Iris: Encouraging Self-Learning of Tactiles Among Blind and Visually Impaired Students

oral presentation at Empower 2024

Authors: Rajagopal Nagarajan, Devidatta Ghosh and Ramita Paul

Blind and visually impaired students across India face challenges learning complex
scientific diagrams. While teacher assistance is essential, the high student-teacher ratio makes it difficult
to provide an engaging learning experience at scale. In this pilot study, we introduce IRIS, a novel TV
remote-sized product designed for visually impaired children to explain the tactiles in audio format.
Results show that IRIS helped students learn about scientific processes in regional languages and
provided for a more comprehensive, holistic grasp of the concepts presented in the tactile diagram when
compared to other methods. We propose IRIS as an assistive technology geared to make students self
reliant in learning tactiles with minimum assistance from teachers, thereby reducing their workload.