Change Makers: A Podcast from APH

Braille History

• American Printing House • Episode 68

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We're celebrating Braille Literacy Month and taking a look back at how braille came to be. We will also hear more from Anne Durham and Greg Stilson as they continue their discussion about the Monarch.  After that, we will hear from someone who got the chance to try out the Monarch.

On this Podcast (In Order of Appearance)

  • Sara Brown, APH Public Relations Manager
  • Micheal Hudson, APH Museum Director
  • Anne Durham,  APH Vice President/Chief Officer, Innovation and Strategy
  • Greg Stilson, APH Head of Global Technology Innovation
  • Karen Anderson, National Federation of the Blind Education Programs Coordinator

Additional Links

Email Links

 Additional Braille Product Links

 BANA Code books, Also Available in Braille 

Narrator:

Welcome to Change Makers, a podcast from APH. We're talking to people from around the world who are creating positive change in the lives of people who are blind or have low vision. Here's your host.

Sara Brown:

Hello and welcome to Change Makers. I'm APH's Public Relations Manager, Sara Brown, and we're still celebrating Braille Literacy Month on this podcast. And we're gonna take a look back at how Braille came to be. We'll also hear more from our interview with Anne Durham and Greg Stilson about The Monarch, and we'll even hear from an individual who has tested it. First, we have APH Museum Director Michael Hudson, here to talk about the origin of braille. Hello Michael, and welcome to Change Makers.

Michael Hudson:

Thank you, Sara. Happy Braille Literacy Awareness Month.

Sara Brown:

Yes, it sure is. And let's talk about the history of braille. How can you talk about its beginnings, the middle, and pretty much where we are today?

Michael Hudson:

Sure, of course. That's a, that's a, that's a pretty big softball question there, right? So, so we call it Braille because it was invented by a kid named Louis Braille, uh, who was born in 1809 in Paris, France. Uh, lost his vision in a accident in his father's workshop. And at the time, uh, France had the only school for kids that were blind or low vision. And Louis got to go there. And when he was 12 years old, he was exposed to a dot code that had been invented by a guy named Charles Barbier. And, uh, Barbier's, this fascinating character who had to flee France during the French Revolution and was an inventor and a, you know, he just was interested in codes and communication. And he'd come up with this dot code, right? It used 12 dots, six dots high, two dots wide. And it wasn't based on the alphabet, it was based on phonics the way we pronounce words. But Louis and his buddies at the school for the bond loved the braille code, I mean, the Barbier Code, because for the first time they could write, they could take notes in class, they could send messages to each other that no one else in the school could read. They loved it. But, but Louis, um, quickly realizes that the Barbie code is too clunky. It's got too many dots. So he simplifies it down to just the six dots we use today. He based in on the alphabet, so you could learn how to spell and punctuate and capitalize on all the things that we do when we, when we write in print. And then he publishes his book for the first time in 1829, but the system is not immediately adopted anywhere, even in France. Um, and it kicked off, uh, this whole period that we call the"War of the Dots," where different competing systems were kicking around, and there were raised letter systems, um, which were just embossed, you know, uh, uh, letters. And, uh, so it, it would, would not in the United States. Uh, it took until 1932, actually long after Louis had died, before we adopted the Standard Braille Code that, um, that we've used for so long. Um, and of course, braille, the code is alive, Sara, that's the cool thing about it. We're constantly, you know, tweaking it and adapting it so that it reflects the way that everybody uses print, right? And so we're constantly ch you know, you know, 20 years ago no one used the hashtag, right? And, and 40 years ago, nobody used the little at symbol to go, you know,"@ aph.Org,: right? So we changed the way we use the language. So the braille code has had to, you know, constantly be edited and a and added to, and that's why we, the, the, the code that we, that we use right now is called UEB, right? Unified English Braille. Um, but, and then there's all the technology that surrounds it, right? Uh, for, for, for decades, if you wanted to write braille, you did it with a little hand tool, uh, called a Slate and stylus that had little windows, and you would use your stylist to poke the dots in. And then, uh, in 1890, a guy named Frank Hall at the Illinois School for the Blind invents the first successful mechanical braille r ider, a nd then we c all it the H all B rail writer. And, you know, every brail r ider that's still around, uh, uh, is based on Hall's original machine. And then in the 1970s, uh, this French guy named Oleg Tretiakoff came up with this thing called the Refreshable Braille display. And so when you look at modern devices like, uh, we sell in our catalog like the chameleon and the Mantis, they use these refreshable braille displays that, uh, connect to your phone or to your computer, or, or even as independent note takers, and they raise the pens into the patterns of the braille. U m, so you can download anything you want off the internet if it's in p rint, and you, then you can read it yourself in braille, uh, you can send p iece people, uh, messages in braille, but t hey, i t arrives, uh, u nder their computer i n print. So, um, you know, braille h as just proven to be this just amazing flexible, uh, elegant, uh, little code that has made it possible for, you know, now, you know, uh, over 200 years of, uh, of braille literacy for people that are blind o r low v ision.

