STEM Resources

This paper demonstrates that, with the use of a 3D printer, it is feasible to make 3D prints from STEM 2D images, creating a tactile learning experience in STEM subjects such as anatomy, histology, biology, astronomy, and geology–subjects that often are inaccessible to blind and visually impaired students. The work discussed by the researcher provides support for more widespread production of image-based, tactile learning objects mirroring the design of virtual learning objects.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This article summarizes research showing that teachers of visually impaired students have insufficient knowledge and expertise in the Nemeth Code of Braille Mathematics to teach their students math skills needed to prepare for a workplace that requires increasingly advanced computational and technological skills. To address this need, the authors describe a free computer-based interactive tutorial that they developed to train sighted teachers in the Nemeth Code.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This article describes the results of a study that implemented three different methods for presenting scientific graphs electronically on computers to the visually impaired: audition, kinesthetics, or a combination of the two. The article concludes that a combination of audio and kinesthetic modalities holds the most promise.
Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: ; Other details:

In this article, Matthew Shifrin, a blind high school senior, explains how he and a sighted friend developed verbal instructions to make LEGO fully accessible to blind builders. For Matthew, building with LEGOS improves spacial awareness and reasoning and helps him better understand the appearance, layout, and construction of structures.
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This article reprints a letter from the mother of a blind student to the NFB following her son’s participation in the NFB science camp, Rocket On! She describes the changes she observed in her son after the program–his increased self-confidence, can-do attitude facing problems, and a newfound sense of self.
Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: ; Other details:

This article describes a software tutorial that can be used by the blind to learn the Nemeth Code of Braille mathematics notation. This software was designed to help blind persons increase their access to fields that rely on knowledge of mathematics.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

Evolving Universe is a unit of study focused on the origins of the universe and is part of the Adapted Curriculum Enhancement program developed by Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning. The materials have been adapted from the Genesis Cosmic Chemistry: Cosmogony module for use by visually impaired students who, throughout the module, will act as scientists as they study tactile models of specific features of the universe [...]
Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: General/basic science, Space science; Other details: Accessible STEM tools, STEM programs

This article discusses the need for tactile graphics, as well as technologies that can be used to produce tactile materials. New technologies such as Rapid Prototyping and equipment that produces tactile images and 3D models are described.
Grade level: Elementary school, Middle/high school; STEM discipline: General/basic science; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

Anatomy in Clay Learning System is a human and animal learning system that teaches skeletal, muscular, and other body systems by building three-dimensional models in clay over skeletal models. The website, which offers workshops and sells products and other materials, describes through video and text the benefits of teaching and learning anatomy and physiology using this tactical, hands-on approach.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This website offers for sale Basic Science Tactile Graphics, which are vacuum-formed raised-line drawings depicting objects, concepts, and relationships covered in most elementary school science textbooks. These tactile graphics, which are labeled in Braille, are intended to supplement and not replace the graphics in a student’s adapted textbook.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This article reprints two newspaper articles about experiences in which the blind are taught they can fully experience the world if they do not put limits on themselves. The first article is about a four day natural history camp for blind and visually impaired eight-to-twelve-year-olds; the second is about a training program where blind adults and children dissect dogfish sharks.
Grade level: Elementary school, Middle/high school; STEM discipline: Biology, Earth science; Other details: STEM programs, STEM stories

This brief article is a 2004 interview by Boston Globe staff of Alicia Verlager, the first blind student to enroll in an MIT graduate program. The interview touches upon her experience in college and graduate school, as well as her creation of a webpage called blindbookworm.org to provide useful materials and links to resources for blind people.
Grade level: College and Career; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

A curation of resources and information that has been shared on the Blindmath listserv over the years.
Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: ; Other details:

This Youtube video by Mark Riccobono provides step-by-step instructions for building a LEGO cat.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This article describes a hands-on program in which multi-age students working in teams design and implement their own inquiry-based investigation in the area of STEM, journaling their work and progress. Because they have chosen the topic of investigation, they are highly motivated and engaged.
Grade level: Elementary school, Middle/high school; STEM discipline: General/basic science; Other details: STEM programs

This article describes a tehcnology which makes it possible for blind and visually impaired students to interact with a virtual object to obtain sensory feedback by using a computer and a haptic force-feedback controller. The results of preliminary research show that computer haptics can provide information through the sense of touch that is comparable to scientific visual information and, as a result, can be a useful tool to teach science.
Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: General/basic science; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

In this article and video, Mark Riccobono provides tips to blind children and their parents for building with LEGOs. To build successfully, it is not necessary to match colors or follow visually-based directions but, instead, to discover patterns, engage in imaginative hands-on exploration, and effectively communicate.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This website offers for sale an analog clock for 6-10 year olds that has Braille and raised large print markings, as well as hands that are easily rotated.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

Through the use of commentary and the live tweets of staff and students, this article provides a firsthand description of the energy and excitement of the STEM learning that took place during the 2011 NFB Youth Slam, a week-long summer program for high school students.

Grade level: Middle/high school; STEM discipline: ; Other details: STEM programs

Everyone’s Universe: A Guide to Accessible Astronomy Places is a state-by-state guide that provides strategies and resources for astronomy educators and astronomy enthusiasts to find accessible astronomy destinations where observing sessions are welcoming and accessible for people of all abilities.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This inspiring article recounts the adventures of Lynn Mattioli, a 1987 NFB scholarship winner and speaker at the 1997 National Convention, over the years that she gathered the academic, professional, and blindness tools needed to become a registered, clinical dietician. The article describes her hard work, accomplishments, the obstacles she encountered, and her strategies for successfully overcoming those obstacles to achieve her goals.
Grade level: College and Career; STEM discipline: ; Other details: STEM stories

This website offers for sale a graphic aid for mathematics for children eight and older. It consists of a cork board mounted with a rubber mat embossed with a 34 x 30 grid of one-half inch squares. Geometric and other figures and graphs can be constructed in arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and calculus by inserting pins at coordinates, connecting rubber bands to make straight lines, and by using flat spring wires between pins to make circles and arcs.
Grade level: ; STEM discipline: ; Other details: Accessible STEM tools

This article describes various hands-on activities that allow blind and visually impaired children from kindergarten to fourth grade to actively explore science, technology, engineering, and math activities. The experiments devised by Marilyn Winograd, a teacher of the visually impaired, and Dr. Lillian Rankel, a science teacher, encourage a multisensory approach to learning to include children at an early age in all aspects of science education.
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This article, reprinted from a September 2001 Council of Schools for the Blind newsletter, discusses a new program that will make it easier for students who are blind or have other disabilities to understand astronomy. With the help of the South Carolina School of the Deaf and the Blind, NASA scientists are working on a pilot project to test and implement a Multisensory Space Science Kit.
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