K Banks  
Okay, hi, everyone. Welcome and thank you for joining us.

Tonight we're going to be discussing toys for blind child toys and games for blind children. I'm Kimberly banks, second vice president of the PBC. Tonight we're going to have with us, Michelle Marie and Sarah herb, both and oh PVC board members, who they'll both be discussing toys and games for kids ages birth to 11. And we'll also have with us Emily and Richard Gibbs, the owner, the owners of 64 ounce games, and both teachers of blind children.

Unknown Speaker  
Please, if

Unknown Speaker  
you can,

K Banks  
if you can leave your email in a comment. So that we can send you we're putting out a newsletter, with more information about webinars coming up. And just all sorts of good stuff is going to be in that we'd love to be able to share that with you. So if you could leave your email and a comment, that would be great. I also want to encourage everybody to feel free to join the no PVC. When you join the MLB no PVC with a twig membership, each person will receive a copy of either Jaws, ZoomText or jaws fusion for their for their child. And that's a one year license of that program. Um, also just an FYI, I will be giving away five door prizes tonight. So stick around, we have some really good ones. So I guess I'm going to go ahead and turn it over to Sarah and Michelle.

S Erb  
Hello, everybody. Hope you guys are doing well. Thanks so much for joining us tonight. And and we are just excited to share we know the holiday season is upon us. And so lots of us are looking for ideas or family members are asking for ideas of games and toys and things that we can get for our kids for the holidays. So we hope that this evening is inspiring and fun for you guys. And if you have any questions along the way, feel free to just stop and ask us so we can answer them as we go. Or you can leave them in the chat.

Unknown Speaker  
And then at the end of So the way we're going to do this session is the first half will be the breath to 11. And then in about an hour, we'll have a break, do some door prizes, and then finish up with older kids at the end. So we are looking forward to sharing with you. And by the way, I'm Michelle, I live in Colorado and I have a six year old and named Michaela and Sarah, would you like to introduce yourself?

Unknown Speaker  
Sure. My name is Sarah herb. I am a parent of a six year old as well. We just have a family of three at our house. And it's been a fun, fun adventure learning from observing our child who's blind. It's been really, really exciting. And just I love nothing more than just to observe like kids and how they interact with the world and how they play. So thanks for being here with us today.

Unknown Speaker  
Sir, you want to start?

Unknown Speaker  
Yeah, sure. So we just wanted to talk a little bit about like gift giving a little bit later and different ideas for gifts. But also wanted to talk about how maybe a blind child or a child who with a vision impairment or has some sight may play differently with a toy than the traditional child. And that's totally okay. There's a lot of information that our, our children who are blind receive from, you know, dropping a toy or listening to the sounds that it makes or learning how to learning how it works or learning how they can interact with it in many different ways. And there's so much learning that happens by that process of learning how they can use a toy in different ways, like a cup could be a hat, or just all sorts of things. And there's a fun resource that Michelle and I came across when our kids were little. And it's called the loose parts and intelligent play things. And it just kind of talks about, there's a little theory that we're going to a schema, which is like a chart of ways to kind of look for toys and follow your child's interests on different toys or things that would might be fun for them to play with like activities, just basic things that you'd have around your home. So that's something we'll post on the document later with this webinar, recording and that's kind of a fun way to look at What your child is interested in and then facilitate that need that they have, either if it's sensory concerns, or something that they would just really enjoy. Like, some kids might repeatedly throw something. And so you're like, Okay, let's get something that's safe for you to throw, but also that you're enjoying and having a fun time and learning as you go. So that's kind of something to look forward to. And just talking about kind of the theory of play that our kids learn are learning so much when they're playing. I think that what I've heard is when a child is doing like schoolwork, there's, you know, a certain amount of learning that's going on, but when they're engaged and actively playing, they're doing that active learning piece, too. And it's the learning is like exponential that they're getting while they're playing. So it's just kind of fun to be able to be here tonight and to be able to talk a little bit more about these different topics.

