Utilizing Adaptive Technology for Children with Visual Impairments (Session 1)

Originally presented January 20, 2020

by Angel Pacheco, Program Administrator, Lighthouse Guild

A review of the latest technology with Apple, Alexa and Microsoft systems that are most accessible to assist persons with visual impairments in everyday tasks. February 17, 2020 Dr. Joy Harris, Executive Director, Council of Schools for the Blind and Visually  Self-Advocacy –  One of the most important skills children with visual impairments can learn is the ability to advocate for themselves.

Transcript

Angel Pacheco

The Echo Dot provides a lot of help to visually impaired, totally blind consumers. Something that we use on a regular basis to order products from Amazon, order food. We can listen to the news and so on. What I’m going to do right now is I’m going to unmute Alexa right now – you’ll see that it’s red. Going to describe a lot of things here. I’m going to unmute. Okay, Alexa, what time is it?

Alexa

The time is 8:37pm. Have a good night.

Angel Pacheco

And it told me to have a good night. Alexa, what’s the temperature?

Alexa

Right now? It’s 59 degrees Fahrenheit.

Angel Pacheco

Alexa, volume 10.  Okay, so I was able to get the time. I was able to get the weather. Now let’s say I want to hear the news. Alexa, play 1010 WINS.

Alexa

1010 wins from Audacy.

response

radio.com is now Audacy. Discover this station and more on Audacy. Music, news, sports and podcasts, find it all on the Audacy app.

Angel Pacheco

Alexa, stop. Let’s say I just want some articles from a newspaper, Alexa, play the New York Times

Alexa

From the New York Times. 

response

From the New York Times, I’m Michael Lavarro. Here’s what you need to know today.

Angel Pacheco

Alexa, stop.  Now again, that was just a few examples of what this small device can do for our consumers. Another thing that it can do is control devices in the home. I’m going to be adjusting my phone from time to time so that way you can see certain things happen. I will describe them as well. 

What I’m going to do now is I’m going to pay my camera over to the lights that I have here in the living room. Alexa, turn living room light off. 

Okay.

Alexa, turn living room light on. 

Okay. 

So, automation is one of the big things here. A lot of our consumers don’t know that they have a light on or off. Having a lamp connected to a wireless device is a simple way of figuring out if you have your light on or off. Another thing that we can do here is adjust the temperature in our thermostat. Alexa, set temperature to 80 degrees.

The heat’s set to 80.

Okay, and the heat is now set to 80. Alexa, set temperature to 67 degrees. 

The heat’s set to 67. 

I also have Alexa set up to my alarm system. A lot of these components really don’t cost much. For example, a plugin into the lamp is about $15 to $20. You don’t need a special hub to connect it. It will connect straight to the Echo Dot. I’m going to mute Alexa for now. 

Other things that you can do with the Alexa is schedule your appointments, reminders, medication, just about anything. This Echo Dot and other smart speakers are also great for children that are autistic. You can just have multiple schedules. For example, if you have them doing chores, you can say you know, Alexa, remind Carlos Jeff, to throw out the garbage at three o’clock, remind Carlos Jeff 3:05 to throw out the garbage. You can also send those messages from your home or anywhere else around the world. And it’ll go ahead and just provide that to your child or adult. So it’s a great little device. 

If you have it connected to your cell phone individuals can also make and receive calls through their smart speakers. It’s great for emergencies as well. If you have more than one smart speaker throughout the house, you can actually send a message to the entire house, which is another great option. Let’s say someone needs assistance in one of the rooms then that individual can request help throughout entire house with multiple smart speakers. So that’s one basic thing that we all use on a daily basis. And we again, take it for granted, but it does so so much for us. 

Next thing I want to get to is the assistive accessibility on the iPhone. The iPhone has a screen reader as well as magnification. I’m briefly going to go through that because there are several other apps that I like to go through. So I’m going to start sharing my phone screen here. Okay, should be broadcast in a couple of seconds.

Okay. I’m going to go ahead, go down to accessibility. Now, there are multiple ways of opening up your speech, your magnification programs. You can triple-click on the right side of the phone or triple-click on your home button. Depending on the type of iPhone that you have. You can go to your settings and then accessibility and you’ll have a list of accessible accessibility features there. The first one is voiceover. So I’m going to tap on VoiceOver. I’m going to turn VoiceOver on.

VoiceOver

VoiceOver on settings, accessibility, back button.

Angel

Can someone tell me if they are able to hear the speech?

Attendee

Yes, we can hear? Yep.

Angel

Okay, great, thank you. In order to work with VoiceOver, you actually need several hand gestures. So right now what I’m going to do is swipe to the right with one finger so that way I can scroll down.

VoiceOver

Voiceover VoiceOver. VoiceOver speaks items on the screen, tap once to select an item, double tap to activate the selected item, Learn More link. 

