MathOMatic Blocks: An Automated, Tactile, Interactive Method of Teaching Mathematics to Blind Students in the K-12 Environment

Learning mathematics has always been a daunting task for the visually impaired student. For the most part, a task that restricted their entry into careers based on the reading and writing of mathematical equations. There have been some notable exceptions, but for the most part education in the domains of math, physics, computer science and engineering have been beyond the grasp of blind students. In the current work, we discuss the basic poroblems associated with learning mathematcics and discuss possible solutions to the problem

Understanding algebraic manipulation: Analysis of the actions of sighted and non-sighted students

Abstract Doing mathematics still remains a challenge for non-sighted students. Communicating with their sighted peers or teachers while doing math also presents difficulties since they use different representation supports. Interaction on accessible mathematical interfaces has had promising results in browsing using braille and audio, but support for doing math requires further development. To date, there aren't many options regarding accessible support for manipulating expressions as it is regularly practised in the learning stage. We have carried out an experiment with sighted and non-sighted students with the aim to better understand the actions they perform while solving basic algebraic expressions, in order to design the interaction in a multimodal interface for doing math. Sighted and non-sighted participants solved four algebraic expressions orally, and sighted participants solved them in write as well. The results showed that the intentions of the participants were in conformity with the systematic application of algebraic rules, regardless of visual ability. It is suggested that success in the interaction design of the interface will depend on the degree of direct access to the expression terms, and the ease of use of features intended to minimise memory load

Design of an Automated Book Reader as an Assistive Technology for Blind Persons

This dissertation introduces a novel automated book reader as an assistive technology tool for persons with blindness. The literature shows extensive work in the area of optical character recognition, but the current methodologies available for the automated reading of books or bound volumes remain inadequate and are severely constrained during document scanning or image acquisition processes. The goal of the book reader design is to automate and simplify the task of reading a book while providing a user-friendly environment with a realistic but affordable system design. This design responds to the main concerns of (a) providing a method of image acquisition that maintains the integrity of the source (b) overcoming optical character recognition errors created by inherent imaging issues such as curvature effects and barrel distortion, and (c) determining a suitable method for accurate recognition of characters that yields an interface with the ability to read from any open book with a high reading accuracy nearing 98%. This research endeavor focuses in its initial aim on the development of an assistive technology tool to help persons with blindness in the reading of books and other bound volumes. But its secondary and broader aim is to also find in this design the perfect platform for the digitization process of bound documentation in line with the mission of the Open Content Alliance (OCA), a nonprofit Alliance at making reading materials available in digital form. The theoretical perspective of this research relates to the mathematical developments that are made in order to resolve both the inherent distortions due to the properties of the camera lens and the anticipated distortions of the changing page curvature as one leafs through the book. This is evidenced by the significant increase of the recognition rate of characters and a high accuracy read-out through text to speech processing. This reasonably priced interface with its high performance results and its compatibility to any computer or laptop through universal serial bus connectors extends greatly the prospects for universal accessibility to documentation