M Murray  
Michelle, did you want to talk about maybe sensory type toys first? Sure. And actually it goes, the first thing that came to mind when you were talking about the trajectory and throwing things is my daughter has had a set of beanbags that I got off of Etsy when she was little, I mean, you could certainly make them yourself, but I'm not that much of a seamstress. But I work with the Etsy seller. And so she normally just made them each one with a different color on one side, red, orange, yellow, blue. And then on the back, it was black and white contrast patterns. But I asked her if she would mind making them in different textures as well as each color. And so we had a satin one and a terry cloth and a velvet and a

Unknown Speaker  
crinkly. And then she also put different contents in each beanbag. So it had a different weight and a different sound and a different feel when you threw it. And so we would play a game where my daughter would throw the beanbag, and then she had to remember where she threw it and go search for it. And she'll still play that. I mean, she's six, but we played different variations, just with beanbags that are different textures. And, you know, like I said, there's colors and contrast for kids that have some sight, but it also has, you know, works on orientation and mobility and memory and search pattern and all these other things just by playing with beanbags. And so that has been really fun. Um, another thing I really have found great for my kiddo is just having a sensory table. And

Unknown Speaker  
oh, yes, okay, I

Unknown Speaker  
sorry, I saw the comment about the Etsy seller, I will find that when Sarah toxin and I can certainly share that and add it to the list. Um, and honestly, just across the board, I have found several Etsy sellers that if I reach out to them and say, Hey, you have a really great product, would you mind modifying it slightly, to make it accessible for my kid, more often than not, they have been crazy accommodating and amazing. And so I just encourage you, I've had a wooden puzzle, that they added different textures to every piece inside a little inset and made a puzzle. And I think they even kept it on their website so that other people could use it. I've contacted a seller who had my daughter went to Montessori School in preschool. And so we had little tiny textured print letter tiles made. And then we added the Braille to it so that she could do this informal tracing of the print letter, along with her classmates, but also had the Braille but we did a smaller scale. And we did felt instead of sandpaper, because the sandpaper was really offensive to her fingertips. And so if you see something on Etsy, just reach out to them and say, you know, Hey, would you mind making a modification or working with me, and more often than not, they've been really great about that. So I can definitely give you the beanbag. The beanbag option and the other ones. And pollywog I know is one of the ones that has been really great in working with me over the years and some other sensory things is just having been it can be an Ikea laundry basket or, you know, a plastic bin from Target or whatever and allowing your kid to get inside of it to play with sensory things that kind of controls the mess. So you know, dry beans or pasta or plastic beads and rice. You know, just different cotton balls, you know, different textures and allowing them to whatever their comfort level is, experience that with their whole body and getting, you know the sensory input in putting their toes in there because sometimes, I think kids who are blind are more sensitive to things being on their fingertips and so I'm touching them with their toes first can often be a little bit more palatable. And so you know, shaving cream, both bubbles and soap and water and you know, just any kind of Um, you know, material that you have around your house, and just putting it in a bin and giving them that chance to have kind of a defined space. And, you know, play important scoop. And all of that has been really great. You can also do smaller containers. But especially when my daughter was younger, I have this picture of her when she was maybe two she got inside a storage bin, and with laying sideways and playing with the beans and just like to be in that cozy space, because I think it just gave her a sense of where she fit in the world when she was so tiny. Um, another thing that's really great is weighted blankets. And I've actually been super grateful that they have become a lot more mainstream, you can get them at Target and Walmart, and, you know, kind of any big box store. I even saw a target this last week in their pillow fort, and brand for kids in their bedding section, that they had a weighted lap blanket, and it even had a hole that you could put your hands inside so that you could have weight on your hands or just wait on your lap. And I don't know about you. But if you have kids that are doing online learning now instead of in person, that might be a great sensory input while they're having to sit in a chair a lot longer. And to have a weighted lap blanket, again, you can make it yourself, we used to make them out of hand towels, and we would fold them in half and sew them and then fill them with dried rice. And you can even heat those up in the microwave. And then it gives warm pressure. Or you can just you know, use it and adjust the weight, I do recommend that you research the weight for your child's age and size and their weight. Because a weighted blanket should be adjusted for what their body weight is. So you can't just put a five pound blanket on a, you know, 30 pound kid, there's a scale and so if you just Google weighted blanket, for child size, it'll tell you what weight is appropriate. Um,

Unknown Speaker  
and then also beads, I'm sorry, paint and shaving cream, like I said before, and then doing things in nature getting sticks and rocks and leaves and grass and just giving your kids a chance to play and explore with those things. Because sometimes when you come across them in nature, it can be a little bit startling. So giving them again, a chance to, um, I think someone said it's approximately seven to 10% of your body weight. So for the weighted blankets, um, but with, you know, with nature, like mulch, you know, is a really different texture or the rubberized ground from playgrounds that use sometimes like shredded tires and things like that. And giving your kids a small amount of that in a controlled way where they can explore it and kind of at their own pace, explore those things, instead of just all of a sudden they're walking on Moulton, what in the world are you asking me to do? And giving them opportunities to explore different natural elements is also really helpful. Sarah, do you have anything else you want to add to that?

