to run off in
various directions once you research, but it's a problem that needs
immediate addressing. And of course, education in general needs major
reform and growth.

Going back to a comment of Robert's, I heard once of a student who only
read audio material. He was not aware of punctuation and grammar, and he
thought the phrase, "Once upon a time," was a single word. This just
shouldn't be happening.

Sincerely,
Bridgit Kuenning-Pollpeter, editor, Slate & Style
Read my blog at:
http://blogs.livewellnebraska.com/author/bpollpeter/
 
"If we discover a desire within us that nothing in this world can
satisfy, we should begin to wonder if perhaps we were created for
another world."
C. S. Lewis

Message: 12
Date: Fri, 8 Feb 2013 08:03:09 -0600
From: "Robert Leslie Newman" <newmanrl at cox.net>
To: "'Writer's Division Mailing List'" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Subject: [stylist] Quote to ponder - taken to another level
Message-ID: <03ed01ce0605$070eb2d0$152c1870$@cox.net>
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We were discussing how the impact of what is read is influenced by the
reader, themselves (by what they personally bring to the reading-table).

And here is an interesting thought or outcome that is happening to too
many blind people! First as a baseline thought - the sighted
student/reader who uses print to read literature, educational stuff and
the like - they are reading the words themselves, visually scanning,
actively processing --- while during this process, the student is being
exposed to important "reading related/literacy" features/elements such
as: format, punctuation, spelling, and features like tables, graphs,
pictures, etc. Also, along the same line of literacy, of actively
reading for oneself --- The blind reader who has the skill of Braille
can get the same basic exposure to content, plus all the important
literacy features as - format, punctuation, spelling and the other
stuff. However, in today's world, at least in this country, Braille is
not being taught as a first-line method of reading for the non-print
reader! And yeah, you all have heard this gripe, this warning before.
There again my point today is a bit different: My thought, question is
--- hey --- picture this- if you could not read print, did not know
Braille and could only hear new information, be it a textbook, or poem
or piece of prose --- you were not getting exposed to formatting,
punctuation, or spelling of anything you heard; 
And so I ask does this then essentially take the blind person back to
the preprint era, back to learning via the oral tradition? Yeah --- what
are these teachers thinking? (Another bazaar thought - what do you think
these teachers who are doing this to the blind would do --- if they were
to find that in school their very own sighted children would have print
taken away and their child was restricted to only listening to what was
being taught??)