[blindkid] braille qwerty usb keyboard needed

[Richard Holloway]

Sounds to me like you are doing just what you hope. (I'd leave the  
braille where it is.) I can't imagine there is a downside to your  
efforts at all. I also think there's a reason why key caps are printed  
for sighted folks and while it may indeed be that experienced blind  
typists can type far faster without the distraction of braille key  
caps (just as sighted typists generally become faster when they no  
longer look at the keys), I think there is a place for the markings  
too, especially with learning children.

Again, coming from a sighted perspective at least, I sometimes find it  
inconvenient to have to put both hands on the keyboard to enter a few  
characters and I tend to look down and enter a quick word or number  
and hit it with only a couple of fingers on one hand, especially if  
the other hand is unavailable. (For example, I'm pushing a 4-year-old  
away from my computer even as I type this.) Does this need never arise  
for blind typists or do they somehow master the entire keyboard's  
layout for use with either hand with no tactile cues beyond home row  
markings? I'm not saying that's not possible, but that's a pretty big  
reach to memorize tactually and especially to be able to swap from  
hand to hand.

I would also suggest that factory made braille key caps would be far  
less distracting than oozing, crooked adhesive labels or pre-picked  
dymo tape markings as well. I'm not bashing anyone's braille labeled  
keyboards, but over time, even the best efforts are going to have  
problems on keys that get pressed on by warm fingers thousands of  
times, over and again....

That's part of why I wanted to find the keyboard I mentioned to begin  
with. In fact it strikes me that even a (tactile) braille reader might  
quickly learn to ignore the braille caps once they were TOUCH typing  
because at that point, they'd be tapping on top of the braille, not  
scanning across the keyboard with their finger tips. It seems like  
only when you stopped to hunt-- like maybe if you were out of position  
and ran your fingers across the keys or were typing a few strokes with  
your hand(s) just getting settled on the keys) would the braille  
suddenly jump back into play.

That's pure speculation on my part, but I'd love to see a test by fast  
typists who are also tactile braille readers to find out. I hardly  
read braille and what I read, I read visually. I do know that once  
typing, I am entirely unaware of home row markings unless I pause my  
typing and scan for them and if I place my (admittedly untrained)  
fingertips directly on top of braille, I certainly feel far less  
difference from character to character than if I'm scanning across the  
same letters conventionally.

Some tactile braille readers may want to jump in and offer opinions on  
this topic. That's fine with me, but I suspect they'll be telling us  
what they think it would be like or what it is like on a keyboard with  
stickers stuck on it as there seem to be very few pre-formed braille  
key caps out there in the marketplace for anyone to have tried out.

In any case, for my situation, I expect (based on her speed with a  
perkins-style keyboard) that my daughter will end up being a very fast  
qwerty typist as well. She just needs a jump-start. If braille key  
caps will help her gain confidence and a desire to use a qwerty  
keyboard, I can't see the harm in trying them. It's not like there is  
a major effort in switching back to a standard keyboard at a later  
time for whatever reason. If Kendra gets through with such a keyboard,  
I could put it on a machine for myself and it would be there to  
reinforce my own inept efforts so simply learn plain old grade 1  
braille...


> This is an interesting discussion. We have labeled every keyboard  
> (letters only) Jack uses at home and school with braille labeling  
> tape. He's 5 and just learning to recognize that those dots mean  
> something. In the back of my mind I was hoping that I was not only   
> helping him learn braille but also placement of keys on a qwerty  
> keyboard.
>
> Marie (mother of Jack born May 2005)
> See glimpses of life with my determined son who is developing in his  
> own way at his own time at http://allaccesspasstojack.blogspot.com
> Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry