Notes from: Braille Literacy-A Functional Approach
--by Diane P. Wormsley
 Good book to read: Teacher, by Sylvia Ashton Warner, 1963
 For the student who is generally unable to learn to read through
traditional methods & may never achieve basic or academic literacy
skills.
 Individualized – uses what's meaningful to the learner
 At home/school:
o add on and off on light switches
o add hot and cold on water taps
 Tell them what you label that isn't usually labeled elsewhere.
 Organizational skills
o extremely important
o organize shelves so they can get own materials
o label shelves in print & Braille to id materials
o label equipment used, utensils, cutlery, dishes, place mats –
whatever used to set table or put things away
o keep in consistent places = more independence
 learn that they have a place in the environment
 Collect vocab words
o from student
o which words are frequently used w/student
o Names of significant people, like- teacher, aide, other students,
cafeteria people, office people, therapists-that the student calls
them.
o Words from daily routine – cafeteria, bus, gym, music
o Favorite foods – tomato soup, macaroni & cheese, coke, choc milk
o brailler, tape recorder, paper, locker, desk, chair
o hobbies, favorite things & activities
o words or phrases used at home
o what they do/where they go on the weekend
o favorite song, TV show, game toy, doll names
o Consistent teacher's greeting, like, "Yo, bud."
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 Make a lead in line of dots 25, space, word, space, line of dots 25 away
from word
o keeps fingers moving L->R
o centers the fingertips
o provides frame of reference
 Use
o 3x5 cards or larger
o blank flash cards from APH – already have a cut corner
o talk cards
 Make extras of each word
 put them in box after student identifies & recognizes them
o put them upside down with the Braille facing the back
 nonslip material under the cards
 all other fingers need to be next to each other like 'scouts' to see how
long the word is and not to slip off that line
 point out how the word feels & its uniqueness
 point out where dots are at the beginning
 over learn before learning the next one
 start off with student' name and "Mr. Nobody" which is 5 full cells
 questions to ask the student about each word
o longer?
o shorter?
o what are the dots at the beginning?
o what are dots at the end?
o how does it feel to you?
 Put flashcards into 2 piles or 2 containers
o got / didn't get
o RIGHT / LEFT-over
 A magnetic card reader will give more independence
 Sort 5 of each word cards into piles DAILY
 match cards on teacher made board with library card pockets or Velcro
 keep track of how many student can recognize in one minute
 use the vocab words to introduce tracking exercises after 2 words are
learned, and begin to teach some of the letters in those words
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 incorporate Mangold, but don't need to use all of it
 Take finger breaks every 5 minutes; massage fingers and hands with
hand cream; switch to another activity for a few minutes
 to demonstrate to student whether or not the fingers are lined up:
o pencil or straight edge
o guided reading technique – teacher's left thumb & fingers create a
frame that rests above and to the left of the student's; thumb
gently push student's fingers as they track along.
 have each had read separately from time to time
 keep introducing new vocab words through the sight word card method,
then integrating them into tracking exercises
 to introduce id of letters:
o select the most distinct first letter of the words
o intro this letter just like the sight word cards
o use that letter to track a line, with the word somewhere in the line
o provide other words that begin with the same letter
o can make cards of those words
 Sorting games:
o Find every card that has the word ____ on it.
o Find every card that has only the letter ____ on it.
o Find every card that has the word ___ on it or that has the word
____ on it, if that is the other word beginning with the letter
____.
o Find all the words beginning with the letter _____, then sort them
by the words that begin with that letter.
 Games for letter discrimination:
o tracking sheet with complete lines repeating only one letter with
spaces in between
o develop a tracking activity sheet with same letter repeating 5 or 6
times in a row, varying it on each row, then switching to another
letter that has been learned.
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 Phonemic awareness skill areas:
o grouping words with similar and dissimilar sounds: rat, rug, sun
o blending and splitting syllables into onset and rime (the beginning
consonant and the ending sound): b-eet
o blending sounds into words: /s/-/u/-/n/
o segmenting a word as a sequence of distinct sounds, or phonemes:
ship is made from 3 phonemes, /sh/, /i/, /p/
o detecting and manipulating sounds with words: changing r in run to s
to make sun
 Phonics – the relationship between sounds and the symbols that
represent them.
 Phonemic awareness and phonics go hand in hand, for ex: changing the
medial vowel from pad – ped – pid – pod – pud
 How to incorporate meaningful vocab with phonics:
o Use the beginning consonants from the vocab words to create
books of words beginning with the same one. For ex: bad, book,
balloon, backpack, banana, bee, bow… Make these books with a child
rather than for him.
o Present other words that follow the same pattern as the vocab
word. For ex: bad, dad, mad, sad, pad, glad…
o Look for consonant blends in the words. For ex: Brittany, bring,
bread, brown…
o Look for vowel patterns. For ex: beat, heat, neat, seat, treat, meat,
eat…
o Look for any other patterns that can lead to other words with the
same pattern.
 Student should also, at the same time, be developing writing skills.
 Create functional uses for reading and writing:
o schedule of activities
o label items in the environment (student can Braille them), items of
clothing as to their color, microwave settings, spices, tools they
use, CDs…
o simple recipes for snacks or quick meals
o grocery lists
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 create stories
o use repetition
o keep stories bound or in a notebook which the student can
decorate
o reading and rereading familiar stories promotes fluency, efficient
tracking, eliminates scrubbing, automatic word recognition, reading
comprehension
 keep track of:
o letters that student can identify and write
o contractions
o phonics patterns mastered
 More ideas of how to use the functional approach:
o with a talking card reader
o songs
o Dolch word list, and then use them together to write sentences
 Ready to move on to more formal reading materials when he has learned
most of the letters, has a good grasp of phonics, and has word boxes full
of words he can read.
 practice reading stories is more fun and motivating that practicing
reading lists of words
 A cardboard box that is perfectly level with the area where the paper is
inserted can be used to help in loading a paper into a Brailler.
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