Ballyland apps for teaching voiceover

Speaker 1 00:08

It's up to you

Speaker 2 00:10

To shine a guiding light and lead the way

Speaker 1 00:18

We have the power to pursue what we believe We'll achieve the dream

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Realization about

Speaker 3 00:30

Hello and thanks for joining me for this week's episode of New Horizons. This week we go back to 2016, an episode where we spoke with Phia Damsma at the roundtable on information access for people with a print disability.

Speaker 3 00:42

That particular roundtable, as I recall, was held in Melbourne and as a reminder, the conference is coming up again this year in May and we hope to be bringing you some content from that conference in the fullness of time.

Speaker 3 00:53

We're going to hear this episode from 2016 and it's about the Ballyland Magic app, which is an app designed to teach children concepts of using voiceover on the iPhone or the iPad. And please recall that some information may be slightly out of date.

Speaker 4 01:13

Yes, thanks Fawn. So I'm the Creative Director of Sonokids Australia and we develop software for children with disabilities and in particular those who are blind or have low vision but not just any software but it's software that helps them to develop technology skills.

Speaker 3 01:33

That's a really interesting thing because one of the things I've always been keen on is technology as anybody who listens to this program knows and I'm particularly keen on accessible technology and making sure that people get an understanding of how accessible technology can help them and of course that starts at a very young age, doesn't it?

Speaker 4 01:52

Well, I think technology is something that nowadays children all learn from a very young age. You see babies with iPads and, you know, whether that's a good development or not, I don't know. But I think it's good to have access to technology and play with it and learn by playing and exploring.

Speaker 4 02:14

And that's what we try to offer.

Speaker 3 02:17

Now, tell me about your experience with young blind children because frequently blind children do grow up with some different ideas to their sighted peers. How have you found that blind children have taken up technology?

Speaker 4 02:30

Well I think the problem is not the children, the problem is if there is a problem it might be the parents or the teachers. I think children are very open and very keen to learn technology and especially because most of them will be in mainstream education and they know that their friends are using technology and it's not right when they feel like they are left out.

Speaker 4 02:54

So and even in the classroom sometimes you know they are told that they can't participate because they can't use the technology. But I feel I'm a very strong advocate for accessibility and access to technology and using technology to get access to information and education.

Speaker 4 03:11

And if you have the proper tools and you learn from a young age and you have accessible learning then you can do anything.

Speaker 3 03:20

Hmm. And I think that's interesting that you say that because nowadays there is no excuse. I mean, we have proliferation of technology, things like iPads and iPhones with voiceover. And of course, Android devices have talk back and both of them have screen magnification.

Speaker 3 03:35

There's really no excuse for blind kids to be left out these days. And I know that you're doing your bit to help. And I heard your presentation at the round table recently on the Bolly Land Magic app.

Speaker 3 03:47

That name really took my fancy. Why don't you tell us about that?

Speaker 4 03:50

Yeah, the Bullyland Magic app, the main reason for starting to develop that was that we felt we were told and we experienced that a lot of teachers and parents are, say, scared or voice -over and because they think it's really hard and very difficult and difficult to learn, they don't teach their children or they don't teach the students to learn voice -over, which obviously if you want to effectively use an iPhone or an iPad or any other iOS device, it's the way to go.

Speaker 4 04:23

You need to know voice -over. So the Bullyland Magic app is an educational but very fun app for iPad that helps young children with vision impairment to learn a number of foundation gestures to navigate voice -over, but also helps people who want to support them to understand more about voice -over and hopefully make it a more magic thing than a scary thing.

Speaker 3 04:52

And Bollie Land has a bit of a history, doesn't it?

Speaker 4 04:55

Yes, yes, Sonokids now has, as we like to say, a whole series of software of Bolliland. And that's really purposely, we use the same characters in all the different educational fund resources. So it started off with the Bolliland Keyboarding software, which is a program that, if you install that on your laptop or your PC or your Mac computer, the keyboard is a safe environment that only produces sounds.

Speaker 4 05:23

So songs and stories and audio and particular keys have specific sounds and the ones that are most important for navigation with a screen reader, such as the enter key and the space bar and escape key and arrow keys, they have the sounds of the Bollilanders, which are the five characters in Bolliland.

Speaker 4 05:44

So if children manage, they just explore the keyboard and if they find the keys that produce the sounds of the Bollilanders, like Bollicopter with his helicopter, he can fly and you hear the chop chop of his propeller and squeaky is a bouncy ball who squeaks.

Speaker 4 06:03

So if you find their signature sounds on the keyboard, you have identified five very important keys to use and build your skills on. So we like to give the children the freedom to learn independently in a way.

Speaker 4 06:18

They need guidance, they love support, but they can explore without somebody constantly telling them, do this, do that, they should be able to explore and learn like other children do in general as well.

Speaker 3 06:32

I think that's a terrific idea and it's really interesting because when I went to school of course we didn't have computers, and when computers came along I was sort of well into my, shall we say middle to later, primary school years, and I had to be taught to use a screen reader by rote and it was okay for my age at the time, but if I was starting before school that really wouldn't work for me.

Speaker 3 06:56

It's much easier isn't it to learn by playing and hearing different sounds and things like that and you pick it up more effectively and it becomes more part of your daily life.

