Visual Impairment

The life of visually impaired people has been improved by the use of new development in assistive technolgy over the years.

Improvement in the visual appearance of the computer screen and items on it can include;
- changing the accessibility options in the operating system
- changing the font size in documents
- using an alternative browser like Opera or Firefox to give better access to font and image maginfication
- using screen magnification software

Speech output can be added to documents using; WordTalk for MS Word; Screenreading software; utilities like Texthelp or Penfriend

Stand alone devices for the visually impaired
Two main types of hardware fall into this category; Scanner/readers and CCTVs. Actually CCTVs are not really closed circuit televisions any more, but people still call them by this name. Essentially they are cameras which output to a acreen to allow users access to a larger image of; something close to such as a book. Something further away like a whiteboard or work display.

Accessing the computer
VI users benefit from learning to touch type. Some standard software for this purpose are no use to VI users.
They also benefit from being taught to use keyboard shortcuts to computer operations in place of mouse clicks. There is a short list of the most useful shortcuts;
www.educationict.org.uk/ictsan/resources/keyboard-shortcuts.pdf

Access to the Curriculum
Large Print Books
There is a greater emphasis now on making the curriculum more accessible rather than providing tools to improve things for VI pupils.
If schools cannot but a book in large print format, they have the right under UK copyright legislation to create an accessible version of a book for a pupil (VIP Copyright Legislation 2002).

DAISY books
A book can also be made into a talking book. Of particular interest to VI users are DAISY books ( Digital Accessible Information Systems). These books can be listened to on dedicated DAISY players (adapted CD/MP3 players) or else on a computer with DAISY reader software installed.



For some examples of assistive technology and immaginitive use of ICT see the photogallery; www.flickr.com/photos/ictsan/sets