Angel

So there it actually already made embedded link. Some instructions, you tap once to select an item, you double tap it to activate that item. You can change the rate at which it speaks, you can change the speed. You can add braille on onto this. There’s so many things that you can do with VoiceOver. Right now, the rate that it’s speaking is kind of slow for me because I’ve been working with speech for decades. For some other people, it may be too fast, but you can increase or decrease the rate to what you prefer until you get used to it. 

So, I’m going to go ahead and go back just to turn it off for now. I double tap to turn it off. I’m going to go back and now I’m going to turn on Zoom. Zoom is the magnification program here. As soon as I turn it on, you’ll only be able to see a portion of my screen. That’s because it’s magnified. So it turns into a bit of a puzzle. When you work with magnification it’s it’s difficult up until the point you learn where everything is on your screen. You have to create this whole mental picture. 

So, if I take my three fingers, I can actually pull it over to the left. So, you actually need three fingers to move around. And in the upper left hand corner, it says accessibility Zoom underneath that it provides you with the title again, Zoom. Underneath that it says Zoom magnifies the entire screen. Double tap three fingers to zoom; drag three fingers to move around the screen; double tap three fingers and drag to change zoom. So you can increase or decrease the size of zoom as well with your fingers. Or you can go down through the menu and select 2x, 3x and so on. I’m going to go ahead and just scroll over to the upper right hand corner. I’m going to tap on Zoom and turn it off. I’m going to back out of accessibility. 

There is another option at the magnifier and it should be on. The magnifier, it should go on and when you open up a window, it should be able to provide you something similar to a handheld magnifier with the magnification of 2-3x and so on for some reason. It’s not working now. So we have 9:50 causing issues for us. But that should work, and if we go down the list though, you’ll see that there are many, many other options here. You can actually change the display and the text size, motions for those individuals that have issues with their hands. The list goes on and on. There’s just so much. Audio descriptions, if it’s available. You can turn that on. Voice control. You can change the way the side button works. 

And most of you probably don’t know this, but the Apple icon in the back of every iPhone is a button as well. So you can set that button in the back of your phone to do certain things. Usually you double tap to turn a feature on or off. 

So, I’m going to get out of settings, I’m going to go back to my home screen here. And I’m going to open up the accessibility folder. Accessibility is a very personal thing. You could have three, four people come in with the same eye disease, let’s say macular degeneration. Each one of them will see things differently. So you know, when someone comes in, you can’t say, Oh, you haven’t macular degeneration. Here. This is what’s going to work for you. Unfortunately, it does not work that way. You would have to still provide the individual different assessments to determine what is best for them. Colors, font size, the list goes on and on. 

One of the apps I’m going to turn it on now is the TapTapSee. TapTapSee does work best when VoiceOver is on. So, I’m going to turn VoiceOver on by triple clicking on the right. You have to tap quickly in order for voiceover to go on. I want to welcome you into my home. Actually I’m aiming my phone towards my TV. I’m about to turn VoiceOver on. Okay, so I’m on the camera button now. I’m going to double tap.

Attendee

Angel, we can’t see your screen anymore.

Angel

Oh, no. Okay, one moment. So I’m going back to where I was, I’m going to go back to take a picture. It took a picture of what’s in front of the camera.  And I didn’t have VoiceOver on. Alright, there we go.

VoiceOver

VoiceOver on. Camera button, button, camera button. Picture three in progress. Picture three is black flat screen TV on brown wooden TV rack.

Angel

So, it gives you a brief description of what’s in front of the camera. So, it told me that there is a black flat screen TV, a brown wooden TV rack. Now, if you needed to hear this, again, we can go back to repeat. We can go to the gallery of pictures. We can also share this picture with someone else. So let’s say there’s a dog here, and it tells you small black dog, and you want to share that picture with someone, you can go ahead and do that because you know what you’re sharing. Okay, so I’m going to go ahead and turn off VoiceOver

I’m going to go ahead and close the TapTapSee app. I’m going to go back to the accessibility folder. And what I’m going to show you next is the EyeNote app. The EyeNote is an application of Department of engraving. And what it can do is it can recognize money. So imagine you you’re paying for an item with cash, and you get some change, but you don’t know what the change is. With this app. You can open it prior to paying for your item. And when you get your change, you can quickly scan your bills and you don’t have to worry whether it’s the front, sideways. So I’m just going to go ahead and place some money in front of the device there.

EyeNote

$5 Front. $5 Back. $20 Back. $1 Front.

Angel

So, you notice I’ve put those in many different ways, sideways, backwards, upside down, and it was still able to recognize that currency. Now, this is just to identify money. It’s a single application specifically for that. So it doesn’t have the bells and whistles. I’m going to close a note. Now, I’m going to go back to the accessibility folder. 

The next app I’m going to introduce is the Seeing AI app. The Seeing AI app was developed by Microsoft. And it has the bells and whistles on there. So I’m going to open that up right now.

So, one of the things it does is identifies text, it’s a short text. In other words, whatever you put in front of it, it’ll read quickly. In this case, it read mass, that’s because in the lower right hand corner of where my TV is, I have a big box that that with mass and mass is in large print. But I’m going to put something in front of it.

Seeing AI

Panko. Japanese style breadcrumb.