Unknown Speaker  
Yes, so on the sensory topic. And one thing that's been really fun for us, we did like a little sensory Class A couple of well last year, and we learned about the different sensory inputs. And we did it with an occupational therapist, it was like a class as a social skills class and mixed in with the OT component. And they hadn't ever had a child who was blind being that before. So that was kind of fun to just kind of see how they adapted it and everything. But I learned the value of heavy work. heavy work would be like having your child do maybe carry in the the grocery shopping from the car. And they're, you know, using their cane, they're using their navigation skills, orientation and mobility, and you know, figuring out how to maneuver getting inside. But also, if you have a sensory seeker it's great to have or someone that, you know, our child likes to jump almost all day long. And so it's been nice to be able to have the heavy work component and we've been looking for some toys that are things that are heavy. So some people families will put pack a little backpack for their child if they're like, just constantly moving and need that input. It also helps with proprioception, another type of sensory input. And that's like feeling your joints expand and contract and kind of that jumping or a child that might be really into like pushing on things, maybe pushing on walls or likes to run into things that would be kind of that same type of thing. So finding toys that facilitate the child and honor the child's need for something has been really fun for us.

Unknown Speaker  
And

Unknown Speaker  
so with heavy work components, we learned that so we just got a an Ikea bin with a blue laundry bins, which is like silicone and silicone plastic ish. And it actually, we used it for a bath bin, we still use it for her, she fits into it for a bathroom because we have a tiny tiny shower. So she likes to hop in and leave sometimes fill it with water beads, and just let her go to town and you know, measure mix, pour whatever she wants to do, but she would just keep it in the shower. And then she uses it for a sleigh when she's pretending to be Santa, she uses it for she'll pull up put put a bunch of like our weights or weightlifting stuff in there, like five and 10 pounds and then haul it around, tie it with a like a big belt, tie around her waist and then drag it around the house. And that's all you know, she's getting her sensory input. By just playing and figuring out how you know physics worked and all sorts of things. So different ot toys have been really cool. We've used them as toys, but they're like ot therapy. materials. So they're pretty expensive because usually the the sensory those sensory tools would be you know, at a clinic or something, but you can look for some maybe and buy them secondhand on like Facebook marketplace or your local second hand marketplaces around your area. So that's what we did. And we found quite a few different things that were like a fraction of the cost. And then we can share them with other families near us too. While they are bring them to like our conventions. And when we get together as with our state, or with our group, we just let the kids play on those toys that are all open ended, they figure out how to make them into all sorts of different things. So heavy work has been amazing for us and learning about proprioception and some of those inputs for kids.

Unknown Speaker  
That's awesome. And along those lines, especially when you have kids that are first starting to learn to walk. And using pre canes, you know, sometimes the orientation mobility specialists will make one out of PVC pipe and have rollers on it and all that kind of stuff. My daughter was never a fan of those. So we found the Fisher Price, brilliant basics, doll stroller, and then we also had a different one. But we attached ankle weights that have a velcro strap to that. So again, like Sarah was saying, so that it was heavy work, it wasn't just this light plastic thing that would fly out away from her. As she was learning to navigate around, it had a little bit more substance and I think it was only you know, two, maybe three pounds, it wasn't a ton of weight. And but that also was a really great sensory input for her when she was first learning to walk in, needed something in front of her so she knew what was coming like a curb or a wall or a car or something like that, but also was a little bit easier to convince her to push her baby doll around, instead of having to carry around this PVC pipe or her cane when she wasn't quite coordinated enough to be able to manage her cane and walking and all of those things. And when she was quite tiny, and the next category are actually before we go into that, does anybody have any questions? You can throw them in the chat or unmute yourself before we go on to gross motor?

K Banks  
Oh, we giveaway a door prize.

Unknown Speaker  
Great idea. Let me just finish I'm still going on. Sorry. Oh, nevermind, ignore me.

K Banks  
Okay, random number generator generated the number one so a $25 gift certificate to the NFP independence market is going to go to Anastasia Fong. If you can just send me your well send me a message on Facebook and we'll get that to you.

