2012-02-22-Slate and Stylus

2012-02-22-Slate and Stylus
Seminars@Hadley
The Slate and Stylus:

Braille Medias Pen and Paper
Presented by
Sue Melrose
Nafisa Keels
Moderated by
Doug Anzlovar
February 22, 2012
Moderator
Youre listening to Seminars at Hadley. This seminar
is the Slate and Stylus, Braille Medias Pen and
Paper, presented by Sue Melrose and Nafisa Keels,
moderated by Doug Anzlovar.
Doug Anzlovar
Okay, lets begin todays seminar again, my name is
Doug Anzlovar, I am the Dean of Educational
Programs and Instruction here at The Hadley School.
Todays topic is the Slate and Stylus, Braille Medias
Pen and Paper.
2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 1 of 57

Id like to welcome todays guest speakers; they are

two of our Hadley faculty members, Sue Melrose and
Nafisa Keels. Nafisa has worked as a Braille
instructor for The Hadley School for 14 years. She
came to Hadley after working for 12 years as a
teacher of the visually impaired in residential, home
and itinerate settings in four different states.
Sue Melrose is currently an instructor for both

Introduction to Braille and Contracted Braille for
professionals and the family program. She also
teaches Internet Beyond the Basics in the Adult
Continuing Education and High School programs.
Sue is a lifelong Braille user and has been using the
Slate and Stylus as one of many means of written
communication since age six. Id like to welcome
Nafisa and Sue to the room, and Im going to turn the
microphone over to Nafisa so she can get started.
Please, if you have questions, you are welcome to

type them in the text chat, I will monitor them
throughout the seminar, and if you would like to hold
questions until the end, we will have a question and
answer session. Thank you, and Nafisa, the
microphone is yours.
Nafisa Keels
Thank you Doug. I am going to start with the history
of writing for the blind with the slate and stylus in

particular. When you consider the writing instruments

from early times to the present, it seems that the slate
and stylus is rather innovative and modern, yet all
writing instruments with which paper is the medium,
they are still relevant and desirable today, even in an
age when computers are used frequently. People still
enjoy all things paper and the writing instruments that
go with them.
The Braille code and the Slate and Stylus have roots
in a Military application. Back in 1819, Captain
Charles Barbier [DeLaSare] met a challenge set by
Napoleon to develop a night writing system for
soldiers to use at night time to communicate on a
battlefield. In its early development the slate and
stylus had many more dots, and the system was more
phonetic than it was alphabetic. But the general idea
of embossing on the spot with a pointed instrument
into a form to make impression on paper is by an
individual made it a portable and useful tool from the
beginning.
Louie Braille did simplify the system and sized it to the

fingertip, but he never forgot Barbiers contribution
and he said, If we have pointed out the advantages
of our method over his, we must say in his honor that
his method gave us the first idea of our own. So if
Barbier had never made it to the National Institute for
Blind Youth in Paris, who knows how the literacy for

the blind would have developed over time. Im going

to turn it over to Sue to discuss the advantages of
using a slate and stylus.
Sue Melrose
Okay, the advantages and disadvantages of the slate
and stylus, the most obvious one of course is that the
slate and stylus is very portable, just like a pencil, the
slate and stylus can be thrown in a purse or put in
your pocket, or just grabbed and carried along in a
notebook. It also doesnt require any batteries, and
most of us who use computer technology today know
the feeling of losing the battery at the most critical
point. The slate and stylus is also very flexible in its
use.
For example, I can use lightweight paper, if I just want

to take quick temporary notes. I can use
heavyweight, if I want to take notes on something
more permanent. I write all my recipes on vinyl paper,
because number one, its more permanent, and also
because I can then wipe them off at the end, and I
dont know about you, but Ive always got something
on my recipe when Im done in the kitchen.
I can use clear plastic paper which I hesitate to use

an embosser, because it oftentimes leaves sort of a
sticky substance on the styluses that needs to be
wiped off, but I use that paper frequently to label my

CDs, to maybe put braille in a childs book that I want

to read to a classroom or to other young children.
And I can also use it for just labeling about anything.
You can write a label, cut it out, and stick it on a box,
a bag, on whatever you want.
I also use magnetic strips, and I find these real handy

for my canned foods for example, and once Ive used
the canned food, I throw it up on the refrigerator, and
it now becomes the temporary grocery list. And these
magnetic labels can be reused many, many times.
And of course theyll stick to anything metal, so I often
use them out in the garage on paint cans or whatever
else I might want. The slate and stylus many of them,
not all, but many of them, have slots in them for
[dimal] tape, but if you dont have the slots you can
just put the tape in the top line and line it up, and write
right on the [dimal] tape.
And Ive even used thin metal strips for my gardening

supplies or anything I want to label outside, so the
weather doesnt ruin it. I can put the slate right on the
lid of a box and label whats in it; I can also use such
materials as old catalogs. I used to use those all the
time until I realized Id better restrict that use to only
my personal use, because if I was writing on an old
catalog page in a meeting, more people than not
would often stop to look and see what was on that

catalog page, and the discussion would go there

instead of what I was writing.
So again, what Im pointing out here is that the slate

and stylus is just incredibly flexible can be under
many circumstances, theyre very portable. There is
no maintenance on it, rarely Ive never had well,
thats not true. I sharpened the stylus once but mostly
you dont have to, and the slates are very durable.
The other thing a slate and stylus can do that a lot of

the computer devices cant do easily is it gives you
immediate hard copy. If I just want to braille a phone
number and either throw it in my wallet or give it to
somebody I can do it with a slate and stylus right then
and there, and hand it out.
Now a couple of disadvantages are obvious, like the

pencil its much slower than say a computer or
typewriter, although again most of know contracted
braille and some of us know grade three braille and
so if we use those codes with the slate and stylus, I
can easily keep up with the rest, anybody who is
writing. And I find it no problem at all to keep up
taking notes of speakers for example. But that does
take practice, and for a new user the slowness would
be a disadvantage.

And the other one is that its not as easy to erase

things, youd have to take your paper and erase it,
and so accuracy is more important I believe for a slate
writer. But again you learn your slate and stylus well,
and then you dont have to worry about that either.
So those are some of the advantages and

disadvantages, and now Ill turn it back to Nafisa.
Nafisa Keels
Thank you Sue. The next thing that we will discuss
are the variety of slates and styluses. I have pulled
up a slide here.
Vileen Shah
Hello this is Vileen Shah, Instructor at the Hadley
School. The best feature I like is about the slate and
stylus is portability, you can carry it in your purse or
pocket and use it any time you want to jot down
something. I just wanted to share a little bit; I had the
fortune to use the same slate and stylus that Louie
Braille had developed when I was in Paris attending
the biennial ceremony of Louis Brailles birthday in
2009.
Nafisa Keels
Well thank you for sharing that Vileen, thats very
nice. What an honor. I have pulled up a slide here of
a few varieties of slates, they come from all over the

world, and if youre ever curious about the extent, go

to a search engine and type in Judy Dixon and slate
and stylus, and you will see her impressive collection.
The photos that I have here are a sample from her

collection, they are designed for many purposes,
there is a full-page slate, which I do have pictured
here in the slide, that will fit 8-1/2 by 11 paper, its
usually made out of plastic, dark black, pretty durable
with hinges, and you close your paper inside and you
can write a whole page without having to move the
slate. But the most portable is the four-line slate, and
I have one pictured here, some are plastic. The one I
have pictured here is metal.
A favorite among those of us who are prone to

mistakes is the four-line metal slate with a window
and we often call that a correction slate. It has a
window that you can open to view and check your
work, maybe make a correction if possible and you do
not have to remove your paper. But every four lines
you will have to move the slate down the page.
Another handy slate thats useful is the notecard slate.