Leitura automática de expressões matemáticas: audiomath

Nesta dissertação estuda-se o problema do ensino e da falta de acessibilidade dosdocumentos com conteúdos matemáticos na Internet por parte de pessoas comnecessidades especiais, nomeadamente cegos e amblíopes.A solução proposta nesta dissertação baseia-se na análise, interpretação econversão de documentos com fórmulas matemáticas em MathML para uma formaescrita por extenso, sendo posteriormente lida com recurso a um conversor texto-fala.Foram desenvolvidas três aplicações: AudioMathENGINE, AudioMathGUI eAudioMathWEB.AudioMathENGINE consiste num motor de análise, interpretação e conversão dedocumentos com conteúdos matemáticos, e que possui módulos de processamento para:numerais, abreviações, acrónimos, referências de rede, assim como, reconhecimentoautomático dos elementos a converter, interpretação e conversão de expressõesmatemáticas, e implementação de mecanismos de navegação nas mesmas.AudioMathGUI consiste numa aplicação gráfica que permite a aplicação do motorde análise, interpretação e conversão de expressões matemáticas, assim como ademonstração de um mecanismo de navegação contextualizado das fórmulas.AudioMathWEB consiste num serviço público on-line de conversão dedocumentos com MathML, que se encontra disponível no sítio web da tese.Neste trabalho apresenta-se também um estudo detalhado sobre a prosódiamatemática e a forma como os humanos lêem e entendem a leitura das expressõesmatemáticas.Ao longo da dissertação são apresentados resultados de trabalhos de pesquisa emdiversas áreas, incluindo: engenharia, psicologia, matemática e linguística, com afinalidade de adquirir conhecimentos, conceitos e teorias, que permitem escolher astecnologias e técnicas mais adequadas à concretização deste trabalho.O trabalho de dissertação termina com um conjunto de testes objectivos esubjectivos para a determinação da qualidade dos resultados obtidos; assim como umconjunto de conclusões sobre esses mesmos resultados.Mais informações sobre a dissertação, incluindo publicações e um serviço públicode conversão de MathML, encontram-se disponíveis no sítio web da tese em:http://lpf-esi.fe.up.pt/~audiomath.This dissertation focus itself the problem of teaching and the lack of accessibility indocuments with mathematical contents over the Internet, aiming people with severaltypes of visual impairment, like blindness.The proposed solution in this thesis consists in the analysis, interpretation andconversion of documents containing mathematical formulae in MathML into a fullwritten form, prepared to be read by a text-to-speech engine later on.Three applications have been mainly developed: AudioMathENGINE,AudioMathGUI and AudioMathWEB.AudioMathENGINE is the engine responsible for the analysis, interpretation andconversion of documents with mathematical contents. This engine includes processingmodules for: numerals, abbreviations, acronyms, network references, and also,automatic recognition of certain elements to be converted, interpretation and conversionof mathematical expressions, and the implementation of a navigation mechanism for theexisting mathematical expressions.AudioMathGUI is a graphical user interface that allows the usage of the analysis,interpretation and conversion engine, and also the demonstration of the contextualizednavigation mechanism for the mathematical expressions.AudioMathWEB consists in a public on-line service, available on the thesiswebsite, which converts documents with MathML.On this thesis a detailed study is presented concerning math prosody and the wayhumans read and perceive mathematical expressions.Along this dissertation several research results are presented in numerous areas,including: engineering, psychology, mathematics and linguistics, with the aim ofacquiring knowledge, concepts and theories that guided in choosing technologies andtechniques that are more adequate to this work's implementation.The dissertation work ends with a set of objective and subjective tests about thequality of results; as well as a set of conclusions concerning these same results.More information about the thesis, including publications and the public on-lineconversion service of MathML, is available in the thesis website at:http://lpf-esi.fe.up.pt/~audiomath

Publicaciones científicas accesibles para personas ciegas y deficientes visuales

La obra, tesis doctoral de la autora, defendida en la Universidad de Barcelona en 2009, analiza la situación actual de la edición accesible, atendiendo a las necesidades específicas de los usuarios con discapacidad visual, y valora las características de los documentos digitales en función de tales necesidades. Al estudiar la estructura de los diversos tipos de documentos digitales, la autora señala la edición de artículos científicos como sector más avanzado, por lo que este tipo de documentos constituyen un modelo particularmente idóneo para validar la edición accesible

Techniques d'interaction multimodales pour l'accès aux mathématiques par des personnes non-voyantes

Cette thèse s‟inscrit dans le domaine de l‟interaction Homme-Machine et plus précisément dans celui des interfaces multimodales destinées aux non-voyants. Elle a pour thème principal la présentation des expressions mathématiques aux non-voyants. Pour les étudiants non-voyants, apprendre les mathématiques est une tâche ardue et peut constituer une barrière, les séparant des disciplines techniques. Les travaux de recherche présentés ici décrivent les problèmes rencontrés dans la conception d‟un système permettant l‟accès aux mathématiques pour les utilisateurs déficients visuels. En effet, nous présentons une analyse des outils existants puis nous proposons des solutions pour combler leurs insuffisances. Nous exposons les techniques utilisées au sein de notre système pour répondre aux problèmes de la présentation des expressions mathématiques aux non-voyants. Nous exploitons la multimodalité comme technique d‟interaction pour développer des applications destinées à ce type d‟utilisateurs parce qu‟elle offre plusieurs opportunités grâce à sa richesse des interactions. Nous dotons également notre système d‟un comportement intelligent pour assurer une certaine autonomie à l‟utilisateur. En effet, le système est capable de présenter l‟information en fonction du contexte de l‟interaction (c-à-d. l‟utilisateur, son environnement et sa machine) et de la nature de l‟information. Le système est « pervasif » et adaptatif. L‟accès à l‟information est assuré n‟importe où n‟importe quand et il s‟adapte dynamiquement aux changements du contexte tout en fournissant continuellement des services à l‟utilisateur non-voyant, sans intervention humaine. Pour rendre le système adaptatif, nous avons élaboré un modèle qui détermine la complexité de l‟expression mathématique et nous avons intégré une technique d‟apprentissage automatique pour implémenter les mécanismes de décisions. Enfin, l‟architecture proposée est du type multi-agent. Ces techniques ont été validées par des études de cas et en utilisant les réseaux de Pétri et l‟outil de simulations JADE