Unknown Speaker  
That's Kimberly bang. So you need to send it to um, so the next section Congratulations, by the way, that's awesome. And it just briefly in case anyone here doesn't know, the independence market is a shop with the National Federation of the Blind in Baltimore, and they have canes, they have accessible kitchen. Things like measuring cups, they have math games, they have accessible balls like soccer balls, frisbees, volleyballs, things like that, that have bells inside. And you can get playing cards and then they have sleeves and stylists, and all kinds of other you know math games and things for adults as well. So even if you don't want a door prize, feel free to check out the independence market and you can also call the National Federation of the Blind and talk with the people who run the independence market and so it's a great resource and If you ever are in the Baltimore area, I highly recommend, maybe not when we're in a pandemic. But I highly recommend taking the time to stop by and visit the National Center because it's a pretty incredible place. And so for the next category, I have gross motor. And Sara kind of touched on that a little bit with the appropriate receptive and heavy work earlier. And some of the things that have been really great for both of our girls are trampolines and hip hop balls, that gives them that deep pressure and just the ability to move. I know for my daughter, she can't run like her peers, but she still has the energy of her peers. And so jumping has been a great way for her to be able to extend that energy even if she's not running around on the playground. And you can get the little tykes one is usually on sale at this time of year that has the handlebar. And we also got one from Walmart that had, I think it was only three and a half feet across. But it had a netting around the whole thing. So they couldn't fall off. And then there was a bar that she could hold on to if she wanted to. And she started using that when she was not quite a year and a half and use it until she outgrew it and then has moved on to

Unknown Speaker  
larger ones. But she's six

Unknown Speaker  
and still loves to jump in. I don't see that, that a need going away anytime soon. Other things that have been really great are swings. If you have a tree, you can just get a strap swing or you know a little baby buckets swinging and hanging up in your tree in your yard. There's also as an indoor swing that goes into a doorframe, I believe it's called the indoor indoor play things or something like that, I can find that. And I'll add it to the list that will send out as follow up as it goes in a doorframe and you bolt it in place. And then there's different straps that can go on that. And my daughter used that from the time she was a year until she was almost six. And she loved it until she got too big for it and still asks for it all the time. And we also have a dizzy disk. And like Sarah said earlier, finding things on eBay, or you know, Facebook marketplace or let go or all the different resale options that are out there. In the world these days, you can often find this stuff and not have to pay full price. So I highly recommend doing that. And the dizzy disc is a platform that can

Unknown Speaker  
it's a circle,

Unknown Speaker  
and it rotates around but you can also tilt to the incline. So it's either completely flat or slightly tilted and your child has to negotiate how to keep their body balanced and they can spin at different rates, you can lay down on your tummy on your back, you can sit up and and that has been really great for vestibular input of just spinning and doing it slowly or quickly. And there are definitely times where my daughter seeks out that spinning motion. And that has been a great way to make that happen. There's also the below bow which is an open ended, make it whatever you want it to be you can sit inside of it and kind of rock back and forth. And you can stand on it, you can hop off of it, you can put it on your back like a turtle. It's a great open ended play

Unknown Speaker  
option.

Unknown Speaker  
And then there's also for the summer and splash pads that it's like a circle, but it's not deep, where there's water, it just sprays water out of little holes all around it. If you're concerned about your kid, you know, sitting in water or if they don't like that, or whatever, but it's still a great way and I think it has kind of a the water is in the bottom. So it's kind of like stepping on a puddle but it's not going to get you completely wet. And then it sprays out. And then also while I had the heavy work, like Sarah said, with the the laundry basket and hip hop balls where it has the little handle, and you sit on the ball and hop up and down. Or there's the roadie that looks like a horse. And then there's unicorns and dinosaurs and all of those different iterations of it, but where you can sit and bounce up and down, but not necessarily travel across the floor, it's a little bit more stable than the ball where you have to keep yourself a bit more balanced. And those are often sized. So just make sure that you're looking at what size is your child and What size do they need. For the hip hop balls you really want it to be when they're sitting on it and holding handles where their legs are at a 90 degree angle like they're sitting in a chair. If it's too big, it's hard for them to get positioned correctly. And Sarah Do you have any other gross motor experience toys you want to share?

