A six year investigation into tactile graphics offers an opportunity to bring about a principled approach to the design, teaching and use of tactile graphics in school. Frances Aldrich and Yvonne Hindle from the University of Sussex bring us up to date on progress so far.

A swell paper line graph (courtesy of MSU, University of Sussex)	A thermoform diagram of a fly (courtesy of National Centre for Tactile Diagrams)

Tactile graphics (TGs) are raised-line diagrams, charts, graphs, maps and other non-verbal displays, designed to be read by touch rather than vision. But do they pose a problem for blind school children?

"It was like a line of the outside of the brain, and there were sections all in the same kind of line. It was just like a whole pile of lines, but the title said 'The Brain'!"

Or offer a solution?

"We had different lines for the joints [of the human skeleton] and we had circles for the actual bones, and as she was talking I could actually, in my mind, see it actually slotting into place as I was studying the diagram."

These two contrasting accounts came from visually impaired pupils who took part in a focus group study we carried out as part of the Reginald Phillips Research Programme, more of which shortly. The study involved 40 pupils aged between 9 and 19 years. The overall picture to emerge was that children's initial enthusiasm for tactile graphics was progressively eroded as they encountered increasingly complex graphics across their school career. By the time they were older, pupils were frequently 'turned off' by TGs ("If there's a written description, I'll go for that ahead of the diagram."), and some experienced real anxiety when faced with them ("You get anxious and you sort of go all tight because your blood vessels contract ... so your hands get freezing cold and you can't read because you literally can't feel it, so it's a vicious circle.").

We ran a complementary study to document teachers' experiences with TGs, in which 24 specialist teachers participated. Some very positive experiences were described, such as the following:

"We were planning a dream garden. We had a grid ... then added materials with different textures representing items such as trees, ponds and paths. It was successful because the whole concept caught their imagination."

However, the emphasis of the teachers' comments was on the difficulties involved - the labour-intensiveness of TGs; the problem of information overload and clutter; and the challenge of making TGs meaningful to learners (especially those involving scale changes, 3D or unusual viewpoints).

The Reginald Phillips Research Programme

Despite pupils' and teachers' reservations about TGs, their use remains mandatory in public exams - transcribers are allowed to adapt visual graphics to the tactile medium but cannot do away with them entirely. For this reason at least, they remain on the school curriculum. However, we wholeheartedly support those teachers who pay more than just lip service to the use of TGs. While TGs undoubtedly present substantial challenges, they can also offer real breakthroughs in communication and we obtained striking evidence of this in the studies we mentioned above.

Too often, however, learners are simply presented with raised photocopies of printed graphics which may be incomprehensible. The aim of the Reginald Phillips Research Programme is to bring about a more principled approach to the design, teaching and use of tactile graphics in schools. The Programme - a six year investigation by a small team of cognitive psychologists - has just entered its final year. During the first three years we looked at current practices and tactile materials in schools, and the experiences of those using them. In the second half of the Programme we are concerned with the skills and knowledge a learner needs to make effective use of such materials, and better ways these can be learnt.

Findings

We have published a number of papers to disseminate our findings so far. Topics include an introduction to TGs written for teachers in mainstream schools; a discussion of the need for more thoughtful introduction of visual graphics to sighted children; the experiences and thoughts of those who have used TGs at school, both teachers and pupils; and an analysis of the skills and knowledge needed for competent use of TGs.

Throughout, our research has focused on the content of TGs rather than the production method - our concern lies not with the medium but the message! We hope to help bring about a major rethink about the content of tactile graphics. It is food for thought that the most effective tactile graphics may not even resemble their visual counterparts ...

Can you help?

We are keen to gain contacts who can give us a better understanding of the issues from a variety of perspectives. If you have any thoughts, ideas or experiences concerning the issues we are investigating, we would be delighted to hear from you. Please contact us for more information about the Reginald Phillips Research Programme and for copies of the papers we have published, or visit us online at:

http://www.lifesci.sussex.ac.uk/reginald-phillips/index.htm

Since this article was published in Visability our contact details have changed and are now:

email:		F.K.Aldrich@sussex.ac.uk
		Y.A.Hindle@sussex.ac.uk
telephone:		01273 877102 (direct to Reginald Phillips Research Programme)
		01273 877975 (department secretary)
fax:		01273 678058
mail:		Dr. Frances Aldrich / Mrs. Yvonne Hindle
		Reginald Phillips Research Programme
		Department of Psychology
		School of Life Sciences (JMS Building)
		University of Sussex
		Brighton BN1 9QG
		UK

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