Angel

So, basically anything I’ve put in front of it…

Seeing AI

Nutrition facts. Eight servings per container two slash three cup mass.

Angel

…it’ll read it. Now, let’s say I wanted a document read.

Seeing AI

Hold study. No text recognized.

Angel

Well, I don’t know why I did that, because there’s no text there.

Seeing AI

Hold steady. Processing.

Angel

Okay, it did take a picture of the text. If we have VoiceOver on, it would read everything on there. But what I’m going to do is hit the play button, which is located in the lower left hand corner.

I’m going to pause it, it’s basically reading the recipe that’s on the back. So, I can go ahead and increase or decrease the font size. That way I can read it myself. I can go ahead and forward it to a friend. You know, maybe they they’re interested in the recipe as well. I’m going to go back and there is the back arrow in the upper left hand corner .

The next feature of the Seeing AI app is the product. These applications are not foolproof. You will have some errors come up. So you may want to attend more than once or twice when scanning certain items. What I’m going to do right now is I’m going to grab a can here, it’s mixed vegetables. Usually, these items are placed on the shelf with the label facing you. And the codes are in the back. With cereal boxes, anything in a paper box, the codes are usually on the bottom. So when you pick up boxes scan the bottom first, because usually that’s where you’ll find the code. When you have an item and you’re trying to get the code you’ll hear a tone once you get close to the bar code. 

Seeing AI

Not recognized.

Angel

So, I’m going to go back and give it another shot 

Seeing AI

Processing. Not recognized. 

Angel

Okay, scan the can here.

Seeing AI

Processing.  At Home mixed vegetable.

Angel

There we go. So, it’s telling me it’s mixed vegetables, but what kind of vegetables? There’s more options on here.  On the bottom is a Share button. So if you want to share it with a family member so that way they can see what you’re you’re listening to and tell you what’s in there. Or you can hit the More Info button which is located in the lower right hand corner. I’m going to tap on that now. It brings you to a window that says At Home mixed vegetables. I’m going to hit the play button in the lower left hand corner so that it can read the information back to me.

Speaker

We’re not hearing – is that supposed to be reading out loud? Is that supposed to be reading out loud? I’m not hearing it.

Angel

Okay, one moment. Let me see if something happened with the speech when I did that. Let me know if you hear it now. Were you able to hear that? 

Speakers

No, no, we can’t hear it. 

Angel

Okay, one moment. Okay. Just turn it on again. Are you able to hear that? 

Speakers

No. No. 

Angel

Okay. Let me shut down the program and restart here. 

Seeing AI

Short text mass product. Process the whole mixed vegetables.

Angel

And let me know if you hear it now. Okay, were you able to hear at that time? 

Speakers

No. I was not Angel. I think it might be one of iOS’ quirks. Not Apple’s. I don’t know. It’s weird. 

Angel

Yeah, there was also an update to Seeing AI so I may be having an issue with that. Okay, well, it will go ahead and read the ingredients in the can to me. So, I was able to identify what’s in that can. I’m going to move on to the fourth app in here which is Person. 

So, you can actually scan a room with this device. And it’ll tell you who’s in the room and how far they are, they are from you. Now when I say that it’s able to tell you who’s in the room that only works when you take a picture of someone and then label it with their name. So, I have my daughter here, and I’m gonna scan the room slowly. It should tell me that Angela is in the room. 

Person

Angela near top right seven feet away.

Angel

Were you able to hear that? 

Speakers

Yes. 

Person

Zero faces.

Angel

Okay, so it says that Angela is to the right, and she’s about seven feet away from me. So I’m going to do that again, 

Person

One face near top right, seven feet away. Angela near top right, eight feet away. Zero faces.

Angel

So if there were other people in the room, and you don’t already have an image of them with their name, it’ll just say person, X amount of distance from you. At least you have an idea of how many people are in the room. Also wear an earpiece, you don’t want people to know that you’re scanning them. I’m going to move on to the next item here, which is the money identifier. It’s somewhat similar to what I introduced before the EyeNote.

Money Identifier

Currency.

Angel

So I’m going to grab some money here.

Money Identifier

Five US dollars. Five US dollars.

Angel

Now if you hear there is a slight difference. The EyeNote said five dollars back, five dollars front.  Here it just lets you know five dollars US. Both applications don’t do coins. So again, assistive technology is a personal thing. If you’re an individual that likes to have them front facing up all the time, then the EyeNote is for you. If you really don’t care how your money is where the face up or face down, then you can use the Seeing AI but the Seeing AI app does something that the EyeNote doesn’t. 

Let’s say you have a bag with you and that’s where you have your money. With the EyeNote the camera light does not go on. So it can’t identify the money in your bag if it’s too dark. Here with the Seeing AI the light is on. You can actually see the reflection on the TV across for me. That allows individuals to scan money in dark areas – their purses, their wallets. So that way no one else around you knows what you have on you, which is great. I’m going to move on to the next item. So I’m going to go ahead and point that my daughter again I’m going to take a picture.