And if youre someone who has a recipe collection or
a rolodex this is very handy to have at your desk. It is
designed to easily insert a standard sized notecard,
and it accommodates five lines with 19 cells each line.

And then one of my favorites as a teacher is the

paperless slate. For beginners this is a fun way, an
enjoyable way to learn how to use the slate. It is
made of plastic, its almost like a brick, a long brick
with ten oversized styles and the brick is black with
the dots or the pegs are white, and the pegs are
movable within each cell, and they can be pushed so
than when you turn it over, you can read what youve
written. It is useful also to keep on your desk to
maybe jot down a quick phone number.
With the variety of slates, there is also a variety of

stylus and I have a picture taken from Judy Dicksons
collection, many different kinds of stylus with different
handles and you can use some that have a saddle
which forms with a curve to your hand, some prefer a
rounder stylus, others like a design where even
though its round, it has one side flat, so it doesnt roll
off your desk.
And of course for those of us who commit to Braille

there is also the beloved eraser, which can correct
certain kinds of mistakes. If you have an unwanted
dot, it might be easy enough to push that dot down,
but if you make a mistake thats bad enough, of
course sometimes just taking the paper out and
starting over is whats needed, but the erasers also
come in different styles, I have two pictured here.

One is a round almost dowel type, another is a knob

with a more pointed end, and then the one that Ive
also seen that I couldnt find a photo of is one thats
shaped almost like a pencil and its a hard plastic.
And Im going to be turning it over to Sue, she is

going to discuss some ways to use and operate the
devices, and shell also give us some input on her
favorites.
Sue Melrose
Okay, yes, Nafisa mentioned most of the most
common slates, but there are some fun ones as well.
Well there is a common one thats an index I think
she mentioned the index card slate, where you just
slide it in, the metal is already put together. It doesnt
open up, you slide the index card in from the bottom,
and its exactly six lines and the width of the card.
There is also a one-line slate, that I think was

designed probably primarily for [dimal] tape, the
hinges are at the top, and you open it up, put the
dimal tape in, close it, and its about a 15 line cell
slate. But I always found it handy for just putting at
the top of the pages on anything on my desk, and just
writing what that paper was, so that it didnt become
this blank anonymous piece of paper. So the one line
slate I find very handy.

There is a slate just for Brailing playing cards, Ive not

ever seen one, but I see them in catalogs all the time
and it has the cells at each corner, so you just slide
the card in and then turn the slate around to braille in
each corner. One that isnt used very often anymore
because cassettes arent that common but there was
a slate designed and this just shows how slates can
be customized, but it was designed absolutely
perfectly to fit on a cassette label. It had an open slot
in the middle where the cassette, little dials were so
that you didnt put braille there and it had cells all
around the cassette, so that you could write on it
above the opening, below it and on each side.
And then there are all kinds of notebooks that you can
buy with slates in them already, where the slate is
designed to be exactly the size of the page of the
notebook, and the American Printing House for the
Blind has several of those kind of notebooks including
a datebook that has a calendar and then lots of
tabbed pages, so you can put notes to yourself, and
put them between whatever page of the calendar
thats appropriate.
So those are kind of some of my favorite slates. Now,

I wanted to talk a little bit about resources, and you
dont need to write these down, because you can
always get the resource list that will be filed with this
seminar when it gets recorded. You can access it by

going to the Hadley page and clicking on the access

past seminars link, go to the Slate and Stylus
seminar, and then the resources list will be available
there, but I do want to refer you to a few.
If you want to purchase a variety of slates, the

American Printing House for the Blind which is known
by those of us who use it APH, the American Printing
House, and you can get it at www.APH.org. And
there they will have a great number of slates. This is
the primary distributor of educational materials around
the US, and so youll find lots of slates there.
The Perkins School for the Blind at Perkins.org also

has a list of slates, and of course they were the
developer of the original Perkins Braillewriter, so
theyre kind of the historically famous one for all of
this.
Independent Living Aids also has slates and styluses,

and they have one I want to discuss, well I think they
call it the upward writing slate. Its one that everybody
whos new at slates, just really thinks they want to
have and its the one that has the dots going up
instead of down, and you use a hollow stylus to write
with, so youve got to its very difficult to use,
because youve got to take this hollow point, and
match it up with the dot, and then push on it, and so it
really is not a practical slate.

Anybody who wants to purchase one, I would say go

for it, but be aware that you probably really wont end
up using it much, because its very frustrating. It looks
like it would be the answer to all your slate problems,
but its not. Using the hollow stylus creates a lot of
ghost dots, because you dont get it quite right and so
it slips onto the dot, instead of going straight down
and making a nice clear dot. The dots usually arent
as clear or as strong, and in my experience and in all
of the people Ive talked to about them, they end up
going back to their traditional slates and styluses.
But Independent Living Aids I believe does carry this;

it comes out of the Royal National Institute for the
Blind, which is the primary source for such things as
slates and styluses for the blind in London, England.
MaxiAids like Independent Living Aids is another

place you can get lots of slates and styluses and
other writing tools for the blind. And of the two
international ones that I want to mention, Ive
mentioned just the Royal National Institute for the
Blind in England and the Canadian National Institute
for the Blind in Canada, throughout Canada. Those
are good sources for writing tools for the blind as well.
Okay, Im going to move on to how the slate and

stylus works, there are three slides that will be shown,

but the slides are mostly pictures, and the information

on the slides Ill be verbalizing. First of all, the
important thing about using the slate and stylus, just
as using a pencil is that you have a good place to use
it. That is a computer desk, or a writing desk,
something that is of good level.
One way to know whether its a good height for you is

that if you lay your arm on the table, your arm and
your hand should be almost parallel to the ground,
maybe your hand, it might slant up slightly, but you
dont want a very high desk where your arms are
really slanted up, or a very low one, where youre
reaching down. You really want it to be comfortable
and have your forearms and your wrist are on the
table, and have a good chair where your feet are on
the ground, and youre feeling sort of solid, because
when youre first starting with the slate and stylus, it
does take some pressure to use it, and some you
get a little tense. So get to a comfortable spot.
A lot of my students say they try to use while theyre

watching TV on the couch, and those of us who are
real used to it can do that, but I think initially thats a
very difficult place to use it, because youre not with
good posture, and not good hand use. So again,
those of you who have slate and styluses if you can
kind of get your arms on the table, you want to be

sure that your forearm and your wrist rest comfortably

on the table, they want to stay on the table.
One common error that students make is they take

their wrist and theyre really pressing from their wrist,
the wrist should stay on the table, only your hand is
going to move up and down to press the dots. Okay,
if you do that, you wont have the strain in your
shoulders and things that I often read about. Once
you lift your wrist, now youre pushing with many more
muscles than you need to. So keep your forearm and
your wrist on the table.
I guess before we get to the stylus, well get the paper