Sara Brown:

Now, I know there's been some instances in the past where APH has partnered with other businesses and organizations to help advance braille talk about that?

Michael Hudson:

We've been responsible for some of the big advances in braille, like we worked with IBM in the 1950s to figure out how to computerize the translation of printed braille. And that sped everything up. And that's at the heart of all these, or organism. I mean, these, uh, um, um, uh, machines that we used, but at the same time, we also, we had this thing called, and, and the braille users out there, uh, will remember the old, uh, lavender braile writer, which was a, an attempt to substitute a lot of plastic parts so that the brail rider would be lightweight, right? But it turns out that the plastic wasn't very durable, and so the machine broke all the time, right? And so it, in the end, it is the, it is usually the marketplace that determines, you know, what, what is the right product at the right time.

Sara Brown:

So true, so true. And, and timing is a big deal too, you know, timing.

Michael Hudson:

But yeah, sometimes things come along too, too early, right? They, they're ahead of their time and pe and the people are just not ready for them.

Sara Brown:

So true. So true. Now, you talked about how braille has, has changed, or just it's a living thing. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, you know, for, like you said back in years ago, they wouldn't have known what the hashtag was, right? Or, you know, how it's evolved. Can you talk about what braille shortcomings, any additional shortcomings that there are with braille?

Michael Hudson:

Well, I don't, I don't think I know, uh, of any shortcomings in braille today, but the, the big problem historically has always been bulk, right? So, so in the 19, 19 59, 19 60 APH undertook, the largest braille project ever attempted. It was a translation of the World Book Encyclopedia. And, uh, and so there are great pictures of, uh, staff in the front yard at APH with the print version of the encyclopedia. And behind it were stacked the five or six volumes of braille that were necessary to make the print. You know, so it's like, if if the thing fell on you, it would've crushed you, right? It was that bulky. And that was, that was from the beginning. It was always a, a complaint that people had that because the character needs to be big enough to fit right underneath your fingertip, it meant that the overall book was a lot bigger. And that's still true today of our paper books. When, when you, you might get a, a a, a high school physics or a chemistry book that might come in 30 or 40 volumes. And so that's where the Refreshable Braille display, or even, you know, the new, uh, uh, the Monarch, the tactile dyna, the dynamic tactile display that we, that a p h has been working on the Holy Braille, right? Uh, the Holy Braille of, of braille is, is, is this, is this Refreshable Braille full page refreshable braille display that also includes graphics. Well, that's very exciting that, that, uh, we're on the cusp potentially, bearing in mind, you know, the caveat we mentioned about picking winners, technological winners, we, we might be on the cusp of a, of a time when a kid might be able to carry all their books around on one convenient tablet that fits right into their backpack. And isn't that exciting? And it's still uses the same"a" and the same"m" and the same"z" that Louis invented as a 12 year old boy back in the early 1800s. I think that's cool.

