A grant for Braille learning + Tactile Times newspaper

Good afternoon,

In this edition:

A grant for Braille tuition and resources
Upcoming online meetings
New edition of BrailleCast
Tactile Times: a new newspaper by young braillists, for young braillists
On the forum: Young poets and haptic Braille speakers

Winston Churchill Memorial Trust grant

We're delighted to announce the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust have awarded us a grant to develop remote Braille tuition courses and distribute Braille resources. We'll have more information to share in the coming weeks.

The WCMT Fellowship has makes grants to inspiring individuals who possess the passion and commitment to make a real difference.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Find full details on how to join our Zoom meetings on http://braillists.org/staysafe.

Join online: https://zoom.us/j/227981901
Call in: +44 203 481 5240 and enter meeting ID 227 981 901 when prompted.

N.B. All times are in UK time, which is UTC+1.

Wednesday the 3rd of June, 6 PM: Clever cooking

Join Emma, who teaches cooking professionally to visually impaired young people, to discuss food, cooking and recipes.

This week, we'll be holding an open Q&A to find out what our growing community wants to discuss over the coming weeks - if you've got a recipe you're itching to try, or a piece of equipment you'd like us to talk about, come along and let us know and we'll cover it over the coming weeks.

Friday the 5th of May, 6 PM: Stay Safe, Stay Connected

This Friday, we'll be talking about money management during the pandemic. With one in ten disabled people in the UK being unable to complete a transaction in cash, and many bank branches closed for all but essential appointments, we'll be talking about practical ways of managing your finances during lockdown.

If you have any questions or concerns about anything from Braille bank statements to online banking to access to cash, we'd love to hear from you on Friday as we share strategies that have worked for us over the last few months.

Please note we are unable to offer any financial advice during the session. If you live in the United Kingdom and are worried about your finances, you can contact the Citizens Advice Bureau here or by telephone on 03444 111 444.

Monday the 3rd of June, 7 PM: Braille for beginners

Our Braille for Beginners series will return on Monday the 1st of June. This week, we'll be continuing with contractions.

If you're following along with RNIB fingerprint at home, we'll be starting with volume three this week.

BrailleCast: UEB Online

UEB Online is an insanely popular free online Braille course developed primarily for sighted learners (but accessible with a screen reader) that has helped tens of thousands of people from over 190 countries learn basic and advanced Braille.

Matthew and Dave caught up with the team behind UEB online for the latest episode of BrailleCast, and you can listen to the interview here.

Tactile Times

Ellie, Lexie and Theo, three young Braillists from the UK, have launched Tactile Times, a twice-yearly newsletter by and for young Braille readers.

They've recently released their second edition, offering tips for getting through lockdown as a blind young person, alongside event listings and a recipe for Chocolate Chip cookies.

You can find out more, and read the latest issue, here.

Discussions on the Braillists forum

Over the last week we have been talking about:

Haptic speaker lets visually impaired people read Braille in mid-air
Braille Challenge awards and US blindness consumer conventions go online for the first time.
National contest for young poets accepting entries in Braille
New Braille phonetic system opens doors for classical singers
Tactile Times Quiz deadline extended to end of June The origins of Braillists Foundation

And Finally...

If you have a story you think we should include in the newsletter you can contact us at help@braillists.org.

As always, you can also follow us on twitter [(@braillists)](http:www.twitter.com/braillists) or join our forum for up to the news during the week.

With warm regards,

The Braillists Team