in the slate. Now, if you have the common slate, its
going to have the hinges, you want those hinges on
the left. You want the opening of the slate on the
right, and the reason for this is because when you put
your paper in, the wider margin then will be on the
right, and when you flip it over, it will be on the left,
and that wider margin will make it possible for you to
staple the page, punch holes or bind the paper as you
wish.
So be sure the hinge is on the left, open your slate

and then take the paper, and put it so that the left
edge of the paper is up against the hinge, and the top
of the page is straight across the top of the slate, and
just kind of use your hands if you cant see it, to line

the slate up so its perfectly straight right along, equal

to the slate. Use the slate as the guide.
Now, while you hold the paper in place with your right
hand, you close the slate with your left hand making
sure that all four pins are punched. Push down on the
top of the slate so that it really punches through those
holes, because if you dont punch through the holes,
then the paper is liable to move while youre writing.
Now, if you do punch down on all the holes, the nice

thing about that its holding the paper securely in
place, if you make an error and have to take your
page out to make the correction, when you put it
back, precisely back on those same four holes and
close your slate, you can go right back to where you
were and clearly feel all the dots, as youre making
corrections
Okay, so youve got your paper in with the left end

against the hinge, the top part clearly lined up with the
slate, youve closed your slate on it. Its securely in
place. Now, how to hold your stylus. This is critically
important as well, because again when I hear my
students say their hands hurt when theyre done, I
often question how theyre holding the stylus and
usually its incorrectly.

So its important, if you have one of the flat styluses

you want that has the one side flat but the stylus is
basically round, with just one side flat, you want your
thumb against it. If you have the truly have the flat
stylus then you cant do that, the flat sides your
index finger has to go over the top and touch the flat
side. But if you have the round stylus with one flat
side, put your thumb against the flat side. If its not
flat, then just put your thumb against the left or right
edge of the stylus, depending on whether youre right
or left-handed.
Now your index finger is going to curl over the top of

the stylus, and the top of the stylus is going to rest
between the second and third joint of your index
finger right in front of the palm of your hand, so the
fleshiest, meatiest part of your index finger is going to
be touching the top of the stylus and the rest of your
finger thats hanging out over the front edge is just
going to slightly curl against the stylus touching the
shaft so that you clearly have the stylus with your
thumb against the flat edge, your index finger over the
top, and the top of the stylus against the fleshy part of
your finger.
Now your middle finger, your ring and your little

fingers are just going to curl in a gentle fist and the
side of your middle finger will be opposite the side
from your thumb. So if youve got your stylus in your

hand, now you should feel that this is pretty secure.

Youve got your thumb and your middle finger on each
side holding it, your index finger curled over the top
touching the shaft of the stylus and you dont have to
hold it real tight, but its very secure because its being
held on many sides.
And now your middle, ring and little fingers just curl in
a gentle fist to stay out of the way. Okay lets put this
holding your stylus, lets put the tip of the stylus, the
sharp point into the very first cell of the slate, and we
always write from right to left on the slate, and thats
the reason why, because youre pushing down, and
youll need to take the paper out and turn it over to
read it.
So to start writing you would put your stylus in the first

top cell, the first cell of the top line, way up to the
right-hand corner, thats the first side, the first side you
come to when youre coming onto the slate will be the
right side, we call that the first side. The top dot is dot
one, top right side, first side. Youll put the point of
your stylus there with most of us with our right hand,
and for most of us our left hand will be laying on the
slate with the index finger, just barely touching the
point of the stylus. Now for sighted people this is
more stability. For blind people of course its to help
actually guide where the stylus goes and to verify that
youve put your point in the right place.

So the index finger of the other hand thats not holding

your stylus is sort of the point guide for the point of
the stylus. And so if youre comfortable, youre sitting
with your arms and your wrist on the table, your hand
holding the stylus in the way I described with your
thumb against the side, index finger curled up at the
top, other three fingers curled slightly, and the point is
in dot one, Im going to turn you back to Nafisa and
she can guide you through actually writing a little bit
on the slate.
Nafisa Keels
Thank you very much Sue. Well that you know how
to write or how to hold the stylus and load your paper,
youll want to practice. And just to get you started and
understanding the learning process, and just so you
dont expect too much from yourself, Ill let you know
that when I was first learning, developing the skill for
the slate and stylus for me required small bits of
practice throughout the day with frequent breaks to
avoid fatigue.
I also observed others learning to use the slate and

stylus and I realized that making lots of mistakes in
the early stages is typical. Its also helpful to use
notebook paper, which is lighter weight, and just dont
even try to correct your mistakes in the beginning, just
have fun with it, and start by just embossing one row

of a letter, and gradually build up to writing words and

when I was writing words, I chose the shortest words
possible, two, three-letter words, and then moved
onto to rhyming words so that I was only changing
maybe one letter each time and with time and practice
as a sighted person learning, my perspective started
to change.
And I actually started to realize that I could read

braille from the back of my slate, the same way as if I
were to pick up a piece of paper with print on it, and
read the print from the backside of the paper. So with
time and practice, your mind will be able to change its
perspective, and as youre writing and embossing
from the right moving towards the left, you will actually
be seeing in your mind, or thinking in your mind the
words and letters as you are moving, and it really
does happen. It just takes time and practice.
But there is a way to systematically introduce writing

on the slate and stylus by thinking of your side
approach. So here we have the view of the
indentations on the embossing side or backside of the
slate, and then youre embossing, you will approach
from the right, move to the left, dot by dot, cell by cell.
You will think of the columns of the braille cell as the
first five which has dots one, two, three and second
side which has dots four, five, six. So whether youre
writing or embossing, starting from the right, or if

youre reading starting from the left, that will never

change.
Each dot is assigned top, middle or bottom. So the

position of dot one or the letter a will be the first
side, top dot. So lets start with the letter a, and Im
going to pull up a slide, that will show you how to
practice the letter a. And I have in red embossed
and then you can see the red a a few cells going
across that gives you the top dot, first side. So you
will emboss going from right to left, and then when
youre done remove the paper and see what youve
done, and then you will be able to read.
Notice whether or not each of them is the same,

notice whether or not you tore the paper, whether you
skipped a space or maybe even produced the wrong
dot, it happens, but dont worry, with time and practice
you will eventually get it correct.
If youre ready lets see if we can practice the letter

h. I will show you a slide here that gives the letter
h in braille and the embossing view in red, and the
reading view in black. So to practice the letter h,
youre going to start from the right, first side, top dot
and middle dot, but youre not through you still have
one more dot to go on the second side, middle dot.
So practice a row, see how it goes. Notice that when
you remove the paper to view your work, the

approach is the same. Reading direction is still first

side top dot, middle dot, second side middle dot.
So this approach is one that we are asked to do when

we introduce it to children, and were told to never say
reverse and to never talk about writing backwards, but
the funny thing is, is that once youve shown a child
how to do this, and youre using this language, they
get very excited and start giggling and talk about oh,
my goodness, Im writing backwards. So they still
perceive it that way, and they think its rather fun and
special.
We have one more letter to practice, this one involves