Sara Brown:

And I think you just answered my next question, which is the future of braille is currently in the works as a museum director. As a museum director of APH museum. How does that feel knowing something's in the pipeline that will truly change the the way braille is received? Because it will.

Michael Hudson:

Yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm very excited about it because it, it basically brings to, uh, the Braille community the same benefits that people who use a Kindle or, or, or any of these e-readers have, you know, it's, it's, it's really an, an awesome idea to imagine that you would, you would take the single most big objection to braille, which is its bulk and wipe it away. Um, but I, but I actually think one of the biggest challenges, Sara, is, is not technological. It's, it's educational and systemic. And that is that we need to encourage Braille literacy for those people in the community for whom braille is the best reading, uh, medium, right? So whether it's braille or large print or audio, whatever the best medium is for you based on your abilities, we need to, we need to not let braille get, uh, swept under the, under the car, under the carpet. And we need to, we need to focus on braille literacy here in, in the United States for our kids.

Sara Brown:

Well, so true. So true. Now, is there anything else you wanna say about Braille, whether it's the this, the past, the present, or its future?

Michael Hudson:

Um, you know, braille is literacy. Sara, braille is literacy. And so it's a tool that, you know, very, a really simple little elegant tool invented a long time ago, but it's still very, very relevant.

Sara Brown:

They say the classics never die, and this is a prime example. And if it ain't that's right. Don't fix it.

Michael Hudson:

If it ain't broke, don't fix it

Sara Brown:

In here, and it's still in you. So that's true. Now, we've got some exciting stuff going on at the APH Museum. Can you let our listeners know what's going on?

Michael Hudson:

Sure. Oh gosh. Wow. Um, so, you know, back in 2020, we became a partner with the American Foundation for the Blind to bring the Helen Keller Archive, AFB Helen Keller Archive to Louisville. And as a part of that partnership, we are going to be closing our museum this summer. And, you know, Helen and Anne Sullivan gave all of their collections day f b with the dream that one day they might be, uh, that they might be put together into a museum exhibit. And so we are gonna collab, we are collaborating with AFB to make that dream come true. And we are gonna reimagine the way that museums work for people with disabilities. We're gonna be telling all kinds of great stories. We're gonna be demystifying blindness. We're gonna be, you know, introducing Helen, uh, Keller as a, as one of the greatest, uh, women of the 19th and 20th centuries. We're gonna be talking about APH and innovation, and we're gonna do it all in a brand new facility that is going to defy a lot of expectations for how you tell stories both to and about people with disabilities. It's gonna be the most accessible museum in the world.

Sara Brown:

Yeah. It's some exciting things. And when can a person see the museum now before it closes?

Michael Hudson:

Right, so we, uh, we are open, uh, 8:30 to 4:30, Monday through Friday, and 10-3 on Saturdays, and we're gonna be open through June 3, and then we will close for about two years and open sometime in 2025.

Sara Brown:

Awesome.

Michael Hudson:

So if you want to come see us, you need to come see us before June 3rd of, of this summer. And then when we, when we reopen, obviously there'll be lots of opportunities to see the, the new installation.

Sara Brown:

Absolutely. All right, Michael, thank you so much for joining me today on Change Makers.

Michael Hudson:

Thank you, Sara.

Sara Brown:

Now let's take a look at the future product that's going to make changes in the way we access braille and tactile graphics. The Monarch, a multi-line device that displays both braille and tactile graphics will transform the way teachers and students engage with materials in the classroom. Let's hear from APH's Vice President and Chief Officer, Innovation and Strategy, Anne Durham and Head of Global Innovation, Greg Stillson on the feedback received during the Monarch's prototype testing, and what's next for 2023? Now, talk about the reception or the feedback you've all received from the, we can call it the Monarch now. So talk about the reactions to the prototypes and I guess in the field testing.

