The Design and Preliminary Evaluation of a Sliding Contact Braille Display for Early Learning

Learning to read and write braille are essential requirements of children who are visually impaired (VI) as it increases their chances of employment. Single-cell braille displays have been designed to reduce the cost of braille displays and have a place in early braille learning. However, currently available single-cell displays do not allow the sliding contact between the finger pad of the user and the braille dots as seen in traditional paper braille reading. The design presented here seeks to overcome this drawback in single-cell displays. An added advantage is that the design can easily be modified to present jumbo braille to early learners. The design with standard braille dimensions has been tested on 15 blind individuals. As a first step towards its validation, its usability was evaluated with a standardized questionnaire: the short version of the User Experience Questionnaire (UEQ). The accuracy rates in reading letters and words were also measured and were high at 96.27 % and 89.72 % respectively. We envisage the use of this device in braille education- to make the teaching and learning of braille affordable, enjoyable and easily accessible for students and their educators.