Speaker 4 07:06

Yeah and computing then becomes an enjoyable experience and parents realize that their children can actually use the technology because again often children don't get access to a computer and a keyboard whereas maybe even younger siblings who are sighted do get access to the computer to play on because parents fear that the child might accidentally delete one of their important files or whatever hit on the keyboard and we've never ever experienced the child doing that but with Bolliland it's a safe environment so they even if they press 10 keys at a time it will only produce the sound of the first one that they hit and that they touch and they can explore and the different keys on the keyboard have different categories of sounds if you want to know more about that it's all on the on the website but for instance all the stories are done numeral keys all the numbers so if they like stories and they listen to one story after the other they know all the number keys on the on the keyboard and all the musical instruments are the F1 to F12 keys so if they go all the way to the top of the keyboard and they discover hey there's different instruments and hey another one hey another one then the teacher later can say to them you remember where those instruments were well now I'll explain to you this is F1 this is F2 etc so even though they're too young to learn all the concepts of what the keys are meaning they will know their position they can map the keyboard in their head and they know where to find different keys which will help them on their way to learn proper touch typing we're going to

Speaker 3 08:45

have a demonstration of the Bolly Land Magic App in just a moment, but first of all, why don't you tell me what have parents' views on this being?

Speaker 4 08:53

Oh, it has been really very well received and we got a lot of responses from people. It's been used in schools but also by parents and that was indeed the intention and what's so good about it is that it's inclusive design or design for all or whatever you want to call it, universal design.

Speaker 4 09:13

So it's very attractive visually as well. All the sound, it's about high quality sound and the stories are meaningful if you just listen to them but it is also attractive to their siblings and their friends.

Speaker 4 09:27

So they do want to play along and there are stories of teachers telling us that the child with vision impairment is actually showing off with the program to their classroom, their classmates and telling them about the program and they all want to join in and it's fabulous to finally have them in the position where they can actually be the example and show others what to do.

Speaker 3 09:52

How can people find out more?

Speaker 4 09:54

Well, we have the Bolliland website, www .bolliland, which is B -A -L -L -Y -L -A -N -D .com And it's called Bolliland because it's about the balls, the toys, the round toys.

Speaker 3 10:12

Fia Domschmer, thank you very much for talking to us.

Speaker 4 10:15

Yeah, thank you for the opportunity, Horne.

Speaker 3 10:17

Fear Damsma there from Sonokids Australia. Now as promised, let's have a brief demonstration of the app. I have my iPhone open now and I will double tap on the app and see what happens.

Speaker 1 10:28

Main menu, please take the right left through the menu items with one finger and double tap to open. Scene 1, preparing for the show, buttons.

Speaker 3 10:39

Alright, now, VoiceOver told me to turn VoiceOver off. Now, the aim of this game, as Fia said, is to teach young children how to use VoiceOver. So, I'll triple -click the home button, which basically means press it three times quickly.

Speaker 3 10:51

VoiceOver off! Alright, now, my phone has gone into landscape. Remember, this app is really designed for the iPad. I'm using it on an iPhone, so it's slightly different, but not significantly.

Speaker 1 11:00

scene one preparing for the show introduction and song button see what else is here level one explore the stage finger drag button and that's all introduction and song button

Speaker 3 11:14

Well, I'm sure you'd all like to hear the song, so let's hear it now.

Speaker 2 11:17

Coming straight from Bolliland, the show stars, the Bollilanders.

Speaker 5 11:33

Hello, I'm Bollycopter.

Speaker 2 11:38

Babaloonie is a purple, blowin' up balloon.

Speaker 5 11:42

How do you do? I am Baba Looney.

Speaker 2 11:47

Tinkerball is a pretty pink ball with a little bell on top.

Speaker 5 11:52

I am, I am Tinkerbell.

Speaker 2 11:59

Squeaky is a colorful bouncy ball.

Speaker 5 12:02

G'day, I'm Squeaky.

Speaker 2 12:06

Wheelie is a blue ball on wheels, like a little car, and he likes to go fast.

Speaker 5 12:13

Howdy, I am Wheelie.

Speaker 3 12:19

We might just skip over the sum of this, I think.

Speaker 1 12:27

We're welcome, you know, you decided to go to the Bolliland Magic Show. Oh, oh, the Bolliland Magic, the Bolliland Magic, the Bolliland Magic Show.

Speaker 6 12:46

You can start by touching the screen when I say now, now.

Speaker 3 12:51

OK, we'll touch the screen.

Speaker 2 12:53

Welcome to the theatre of the Bolliland magic show. Everybody is getting a bit excited before the show. The Bollilanders are on the stage.

Speaker 6 13:04

Explore the screen. Finger drag and listen carefully to find out where the Bollylanders are. How many Bollylanders can you find? You have to find and listen to each Bollylander at least two times to get to the next level.

Speaker 6 13:20

You can start when I say now. Now.

Speaker 3 13:24

I wonder if you can guess who that voice is. Alright, so I'm going to drag my finger across the screen and let's see what we get.

Speaker 5 13:31

Here is Bubba Looney. Here is Wheelie.

Speaker 6 13:40

You have finished level one you can go to level two by touching the screen when I say Now.

Speaker 3 13:47

And we'll leave it there, but I think that gives you a good idea of what this app is all about. Remember, it's designed to teach young children how to use voiceover. And things have moved on considerably since that time.

Speaker 3 13:56

There are a number of apps in the App Store now, if you'd like to have a look, including many more for teaching children how to use voiceover, but also moving into teaching children how to code and create apps for themselves.

Speaker 3 14:09

If you'd like to know more, you can look for Ballyland and just see what's available. There's quite a number there. And hopefully, we'll be speaking with Phia again very shortly.