Anne Durham:

Well, I think, you know, um, before we would do the field testing, you know, Greg and I, you know, sort of in evangelizing the highway, uh, would go and visit a different organization, blindest organizations, tech companies, whatnot, and, uh, take the prototypes with us. And I would say that first of all, there was skepticism before we we'd show them anything, wouldn't you, Greg? We were kind of walking into a room of skeptics. Typically.

Greg Stilson:

We, we did a, what we called our"prove it" tour and<laugh> the very beginning, right? We, we didn't even have the full device. What we were doing were basically showing just the technology at work. We had these very rudimentary, um, tactile, I almost like tactile windows that we were bringing around, showing mm-hmm.<affirmative> examples of what could be displayed. And before we showed this, you're right, it was all it, it was this whole,"I've heard this song and dance before" because they all had wanted to make, I wanna, I wanna make sure that we respect that, right? Like this has been, yeah, we, we had this whole thing that we had to prove why, why you should believe us that this, this stuff really does work now. Um, but yeah, there was a lot of skepticism at First.

Anne Durham:

Yeah, there, there was. And then, you know, and Greg is, is very good as, as a person, and usually I let him do the demonstration of the technology. Um, and he's very good about slowly introducing the concept, starting with a little bit of braille, and then moving, um, maybe to a tactile graphic of a car, um, and then onto a, a chart bar chart or pie chart and graph, and then to a more complicated problems. And, um, I have seen, um, this, this is kind of actually emotional talk about, I have seen a wide range of emo emotions from people. I see joy, I see huge smiles. I see people break out into laughter. I see them astonished, um, gasping. Um, I see I've seen people break down into tears. Um, they've, they've said things like, uh, this is something I've dreamed about my entire life and I can't believe I'm holding it in my hands right now. Um, you know, that, that, starting with that disbelief of can't believe it's actually happening to, I can't believe I'm holding it, you know? Um, that whole range. And, you know, I always say to everybody, back at a p h, I wish you could be in the room when this happens, because it is the kind of thing when you're working through a very difficult project like this that lets you know, yes, we're on the right track track, um, we're doing exactly what we need to do. And it gives you that, uh, that fire, uh, to keep going.

Greg Stilson:

Yeah. I think some of the most impactful stuff is also from the teachers, right? Like teachers, oh gosh, teachers today, you know, I remember my TVI that I, that I had in my, you know, pre-calc classes and things like that. They oftentimes the teacher, the classroom teacher, forgot to get them a graphic to be turned into a tactical graphic, right? So these teachers, the visually impaired are some of the most creative folks to do this on the fly gymnastics or, you know, MacGyvering a a, a tactile graphic out of like pipe cleaners and rubber bands, right? But they do it, and it, it, it creates a, an environment for learning in some way, shape, or form, right? But now with a device like this, being able to, uh, essentially draw a, one of the apps that we're gonna be working on is an impromptu learning tool where a teach a teacher's visually impaired could draw a graphic, a very rudimentary graphic, but draw a graphic on their smartphone or tablet and cast that graphic over to the tactile display. And when we talk about that and show them that this is a possibility, it changes the entire game for impromptu mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Now obviously you want to have a, a, you know, fully fledged, tactile graphic created, but in the event that the classroom teacher forgets to do that, which they inevitably will, the teachers have a, a much more productive solution at that stage and, and something that they'll be able to, to really take full advantage of. Um, and that's, that's something that I think kind of is emotionally connecting to me, is watching these TV eyes go mm-hmm.<affirmative>, oh my God, I can do so much with this. Right?

Anne Durham:

Or I get, I get so many hours of my life back every week,

Greg Stilson:

<laugh><laugh>. It's a true statement. Yeah, exactly.

Anne Durham:

Yeah. Yeah. And, and there's a lot of joy for the teachers too, and just amazement, um, because, you know, as, as, as quickly as they say, I get so many hours back of my life, they quickly are filling up those hours with all the things they believe they can create with the Monarch. So, you know, it's, uh, it's really, really fun to watch and, uh, the teachers, uh, imagine what is possible. And, and every time we take these out, someone else has another fabulous idea of how it could be used. And, and, you know, we, we need like, oh my gosh, volumes and volumes of these big ideas. And you know, Greg, Greg probably gets annoyed at me because I'm always saying"textbooks first, everybody," you know, because everybody's ready to do just about everything for this device, but we've got to get it when it comes out. That's the number one thing we have to achieve, as is the textbook, uh, user example. But, but the things that the mark will be able to do as it grows and develops, um, and as we implement, a lot of these ideas are just astonishing.