APP

Processing.  A woman sitting on a couch holding a laptop.

Angel

Okay, a woman sitting on a couch holding a laptop. So, they gave me some information. The whole thing is I’m expecting a woman to be there. Meanwhile, my daughter is only 16 years old.

Now, this feature is not 100% foolproof. If I take a picture of what’s across from me, it’ll tell me it’s a TV. But I also have a fish tank to the left, I’m going to take a picture of that.

APP

Processing, probably a TV on the wall.

Angel

So, it thinks that my fish tank is a TV on a wall.  It’s a 75 gallon tank.  Again, it gets easily confused. It goes by the shape of of items in your your home. 

There are a few other options here, you do have color options. Color identifiers, they’re okay, but it depends on the lighting you have in a room. For example, if you have navy blue and your room is kind of dim, it may recognize it as black. Certain colors, light blue colors may be identified as gray. So, don’t always, you know, count on on the color identifier being right 100% of time, most of the time, it isn’t. 

Another great feature on here is the handwriting recognition. As long as you don’t write like a most doctors do with prescriptions. This will identify handwritten notes. So, someone leaves a handwritten note somewhere on your desk, you can actually scan it with the Seeing AI app, and it should be able to read it back to you.

The last feature on here is Light. You heard a little tone. That’s letting me know that there is light in the room. A lot of people that have a visual impairment, that very low vision or totally blind cannot make out the light, period. So, if you use the light feature, you can actually identify whether there’s light in your room. But then again, that light can be coming from your windows, or the light source could be a bulb. So, what you can do is move your phone up to the ceiling or wherever your light source usually is. And, if the light is on, the tone will get higher. So I’m going to do that now.

Light

(tone sound)

Angel

So, as you can tell if you can identify where the light source is coming from, you can tell whether your light is on and then you can turn it off if you like. So, that’s what Seeing AI does for you. Okay, now I heard someone say all this, you know, it’s not more for kids. You’d be surprised what kids can learn. And it’s important to get kids into the assistive technology sooner rather than later. 

Speaker

I didn’t mean to dismiss anything or say anything wasn’t worthwhile,.  He doesn’t have the same amount of vision issues. He’s low vision, but not completely without vision. So I’m just not sure it’s, – but it’s still helpful to know. So I appreciate it. I’m sorry – I didn’t mean to interrupt.

Angel

Oh, no problem at all. But it is important to get the kids started early. I ran children’s groups for about 12 years. And you’d be amazed at, the years went by and how many kids came back and said you know that all the training helped them get through high school and some went on to college and got their degrees. Some still had the computers that we were we were able to provide at that time, which was awesome. So, the sooner you get the kids into playing with the voice, magnification, it’ll be much easier for them down the road. 

Speaker

Thank you very much.

Angel

You’re welcome. I’m going to go ahead and close Seeing AI, and another app that’s available out there is Be My Eyes. Let’s say mom and dad are not around, and you’re unable to see the date on a milk, you’re unable to identify certain items. Or if you drop something on the floor and you need assistance finding it, Be My Eyes is a volunteer app. As it says on the screen, there’s 4.6 million volunteers assisting almost 300,000 visually impaired and blind individuals. I’m actually a volunteer. 

And what happens is that when someone needs assistance, it actually goes to five volunteers, sometimes more. And the first volunteer to pick up is the one that assists the individual. I have had calls on, you know, can you tell me if these shoes are the same color? Can you tell me if the milk has expired? This is all great. But you do have to be careful when you use this app. These individuals are only volunteers. They’re not certified in any way, shape, or form. So, don’t give up personal information whatsoever. It’s just, can you tell me if I spilled something, I dropped my ring, can you tell me if you can see it, and so on and so forth. So, Be My Eyes is a pretty good app. 

Script Talk is another app that older kids can use. It can tell them where there are pharmacies that can provide them with large print labels or labels that can be scanned. So, if I hit find pharmacy, I’m going to type in. Go here. Hit go. And then if I scroll down the results for talking labels, large print, braille translated labels – there are 41 script ability pharmacies within five miles. So, we can scroll down and I can see all of the pharmacies that are able to assist. This also works with VoiceOver so this information can be read read back to you if you are totally blind. I’m going to close this app out. 

There is a GPS program out there that Lazarillo that can help you identify where certain stores are. You have to be very careful when you use it. Always use assistance wherever possible. I’m going to turn this on, it’ll probably give my here my location right now.

GPS App

You are on Lehmann Street, 26, Lebanon, PA.

Angel

And if I had VoiceOver on, I can go ahead and scroll from left to right. I want to find the place…

GPS App

Intersection Harrison Avenue and Lehman street 55 feet to the west. Intersection Beach Street and Harrison Avenue 112 feet to your left.

Angel

I clicked on a restaurant here.

GPS App

Restaurant. Italian village pizza 249 feet behind you.

Angel

Okay, so it’s letting me know that the Italian Village is 223 feet behind me. And I want to walk there. And it’s asking me to choose an app. I can use the Lazarillo app, I can use Google Maps, Apple Maps. Going to use the current map.