a few more dots, and for some people it can be a little
bit of a challenge. Its the letter t. So I brought up a
slide with the red embossing side and the black
reading starting from the right, first side, middle and
bottom dots; on the second side, top and middle dots.
So practice a row and remove your paper. Check

against the diagram if you can, notice if youre
consistent with pressure, did the paper tear, did some
dots not come out very well, or maybe you entered an
incorrect dot, these are common mistakes that will go
away with time and practice. Do you think you are
ready to emboss a word? Well, we have the letters
but we can braille the word hat. And so now you

have the challenge with three letters, different letters

and a space.
Spacing between your words is important, so make

sure that your hand is right there to help you
determine when you finished to leave an empty cell
and then move to the next, because its very
necessary to make sure you dont run any words
together. And then when youre done how are your
hands? Are they tired? Always take frequent breaks.
Now remember that just as with print the goal is to

produce words which you read from left to right. And I
will turn it back over to Sue to see if she has anything
to add.
Sue Melrose
Okay, I was noticing that there is a lot of questions on
the chat about metal slates and plastic slates and
what kind of styluses and all that, and it really ends up
being personal preference. Plastic slates, Ive
replaced a few more plastic slates than metal ones,
however, I must let you know that even if you spend
the money and buy a metal one, they do spring and
so eventually sometimes you cant get the slate to
stay closed very well.
So theres pros and cons to both, and I think with

todays plastic slates, they tend to be just about as

good as the metal ones, and in terms of stylus, I do

recommend that you use the regular stylus, the pen
and pencil stylus. Unfortunately, it tends to have
people hold it like a pencil, and then youre having a
difficulty pushing it down. So I think the traditional
styluses, there are a variety of them, but are better
than the pen and pencil because it does let you hold
the stylus correctly and has you pushing down with
the appropriate muscles.
I also just wanted to mention that I learned to use the

slate and stylus when I was six years old; we were
taught it right along with the braillewriter at the same
time. All my first grade class, I went to the school for
the blind, so all the first grade class were taught at the
same time, and I dont remember any of us having
any trouble.
Children unless there is a specific learning disability

that gets in the way, children are very flexible, and
again if you use the terms, the first side, second side,
its the same instructions for both braillewriter and
slate or note taker, or whatever they might be using,
and sometimes I think younger children get it better.
If the slate and stylus is not taught until the child is
junior high or senior high, they dont want to slow
down and go back and learn that again, just like you
wouldnt want to learn print letters with a pencil, if

you hadnt been taught that earlier, you would stick

with your old tried and true.
So my experience and from the experience of those

Ive worked with seems to be, get the stylus that fits in
your hand best, there are small ones for small
children and small hands, larger ones as they get
older, and teach it well, teach it early.
Im going to talk a little bit about the familys role in the

slate and stylus. And I think it plays a big role actually
because blind children like any child looks to their
parents to be the role model. So having a parent
thats learning the slate and stylus and having fun
doing it by the way, is a good role model.
So I am really pleased when I see a family member

taking our braille courses and they turn in that lesson
six, and theyve mastered the slate and stylus and tell
me about their experience, and I cheer right along
with them, because I know then that that child will
have a better chance at loving the slate and stylus
too.
So learning it probably the first thing family members

ought to be thinking about doing. I know in my own
family, my mother started it very seriously, she took
the alphabet, this many, many years ago, so we didnt
have the Hadley courses yet, so she took the

alphabet card, and she flipped it over and tried to

figure that all out, and got the slate out and she
learned it pretty well, and learned to do it without any
cheat sheet so to speak.
And my dad, he only would use the cheat sheet, he

never really wanted to learn it, but he did want to
occasionally write me something fun or funny, and so
he would take the cheat sheet alphabet out and turn it
over and slate and stylus away. Now my brother he
learned it because he wanted to read my diary, typical
brother, and so he learned the braille pretty quickly,
but he didnt realize was that there were several
codes of braille and I wrote my diary in contracted
braille, he only learned trade one braille or the
alphabet uncontracted braille and got discouraged
thank goodness, didnt want to go on, it wasnt worth
that much to read his sisters diary.
So each family member is going to do it for their

reasons and do it in their own way, but I think the
important is that they do it. Because once youve
learned the slate and stylus then you can be a good
role model, you can support your child and theyre
learning it, you can cheer them on, and you can have
fun with it. And you can use it to label everything.
And as we all know, just as with sighted people,

learning to read sighted children learning to read

print by seeing it everywhere, blind children learn to

read braille much better if its placed everywhere
where their fingers are. So get those braille slates out
and braille clear plastic, sticky labels and put them on
everything. Label anything you would have labeled
for your sighted child. You know put refrigerator on
the refrigerator and let your blind child amuse
themselves at big a word that is and how long it is.
And no they wont be able to read it, young children
cant read print either right away, but the fact its there,
makes them curious, they will eventually learn that all
those funny little dots actually have a meaning.
Your Fisher Price letters now, many of them have the

braille right on the letter block itself, and once you
learn the slate and stylus, you can quickly put in a
piece of dimal tape and cut out letters and stick them
on your toy, keyboards and other things. So again the
slate and stylus lets you very quickly, with a very
portable thing be able to braille labels anywhere,
anytime, anyplace and stick them on. So if youre
traveling in the car and you buy some little toy that
would be handy if you had a label to stick on it, while
the kid was traveling with you, youve got your slate
and stylus to do it.
Now another reason its fun to have the family

members have slate and styluses and learn to use
them is that you can supervise your child while they

learn to scribble and learn the basics of slate and

stylus too. Just as youd hand your sighted child a
pencil and let them scribble on a page, having a slate
and stylus and letting a blind child kind of scribble
with the braille dots is fun, they like to make little dot
patterns and feel them. You can teach them how to
do the wave you know the top right and the next cell
is middle right, and the next cell is bottom right, and
then you go, bottom left, middle left, and so youll
have a wave going up and down. You can get them
to do kinds of things and then just let them free hand
it and have fun with it too.
And of course because its a sharp stylus, you will

want to supervise your most little ones, but the fact
that youre using it, youre role modeling it, youre
doing it with a smile, thats important, they will come
up and think its fun and interesting and want to know
what youre doing too. So families play a big role in
that.
So I think were pretty much done with the

presentation, but Im sure that weve said and done a
lot of things that probably raise questions, so Ill turn it
over to Nafisa first to see if she has anything to add,
and maybe well just open it up for questions.

