WHAT IS BRAILLE?

Braille is used by blind people throughout the world. Braille is a code based on an arrangement of one to six raised dots. Each dot has a number to indicate where it is. There are 64 ways to arrange the 6 dots in the rectangular box that is called a Braille cell.

The Braille characters make up the letters of the alphabet, punctuation marks, numbers, and everything else you can write in print.

For more information on Braille, you can visit this website, which has awesome explanations of the Braille Alphabet.

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/braille.htm

WHO INVENTED BRAILLE?
Louis Braille (1809-1852)
Six dots. Six bumps. Six bumps in different patterns, like constellations, spreading out over the page. What are they? Numbers, letters, words. Who made this code? None other than Louis Braille, a French 12-year-old, who was also blind. And his work changed the world of reading and writing, forever.
Louis was from a small town called Coupvray, near Paris—he was born on January 4 in 1809. Louis became blind by accident, when he was 3 years old. Deep in his Dad's harness workshop, Louis tried to be like his Dad, but it went very wrong; he grabbed an awl, a sharp tool for making holes, and the tool slid and hurt his eye. The wound got infected, and the infection spread, and soon, Louis was blind in both eyes.

All of a sudden, Louis needed a new way to learn. He stayed at his old school for two more years, but he couldn't learn everything just by listening. Things were looking up when Louis got a scholarship to the Royal Institution for Blind Youth in Paris, when he was 10. But even there, most of the teachers just talked at the students. The library had 14 huge books with raised letters that were very hard to read. Louis was impatient.
Then in 1821, a former soldier named Charles Barbier visited the school. Barbier shared his invention called "night writing," a code of 12 raised dots that let soldiers share top-secret information on the battlefield without even having to speak. Unfortunately, the code was too hard for the soldiers, but not for 12-year-old Louis!
Louis trimmed Barbier's 12 dots into 6, ironed out the system by the time he was 15, then published the first-ever Braille book in 1829. But did he stop there? No way! In 1837, he added symbols for math and music. But since the public was skeptical, blind students had to study Braille on their own. Even at the Royal Institution, where Louis taught after he graduated, Braille wasn't taught until after his death. Braille began to spread worldwide in 1868, when a group of British men, now known as the Royal National Institute for the Blind, took up the cause.
Now practically every country in the world uses Braille. Braille books have double-sided pages, which saves a lot of space. Braille signs help blind people get around in public spaces. And, most important, blind people can communicate independently, without needing print.


Braille Technology
Modern technology has made many useful tools for people who read and write Braille. There are some devices that produce books in Braille and others that let people read information on computers and from the Internet. Some devices are simple and inexpensive and others are very complicated. The devices below are used by many people who read Braille to complete their schoolwork, take care of personal business, and do their jobs at work.

Slate and Stylus
The slate and stylus are inexpensive, portable tools used to write Braille - just the way paper and pencil are used for writing print. Slates are made of two flat pieces of metal or plastic held together by a hinge at one end. The slate opens up to hold paper. The top part has rows of openings that are the same shape and size as a Braille cell. The back part has rows of indentations in the size and shape of Braille cells. The stylus is a pointed piece of metal with a plastic or wooden handle. The stylus is used to punch or emboss the Braille dots onto the paper held in the slate. The indentations in the slate prevent the stylus from punching a hole in the paper when the dots are embossed. Slates and styluses come in many shapes and sizes.

Braille Displays
A Braille display is a device that has a row of special "soft" cells made of plastic or metal pins. The pins are controlled by a computer and move up or down to display, in Braille, the characters that appear on the computer screen. This type of Braille is said to be "refreshable," because it changes as the user moves around on the screen. The Braille display usually sits under the computer keyboard.

Electronic Braille Notetakers
Electronic Braille notetakers are portable devices with Braille keyboards that Braille readers can use to enter information. The text stored in these devices can be read with a built-in Braille display or the device can read aloud with a synthesized voice. These devices are handy for taking notes in class, and often have built-in address books, calculators, and calendars, too!

Braille Printers (Embossers)
Braille printers are devices connected to a computer that do the actual embossing of Braille onto thick (heavyweight) paper. They work like a regular computer printer does, in that the user can print out letters, reports, and other files from the computer.

Braille writers
This student is using a Perkins braillewriter to complete his homework. The mechanical braillewriter works a little bit like a typewriter. It has six keys—one for each dot in a Braille cell—a space bar, a backspace key, a carriage return, and a line feed key. The braillewriter uses heavyweight paper (just like the Braille printer) but it doesn't need any electricity to work.