GPS App

Instructions, head east on Lehmann street toward N. Hanover Street.

Angel

Okay, and if I wanted to hear all the directions, and I have VoiceOver on, I can open up the full direction list and actually just scroll through each one and it would be back at East on Lehmann street toward North Hanover Street and then turn right, destination will be on the left which is actually correct. So,I can find the different locations, Food Banks, health. The list goes on and on. So, this is another app here that can assist individuals get from one place to another. 

I’m going to stop sharing my screen here.

As I mentioned earlier, it’s important to start giving access to speech magnification to your kids. I say that because in the 12 years that I worked with kids, a lot of kids were shy or embarrassed to use the devices in their classes. A lot of the kids didn’t tell their friends or classmates that they have visual impairments. But once they they were actually in a group setting, and they work together, and saw that there were other kids that had the same issues as them, they got much more comfortable. They actually started using their devices more. 

You can start off with iPad. iPad has the same accessibility as the iPhone that I was just using. Again, this voiceover, this magnification. You can also just use Siri, Siri does quite a bit. You can ask Siri to make calls for you. You can text family members or friends. You can have those text messages read back to you. You don’t have to learn all those hand gestures. But that’s a huge beginning. 

Also, if you go to applevis.com, there’s a list of applications on there not just for adults, or for kids to play games and hear the information going back and forth. You can play games with other individuals, for example, chess. And you’re probably thinking, well, how are they going to remember what one is and everything? It describes all of that to you. And you’d be surprised kids catch on to things quickly. They’ll remember the board as though they were looking at it, which is awesome. I’ve seen it done so many times. And that’s the end of my presentation. Any questions?

Sheila

That was really good. I know Meredith had a question I wanted to make sure you got it answered. She said, Would it be possible to get the names of the apps again?

Angel

Sure. There’s a number of apps out there. There’s TapTapSee. There’s also EyeNote. That’s from the Department of Engraving. Then there’s the big one that has the bells and whistles, which is Seeing AI. Be My Eyes is if you need a volunteer to assist you. And then there’s Lazarillo, which is the GPS application.

Arthur

Earlier, I had interrupted, I apologize again. My son is low vision and has aniridia. So he’s  like three years old, three or four. So, he’s much younger. So, that’s why I was saying like, he has a little bit less autonomy to be able to use some of these apps. So, when I said like children, it’s for, you know, I’m sure lots of children that have vision issues, who are a little more advanced can use some of these things that you recommended and they’re very helpful. But for some children who are much younger in the three to four, you know, or three to six range who have less autonomy or usage of these devices, I’m just wondering if you have any insight about any apps that might be useful for them?

Angel

Sure. Audiobooks, get them used to listening to books, get them used to the voice, you can you can change the speed as as they continue to listen, they’ll get so used to it that they’ll get bored if you keep it at the same rate every single time. For us humans, we talk one to 300 words per minute. Imagine me talking to you at a slow rate, you probably get very bored. Same thing with kids. They they get used to the to the audio. And the next thing you know you’re raising the rate at which it’s writing the feedback and with some people, it’ll get to a point that all they hear are our tones, and they are able to pick up every single word that was said.

Arthur

Okay, that’s really helpful. Thank you very much.

Rachel

First of all, I wanted to say something to Arthur.  My son used to use a – I used to have an app on my phone called Ballyland Magic app which teaches gestures and it’s perfect for a three or four year old, I think. I mean, my son was a little older, maybe like five, six, but I think a three-four year old can also.  It teach us the gestures. So, it gives them a heads up of eventually being able to use iPad/iPhone, with our gestures. 

Arthur

What’s it called?

Rachel

Ballyland Magic app. So that was very cute and a lot of fun. And then there’s like, I don’t know if he’s going to do braille or not, I know what his vision level is or if it’s going to deteriorate. But there is like some kind of Madilyn something game with, you know, teaching basic braille, whatever. But that’s another story. 

So I actually had a question for you, Angel, actually two questions. First of all, about the Alexa Echo Dot that you spoke about in the beginning. You said for the lamp it’s very simple –  just connected to you buy this like cheap thing for $20 and you can connect it to Alexa. But what about like your thermostat? And you said to your security system? Is that more intensive? Like, do you need an electrician to do that?

Angel

No. You don’t need an electrician at all. Actually, the thermostat is the same two wires that are on the back of your current thermostat. So when you take off your old thermostat, you just make sure that you put the same two wires back on your new wireless thermostat. For the security system, you can buy it in a box, you can set it up yourself, and then have Alexa, just turn on the Alexa feature. And it’ll go ahead and set the the alarm on/off. And I can give you a quick demo of that. 

Rachel

Where did I get it though? What it was called? Where do we get them? Is it like on Amazon?

Angel

I use SimpliSafe at home. But it actually works with almost any wireless alarm system out there.

Rachel

What are these things called – the devices that you attach?

Angel

For the lamps and so on? They’re just Wi Fi connectors, outlet connectors. If you go to amazon.com, I think they have three for like $20-$25.