Nafisa Keels
Yes, I did notice a couple of questions caught my eye,
and I wanted to just give my perspective on my
travels. Two times people have asked is it best to
start with the slate and stylus and then go to the
braillewriter, and I would have to say that in my travels
to other countries, that is the practice. I have visited
schools in China and Russia and they both start with
the slate and stylus first and make sure that students
master that before they have earned the privilege to
use a braillewriter.
And Ive noticed that the students were very adept at

using the slate and stylus, they never questioned the
practice, they enjoyed it, and they had a slate and
stylus with them wherever they went and partly this
was due because a lot of these places have
residential schools and children go home, and if they
go home, they wouldnt have a braillewriter handy but
they can always bring their slate and stylus to do
homework or for practical purposes.
So in my feeling, I think its a wonderful practice, if

youre able to do it and as a teacher in public schools,
I wished and prayed that I had children come to
school who had been introduced to the slate and
stylus in a positive way by their family, because
unfortunately by the time I may have met up with the
student in itinerant setting, they may have already

received some negative feelings about the slate and

stylus, or just hadnt been introduced to it until I came
along and it makes it a little bit harder.
So I had to be creative in ways of introducing, and I

would have to kind of sneak it in, maybe do some
notes on the side and let the student wonder what I
was doing and then eventually they became curious
and wanted to do something that I was doing. So that
was usually how I would introduce the slate to
students who were reluctant. And of course for those
who are sighted, we do have a course, Introduction to
Braille that provides some instruction on using the
slate and stylus and gives you an opportunity to show
your mastery. So if you are interested in building your
skills as a sighted person because you need to
introduce those skills to someone else, I highly
recommend taking that course.
Doug Anzlovar
Thank you Nafisa and Sue. I will open up the floor for
questions here for either Nafisa or Sue.
Susan Fisher
Hi this is Susan Fisher, thanks Nafisa and Sue. I just
wanted to mention the fact that with the Braille
Literacy Series, you begin writing braille in Braille
Literacy Three, and the very first lesson is a lesson
with the slate and stylus, that is followed by the

braillewriter. So from the very beginning, were

encouraging the slate and stylus and we introduce it
before we introduce the braillewriter, because we
think its such an important tool.
Sue Melrose
Yes, I agree with Susan Fisher and I think what we
need to keep in mind is that like sighted people find
pens and pencils handy, the slate and stylus is equally
handy for the blind. And so its just a tool that we
should just automatically teach, unless there is some
reason not to, because it does allow for such
flexibility, portability and anywhere, anytime use.
Kelly Superja
Hi, this is Kelly Superja; I have a couple of questions
regarding slates and styluses. First of all I was
looking on APHs website just now, and I saw that
they had some slates and styluses with one having
what they called pins up and then the other pins
down. And Im just wondering what that means. And
as well with my slate, which is a six line slate, there is
a couple of big holes in the sort of the top right on
the first two it looks like its almost of the width of the
first two lines, and I was wondering if you know what
those would be for?

Sue Melrose
Yes, those are both good questions. Pins up and pins
down, the four pins that hold the paper in place, the
pins up are the ones that are more traditional, thats
where you put the paper in and then the pins come up
through the paper. Pins down where the pins are on
the top part of the slate, and when you close the slate
the pins push down through the page, thats designed
so that you can open your slate then and the paper
will stay on the top of the slate, and you can read it
without taking it away from the pins. Some people
find that real handy and some people find it a little
awkward, but thats the purpose. It was so that you
could keep your paper in the slate, in position, open it
up and read it.
The slots on your slate are probably for dimal tape.

You put the dimal tape through the slots at each end
of the lines, and that makes the dimal tape precisely
positioned to be written on, so that you can write on
the dimal tape, pull it out through those slots again
and cut off your label. So theyre dimal tap slots, I
would suspect is what youre seeing there.
Susan Fisher
Its Susan Fisher. I was ordering some slates from
the American Printing House for the Blind, and I
contacted their customer service representative and
he and I had a nice discussion about pins up and pins

down. And I asked him do people typically order one

or the other. And he said by far the pins up like Sue
mentioned. And he honestly said that they very rarely
get calls for the pins down.
Walter Grims
My name is Walter Grims; I am a P&R technician. I
use a slate and stylus every day, and I used to have
years ago a reversible stylus where you could
unscrew the point off of the stylus and store it in the
handle so that when like myself, I would carry it in my
pocket, I wouldnt get stuck with the point of the
stylus. Thats my first question, I was wondering if
you knew if they were still available and where.
Secondly, I like the plastic slate and I do use I have

a metal one right now, but the plastics are pretty nice
now, and the thing is Ive been having some problems
with paper lately, where my stylus, I just got a new
slate and stylus tends to stick in the paper, the paper
sort of feels like as though its gummy rather than I
used to be able to write fast with you know previous
paper. And Ive been using mainly index cards to
carry 3 by 5 or 4 by 6, mainly 4 by 6 cards to write
information down, and I found it to be sticky and then
it tends to have a make a mistake. I mean in taking
my dictation like for a customers name, phone
number, address and such.

And then I tried to write those as legibly as possible

so that I dont have mistakes to misspell anything, and
I wondered what kind of paper and where to get this
paper, what would you best recommend for the best
quality of braille that I can possibly get.
Sue Melrose
Again, you can buy paper at places like American
Printing House for the Blind and the Independent
Living and RNIB and CNIB. I find though that if I just
go to my office supply place and ask for either 60
weight or 100 weight paper, 60 weight is pretty good
for just about anything youd want to do. 100 weight
is very heavy, its the traditional braille paper and its
harder to write on but it does last longer.
I see what youre saying about the paper, there are so

many kinds of paper now, and there is recycled paper
and theres other things that are starting to get in the
way of good quality paper for brailing but again I find
that office supply places usually is my best source.
Walter Grims
I also wondered what, if you recommend like carrying
a six-line slate or an eight-line slate, say 19 cell and
what you find to be the most convenient. Right now,
Ive got a six-line 19 cell and I think its pretty fair
when Ive got pins up on them, on the slate. Oh and
you didnt cover the stylus if you knew where you

could get the reversible styluses were still available,

and you know where they might be purchased if they
arent available yet.
Sue Melrose
The last time I bought one, I got it from APH, but
honestly its been years ago, I dont know. I can
check into that, though, and if I find one Ill add it to
the resource list.
Linda Perry
Hi this is Linda Perry, Im one of the Hadley Braille
teachers, and when I first started at Hadley many
moons ago, one of the instructors gave me a gift
because she had been my instructor for a Hadley
course when I was much younger, she got me the
reversible stylus, and I think that it came from Perkins,
Perkins.org in their product section. I used it for years
and years and years, all the time because I did a lot of
note taking with the stylus back then. The final thing,
the straw that broke the camels back with it was that
the stylus just broke right off, and I dont know if that
happens regularly, but I had put it to great use for
probably almost ten years.
Nafisa Keels
Two people have asked the question about what age
you would recommend the slate and stylus be
introduced to children. And as a teacher in a

residential school, we started as soon as the children

were learning to read and write. So usually age five
or six, and it would be wonderful if, as students
suggested that the family have had a slate and stylus
in the home, and that it had been used so that the
kids would have been familiar with it, but if that hasnt
happened, children can learn as early as five or six,
and as soon as theyre learning to read and write,
they would do just the same as children learning to
use the pencil or pen.
Linda Perry
This is Linda Perry again, and I have to say that I was
raised in the public school started when I was five and
I think the idea back then was that our hands were too
small to hold the styluses, or that our hands would be
damaged holding the styluses all the time, but
thinking back, I wish that I had started out with the
slate and stylus. I begged to learn it when I was in
junior high, because I got tired of carrying the brailler
from class to class and I was embarrassed by the
noise it made.
So if youre a parent of a child out there who is getting

close to school age, it would be a good idea as Nafisa
said to have the slate and stylus around, but it took
my music braille music and piano instructor, who
was also blind when I was in I dont know 7th or 8th
grade to show me the slate for the very first time in

my whole life, and I hope that any parents out there

whose children are young will get them started right
away.
Sue Melrose
Yes, again, at the schools for the blind, they teach
them early. Your hands are not too small, there is a
small stylus, we just didnt have any problems, and I
can tell you that those who learn it early are good with
it. Those who tend to wait until junior high, Linda is an
exception; honestly, they dont want to give it the time,
because they dont want to stop and slow down again.
So your best and best opportunity is when the child is

young and we just learned it right along, we had a
braillewriter and a slate handed to us, and we were
taught here is how you do an h on the braillewriter,
and here is how you do it on the slate, and we
practiced both and had writing contests to build
speed, and just all the things you would normally do.
Doug Anzlovar
Sue and Nafisa, a question has come into the text
chat, sometimes I lose my place and have to take the
paper and count the number of spaces. Is there a
better method doing this?

