Canute: Using Braille to make ‘Kindles’ for blind people…

Posted on by Chris The Story Reading Ape

Extract of an interesting article from The Memo site:

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Canute is tackling the decline in Braille literacy – and everyone should care.

Being able to read is one of the most precious of skills: Books free the imagination and inspire creativity – they allow people to learn independently, and relax after a hard day.

But not everyone has that luxury.

This week is National Braille Week: a week dedicated to the raised dots that allow blind people to read letters, numbers, punctuation and words.

But Braille is on the decline.

In the ’60s up to 50% of blind school children in the US were able to read Braille, but this figure is now closer to 10%.

Today one company hopes to turn this around, with a device that’s fit for the digital age.

Get ready to meet Canute.

Continue reading at:

Like a kindle for blind people

 

21 thoughts on “Canute: Using Braille to make ‘Kindles’ for blind people…”

  3. Many thanks for drawing attention to this excellent invention Chris. As someone who has been blind since approximately 18-months-old I welcome anything that enhances the ability of visually impaired people to read independently. I learned to read braille from about 6-years-old and love sitting with a braille book on my knee. Further enhancing the capacity of braille readers to access text in this medium, using an electronic device is to be welcomed as while the text to speech facility on the Kindle is great, its exciting to know there will be a braille alternative. Kevin

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  8. Pingback: Canute: Using Braille to make ‘Kindles’ for blind people… | Annette Rochelle Aben

  10. Thanks, Chris. I had wondered about Braille books. The article makes an excellent point about the difference between reading and being readt-to by text-to-speech. I know that Nick, having lost so much of his sight, really mourned his inability to read (he’d always been a bookworm) until the re-sizeable fonts on Kindle allowed him to do so. I hope this takes off. It would be a crying shame to prevent people reading for themselves just because text to speech is a cheaper option.

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