Rachel

It’s called Wi Fi connectors?

Angel

Yes. And just make sure that they are Alexa-friendly. Alexa or Google Home, whatever it is that you use.  

Arthur

There is an extensive list of Alexa-supported devices. And you can look at that on Amazon’s website as as well to be sure that you’re not getting the wrong. Because I have run into some sometimes where yes, there are devices that you think oh, well, this is a smart system, it ought to work fine with Alexa, and it doesn’t. And so that’s why I would say check that support list. And that way, you know, you’re in the right. You’re not going out and wasting your money on something that you get home and then you find out that’s right doesn’t work. And read those reviews. Those reviews are very important. 

Angel

And as I mentioned before, if you go to applevis.com There are many apps there. There’s actually over 2000 accessible apps for kids on up. So just go in there, just go through the list and do a search for children’s apps and a lot of them will come up for you.

Rachel

And I have one more question and that’s okay.

Speaker 1

And I have the Amazon Basics microwave that has Alexa built into it. You can actually link with your Echo dot or your Echo. And it will allow you to basically heat up food or whatever without even pressing the buttons. 

Angel

They even have stoves that do that now. And refrigerators.

Rachel

I just wanted to ask one more question if that’s okay, about Seeing AI. So I found that it will read text to me but what if I want to then scroll through the text let’s say word by word or character by character. It didn’t seem like it worked, you know like the regular voiceovers character by character, word for word gesture.

Angel

What you would have to do with that, with the document version, don’t do the simple text version which is the second component in the Seeing AI. And then save the document, and then that can be read back with VoiceOver.

Rachel

So it has to be saved first. 

Angel

Yes. 

Rachel

And I save it within Seeing AI.

Angel

Well, you could save it within Seeing AI, you could have Seeing AI read it back, but you can also save it and have it read back with VoiceOver if you wanted to.

Rachel

Okay, I’m gonna have to check it out. Okay, thank you.

Angel

Sure. Someone else had a question?

Mike

We had a question. Our son’s 12 and he does just about everything – his schoolwork –  through an iPad Pro. And so we’ve struggled in particularly with some of the apps that he uses to fill out like a fill out with his Apple pen. He’ll save that, and then trying to send that via email or something to the teacher, there are huge files. 

Cynthia

He takes a picture with his iPad Pro – say there’s a five page worksheet, let’s just say it’s Math Worksheets. W, where our limitation is he then sends that to Bookshare so that he can edit and mark up the answers but then the file sizes are way too large. So, we find that he only can send one page at a time and email it to the teacher. We never found any apps other than Bookshare to be able to write up or mark up a document to to send or share that with people.

Angel

There’s so many ways to go…

Cynthia

There’s Voice Stream, but it’s limited on how much it zooms in.

Angel

Okay, you may want to try Seeing AI and take the picture of the document, and then save it as a txt file. If not, I’m trying to think. Adobe will actually save that document as a txt file. Under accessibility.

Speaker 4

There is an app called Paperbacks that might be good for that, it’s like a web page or a workbook on the internet that you can just simply hit the Share at the bottom of Safari and then copy the URL to your clipboard, then go back to the Paperback app and just paste it in there, or hit like the copy button at the top. And then they’ll give you the URL hit Copy, and then it’ll basically save it so you can read it.

Cynthia

The problem I have is I ended up taking page by page from Bookshare every PDF that’s marked out, and I spend hours printing them out on a printer, and then re-scanning let’s say the 15-20 pages into one final PDF to send to the teacher.

Speaker

What about Google Drive or Notability?

Cynthia

Google Drive is behind on the markup features. You can do voice to text on it, but not the markup.

William

I was just gonna recommend if it’s an issue with the fact that the files are large, you may have to move towards cloud services like Google Drive or Dropbox. And then it would be a matter of sharing that Dropbox link with whatever instructor or whatever class he’s taking. Because those cloud services are equipped to handle larger files. And then that would alleviate the issue of you trying to go through Apple mail or email or whatever email programs he is using and then it not accepting it because it’s too large of a file. I think with Google Drive, by default, you get 16 gigs. And then with Dropbox I think it gives you two gigs. I have the Dropbox Plus Pro Plan so I’ve got I’ve got two terabytes of storage. That may be an option for you there. As far as reading goes and marking up and doing all the other editing stuff, unfortunately, with iOS, it’s more limited than if you’re using something along the lines of a computer or a note taker like a braille note or a braille sense and that’s just been my finding with iOS and word processing and editing.

Mike

Thank you very much. Dropbox or Drive is a good idea once we figure that out.

Angel

There is an OCR app out there, it’s by the National Federation for the Blind. It’s $99, though, it’s that it’s up there in price. It’s one of the most expensive apps out there. That might be something that can help you. I’m trying to remember the exact….

Speaker

it is called KNFB Reader.

Speaker

Great, but I don’t think it’s up to date.

Speaker

There’s another one, which I’m not sure if it’s still available on the App Store called Text Detective. It’s pretty good. 