Unknown Speaker  
All sorts really gross motor all day long every day. And so another one that's like the hip hop ball like that's one that maybe some of us would have grown up with those little balls with the handle or some of them have like two little ears or horns that the child can hold on to while they're hopping around. Another version of that is called a roadie. It's a European company and it's a little bit thicker, like a vinyle plastic and you blow it up, you can blow it up kind of however you need it. size for your child. It's like a donkey, they have a couple different colors. And then there's other companies that are making them too that are kind of more aftermarket. This one's a little bit pricier. But that works, I think, well for like ages that are maybe four and under, depending on how how tall your child is. So we got one for our child when she was one and she couldn't stand unassisted. She didn't stand stand unassisted until she was about 22 months. But she we would put a pillow on each side of her because it was a little bit too tall, she was little. And we put a pillow on each side and she would just kind of sway side to side. And she would get that you know, she's getting that input, she's getting a little bit of strength because she has to hold her body up on it and hold her get some core strength. So the roadie was a really fun one. And now she's you know, hopping all around the house, there's the bigger version for ages like five and up, or it's really a weight weight rated. They also have rocker bases you could put on under them. So you could use it kind of like those old vintage rocking horses, the plastic ones with a big squeaky springs, the metal springs. So it has that kind of a component like a rocking horse, that you a different base you can add to it. And the roadie Max, I think goes up to 150 pounds. So our daughter likes to get on the little one and then do what she calls a prairie ride, she learned about black beauty and learned about taking care of horses. So I get on the big one, I'm over 150 pounds, and it's been okay. And it's just been fun to get to like get in there and just really play play hard with your kid. The bill about I second the Bilbo big time, that's been a great one for us. Another one is like a spinning wheel. It's kind of like a dry like a steering wheel for a swing option. And lots of different ways we can you can use a swing, you could use like a hammock, and just hang it from an anchor in your home. And up, you know, solidly placed Of course in the rafters or whatnot. And we've so we use like a woven wrap when she was a baby. And then she obviously grew out of it and was too big for me to carry, but we just attached it into a swing. And that's her favorite attachment on our swing. Currently, we just put it up in the house, it doesn't we don't have a ton of space. But it's been fine. To be able to use that the rocker board are really great, like the bent wood are fantastic. There's some really big ones you can find they're more pricey, but they're incredible. A lot of kids will just sit in their little rocker board, it's like a semi circle, just a little arc, and literally open ended really great play toy. And they could if it's a big, big enough one, they can sit in it and like read and just kind of hang out and get that sensory input while you know doing something else or listening to a book or something. So lots of different ways to do swings and different things like that. So the

Unknown Speaker  
this

Unknown Speaker  
the spinning wheel, there's a couple of them versions of them online. And the one that I saw was the green plastic one, and it's about 30 or 35. I got it secondhand from someone locally, but that has like a ball bearing inside of it. So it connects to your swing and then the child can just they can either you can do it low enough that they can grab on to it hold up their whole body weight and then spin. So just a lots of different ways to play and facilitate that gross motor play. Another one for younger kids. If maybe there you've got a child that's not crawling, or needs some help with the core strength. A great one to use is these are this is more pricey. So if you have someone that's maybe going in on a gift, some families like to go in on a gift for their child for a birthday or something or instead of a bunch of people gifting to their child a bunch of small items, they can just pitch in and get one bigger item for the child. particulars triangle is incredibly amazing. And it's essentially like a like a 10th shape. So it's like an A frame with one inch dowels that are like a ladder. And then you can buy different heights. You can also get someone locally to build one for you. They get a little bit pricier because of the materials cost a little bit more. But the Pickler triangle is really neat because you can set it up at different like levels usually, and the child is learning doing that a lot of a lot of blind children don't crawl and so Getting that input where at least they're getting what I learned when our child was a baby is that it's okay, if they don't crawl, it's pretty normal, because it's a really visual activity and our child is completely blind. But getting any input where they're using opposite hand, opposite foot, so the left foot and the right hand is they're still getting that brain development and that those pathways going in the brain that you would get as if you were crawling. So piccolos triangle is great for that. Or even just letting them crawl up the stairs, we would put out pull out a, the, on our couch in our living room, we pull out the cushions, and then like set up a stairs on the cushions, so that she fell, she wasn't coming, you know, falling down really far. But she was learning how to climb and learning how to, to get someplace and then put a little goal like a little toy that was a squeaky toy, one that made the sound so that would encourage her to, to, you know, move her body in and get it moving and get walking. Another thing that helped with us for some of those, when she was a baby was she didn't know how to sit up on her own. And she wouldn't do it, because she didn't have the visual input, or something to sit up with. So we use one of those Johnny jump ups. And some people swear by like not doing any of those type of things. But it was fantastic for us because it really helped her core strength. And she was sitting up by like five months, even though she was very, really so because she just loved to jump and love to just play. So we just play music, and she would jump to the beats. And it's Yeah, it's been fun, especially fun, following her lead and following kind of her interests and really what gets her excited about things. So even though it's a lot of it feels like sometimes it's a lot of work to be a parent of a blind child, because there's a little bit more, you got to be a little get get in there and work on some of those developmental goals. But it's also been really, really cool to see how if we let our kids take the lead, and then just support them on wherever their interests take them, they are going to cruise and learn self advocacy along the way. So I was going to talk about we haven't talked about music yet. But Michelle, what do you have next on your list?

