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Image of hands holding a tablet with floating app icons. Text, "Tech Standards. Why Teach Digital Concepts Early?"

Tech Standards: Why Teach Digital Concepts Early?

Teachers of students with visual impairments or blindness are responsible for teaching so many things. How do you prioritize what to teach when? It used to be...
Toddler touching an iPad screen with Text, "ABC's of iOS Course"

ABC's of iOS: VoiceOver for Kids 3 - 8 Course

Perkins is offering a 6 module (12 weeks) course on how to introduce young children to an iPad running VoiceOver. The online modules are video tutorials...
Cartoon girl with clasped praying hands showing distress in front of a computer with text, "Homework hotline"

National Homework Hotline for Blind or Visually Impaired Students: Part 2

The National Homework Hotline for Blind and Visually Impaired students (NHH-BVI) was created in response to the school closures due to COVID. (See Homework...
Christmas Alphabet book cover with an image of Santa, audio button, and text, "Emerging Reader Book".

Christmas Alphabet Book

Alphabet books are among a child's first exposures to read aloud books and are important first steps to reading. Students with visual impairments should also...
title page of the Five Little Ducks book with text, "Creating Accessible Books"

Creating Accessible Books Using Pages

Emerging readers should have access to fun digital books - just like their peers! The books can be read aloud to the student, the student can listen to the...
BrailleBuzz logo with text, "Beginning Braille App"

BrailleBuzz App Review

Teachers are buzzing about APH's new beginning braille letter app, BrailleBuzz! This is a sister app to the popular stand-alone BrailleBuzz toy. Both games...
A page from the Rainbow Cat book with text, "This is Rainbow Cat" and image of painted ceramic cat.

Rainbow Cat Book: Emerging Reader

Emerging readers should be flooded with interesting books and these books should be available in various formats! Preschoolers love to do the same activity...
cartoon drawing of an iPad with a finger on the braille word "barn" on the answer sheet & text, "Braille Sheets: iPad Game".

ObjectiveEd: Braille Sheets

A combination of paper braille and technology? How cool is that!  Braille Sheets literacy tool that combines paper braille in tandem with with a fun app! In...
Screenshot of video: Graphic, "The Kindergarten Sight Word Dance Song" and Sight Word Lesson.

Kindergarten and First Grade Sight Words Lesson

Remote instruction activities can be challenging for young students to sit through. We know that early elementary students have trouble sitting still in class...
Young girl reading a teacher-created print/braille book with her hands on the braille.

Teacher-Created Resource Library!

Finding Solutions Students in today's classrooms are using digital educational materials - especially now with remote instruction, online courses and virtual...
Seesaw logo and text, "Remote Instruction"

Remote Instruction using Seesaw for Dual Media Learner

Seesaw is an online platform that had been used by schools prior to COVID- 19 in New Hampshire to communicate with parents and share student work. Once schools...
Image of cartoon readers sitting on and standing around a digital book and "Bookshare #AllInTogether Summer Read-a-thon"

Bookshare's #AllInTogether Summer Read-a-thon

Get #AllInTogether for Summer Reading Are you looking for fun and EASY ways to keep your child or students learning this summer? Bookshare’s #AllInTogether ...
Cover page of ABC's of iOS: A VoiceOver Manual for Toddlers and Beyond! a collaboration between Diane Brauner & CNIB Foundation.

ABC's of iOS: A VoiceOver Manual for Toddlers and Beyond!

UPDATE! The ABC's of iOS manual is currently available FREE for everyone during COVID-19!  Are you a parent or teacher of a toddler, preschooler, or...
Image of a student playing an iPad game and text, "Free O&M and Braille Webinars"

ObjectiveEd Daily Live Webinars

We are now offering two live webinars every day - one focused on Orientation & Mobility skills and Assistive Technology skills, and another focused on...
Photo of hands on a braille display and open app on iPhone with text, "Remote Braille Instruction: Braille AI Tutor"

ObjectiveEd and Microsoft Help Students Practice Braille During Pandemic

Thanks to a grant from Microsoft’s AI for Accessibility program, ObjectiveEd has developed Braille AI Tutor – an innovative system to enable students to...
Screenshot of Word Melodies Home screen with cartoon animals, musical notes and text, "Accessible Emerging Reader App"

Word Melodies: Emerging Reading and Writing App

Update: 4/8/20 Word Melodies version 1.0.1 is now available in Google Play as well as in the App Store. This new release fixed the bugs mentioned below. I am...
Photo of Crosby an adorable 7 month old golden retriever.

Crosby, Service Dog in Training: iBook

Read all about Crosby, a seven month old Golden Retriever in training with the Wildcat Service Dog Program in Lexington, Kentucky. After a year of training in...
photo of a fluffy white cat laying on the couch and text, "Braille Contractions"

Alphabetic Word Sign Book for Early Readers

My student has been learning to read high frequency words in braille and alphabetic word signs. She’s had the greatest success reading teacher created...
Black witch's caldron with green bubbles and text, "Contraction magic".

Contraction Magic: A Bewitching Way of Teaching Braille Contractions

Learning braille contractions does not need to be a mystery. Convert contraction catastrophe into a captivating contraction activity with this bewitching spell...
Cover page of a digital book titled I am Thankful with an image of four book boxes lined up next to each other on a shelf.

