Hello Kimber, without trying to start a non-Apple product debate on
list, I have to respectfully disagree with the following statement you made.
> the assertion that screen readers and audiobooks are responsible for
> blind kids/adults not being able to
> spell is ludicrous. It's our lousy educational system that produces
> rotten spellers, not adaptive technology.
I am willing to discuss this further off list since I know it's not list
related. I agree that the educational system has its problems and can
stand to use betterment. My seven year old first grader is bored out of
his mind because of the math curriculum the public schools use here. And
so he gets into trouble because he doesn't have something to challenge
him. So, to make up for that, I have him do extra things at home and
he's very advanced in math.
However, it has been proven that the same part of the brain is
stimulated when a sighted person reads print with their eyes or a blind
person reads Braille with their fingers. That same part is not
stimulated when a person, blind or sighted is only listening to material
such as synthetic speech or audio books. This contributes to why many
people zone out when only listening to audio. It's also proven, at least
with blind people that in many cases, those who depend on speech and
haven't had much, if any Braille training, don't capitalize things. This
is because they don't think that words need to be capitalized. It's sad,
but on various blindness oriented lists I'm on, I see many people's
display names or signatures without proper capitalization. In fact, many
on this list fall into this category. Does that mean they aren't Braille
readers, or are only speech users and don't know to capitalize things?
Who is to say, but I would venture a guess that a great many are
probably only speech users. Either that, or just lazy.
Of course, with anything, there are always exceptions. One of my good
friends is a school teacher and a brilliant one, however you would never
know it by reading her emails.
Regarding spelling, I can't really comment on that because I think poor
spelling skills can be attributed to many factors. I am a horrid speller
and so try to not impose my standards on others. I however, try to do my
best by capitalizing things, spell things right, and if I'm stuck, I'll
spell-check. English is my second language, and yet I am saddened to see
many people who have full command of English, and yet they can't spell
things like since, sense, scent, or cents. And worse yet, they can't use
them in the proper context. Does it mean they are blind and only speech
users? No, it really proves nothing in the end. I guess what I'm trying
to say is that I feel there is some truth with the assertion that speech
only users may have a harder time. I've seen it happen with people I
know and in those situations, it hasn't been the educational system's fault.
OK, I'm off my soapbox now.
--
Raul A. Gallegos
My Doctor told me that I'm paranoid, I wonder if he's told anyone else...
Home Page: http://raulgallegos.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/rau47
Facebook: http://facebook.com/rgallegos74
On 5/3/2012 12:31 PM, Kimber Gardner wrote:
I also don't buy into the statements that devices which make things
easier for us are also making us dumber.
I said something similar to my husband after reading the article which
was, on the whole, pretty good. But the assertion that screen readers
and audiobooks are responsible for blind kids/adults not being able to
spell is ludicrous. It's our lousy educational system that produces
rotten spellers, not adaptive technology.
K
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