Caller
I hope you guys dont mind, Im sorry if I come in here
and say what I teach my students, and that is that the
slate the stylus itself can be used like a cane, and if
you touch in the cells lightly, if youre already written in
that cell the stylus will fall down into the holes, if you
havent the cell should feel kind of flat and not you
should be able to move around it easily. And if your
paper has been place in correctly and you made all
the holes to hold it in place, then you should be use
that to figure out where you were. Another thing that I
do also is I open the slate, stick my hand in with the
paper still there and then bring my other hand with the
stylus in it right to the spot where I feel I last wrote.
Those are the two things I have always taught my
students.
Ellen Carpenter
Ellen Carpenter here, Ive got an slate, its a metal
one, unfortunately when I did the pole a while back
earlier, I said yes if I had a slate and stylus with me,
Ive got the slate, but somewhere along the line, I lost
my stylus, so I need to get a hold of another one, but
this is an oldie, but a goodie, as far as they say, I got it
from a teacher at the State School for the Deaf and
Blind here in Montana, and she started teaching me
braille, a few other kids as well with the slate and
stylus.

We knew it already somewhat with the braillewriter,

but I was nine years old at the time, Im aging myself
here, but Ive had this maybe for 55 years, and its got
three parts to it. The first part is where you do your
punching in and all your letters with the slate, I mean
that you want to write, contracted or otherwise, and
then if you want to check it, you flip this over, and
making sure of course I hold it actually, but Im just
showing it.
The middle part, you flip over, you hold the page still
and then this bottom part, where that has the full cells,
you can feel them on the outside, but thats where the
printing of the braille goes and you can check your
four lines, its a four-line slate and check your work to
see how youre doing.
Sue Melrose
For most of us the easiest way is if you just leave the
paper in the slate, open the top part, so its still on the
pins, you can feel with your fingers and you can feel
how many lines have been written on, and then what
you do is you find the bottom line and you take your
fingers and track it across until you feel the last
character, and I just hold my finger there and then
gently close the slate so Im not pinching my finger,
and with my other hand on the other side of the top of
the slate I can pretty much get right to the cell, and
match up my two fingers.

Then once I actually close the slate, then I do what

Linda does, take my stylus and just gently go into the
cell I think is the empty one, and if it is, then I back up
to make sure I find the last cell written in and then
space and keep going.
Now, also if youll notice on your slate, most slates

have a raised dot every five cells between lines one
and two and then another raised dot every five cells
between three and four. So you can kind of keep
track of where you when you quite writing if you
notice okay Im in you know Im past the second
raised dot, so thats 10 cells already, and maybe three
past that, so thats cell 13, Im going to come back to
it.
Also when you get used to it, you can some slates
arent as good as others, but many slates and
styluses you can just leave your stylus in the cell,
open the slate just a little bit, put your stylus in that
cell and slant it so that its resting against the slate,
and then when you come back to it, if you gently
reach for the stylus, it will stay right in that cell. So if
you try to do that, put your stylus in the cell, slant it
and then it will open the slate just slightly and it kind
of tucks in there and stays. So again, we find our
places by feeling the position of the braille while its

still in the slate, matching it once you close the slate,

and then with the tip of your stylus.
Ellen Carpenter
Ellen Carpenter, the summer before I got this slate
that Ive had for so long, I tried working with my
mothers slate and stylus and hers was the kind that
the slate was held diagonally on a board so that it
would get flopped around or anything, but you came
to use it, you put it up at the top of the board, put your
paper in, and then you had this little flange up at the
top that you put over and that had the pins up on it,
and her slate, the slate part itself was for, and then
when you got to the four lines, when you got to the
fourth line and finished it, you moved your slate down
the board, and the board had little, whats the word,
little areas on each side, so many inches apart where
the slate would drop down in again, and then youd go
proceed again.
When I tried writing with her slate that she had and oh
boy, that was something else. She taught herself
braille from someplace, I forget where she said she
got it, American Printing House, I think, because she
wanted to write me braille letters so that I could read
my letters in private when I was a kid at the State
school here.

Linda Carpenter
Im so glad you brought that up Ellen, this is Linda
again. Back in my day they called those desk slates,
it was basically a clipboard, with a clip on the top that
had pins, so it would the paper in place, and the slate
that went with those usually had feet on the bottom so
that the slate could slip right into these holes down
the board.
You can also use a regular pocket slate with that

board if you want to, but it took me five years,
remember I was a late starter to figure out that I didnt
have to open the slate to move it down, that I could
just move it down as I was finished with four lines,
and that was the slate that I used mostly in class,
because I could move to the next four lines faster, and
I believe that APH and Perkins still sell the desk slates
or what they call them nowadays, board slates,
whatever, but they are helpful for some people who
know they have to be in a situation where theyll be
writing on their laps.
Caller
Hello, Im [Anatoli]. I have a four year old daughter
and she has no vision. What I want I try to teach
her braille she tries to see the letters instead of
touching it. So what I do for her?

Linda Carpenter
This is Linda again, Im just wondering if she would
stand some dark glasses, or maybe some kind of
shade, so she wouldnt be able to see the dots or if
you could have her look over at something that she
likes to look at while shes doing the braille those
would be my two suggestions.
Kelly Superja
Kelly Superja again, while you were talking about
different slates, it reminded me of another one I have
there; I think its around here somewhere. Its I
believe a four-line metallic slate, its fairly long, I dont
really know how many cells it has on there, but I
noticed the one thing I was looking at it a while ago,
when I opened it up it didnt have any pins on the
inside, and when I first saw that, I was thinking well
this obviously might be useless. I was just wondering
if you heard of any slates like that you that dont have
any pins on the inside, and if so, how would you use
that if you indeed can?
Sue Melrose
I wonder if that is the slate theyve been talking about
if it has two pegs on the bottom of it it was designed
to go with the board, and the board had holes where
those pegs went in to hold it in place so you dont
need pins. The other reason that might be is there
are slates that transcribers use that are 40 cells long

and they use them to make corrections in

proofreading, when theyre brailing material for other
persons and to do the corrections. And so not having
the pins they might have done the thing on the
braillewriter and so this allows you to just put the
paper in and freehand it.
I actually had my husband, we had been talking about

pins and theyre very important to people who are
new and using the slate for normal purposes, but I do
have one slate where I had my husband cut the pins
off and I do use it for just that purpose if I want to put
something in and I kind of freehand, I actually use it
for kind of drawings things sometimes. I also use it
for making corrections on a larger piece of paper that
might have been done on a braillewriter or is in a
book or whatever. So there are times when you need
a slate to just kind of freehand it, and thats when you
would not want the pins. They are not as common,
but they are out there and they are correction slate.
Doug Anzlovar
This is Doug again, a question that is in the text chat.
How do you teach a left-handed person to write and
track, do you have any tips either one of you for this
question.

