A new concept in Braille Teaching and Testing

The Braille Test 'n' Teach opening screen

Above a screen shot of the Braille Characters Selection Bar

A screen shot of the Braille Contractions Selection Screen

The teacher selects which Braille characters, or contractions etc., that  they wish to be presented to the student by clicking on the selection with the mouse.

When selected selections turn from pink to green. The program is then started and the computer verbally speaks the selections to the student, e.g. "A" or "for" etc.

The student then has to respond by typing the appropriate Braille symbol on the keyboard, using the six key Braille method (e.g. keyboard keys SDF JKL represent Braille keys 3 2 1  4 5 6) and then presses the space bar.

If the student enters the correct character the computer makes a bell like sound and a large tick is displayed, if the student enters an incorrect character then an "Oh Oh" sound is heard and a large X is displayed.

When the student enters the correct symbol the program advances to the next selection.

All of the students responses are recorded so that a teacher can accurately assess the students strengths and weaknesses.

In addition to the count of correct and incorrect responses, the characters and contractions that were attempted,  the date and the amount of time that the student took to complete the test is recorded.

Additionally the teacher or student can elect to print out their scores if a printer is connected to the computer.

These printed 'score sheets' can be an ongoing record of the students progress for both the teacher and the student..

The teacher can decide on how many errors a student can make for a single selection before the correct answer  (symbol) is displayed. When the error total is reached then the appropriate Braille symbol is displayed on screen and the computer verbally describes it.

In the above instance the error count has been set at 5 and the computer will say, "One Letter. Dots 1 and 4 and 5 and 6"

The student then has to key in the correct Braille symbol to advance to the next selection.

The teacher has total control over the program, deciding upon which voice is used, whether the selections will be presented as they are seen on screen from left to right, or presented randomly, or presented in the order in which they were selected.

All of these selections etc., can be previously made by the teacher and saved on hard disk as lesson plans which can be opened and immediately started by the student, enabling the teacher to then concentrate on other students whilst the Braille Test 'n' Teach program is running.

Also for some students who still retain sight, there are various levels of magnification available.

All of the settings are saved when the program is ended, and is named by the teacher.

When saving the teacher can determine whether to save the lesson in the students name, or can prepare lessons before hand and save them named 'Lesson One', 'Lesson Two' etc.

A fully featured 'Help' file is always available on screen, plus at installation the manual is installed on the desktop of the computer.