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Bookshare Blog Posts

Twelve Holiday Books for All Ages

Thanks to the Collection Development team and Kristina Cohen for their assistance with this post. No matter how old you are, nothing is more delightful than reading a good book or two over the holidays! A wonderful family activity is reading together.  The books become traditions and children want them read year after year. If you are looking for something to read this holiday season, perhaps something different, the books below all look like good reads. Young Children The Best Christmas Pageant Ever by Barbara Robinson: The six horrible Herdmans, the worst children in the history of the world, take…

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What You Can Do During Inclusive Schools Week

This week, December 5 to 9, I recently learned is Inclusive Schools Week sponsored by Stetson & Associates, Inc., and this year marks the 11th anniversary of the event. The purpose of the week, to quote from their website, is “to highlight the progress schools have made in providing a supportive and quality education to students of diverse backgrounds and abilities and to provide an opportunity for educators, students, and families to ensure that schools continue to improve their ability to successfully educate all children.” Apparently, thousands of districts are planning to celebrate this week and participate in “Moving From…

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Boy Scout Manuals on Bookshare!

Credit for this post goes to Bryan Wendell, with the Boy Scouts of America. Here’s the original. For some boys, reading doesn’t come easy. And that makes the Boy Scouts of America a challenging place. The Boy Scout Handbook. Merit Badge pamphlets. BSA training manuals. Daunting prospects for boys with print disabilities. Fortunately, the BSA has some great resources for those Scouts. Starting with Bookshare. This summer, the BSA signed a memorandum of understanding that cements a partnership aimed at improving the Scouting experience for boys and girls with print disabilities. Bookshare’s cool online library (bookshare.org) allows Scouts in your…

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Good News! Bookshare Wins Award!

Good news! District Administration (DA) Magazine has announced its 2011 Readers’ Choice Top 100 Products awards, and Bookshare is one of the winners! After conducting a thorough review of hundreds of submissions and research into the products, the editorial staff picked Bookshare as one of the Top 100. The winners include products for districts of all sizes and technologies for many uses, from information systems to assistive technologies. It is a great honor to be included in such a list! We thank DA for recognizing the benefits Bookshare offers students with disabilities. Nominations require testimonials from school administrators that explain…

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6th Grade Volunteers at Bookshare Surprised!

Three sixth graders from Jordan Middle School in Palo Alto, CA, never thought community service would be so much fun. They volunteered to spend several hours helping organize the collection at Bookshare. However, the students didn’t know very much about Bookshare and what they’d be doing, nor did they realize that they’d also learn how students who can’t read print, (those who are blind or have low vision, a physical disability, or a severe learning disability like dyslexia) can read a digital accessible book. When they arrived, they were introduced to the process Bookshare uses to convert many print textbooks…

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New Update for Read2Go … Now Available

Apple has now approved this release and it is available in the app store. A new version of Read2Go is now available in the iTunes store. This version has support for iOS 5.0 and further enhancements for handling large books. Large books will be broken into smaller segments, but the segments will be invisible to the user. It’s version 1.0.2.0. Thanks for your patience!

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Education Week Editor Posts YouTube Audio

Recently, Education Week special education editor Nirvi Shah recently wrote a thorough article about Bookshare, its accessible books, services for students with print disabilities, and the recent LIT award from OSEP to build tools that will make it easier to read digital accessible books and increase student use of books with training for educators and more information for families. Nirvi interviewed educators about their accessible book programs in Washington, DC, Maryland and New York and talked about students’ familiarity and ease of use with technology readers and digital materials.  In the piece, she likened “synthesized computer voices” to popular TV…

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District of Columbia Public Schools Project Changes Students’ Lives

Picture a room with senior administrators from some of our nation’s largest districts. And then add tears in many eyes. You’re picturing the room at the Council of Great City Schools recent conference in Boston, MA, during the presentation given by Norma Villanueva, Director of Low Incidence Disabilities for the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS). In describing her work with her students with visual impairments and physical disabilities, she told the story of several students whose lives were turned around by assistive technologies and Bookshare. Instead of dropping out, these students have graduated and have a future. Two videos…

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One Machine, 2.6 Million Pages

With over 125,000 books in Bookshare (see post), where have they all come from? During our last maintenance call for our in-office scanner, the technician couldn’t believe that we’d scanned over 2.6 million pages with this four-year-old machine.  We couldn’t believe it either. While more and more publishers are providing us with digital copies of their books to convert, we still do a healthy amount of processing content the old-fashioned way – chopping and scanning a physical book. Visitors to our processing offices are invited to “feed the beast” – under the watchful eyes of our scanning staff – and…

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150,000 Student Members, 125,000 books, and a New OSEP Award

We are excited to announce that Bookshare now serves over 150,000 student members and has over 125,000 books in the collection.  Of these, 80,000 are educational titles that continue to pour into the library from publishers, as well as hundreds of student textbook requests that are fulfilled every month! These are major milestones that we have achieved a year ahead of schedule as part of our 5-year Bookshare for Education (B4E) award from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP). We look forward to continuing our support of students with print disabilities. To this end, Benetech,…

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