Sue Melrose
I would follow the exact same instructions. I tried to
give instructions today that didnt say right or left, you
hold the stylus exactly the same way whether its in
your right hand or your left hand, you would still want
the point in the cell, and you would have either right or
left hand index finger tracking the point of the stylus.
So really there isnt much difference in how you do it
or how you hold it or how you use it, whether its right
or left-handed.
Alice Mazza
Hello, this is Alice Mazza and when I was teaching
braille I certainly was agreeing with your philosophy
about not using the word backwards and all that you
said about the first side, but I also used a little slogan,
what you touch first when youre reading is what you
punch first when youre slating, and that seemed to
help some people. And then for the person whos
concerned about the slate punching a hole in a
pocket, one time someone gave me a lipstick case,
and its what a tube of lipstick would go into and it has
a little snap on it, and many of you may know what Im
speaking, and I was amazed to find that a typical
stylus fits perfectly into that lipstick case, and so Ive
always used those and I actually came to slating
rather late in life, even though I became legally blind
at 16, I did not start slating until around 30 or early
30s.

And in my last about 14 years of teaching sighted

students who were public speaking as a lesson, I
found that besides using my then braille and speak
and having a regular computer in the classroom, I still
used a slate and stylus to take notes while my sighted
students were speaking. At the end of the period
when I would speak individually with these students, I
could take my notes from my slate and make
particular points immediately with the student on an
individual conference about that students speech. So
its certainly even though I learned it much later in life,
it certainly came in very, very handy for me along with
the computer equipment.
Sharee
Hi this is Sharee from North Carolina. Also there are
some slates that we call interpoint slates that do have
reversibility, you can turn your paper over and actually
do the same interpoints to write on either side of the
paper. I havent done too much with that, Ive been a
DI teacher since 1983.
Sue Melrose
Yes, I do have one of those and it works pretty well,
but its not accurate enough that I wouldnt use it for
numbers or something real important, because
occasionally it writes over a dot from the other side
and pushes it down, but they do have them. The

ones I like even better and that have some application

particularly when youre maybe first teaching, and so
you write above the childs work, there are slates that
will have every other line, and then you can turn the
slate over and write on the other side as well. But still
its interpoint in, but its only every other lines, so that
the lines dont interpoint.
Caller
Ive got this one slate that its one of those ones
where you have to write with a hollow stylus. Ive got
one that uses regular dots, and actually another one
that uses the jumbo dot, that has a jumbo dot and the
styluses are reversible for one side is to write the
jumbo dot, and the other side is for the regular dot. I
find it very hard if I want to change the paper, I dont
think its got little pins on it, where I could keep it in
place and when I want to change it, it wont let me
change the paper too well. It will just make it like oh
how would you say it, kind of messed up. Kind of off
line and not even. It would probably either make the
lines get too close together or get them too far apart.
Is there any way I could overcome that?
Sue Melrose
No that really is the purpose of the pins is to keep the
paper going smoothly and evenly down the page as
you write. Im glad you did bring up one thing though,
because we havent mentioned, there are slates for

jumbo dots, more it seems like rather than making a

jumbo dot, what the bigger slates do is they just
space the dots farther apart, and so somebody who
like an older person with neuropathy, or somebody
who has difficulty and needs the larger cells you can
get slates with the larger cells too, and we havent
mentioned that. I dont know I think a childs finger
is small enough that youre better off just sticking with
the normal size, but for an older person, sometimes
they would use braille more often if they had the
larger cells.
Doug Anzlovar
Thank you, Sue, this is Doug again, another question
in our chat window. We have a writer in the group
and they want to know if its possible to write stories
with the slate and stylus I think theyre asking if
prolonged writing is possible or lengthy writing
sessions. What are your suggestions for this
question?
Sue Melrose
Oh absolutely. Once you get beyond, you know once
your muscles are trained and youre used to doing it,
and you get beyond the beginner stage, so that youre
feeling comfortable with it, youre relaxed, youre not
straining your hand while youre trying to think how to
do it. I mean I can tell you, I use the slate, and when I
was in college, I mean I used it for all my classes. I

use it when I go to meetings because its quieter and

quicker, and less intrusive than some other devices,
and I can write for hours using the slate and stylus.
There are children in other countries, many of them

thats all they do have. When I went to Viet Nam, the
slate the stylus the braillewriter was a real luxury, so
kids wrote on the slate and stylus all day long, and I
dont have any problems writing for many hours on
the slate and stylus, but again, its building those
muscles. I wouldnt tell a student to go do that right
away.
As Nafisa said when you first start out you do it with

lightweight paper, you do it with short times, and then
you build your length of time you can use it. If Im
going to use it for a long time, I wouldnt use 100
weight paper either, Id use the 60 weight maximum
and if its something thats just going to be temporary,
Id use even lighter weight paper like copy paper.
Kelly Superja
Hi its Kelly Superja again, if this question has been
announced already, I apologize, but what do you do
as far as improving your speed, do you just practice
more or what, because usually when I write down
something like a phone number, I find it does take me
a while to get the holes punched through like for the
cells that I want.

Linda
I wanted to say something this is Linda again
about what Sue said. I definitely agree and I think
that as far as our other question here, the more that
you practice moving around in the cell without any
extra movements you know some people think they
have to take the stylus all the way out of the cell to
move to another dot in that same cell, but the more
that you learn how to move around comfortably, the
faster that youll get especially if youre using lighter
weight paper.
When I finally got my first slate and I said here it is, I

want to learn how to use this, the first thing my
teacher had me do was to watch the weather and
take notes on it. Its not a very long thing, but you
know thats how you get started. The other thing I
found was the more that I used the slate, the more I
worked out my own ways of punching the dots for
certain letters; it doesnt matter as long as you get the
correct dots punched whether you go up one side and
down the other, whatever. I know like for the letter t
I always punch dots three and two first and then I go
up and over to do dots four and five. But thats the
fastest way for me.
When I was in college, I started writing in spiral

notebooks, I still do that, the pages are lightweight, so

its not going to last forever, but it lasted as long as a

semester for what I needed for and I was able to
move faster and write more quietly.
Susan Fisher
This is Susan Fisher and I teach the braille letters
two, three and four courses and I have more than a
handful of students who actually prefer the slate and
stylus over the braillewriter, and sometimes they
discontinue use with the braillewriter and just use the
slate and stylus exclusively, they say that they feel
they have much more control over what theyre
writing.
Miriam Dixon
This is Miriam Dixon. Ive also know that some banks
offer a combination of a braille slate and signature
guide for checks. Can you comment on where banks
offer this slates.
Sharee
This is Sharee, I have used a check slate from well
what used to be Wachovia, they dont offer that
anymore unfortunately, because Ive used it for years,
since they came out in early 70s. I dont know if any
other banks use those or not though.

