Picture+Book+Goals

Some thoughts on how this all got started and what we might accomplish.
My goal is for children who need electronic access to picture books to be able to read as many different and wonderful books as typical kids get to read. Currently, parents and educators are spending many hours of their own time adapting books for their individual students. There has not been wide-spread sharing of these adapted books because of copyright concerns. With this one-by-one approach, books are created to meet the needs of that one individual student. When they are shared, they usually need to be modified to meet the needs of another student. For example, one teacher might make a book for a student with mild physical and cognitive disabilities. They might make it so that the book pages can be turned by a simple mouse click. Another student with physical disabilities might also have visual disabilities and need the font enlarged.

I wanted to make books that would be useful to a wide range of students - focusing on the kids who are unable to access books in print format. I worked on coming up with a list of features that I wanted picture books to have so that they would be accessible to as many kids as possible. That document is called Universal Design for Learning and Picture Books and is posted here in a form that invites collaboration through the wiki.

After talking with Joe Rickerson at [|AccessibleBookCollection.org], I found a solution to the sharing problem. If we all send our books to him, he is able to distribute them legally to individuals who qualify under the [|Chafee Amendment].

I connected with Darlene and others through the QIAT list and through Joe. Later, Yuichi Tamano joined the effort adding over 100 books in Boardmaker Plus! format. Now we have started to do something for hundreds of kids that hasn’t been done before. The potential of it is very exciting!

IntelliTools Classroom Suite Books Clicker 5 Books [|Boardmaker Plus Books]