Unknown Speaker  
I was adding the Etsy stuff to the chat. So if anybody's interested, I added the different shops, and then the things that I have ordered from those different places. Along with what Sarah was saying with a jelly jumper. We also we live parallel lives just so you know, our kids are so similar. It is really great to be able to say, Oh, you too, okay, great. Um, we had the jelly jumper. But we instead of having the one that goes in the doorframe, we had a standalone frame. And my daughter, it has a chest strap that velcros around their testing goes between their legs. And so it forces them to stand up more. And so she learned how to start taking steps and learn how to jump by doing that. And it was great. And we would do the same thing where we would play music and she loved it. And that was really nice to be able to also hold it up and put it away. But um, because it just, you know, there's little screws in the top and you loosen those and fold it flat and you can move it out of the way if you need to. And but that was a really awesome sensory activity for her when she was older to her younger, and also the Pickler triangle. Totally second that my daughter still uses it, we got one, I'll add that to the Etsy, I love Etsy guys. We got the largest one that we could find on an Etsy and she still uses it all the time if she needs to move her body and figure out how to negotiate. And the thing that's been really nice about it is we were running into a lot of hesitation at the school for her to explore playground equipment. And so it became really important for me to for her to have time and space and opportunity to explore her body until learn how to climb and do all those things that when she was at school, it was like, Oh, don't do that. You might fall you might fall. And so at home, we just set it up and she could do whatever she wanted. And sometimes she fell but for the most part she became became a really great climber. And so it has been just great to have those opportunities where you have the freedom to explore in your own way in your own time. And kind of they can test their own limits of what they're comfortable with, without the pressure of other kids running around or adults commenting about what they should or shouldn't be doing. So those have all been really helpful. And the next thing I had was household items for like treasure baskets and things like that. But Sarah I don't know if that you want to take a break for questions or If there was something else that you wanted to go to next,

Unknown Speaker  
yeah, I was thinking maybe we could ask to see what age ranges the kids are. The parents are here, what ages their kids are.

Unknown Speaker  
Hi.

Unknown Speaker  
Hello. Hi. Go ahead. I'm

Unknown Speaker  
sorry. I'm

Unknown Speaker  
Julie, um, my son is 16 months. Awesome.

Unknown Speaker  
So we can kind of choose how we want to use the time for those that are here, and maybe specific things that you guys are working on. And Hi, my name is Meredith and my son is one but adjusted age is probably 10 months.

Unknown Speaker  
Awesome. Thanks for being here.

Unknown Speaker  
Hi, this is Rachel, Australia is seven.

Unknown Speaker  
Can we have another elliana in the chat? Oh, in five and a half developmentally three to four.

Unknown Speaker  
Anybody else?

Unknown Speaker  
I see a 10 year old six year old. Awesome. So it seems like a lot of people that are here now are that younger? 10. And under age, which is awesome. That's what we have experienced with I I look to other people when it comes to teenagers and things like that four and a half year old. Yeah. So it looks like everybody is 10 months to 10 years old at this point.

K Banks  
Go ahead and give them other door prize. Yeah, the random number generator generated the number nine. So Karen, I'm going to get the last name wrong. Karen Pullman's poll pullets. If you could post your email, and in the comments, I'll send you a message. And we can talk about how you can get your $25 independence market gift card. So Karen, um, poster,

Unknown Speaker  
there's a does every,

K Banks  
I guess there's a chat button and you just hit chat. And then you can type whatever you want in there. And

Unknown Speaker  
we'll get that sent out to you.

Unknown Speaker  
And you can send it directly to Kimberly bank, she's listed as the co host.

K Banks  
Yeah. And I'll actually type my email and the I'm in the chat as well. And then you can email me directly if you're more comfortable.

Unknown Speaker  
Okay, awesome.

Unknown Speaker  
It looks like Patricia just joined us, Patricia, would you like to share, if you've got a child in your life, how old you know, now pumped to share.