Digital Thanksgiving Book for Early Readers

This month, my student and I created a book about what she is a thankful for using the Book Creator app on an iPad. My student dictated the sentences for the...
Image of Orbit Braille Display and tablet with "Teach" in print; text, "Interactive Braille Lessons"

Introducing the Orbit Teacher Platform

Press release submitted to Paths to Technology by Orbit Research.  SONIPAT, INDIA – October 15, 2019 –  Orbit Research announced the launch of the Orbit...
Glad I am not a turkey poem.

Screen Reader Tech Activities: Thanksgiving Lesson Plan

How do you start teaching digital literacy skills to young students who are learning technology?  Memorizing a list of commands is B-O-R-I-N-G! How about...
Screenshot of Google Docs with focus on dictation button and text, "Today is Sunday. I am writing using dictation."

Educational Example of Using Speech to Text and Dictation

When a student becomes frustrated expressing their ideas in writing in their primary learning medium and it has negative implications on learning and their...
Image of a cartoon acorn and text, "Going Nuts about a New School Year"

Going Nuts about a New School Year

Ask your student his/her "resolutions" for the new school year! This fun activity can be done with an individual student as an O&M or VI lesson or with the...
24 month old boy sitting at a child's table with fingers pressing keys on an APH 18 Refreshabraille.

Benefits of Using a Braille Display with Emerging Readers

Refreshable Braille Displays (RBD) are peripheral devices that display braille characters, usually be raising and lowering dots through holes in a flat surface...
Photo of a BrailleSense Polaris notetaker and the text, "Check Spelling".

BrailleSense Polaris: Check Spelling

BrailleSense Polaris is a braille notetaker with a 32 cell refreshable braille display, Perkin'sstyle keyboard with a backspace and enter key, and a small LCD...
Image: Cover of the book What Can Swim? Includes title and an image of a Golden Retriever swimming in the water.

What Can Swim?

This year, I created over thirty digital accessible books for one of my students using the Book Creator App. Attached is the final book I created using...
computer screenshot of book cover image, Frank and Beans, in a Word document with alt text pane open

Adding Alt Text to an Image in Word for Office 365

Alt Text description of book on the post's featured image: "Microsoft Word document displaying the image of the book cover Frank and Beanswith an alt text pane...
Image of Orbit Reader and Braille Trail Reader and text, "APH Quota Braille Displays"

Update: Orbit Reader is available through APH

Update: June 20, 2019 the Orbit Reader is available again through APH! After months of ongoing negotiations between the Transforming Braille Group (of which...
iPad with a screen displaying the title page of the book Quack the Duck’s Family and an Orbit Reader 20 braille display on table

Reading Books Created with Book Creator App Using an iPad and RBD

Here is a video demonstrating how to read digital books created using the Book Creator app on the iPad with an Orbit Reader 20 refreshable braille display (RBD...
Photos of Braille Trail Reader and Braille Bug with text, "So many Braille Displays, Which One is Right for My Student?

So Many Braille Displays, Which One is Right for My Student? Part Five

NOTE: Please see other posts in this series including So Many Braille Displays Part One (focusing on the Brailliant BI 40 and BI 80 models) So Many Braille...
Photo of Aeden pushing button to turn on his Braille Display and text, "Aeden's Journey on the iPad: Part 5"

Aeden's Journey on the iPad: Part 5

Lesson 12: I can link the iPad to the RFB display independently. Materials Needed iPad RFB or Braille Display Objective The student will be able to...
Cover of the book, Noelle the Cat. The print title and picture of a fluffy white cat sitting at a window are on the cover.

Noelle the Cat ePub

This month I created six more digital accessible books for my kindergarten student using the Book Creator App. Attached is an ePub file of my version of the...
Photo of Braille Beetle and text, "So Many Braille Displays, Which One is Right for My Student? Smart Beetle.

So Many Braille Displays, Which One is Right for My Student? Part Four

NOTE: Please see other posts in this series including So Many Braille Displays Part One (focusing on the Brailliant BI 40 and BI 80 models) So Many Braille...
Title page of the a digital book with a tan and white kitten and the title, "What do you like?"

Accessible Digital Kindergarten Books

In the past two months, I have made 15-leveled books from the Reading Street program digitally accessible for my dual media student. Each book was made...
2 braille displays & text, "So many braille displays: which one is right for my Student? Brailliant BI 14 & Braille Trail Reader

So Many Braille Displays, Which One is Right for My Student? Part Two

NOTE: Please see other posts in this series including So Many Braille Displays Part One (focusing on the Brailliant BI 40 and BI 80 models) So Many Braille...
Photos of Braille Me and Orbit Reader 20; text, "Braille Me vs. Orbit Reader"

Braille Me and Orbit Reader: Braille Display Comparison

For many users, the cost of a traditional braille displays can be an issue. There are currently two options for small braille displays that cost around $500:...
cartoon leprechaun and text, "5 little leprechauns iBook & PDF"

Five Little Leprechauns iBook and PDF

Paths to Technology strongly supports emerging literacy skills for students with visual impairments. These teacher-created iBooks and PDFs are available for...
Cartoon image of girl with glasses holding a book and text, "Creating and/or Using Simple Digital Books"

Creating and/or Using Simple Digital Books

I still remember that first picture book that I read - ok, memorized - as a preschooler. I read that book over and over again, to myself, to mom and dad, my...
Ladybug image and text, "Ladybugs: Accessible ePub Book"

Ladybugs: ePub Book

This accessible digital book was created using iBooks Author. (Step-by-step directions on how to use iBooks Author here.) iBooks Author is currently the only...

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