Enabling the Legally Blind in Classroom Note-Taking

Enabling the Legally Blind in Classroom Note-Taking

Publication Type:

Conference Paper

Authors:

D. Hayden, D. Colbry, J. Black, S. Panchanathan

Source:

Tenth International ACM SIGACCESS Conference on Computers and Accessibility (ASSETS 2008), Halifax, Canada (2008)

Document:

Abstract:

Classroom note-taking has been shown to be beneficial, even if the student never reviews his/her own notes. Students that are legally blind are thus at a disadvantage because they face significant barriers to note-taking in the classroom. This presentation demonstrates a working prototype of the CUbiC Note Taker, which is a highly portable device that allows students who are legally blind to take their own notes in class without any special in-classroom accommodations, and without requiring lecturers to adapt their presentation in any way.

Authors

David Hayden

David Hayden

Masters Student Researcher

Dirk Joel Luchini Colbry

Dirk Joel Luchini Colbry

Assistant Research Professor

John A. Black, Jr

John A. Black, Jr

Research Scientist

Dr. Sethuraman "Panch" Panchanathan

Dr. Sethuraman "Panch" Panchanathan

Director, National Science Foundation

Projects

To take notes in class, students with visual impairments must rapidly switch between writing their notes (a near-sight task) and viewing a board at the front of the classroom (a far-sight task). Current assistive technologies provide magnification for near-sight tasks,…