Sara Brown:

What are the plans for The Monarch in 2023? Just what you would like to see happen or what you got in mind, even though we know they could change mm-hmm.<affirmative>, what do you see on the horizon?

Greg Stilson:

So, I'll tell you where we are right now. Um, you know, we, we, we talk like we've been ha we, we've had this alpha unit forever, and it does feel like a long time, but the reality is we got this

Anne Durham:

Alpha, the travel

Greg Stilson:

<laugh> in September, right?<laugh>. So we've done, we've packed like a year's worth of travel in just

Anne Durham:

A couple weeks, four or four of this year,<laugh>. So yes, ma'am.

Greg Stilson:

Um, and so where we are right now, we produced our first Alpha prototype. We've been getting a lot of great feedback. Um, we know we've had to make some changes to it. It's also incredibly alpha"e" if you will,<laugh>, you know, it doesn't always turn on sometimes. And there's, you know, there's things that happen in every, as somebody who's developed numerous products throughout my career, like, I always joke with Anne, I'm like, I always love to see these weird things that happen in the alpha units and<laugh>. Um, like the fact that when you put it to sleep, it just wakes itself up randomly. It's awesome. Um, but you know, that that's where we are right now. We've been traveling around getting feedback. Um, we've been hard, hard, you know, the part of this is that there's a lot of pieces that are happening in parallel as well. Mm-hmm.<affirmative>, um, the eBRF, the, um, eBRF committee, which William is leading, is happening in parallel. We're gonna be contracting with, um, with DAISY Consortium next year to really make this, this eBRF dream a reality. Um, in parallel, we're gonna also be building a BRF to eBRF converter tool next year so that all of the thousands and hundreds of thousands of B RFS that are out there will be able to be converted, uh, with a web tool to eBRF and give some markup to that as well. Um, and then also in parallel, we are ordering parts and, and, you know, trying to get ahead of the supply chain challenges to ensure that our, our beta units come on time. And we are very hopeful that, you know, spring of of 23, we're gonna start to see the rolling in of, of the first beta units, um, that are very well spoken for. I can tell you that we've had a lot of folks that, uh, are part of school districts and mm-hmm<affirmative> testing centers and, and such that, um, are, are looking to give us feedback. And we're also obligated by the federal government to do a round of specific field testing in the education system as well. So we are, um, gonna be doing our initial beta testing in, uh, the, the majority of 2023, making software changes, uh, and things like that. And then we roll into 24, um, where we are gonna be focused heavily on the teachers and ensuring that the teachers are trained on how to teach all of these new concepts. These are all concepts that have never been taught before, uh, to blind students, you know, concepts of zooming in and out of graphics and panning around graphics and things. If you born blind, you're, you're not born with, you know, an understanding of these concepts. And so teaching those type of concepts and teaching how to, how to integrate this device into your daily workflow, um, our, our hope is, and we say hope, cuz there can be a lot of things that can go wrong between now and the end of 2024, but our hope is to have this available by the end of 2024.

Anne Durham:

Mm-hmm.<affirmative>. Yep.

Sara Brown:

Wow. Well that's exciting because that will be here, gosh, before you know it. So there's a

Anne Durham:

Lot. It's a line, you know. Oh my gosh.

Sara Brown:

Now we're gonna talk to education programs coordinator for the National Federation of the Blind, Karen Anderson. She's being interviewed by a P h's Senior Director, engagement and Experience Leslie Farr Knox. Karen shares her thoughts on the way the Monarch referenced in the interview as the DTD can change the way Braille is taught and how it can provide children with unprecedented access to books and graphics.