Unknown Speaker  
And I there's Oh, there's some people that said 12, but developmentally five to six. So, yeah, everybody's in that kind of 10 and under range. And so the next category that I had is household items, and what I called treasure baskets. And this is a Montessori and wry philosophy as far as child development goes, but because our kids don't learn, necessarily, incidentally, from just observing the world around them, while they're sitting in their highchair, or in a classroom or whatever, and giving them opportunity to explore everyday objects

Unknown Speaker  
in a,

Unknown Speaker  
you know, figure it out for yourself kind of way. So since my daughter was little, we would have a treasure basket. And we still have one to this day that she loves and keeps her special things in. But we would do different themes, for example, having a wooden spoon and a rubber spatula and metal bowl and their stainless steel or a glass cup if you're on a rug, and kind of keeping an eye out for him. But just giving your child a chance to explore household objects that we use every day and figuring out how to Tom's work and how to what do I do with the cup and things like that. You can also do things for the bathroom like a washcloth and a bar soap that's even if it's still in the package or you can take it out and you know that has different scents to it or having a toothbrush and a hairbrush and a comb, and just giving them those chances to explore and play with them outside of daily routines where they have a little bit more freedom and can play around with what sound does it make and when I drop it, what is the cat comb sound like versus what is a brush sound like my daughter would drop things over and over and over and over again. And when she was three she was getting in trouble in school for not handling the materials appropriately and her Montessori School. I tried to tell the teachers I think she's trying to figure out what does it sound like when I drop this so that when I drop it, I know how to find it. And, you know, how does it roll away, or does it just fall flat at my feet and stay there. And so she was really experimenting with that, and still does sometimes, and but just giving your child the freedom to be able to explore materials. And you can come up with a zillion different, you know, categories, nature items. And dressing like having socks and shoes and shirts that they can, again, just play with and figure out where the tags are in that there's a button and as a Bernina, snap, and all of that kind of stuff. So that is another option. Um, and then oh, this kind of goes along with the household items, but something that we loved and still use to this day. And I included it, I think in the chat, I'm from Etsy, and you can now get them on Amazon, too, it was a wooden knife. So it's a square, I can get my hands, right, it's a square knife, and it has a little bit of a curve on the top where your hand goes. And then it's indented, where you would pinch it with your fingers. And you can cut cheese, apples, celery, carrots would be a little bit harder. And bananas, anything like that, and my daughter could chop her own food, however she wanted, and there was no danger of her cutting her finger. And she might pinch it a little bit, but she wasn't gonna cut herself. And then let us knives or there's some kid I think it's curious chef makes them and there's again, there's some other ones on Amazon that are made of nylon or plastic and they're like lettuce knives where you can you know, kind of head of lettuce with it, but you can also use it for cutting lots of different things and there's far less chance of your child cutting their finger with a knife. And but you know, they can still engage in helping prepare food and things like that. And know Sarah is awesome with involving her daughter and cooking at home. So she might have some other ideas for things like that as well.

Unknown Speaker  
And not as awesome as I as often as I'd like to be with cooking with her. But um, but it's always a fun. Yeah, it's always a good adventure. For household items, we learned that it's better just to use the actual item than to get like a play version or a toy version of something. And mainly just because they're actually usable and so instead of we phased out our play kitchen that I was all excited about when she was little she rarely used it she wanted to be in the kitchen right there doing what we were doing with us handing everything wanted to taste each item as we were you know putting it we would make smoothies every couple of days and she would taste each item as she as we would put it in and then tasted when it was done or tasted after each you know after we added each item that was just fun to see that she just loved loved loved experiencing everything and getting a mind a reference for everything a reference point and just expanding that

Unknown Speaker  
the

Unknown Speaker  
Shen and she has access to most everything she knows how to get to you know the dishes and we've got some dishes that our level so she can access them and then a snack to her that she can get into and a lot of times she gets mad at us when we you know start serving things so she says no, no, it's my turn. But anything that can help increase their independence you know in the around the home. Oh, that

Unknown Speaker  
is anyone else experiencing

Unknown Speaker  
technical issues with it cutting out if you can message in the chat or is it just me?

K Banks  
I think that it's Sarah's computer.

Unknown Speaker  
Okay,

Unknown Speaker  
all right, hold

Unknown Speaker  
tight, everybody.

Unknown Speaker  
We

Unknown Speaker  
will get this sorted out. Well, all the world is on the internet. Now. It's hard to

Unknown Speaker  
hard to keep everybody connected. And while we're waiting for Sarah's video to come back on, does anybody have questions or comments? Good? Put them in the chat or unmute yourself. Can you talk about bicycles?

