Field Evaluators Needed for Braille Literacy Project APH is collaborating with the American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) to produce a Practice Guide for the I-M-ABLE (Individualized Meaning-centered Approach to Braille Literacy Education ) by Dr. Diane P. Wormsley. APH will pair the I-M-ABLE Practice Guide with several other APH literacy-related products, including a talking card reader. The kit will be available with Federal Quota Funds. I-M-ABLE is an approach developed for students who have not been successful learning to read braille. The approach is a whole- to-part approach that begins with teaching whole words -- individualized vocabulary words that are meaningful to the student. Students move from reading whole words into reading charted stories and from there into phonics instruction and reading more sophisticated stories. The approach also focuses on proper hand and finger technique in reading as well as writing braille. Field testing of the kit will begin in Fall of 2015 (mid-September) and extend through Spring 2016 (end of March). Evaluators must have a student or students with whom they will agree to use the approach for the entire six-month period. Students who are ages 7 through 18 and have made little or no progress in reading braille and who have additional disabilities, such as a mild to moderate cognitive impairment and/or ESL, will be considered for the field testing. Field evaluators will receive training in the use of the I-M-ABLE and baseline data collection. They will be expected to work with students for at least three to four days a week using the approach and to keep track of and report student outcomes as part of the product evaluation. Included in the kit will be the I-M-ABLE Practice Guide, a Califone Talking Card Reader and a small set of blank cards, braille reward stickers, the Chunk Stacker game with braille labels (for phonics activities), along with record keeping sheets for reporting student progress. In addition APH will provide the APH Word PlayHouse for supporting phonics instruction when your student reaches a predetermined level of competence. If you wish to be considered as an evaluator for the I-M-ABLE Practice Guide Kit, please go to the link below for more information and to complete a survey that will ask for information on you and the student(s) with whom you intend to use this approach. (The survey permits you to enter a rationale for a particular student who you feel would benefit, even if the student doesn’t completely match the criteria.) Here is the link to the survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/CZ9DTWP Please contact sspicknall@aph.org<mailto:sspicknall@aph.org> if you have any difficulty completing the survey, or if you have questions about the field evaluation or the I-M-ABLE. Diane P. Wormsley, Ph. D. Brenda Brodie Endowed Chair (Retired) Editor in Chief, Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness Email: dwormsley@nccu.edu ________________________________ Diane P. Wormsley, Ph. D. Brenda Brodie Endowed Chair (Retired) Editor in Chief, Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness Email: dwormsley@nccu.edu ________________________________ From: Wormsley, Diane P Sent: Tuesday, May 13, 2014 1:29 PM To: aernet@lists.aerbvi.org; division10@lists.aerbvi.org; banachapters-bounces@lists.aerbvi.org; personnelprep@lists.aerbvi.org Subject: RE: [AERNet] BANA Press Release Below is the Press Release in a docx format. Attached is a pdf. The link to the HTML version on the website is http://www.brailleauthority.org/pressreleases/pr-2014-4.html. Press Release Spring 2014 For Immediate Release ________________________________ CONTACT: Frances Mary D’Andrea, Chair Braille Authority of North America Phone: 412-521-5797 Email: literacy2@mindspring.com<mailto:literacy2@mindspring.com> Recent Actions: BANA Held Spring Meeting in Philadelphia The Braille Authority of North America (BANA) held its 2014 spring meeting April 3 – 5 in Philadelphia, PA. Associated Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired, (ASB), a BANA member organization, hosted the meeting. All sessions were held at ASB. During its three-day meeting, the BANA Board reviewed and acted on semiannual reports from its eighteen committees, considered committee recommendations, and deliberated issues and challenges facing braille users and producers. The UEB Task Force reported on the development of a plan for the transition to UEB in the United States as well as the collaborative steps that have been taken to initiate dialogue and planning among the various braille communities. The development of resources for training teachers, transcribers, consumers, and family members is a focus of BANA’s efforts at this time. BANA welcomed three new organizational representatives to their first meeting as members of the Board. Dawn Gross is the new representative from the Alternate Text Production Center of the California Community Colleges (ATPC). Peggy Schuetz now represents the California Transcribers and Educators of the Blind and Visually Impaired (CTEBVI). Kyle Key has recently been appointed as the representative from the Clovernook Center for the Blind. In addition to extensive deliberations involved in the 44-item meeting agenda, actions of note included the following: Revisited and revised organizational priorities in order to balance BANA’s work during this time of focus on the transition to UEB. Approved a recommendation from the Tactile Graphics Technical Committee that any braille volume containing one or more tactile graphics should contain a note on the Transcriber’s Notes page stating: “The Guidelines and Standards for Tactile Graphics, 2010 was used in the preparation of the tactile graphics.” Approved a document detailing specific factors and specifications that should be employed when producing braille signage. This new fact sheet will be posted on the BANA website. Voted that, in light of the major revision underway to align the Braille Formats publication with UEB, BANA will not produce for sale hardcopy editions of Braille Formats 2011, which can be downloaded free of charge from the BANA website and printed or embossed. The Board also voted to add the recently posted errata in the HTML, PDF, and BRF files of Braille Formats 2011 that are posted on the BANA website. These decisions followed an extensive deliberation of the complex issues impacting BANA’s current obligations and resources. NOTE: Braille Formats 2011 went into effect in January 1, 2013. Materials now being transcribed should follow these guidelines. On Saturday morning, BANA hosted an Open Forum, which was well attended by individuals from the Philadelphia community. BANA Board members and forum participants enjoyed reading example documents transcribed in Unified English Braille and discussing the characteristics of the code. They also discussed the progress of the transition to UEB as well as ongoing plans for informing braille readers and preparing educators and transcribers about specific code changes. NOTE: This press release is available in HTML on the BANA website at http://www.brailleauthority.org/pressreleases/pr-2014-4.html For additional resource information, visit www.brailleauthority.org<http://www.brailleauthority.org/>. You can follow the work of BANA by signing up for BANA-Announce, a one-way email list that disseminates news and information. To join this list, send a blank email message to bana-announce-subscribe@brailleauthority.org<mailto:bana-announce-subscribe@brailleauthority.org> and follow the directions in the confirmation email that will be sent in response. You can also follow BANA on Facebook and Twitter! The Board of BANA consists of appointed representatives from seventeen member organizations of braille producers, transcribers, teachers, and consumers. The mission of the Braille Authority of North America is to assure literacy for tactile readers through the standardization of braille and/or tactile graphics. The purpose of BANA is to promote and to facilitate the uses, teaching, and production of braille. Pursuant to this purpose, BANA will promulgate rules, make interpretations, and render opinions pertaining to braille codes and guidelines for the provisions of literary and technical materials and related forms and formats of embossed materials now in existence or to be developed in the future for the use of blind persons in North America. When appropriate, BANA shall accomplish these activities in international collaboration with countries using English braille. In exercising its function and authority, BANA shall consider the effects of its decisions on other existing braille codes and guidelines, forms and formats; ease of production by various methods; and acceptability to readers. Diane P. Wormsley, Ph. D. Brenda Brodie Endowed Chair Professor of Special Education in Visual Impairment Editor in Chief, Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness North Carolina Central University School of Education, H.M. Michaux Building 700 Cecil Street Durham, NC 27707 Phone: 919-530-7693 Fax: 919-530-5353 Email: dwormsley@nccu.edu ________________________________ ___________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________ This email has been scanned by the Symantec Email Security.cloud service. For more information please visit http://www.symanteccloud.com ______________________________________________________________________