Speaker

You know, that’s a great question. It was for a time and I’m not sure. I will have to look into that. Angel. Do you know if that’s still available?

Angel

No, I don’t.

Speaker

Prizmo is another option. And it is also an OCR app like KNFB Reader, it’s spelled p r i z as in Zulu, M, as in Mike Oh is an orientation option, however you want to pronounce phonetically that Prizmo. And there’s a lite version. And then there’s a paid version. I do believe that the paid version is slightly cheaper than KNFB Reader.  It is also fully voiceover tested and accessibility approved of in the blindness and low vision realm. So perhaps, maybe that’s another app that you may want to look into if you’re not willing to spend that $99 price tag because it can be a little high. I’m sure for a lot of people, understandably.

Speaker

There’s one called Text Detective that was available at one point, I’m not sure if it’s still on the App Store. But that was really good for like, if you just wanted to scan a document or whatever, into there.

Speaker

Yes. I know exactly what you’re talking about. And I have not used or played around with that app in years. And so, I would not know if that’s I don’t know if that’s available. 

Angel

I just checked and Text Detective is not on there anymore.

Speaker

I had a feeling, I just had a feeling.

Sheila

Any other questions? I know somebody in the chat also wrote – I think you might have mentioned, but I think it’s always worth a mentioned, the Read2Go and Bookshare that’s online.

Speaker

Read2Go is a great free option. If you want to pay a slightly higher price, I think it’s a around a $10 price tag, you can get an app called Voice Dream Reader and it will also read Bookshare as well. And I personally, I prefer the interface a little bit better than Read2Go because it’s a little bit better than Read2Go.  It’s a little more robust and has a little bit more to work with in terms of navigation and extra visual features.  But Read2Go is a good start. That should be a free app.

Angel

It’s actually $19.99.

Speaker

Oh, that’s right. Thank you, I forgot.

Sheila

And some of you, sometimes your school will pay for some of these apps depending on your school district.. And they’;; go ahead and install them in for you. We had that experience.

Speaker

Yeah. And if your child is with the New York State Commission for the Blind, sometimes the counselors will go ahead and pay for those apps. And they’ll reach out to the school as well. You might get a gift card instead of you know, having them give you cash or anything like that. But it’ll be for the app store for you to purchase that app for your child.

Speaker

Angel, I have a question. What is your experience? My son, he has CVI and he’s also cerebral palsy. What is your experience with these different apps that can be used with the kids like multiple disabilities?

Angel

As I mentioned earlier, if you go into the settings and you go into accessibility in the iOS and the Apple program, there is something called Switch Control where he doesn’t have to do all the hand gestures. There’s also a possibility of attaching a keyboard, a Bluetooth keyboard to your device. So if he’s able to read certain keys, he can use what’s called Sticky Keys, where he can press one key once, it’ll actually stay on. And then you can press another key to have a command to happen on the screen. So there are ways of getting things done on that iOS or on a computer as well. So, there are options out there. And in some situations, the keyboard can be removed altogether. And, if he’s able to move his hand enough, you can actually write what he needs to. And it’ll go ahead and put it in print on the screen. So he may use a drawing tablet, to write his information out if he’s able to do that. But there are many devices out there for him. And actually, the Lighthouse Guild has a company in the building – Sheila, do the you know the name of that company that has the equipment for individuals with CP.

Sheila

No, I don’t sorry. 

Angel

I’ll try and get that information.

Speaker

Thanks.

Sheila

Any other questions?

Linda

This is Linda. I just actually wanted just to touch base with Cynthia and Mike for a moment as a parent of a blind and child who is now in college. I just wondered that the markup part I think I know what you’re speaking of is just where the teacher has done some correction on it, and he’s supposed to add to it or do whatever needs to be done in that what I’m understanding of this paper is that you have?

Cynthia

it’s actually, so our son is still able to zoom in and use his pencil, his iPad pencil to write on everything. So this would be Math Worksheets, science worksheets, vocabulary, question worksheets. So it’s all the writing, the answering questions. He might read a short story and then have like a five page worksheet that he has to go in depth and write answers to. Math equations, all that. So, by the time he marks everything up and then tries to email each page to the teacher, it’s just, it’s really cumbersome. There has to be a way to combine all this. The problem that we have, when we do try to upload it to Google Drive, is a lot of times it can’t distinguish between the markups that were added versus original text and it drops those markups.

Linda

Great. Well, I’m just thinking it’s hard on you, on the back end, trying to do what you need to for your son and get it to the teacher. So, is there something else that you can maybe talk with the teacher about doing it a different way whether you could fax over, you know, old fashion way, whatever is easiest for you to get it to back to the teacher? 

Angel

Can you or the teacher just take screenshots of the changes that are required, email it to your son and have your son print it out, make the changes, and then send them back?

Cynthia

He still does everything digitally on his iPad. So, if he printed something out, then he would need his CCTV machine which can’t be transported classroom to classroom with them. So, he really has to stick back to be able to do an iPad Pro to zoom in to do that writing.

