[stylist] Quote to ponder - taken to another level-spellingisfirst, recognition of a pattern

Sat Feb 9 21:44:12 UTC 2013

I like the shape of the y, which as you know also means 'you. It feels like
a little hug.
Donna 

-----Original Message-----
From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Lynda Lambert
Sent: Saturday, February 09, 2013 4:20 PM
To: Writer's Division Mailing List
Subject: Re: [stylist] Quote to ponder - taken to another
level-spellingisfirst, recognition of a pattern

I think this has been an interesting discussion and I am learning so much
through it. When I was learning Braille I was envisioning the shapes that
the dots form. I found that there were some shapes there that I really
enjoyed a lot and others I did not like at all. For some wild reason I do
not know, I was very partial to the "i" because of the upward movement - it
was dynamic to me. I felt like I could fly right off that page every time I 
felt the "i."   I know that is so crazy.
Lynda

----- Original Message -----
From: "Donna Hill" <penatwork at epix.net>
To: "'Writer's Division Mailing List'" <stylist at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, February 09, 2013 3:52 PM
Subject: Re: [stylist] Quote to ponder - taken to another level
-spellingisfirst, recognition of a pattern

> Robert,
> First, it looks like there was something at the end of this message 
> that got cut off.
>
> The other thing I was thinking about was about whether a totally, 
> congenitally blind person can visualize. I believe they can. It may be 
> a matter of semantics, but there is also something which I think is 
> called spacial awareness. It has to do with understanding, for 
> instance, shapes, how far away the table is or what it's proportions 
> are and where a cup was placed. My understanding has always been that 
> in general men are better at this than women -- or should I say they 
> gravitate to it more readily and pick it up at an earlier age. The 
> theory used to be that this was because men were the hunters and women 
> the gatherers. The thing I was thinking about with regard to blindness 
> is how this spacial awareness works with regard to both travel and 
> reading. After all, those Braille dots are in patterns governed by 
> specific proportions. A sighted person might look at a Braille letter 
> and see a design or pattern, but when a blind person feels the same 
> letter, they understand the same design, minus colors, perhaps, but in 
> terms of distance and placement of the dots, shape and depth, it 
> amounts to the same thing. I think this is all related to the visual 
> cortex, which has other uses than strictly visual in both blind and 
> sighted people. It would be interesting to learn what life without a 
> visual cortex would be like -- no, I'm not volunteering to have mine 
> removed, thank you very much.
> Donna
> -----Original Message-----
> From: stylist [mailto:stylist-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Robert 
> Leslie Newman
> Sent: Saturday, February 09, 2013 1:13 PM
> To: 'Writer's Division Mailing List'
> Subject: Re: [stylist] Quote to ponder - taken to another level 
> -spelling isfirst, recognition of a pattern
>
> Hi you all, good discussion going here:
>
> My take on spelling, or in the larger sense the ability to "read" 
> itself is not a question of vision, or touch or hearing --- but is a 
> question that begins with the human ability to recognize and decipher 
> patterns.  And I'm starting at this super basic point, and from that 
> we can plug in our questions of "is spelling and/or reading a visual 
> or tactile  or auditory reliant skill?" Or, "can someone who has been 
> blind all their life 'visualize,' in order to do things?"
>
> Well, I think we know that  " people do learn to read and spell using 
> vision (interpreting visual markings which consist of a known 
> alphabet). And we know that people also learn to read and spell via 
> touch, by the use of Braille (another system of set patterns 
> consisting of raised dots that represent the same stuff the visual 
> world is working with). Also, we all know that most anyone who can 
> hear, is able to read via recordings.
>
> Finally, we all know that some of us have a preferred mode of 
> learning, that tends to favor our dominant sensory modality like -- A 
> person might say, "I am a visual learner." Or, "I learn best if it is 
> hands-on?" Or, "Reading it in Braille is what makes it stick for me." 
> Or, etc.
>
> And so what is my point? Well --- that we humans are intelligent and 
> adaptive. That we all have more than one sensory modality that we can 
> use to read and know if a word is spelled correctly. Also that we all 
> tend to favor one sensory modality over the others. And yes, some of 
> us are "visual"
> learners, where some are hands-on, and some are auditory. 
> Additionally, our proficiency with any of these sensory modalities, 
> our ability to read and spell is greatly impacted by how we have 
> worked with and trained to use our chosen mode of operating with that 
> favored sense. Bottom-line, any and all of these sensory pathways will 
> work; hopefully as we go through life, we have the opportunity to make 
> use of our favorite sensory modality for all the tasks we find 
> necessary to perform. And if we have to give up our favorite, either 
> in part or in its entirety, then that we have the opportunity to learn 
> how to make use of the next best pathway to reading and/or being able 
> to continue on with our lives. (What is being said between the line is 
> - one group does not have it over the others! Second, there is much 
> ignorance and with the consequence, there is too much discrimination 
> that happens with all this going on.)
>
> (This past Saturday, I attended a meeting of the Nebraska Commission 
> Board, and there was a testimony by a first year college student who 
> started out reading braille in elementary school; in later elementary 
> classes, got a new "Vision Teacher" and was switched to magnifying 
> glasses that allowed her to read 20 words per minute [with much eye 
> strain and headaches]; in high school she got a different "Vision 
> Teacher" and was switched back to braille and now she reads at 485 
> words per minute.) And yea,  then was  , using
>
>
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