Leslie Farr Knox:

So I'm gonna start with the same question I asked President Mark Riccobono, you just got to see the, the alpha prototype of the DTD. Tell us what your first impressions were?

Karen Anderson:

So getting to see the Alpha prototype really get my hands on it, it was the first time that I was able to manipulate the multi-line braille display. Um, the first time I was able to manipulate the graphics myself, and it just makes me wonder what's gonna happen next? What's gonna happen when we get these in front of kids? Um, how many possibilities is this gonna unlock for kids and for teachers, for blind people of all ages? Um, it's the dream that we've had for so long and it's unbelievably exciting to see it starting to come to fruition.

Leslie Farr Knox:

So as the person at the National Federation of the Blind who oversees programs like the Bell Academy that teach braille and other kind of skills, tell us how the DTD is gonna change approaches to early literacy and teaching braille?

Karen Anderson:

I think the DTD is gonna make teaching braille and teaching braille well and teaching the reading mechanics of braille well, easier. Um, or at least that, that's my hope. I hope that teachers now are going to have an easier time understanding why it's important to teach kids to read with two hands and to teach kids to read With multiple fingers on each hand, to teach kids how to finish a line with one hand while they're starting the line with the next, um, you know, for a long time now we've been hearing, well mostly they're gonna read on their braille display and that's only one line, so it doesn't matter and it, it does matter. That's how you really build up a lot of your speed. So I think it's gonna put braille in front of kids more readily. I think it's going to make some of those mechanics at least. I really hope it's gonna make teaching those mechanics more common. But I also think the tactile literacy that's gonna be available is gonna be really powerful. Getting graphics in front of kids at a really early age. Um, you know, you mentioned the Bell Academy and Bell is for kids ages four through 12. What kind of graphics do we wanna get in front of our blind four year olds and get them really starting to explore tactile graphics at a really young age, just like our sighted kids are exploring print pictures? Um, um, I think we don't know how far a blind person's understanding of tactile graphics can go because we've never been able to get Multiple graphics in front of blind kids at such a young age. Um, so I, I think the answer is we really don't know, but I really hope, at least in terms of braille education and reading mechanics, I hope that that will, uh, be a, a really big stepping stone.

Leslie Farr Knox:

So same question, a little bit different focus. How will access to a device like the DTD affect things like reading speed and overall literacy? If you had to guess what, what would your thought be?

Karen Anderson:

I hope, I very much hope that it's going to bring kids reading speed up because they'll be taught, uh, reading mechanics better. Um, they'll be taught to use two hands at a time. They'll be taught to use multiple fingers on each hand at a time. Um, I think we, we know from research that's been conducted that that's how you really build up that speed. That's how you get to three and 400 words a minute in braille is by using multiple hands, both hands, multiple fingers on each hand. Um, and I think convincing kids to do that when they have this cool piece of technology is gonna be a little bit easier. I also think it's going to make getting braille in front of kids easier. Uh, when it comes to like textbooks right now, it takes a substantial amount of time for a blind kid to get their textbook and hopefully with this device we'll be able to get those textbooks to blind kids a lot earlier, a lot faster. So there won't be as many opportunities for teachers or whoever administrators to say like, well, we don't have the textbook so they can just listen to it. We don't have the textbook in braille so they can use what little vision they have and try and read it under a CCTV or under magnification. I really hope that Being able to digitally deliver textbooks in braille with tactile graphics is gonna make the textbooks easier for students to get, which will then make it easier for students to, to be using braille in their classrooms and kids using braille in school. It being in context, them using it on a regular basis is really how they become proficient.

Sara Brown:

This is such an amazing and exciting time here at APH and I hope you all are finding that too from these interviews, especially learning about The Monarch. I wanna thank you so much for listening to this episode of Changemakers. I've put links in the show notes to a p h products that help encourage braille learning and links where you can sign up for more information about the Monarch. As always, be sure to look for ways you can be a change maker this week.