Structure Formulae Made Accessible
DORINE: Welcome to my stand Structure Formulae Made Accessible. I'm Dorine in 't Veld, product manager tactile learning and reading at Dedicon in the Netherlands. Structure formulae can be written in a linear notation. But for more complex models this notation gets very hard to read. That is why we wanted drawings for our blind students just as for our sighted students. We developed a book with tactile images to teach them to work with drawings of structure formulae called up 'Op de tast, structuurformules' to read, to learn to read the drawings. It covers all types of structure formulas students need to know for their final school exams and can be used parallel to any teaching method that is used in schools. The drawing method is called skeleton drawings. They are very logical when you know what a structure formulae is and easy to read tactilely. The book starts with the simplest structure formulae and then continues with even more complex ones. In the book we advise to use a construction kit in the concept building phase preferably one with tactile markings. Once you have a good mental representation, you don't want to build every new variation that takes too much time and a drawing will do. This new slide shows a page from Op de tast with more advanced structure formulae. Because of our drawing method, they still do look very simple. Let's take Cyclobutaan drawn as a simple square. You can look up all there is to know in the explanation that comes with the tactile drawings. But you can also go to goedekennis.dedicon.nl and type structuurformules in the search field. This will lead you to an introduction page. It is in Dutch, but a translation app will help you. On the introduction page, you'll find links leading to the pages with structure formulae. Now let's check out Cyclobutaan. I prepared this and now we are on the website. So we go directly to the model. I click on the model, I type a and then I can navigate with arrows. In this case to the left and right. Below the model you'll find a description that can be read by any screen reader. It says carbon one with two bonded hydrogen atoms. Single bond with carbon four, single bond with carbon two. You see that carbon one is connected to carbon four. Which is logical, since as we remember Cyclobutaan is a square. Arrow right, carbon two. Arrow right, carbon three. Arrow right, carbon four. End. If there are more levels to arrow down, that will bring you to the next level. The model does break up the molecules in comprehensible chunks. Every structure formulae that is in Op de tast is also on the website. (keyboard clattering) The models are platform independent and can be inserted into EPUB. We now have a limited number of structure formulae for learning purposes. The next step could be a conversion surface where one can upload any image of a structure formulae and get a navigable model. So it needs further development. It's easy to localise the output. Who would be interested to join? You want to know more, mail me at dorineintveld@dedicon.nl Thank you. (keyboard clattering)