Nafisa Keels
On the web page that I mentioned where Judy Dixon
has her slate and stylus collection, there is a photo
and also a link to where a bank used to sell the check
writing slate and the signature guide, but Im not sure
that they are still available.
In reference to the question about improving speed,

the way I developed speed was to write words that
had patterns that were similar, so as I had mentioned
before, I started with just letters, then short words,
and usually rhyming words so that I would develop a
pattern and a muscle memory for words, and I notice
that the more I did that, the more second nature
certain words would come to me and I wouldnt really
have to think about dot placement, it just became
automatic. So that was how I developed a little bit
more speed.
Sue Melrose
Yes, I think speed building, the only way to do it is
what everybody is saying, you do it just by what we
did too is we practiced letters, you know you write four
lines of bs and pretty soon that b becomes just
really stuck in your head and your hand and its
automatic and four lines of cs and four lines of gs
and so that you find to have a certain pattern thats
difficult for you, like the t or p, practice it over and
over and over, until it really is muscle memory.

I mean that sounds strange but your muscles do get

to where you dont even think about it after a while.
Just as those of you who can see you now write with
a pencil, and you dont think about forming your
shapes you just do it, well the same becomes true of
the slate and stylus.
Doug Anzlovar
Thank you Sue, this is Doug again your moderator.
There was one more question in the text chat, we are
drawing to the close of the seminar, and I wondered if
you or Nafisa could offer any advice as to where one
might purchase jumbo slates. The individual in the
chat room has experienced several bad batches of
jumbo slates, and theyre looking for resources if
anyone has resources for this person.
Sue Melrose
Well again the six places that I mentioned, most of
them have jumbo slates, but I dont know which ones
youve had in the past, but you know you have to
maybe just try a different one different sources, APH
and Perkins are the two places I would start with,
because they kind of have the main supplier, and see
how it goes.

Linda Perry:
This is Linda Perry again, you might even want to use
the terminology large cell slates now as Sue was
saying earlier, theyre not really so jumbo anymore,
because the dots arent bigger, but the cells are
bigger. So maybe if you try looking for large cell
slates you might find some other manufacturers.
And for the gentleman who was talking about getting

his stylus stuck, some people believe in this, and I
dont know how true it is, but if you have a stylus
where if you feel it, its really small at the top, but as
you get toward the hand, the stylus gets fatter, some
people actually file that fatness away to make the
stylus thin all the way up and down and it seems to
slip out of the cell holes more easily. I have not
personally done this, but when I was in school there
were several blind students who did that.
Nafisa Keels
I have a jumbo slate, its called the jumbo easy read
from Halpress or Perkins, and its held up very well. It
is metal, and Ive had no problems with this one, just
in case you want to contact that particular resource.
Doug Anzlovar
Thank you Nafisa, this is Doug again. I want to draw
to the conclusion our seminar. I have a few brief

announcements so please stay with us, and I will ask

Nafisa for some closing comments.
So this seminar like all seminars at Hadley is going to

be archived on our website and will be available 24
hours a day to listen to or to download. A resource list
for the seminar will also be posted on the archived
page. This seminar will be archived on Hadleys
website under Past Seminars, you can access this
going to www.hadley.edu.
We also have new podcast notification available.

Information on podcasting is available by going to the
past seminars page on our website. Thank you for
participating in todays seminar. We value your
feedback. Please let us know what you think of this
seminar and if you have other suggestions for future
seminar topics we are most interested. You can email
any suggestions to feedback@hadley.edu, and by
completing the short survey when we conclude today.
Im going to hand the microphone off to Nafisa for
closing comments and then Sue.
Nafisa Keels
Thank you very much; Ive enjoyed sharing my
experience with the slate and stylus. I hope it has
motivated some of you to take our braille courses and
to keep using your slate and improving and practicing
a little every day. We have the Hadley contact

information up here for just another couple of minutes,

but any time you have questions feel free to contact to
our website or Sue or I, and well be happy to help.
Thank you very much for coming.
Sue Melrose
And I too want to thank everybody, its been great, its
been great fun, I did want to add one more thing that
a candle is a very handy thing to have around your
stylus if you can rub the stylus on the wax it might
help your getting the stylus out of the paper more
easily, although I would change the paper, but also it
helps using your eraser with a little bit of wax on it, it
helps the dot to stay down, we havent mentioned that
technique.
Okay, Im done telling you things now. I do really want

to thank everybody for coming, it was great fun, great
discussion, good questions and I hope that it has
motivated you all to use your slate and styluses for
yourselves, with your students, with your children and
to remember that its as important as the pencil for the
sighted. Thank you.
Doug Anzlovar
Thank you Sue and Nafisa. If you are taking this
seminar for credit, today the quiz will be open
approximately 15 minutes after the seminar has aired.
Once passed at 70% or better, the certificate will be

issued electronically only in pdf format right after the

short survey evaluation. The system will provide
access to you within seven days of successful
completion to view, save or reprint the certificate.
Lastly if you have any questions, you can contact

Hadleys help desk at Hadley.edu for technical
problems and student services at Hadley.edu for
general inquiries. Thank you again for participating.

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2012-02-22-Slate and Stylus

The Slate and Stylus:

February 22, 2012

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 1 of 57

Id like to welcome todays guest speakers; they are

Sue Melrose is currently an instructor for both

Please, if you have questions, you are welcome to

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 2 of 57

particular. When you consider the writing instruments

Louie Braille did simplify the system and sized it to the

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 3 of 57

the blind would have developed over time. Im going

For example, I can use lightweight paper, if I just want

I can use clear plastic paper which I hesitate to use

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 4 of 57

CDs, to maybe put braille in a childs book that I want

I also use magnetic strips, and I find these real handy

And Ive even used thin metal strips for my gardening

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 5 of 57

catalog page, and the discussion would go there

So again, what Im pointing out here is that the slate

The other thing a slate and stylus can do that a lot of

Now a couple of disadvantages are obvious, like the

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 6 of 57

And the other one is that its not as easy to erase

So those are some of the advantages and

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 7 of 57

world, and if youre ever curious about the extent, go

The photos that I have here are a sample from her

A favorite among those of us who are prone to

Another handy slate thats useful is the notecard slate.

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 8 of 57

And then one of my favorites as a teacher is the

With the variety of slates, there is also a variety of

And of course for those of us who commit to Braille

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 9 of 57

One is a round almost dowel type, another is a knob

And Im going to be turning it over to Sue, she is

There is also a one-line slate, that I think was

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 10 of 57

There is a slate just for Brailing playing cards, Ive not

So those are kind of some of my favorite slates. Now,

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 11 of 57

going to the Hadley page and clicking on the access

If you want to purchase a variety of slates, the

The Perkins School for the Blind at Perkins.org also

Independent Living Aids also has slates and styluses,

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 12 of 57

Anybody who wants to purchase one, I would say go

But Independent Living Aids I believe does carry this;

MaxiAids like Independent Living Aids is another

Okay, Im going to move on to how the slate and

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 13 of 57

but the slides are mostly pictures, and the information

One way to know whether its a good height for you is

A lot of my students say they try to use while theyre

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 14 of 57

sure that your forearm and your wrist rest comfortably

One common error that students make is they take

I guess before we get to the stylus, well get the paper

So be sure the hinge is on the left, open your slate

2011 The Hadley School for the Blind Page 15 of 57

the slate up so its perfectly straight right along, equal