The Read Read - Breakthrough Literacy Tool for the Blind

The majority of blind children in the United States are illiterate - their only path to literacy is one-on-one braille instruction from specialists, yet too few exist. The Read Read allows blind students to independently learn phonics and braille, and gain early literacy to keep pace with their sighted peers.

In the US, 97% of blind adults who don't know braille are unemployed, yet less than 10% of blind children learn braille in school.

Most blind children attend public schools, wherein they receive services from itinerant Teachers of the Visually Impaired (TVIs) as infrequently as once every two weeks. Classroom teachers are not prepared to teach literacy to blind students.

In the US, if we were to double the number of TVIs, there would still be too few. In developing nations blind children are relegated to classrooms of 70 children, receiving no one-on-one instruction, with no chance at basic literacy.

Invented by a phonics and literacy specialist, developed at the Harvard Innovation Lab, and piloted at the Perkins School for the Blind and the Harvard Graduate School of Education, the Read Read has been vetted by world-leaders in education. Kate Crohan, a Braille and Technology Teacher at Perkins, said, "The Read Read can change the course of history for kids who are blind.” During the device’s 12-week pilot at Perkins, a student who had struggled to learn the first ten letters of the alphabet all year long, learned them after only 2 days, practicing less than 20 minutes each day.

There are structures and technologies in place that allow blind students to succeed at levels equal to their sighted peers, given that they become literate at a typical pace: unfortunately, this is not the status quo. Given the results of our pilot at Perkins as precedent, we hypothesize that we will observe improved literacy outcomes for students who use the Read Read in randomized control trials. Due to the relatively small population of blind children, we should observe an uptick in achievement due to the acquisition of early literacy along metrics such as high school and college graduation, and employment.

We will conduct teacher and paraprofessional surveys, and use the device's built-in sensors to record and report usage data. - Students who use the Read Read will have greater exposure to braille in the classroom than students who do not.

We will conduct pre- and post-surveys with classroom teachers. - Non-specialists teachers whose students use the Read Read will become able to instruct their students in phonics and braille.

Randomized control trial with intermittent assessment protocols. - Students who use the Read Read will score higher on standardized reading assessments than students who do not.

The Read Read, a patent pending physical learning platform, allows learners to interact with physical manipulatives while receiving immediate audio feedback, to learn foundational reading and/or braille skills independently. While pointing under a letter, or touching a braille cell, the device articulates its name or sound, instead of requiring that a teacher perform the articulation. The use of capacitive touch sensing with moveable manipulatives is novel, and elegantly mirrors best practice.

Classroom teachers who have never taught visually impaired students can use the Read Read to effectively teach visually impaired students, because its interface aligns with existing best-practice phonics instruction.

The Read Read has undergone multiple rounds of iterative, parallel prototyping, with design iterations informed by users and experts in special education, braille, and Universal Design for Learning (UDL). Expert braille users and teachers at the world-famous Perkins School for the Blind have consulted on the design and user interface of the device. User feedback from blind students was recorded during each piloting session: 3D printing and Arduino reprogramming allowed for design recommendations to be rapidly implemented and tested throughout piloting. Among the experts that have consulted on the device are representatives from Perkins, National Braille Press, and other organizations.

The Read Read has been designed with mass-production in mind. All of its components are optimized for injection molding, and it requires a single PCB. Thus, the cost at scale will be very low. Due to its simple design, the cost when producing small quantities (approximately 500 units) is still only $70. This allows the Read Read to fit comfortably within Federal and State budgets for assistive technologies for the blind. The Federal Quota is funding of approximately $300 per student that is given to each teacher serving a blind student, and is allocated for the purchase of assistive technology.

After an initial investment to finance the purchase of molds for injection molding, we will manufacture and sell the Read Read to the American Printing House for the Blind, the non-profit which controls the Federal Quota funding, and allows teachers to purchase assistive technology for their blind students using Federal funding. In parallel, we will sell the Read Read to Schools for the Blind in the United States and in other anglophone countries at a 70% profit margin. We will use these profits to optimize our manufacturing protocols, so that we may reduce the cost and price of the device. In parallel, we will finance randomized control trials from a research institution to show the device's efficacy, and encourage uptake of the device by Federal Governments. We will similarly pilot the device as a phonics-learning platform for students with disabilities such as Autism, Speech/Language Pathology, Cognitive Delay, and Dyslexia.

We have successfully piloted the Read Read at the Perkins School for the Blind with students with various disabilities: blindness, visual impairment, Autism Spectrum Disorder, and diminished motor function.

We have worked with a team of electrical and mechanical engineers, and have official estimates on every cost required to have the Read Read professionally manufactured, assembled, and delivered.

Our potential barrier is we cannot make the device available at a low cost without initial funding of injection molding, yet the organizations and schools that will purchase the device are not cleared to do so until a production model is available.

http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/17/07/read-read

http://www.perkins.org/stories/new-braille-teaching-technology-piloted-at-perkins

http://www.wcvb.com/article/college-student-s-invention-helping-visually-impaired/10344141?bblinkid=54794152&bbemailid=4533092&bbejrid=336535927

We are at the precipice of enabling an enormous shift in the life outcomes for people who are blind. We have used human-centered design, letting blind children and adults be our guides, to develop the first learning platform that allows people who are blind to independently become literate. While we have relied heavily on our professional backgrounds as literacy instructors, and our academic backgrounds in neuroscience/cognitive science and educational technology, we have maxed out our core competencies - we need mentorship to effectively scale manufacture and implementation. This project is too important for first-timers to go it alone.

We are working to form a consortium with the Perkins School for the Blind, National Braille Press, the American Council for the Blind, the Royal National Institute for the Blind, the American Printing House for the Blind, and Vision Australia. Mentors include experts from Harvard, MIT, and national organizations.

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