Speaker

If he’s carrying his if he’s carrying his iPad Pro, why isn’t he able to use that as a CCTV? All he has to do is open up the camera and use the pinch effect to increase or decrease the magnification.

Cynthia

So, trying to go back to like the paper pencil writing. We could try that.

Angel

And there are standards available for the iPad so he can use them as a CCTV.

Cynthia

That’s a good idea.

Linda

As a parent, try to do what’s least stressful for everyone. But you just have to voice that to the teacher because they have no idea.

Angel

Yes, They’re learning as well.

Linda

exactly.

Kim

Hi, this is Kim, I have a question. For someone who is totally blind using Seeing AI. Sometimes it’s frustrating because once you’ve shown the iPhone the text that you want read, getting that to go away and do the next thing, it’s still, I guess I need some sort of Clear All button or something like that, because it keeps reading pieces of the previous thing when I try to get to a new one. How do you tell it to get ready for something new?

Angel

That’s because it’s still in memory. Usually, to get away from that, you go to the back button. And that should clear it. Back button is in the upper left hand corner. Okay. So, once it gives you the information it starts reading, just swipe from right to left, go to the back button, tap on it twice, and it will take you back. And then you can go on to retake the picture of the document.

Speaker

You can also do a two finger scrub, which is taking two fingers and then moving a swift back and forth motion from the right to the left. And then a lot of times if it’s a voiceover friendly app, that will also invoke the back function. So you don’t have to click the back button.

Kim

And if let’s say that it’s a document, and I’m in the document mode, and I let it center and read. If I don’t get the section that I need, or it doesn’t get all of it, should I back out of it and do the whole thing again?

Angel

Yes. So, it’s important to do it at least twice. Because depending on the distance, you may not have the entire document in view. You might only have top portion or the bottom portion. I usually tell my consumer to try and keep it at least a foot away from the iPhone. I have a stand that I use. If you use both your hands, it’s kind of difficult, you can put the paper on the table, but are you holding it at the right angle? Are you holding the camera flat enough to to catch the document? So if you have a stand, you might get used to you know, holding the paper at a distance. It’s basically muscle memory. Okay, I gotta keep my arm here, my stand is here. And again, they purchase all types of stands, and you can adjust stands to you know, anywhere from a few inches up to a foot. So you may want to try one of those stands try and help you.

Kim

Okay, thank you.

Ashley

There’s a thing you can turn on under your camera settings, I think it is.  It’s built by Tilt Guidance, where it’ll kind of like help align you to where the paper is. 

Kim

Thanks.

Angel

Right, and it works similar to Seeing AI.  It may not be able to capture everything. Because, if you have your camera at an angle, a portion of that text may be blurry, so you’ll only get the portion that was able to pick up of course. 

Kim

Okay, thank you.

Speaker

I just want to say thank you so much, Angel, this information was very helpful. You know, I just want to let everybody know that this is super great resource that we have the resource and we have the application. But it’s so crazy to go out there and kind of personalize that. So, sometimes I just want to have somebody to come, you know, specifically for my daughter and you see this one is perfect for you. Let me show you how to store it. Let me show your daughter how to use it. But it’s not that easy. But this one, it gives us a little bit of a help with that. Thank you so much, Angel.

Angel

You’re welcome. And I want to thank everyone out there that provides some information.  I’ve learned quite a bit myself. I’m definitely going to look at some of the apps that were discussed today. Actually, I was doing that as I was listening to everyone else. But you know, I want to put all of you know, you’re doing a great job, your kids, attending this is an awesome thing. And I appreciate that from all of you. 

Also, be aware that there is help out there with iOS devices. If you call up Apple, you can actually find someone that can assist you. And walk you through the accessibility features. Some stores, especially in Manhattan, on 14th Street and the one that’s close to the agency, Lighthouse, on 68th and Broadway, they work with a lot of our consumers. So, they actually have someone on staff that can show them where the accessibility is, and help them adjust it to their needs. Also, unfortunately, due to COVID, but I’m hoping that things open up soon, the Heiskell Library also provides free training on Saturdays. But  they don’t have that yet. Hopefully, it’ll open up again soon. And all you have to do is call up the library, the Heiskell Library and start scheduling. There might be a long list down down the road, unfortunately. But try to jump on those things as quickly as possible. There is a lot of free training out there. And you know, thanks to Sheila for putting this together, we can share that information.

Speaker

Can I just say one more thing. I just want to say that 01:06:23 does free training for people one on one, or sometimes they do specific things, they do it in a group setting. 

Angel

Okay, thank you. I’m glad they started doing that as well.

Sheila

And speaking of resources, our next presentation will be Monday, May 17, same time, and it will be talking about building resilience in children and teens. With Dr. Laura Newman, she’s really – if you don’t haven’t heard her talk, to give some really wonderful practical advice. So, if you’re available, we’d love to have you back with us. Thank you, everybody, for coming on tonight. And thank you, Angel again for all this wonderful information.

Angel

Thanks for having me.

Sheila

Hope to talk to you guys all soon. Have a good night, everybody.