Unknown Speaker  
Oh, good

Unknown Speaker  
point what ah specifically because I can talk about several different ones. And Oscar was asking about bicycles and if for younger Kids, there's a wooden bike called the wishbone. And you can can it can be a balanced bike or bicycle, there are no pedals. So their feet have to be the momentum on your daughter's 10 Okay, um,

Unknown Speaker  
so we

Unknown Speaker  
that is a great one because you can have it be a two wheeler or a Three Wheeler and they have to self propel so it gives them more input and kind of grounds them a little bit more when they're little. Um, and then I have seen an Oscar I'll have to look I have seen a bike where you can attach it to an adult bike and then it has a an another like a kid sized bike that can attach to the adults bike. So it's almost tandem, but not the same.

K Banks  
It's called trail Gator

Unknown Speaker  
trail Gator. Thank

Unknown Speaker  
you.

Unknown Speaker  
Um, yeah,

Unknown Speaker  
we I can put a link for that the trail Gator, there was also I will have to find this. There. When I was in Washington, DC for the NFB national seminar one year Washington seminar when you're, we were standing at a traffic light. And someone came up to us and said, Hey, I have a foundation that provides bikes for blind people. What? tandem bikes, so I can try to figure that one. I'll figure that out and send it in the chat as well. Um,

Unknown Speaker  
are there any other questions?

Unknown Speaker  
striders are great with no pedals and build balance for younger kids. feet to touch the ground. Yeah. And, um, did somebody let Sarah in? I see that she, Oh, she I think somebody must have let her let her in. And Oscar depending on if you have a PT or OT, you might qualify for a tricycle through insurance and Medicaid. Yes, that's another option. Depending on the ability level of your kids there are tricycles for older children. So they have this stability. And there's even some that have straps that go around their feet to keep their feet in place. And there's a handle on the back for kids. So I mean for the adult, so you can help propel them. And the image center in Baltimore. Okay, awesome. And the image center in Baltimore, makes adaptive bikes.

Unknown Speaker  
Um,

Unknown Speaker  
and then

Unknown Speaker  
yeah, so check with your ot or PT to see if you might qualify for the adapted tricycles. And there's also a program I think it's called gogo baby and they modify

Unknown Speaker  
the like the, you know, kid cars that have or battery operated or different materials, they will assess your child and what their needs are and their size and all of that, and they will create adaptive bikes. For example, if you have a child who has limited mobility, but they can put a switch behind their head, and then they can lean their head back and make it go and then when they move their forehead, head forward, it stops. And I believe that's go go baby. I will also look for that link and send it in the chat. Sarah, are

Unknown Speaker  
you back with us?

Unknown Speaker  
I am sorry. Calling in it helped me out. Um, no. This is great about bikes. There's Did you already talk about regular bikes like trailers or attaching a child to with you on your bike?

Unknown Speaker  
We did talk about the gate. What is it called? trailer Gator trail Gator, that a topic. But we didn't talk about this seat that just attaches.

Unknown Speaker  
Okay, that what's the tailgater? I don't know that one. Is it like a just a wheel? An extra wheel. And you know tagalong

K Banks  
it's like a bar and it attaches the children when adults bike.

Unknown Speaker  
Got it.

Unknown Speaker  
There's another version there's most of the bike companies sell one it's like one company calls it a tagalong. Another company calls it a it's like just a wheel. The child has a wheel and a handlebars and their own pedal set of pedals. And it attaches on to the adults bike and so they can help pedal providing they can stay in the seat. Another one if your child isn't to that level yet, probably around age like average size of a seven year old six or seven year olds would be big enough for that type. So essentially turns it like into a tandem size Style Bike would be so the couple different companies make that I know Rei sells one. The bigger companies make one too. So there's that option. There's one that we have is called the whee hoo and it's a trailer a recumbent size style trailer and our child is just getting a little bit big for it. She's about 50 pounds now, and maybe 55. But she's just getting growing out of it a little bit. It's got a seat, handlebars on the side. And then they've got the pedals in front, they have a version without pedals or with pedals. And so you can harness them. And it's a five point harness. And so she could have done that when you know, since she was two, and hopped in there, we used a different setup before that when she was a baby, but it's been great for us because she can pedal along and if I don't pedal, she can help me pedal and get that input too. So that's fantastic. They have one that's the wieku is a either you can do a single or a double. So if you've got multiple kids, you can get one that has two seats, it only allows for one child to pedal. But that's a great one. The other one we had when she was a baby sat in front of us instead of the seat in the back that you connect to the back of you know, above your back wheel that connected on the the bar in front of you. And you just pedal your legs, your knees to the side instead of right in front. It's called a we ride. And that was fantastic. And it's not terribly expensive. You can look for those used as well, that had a five point harness as well. And went up to about eight, maybe weight, probably 30 pounds comfortably.

K Banks  
And for people with older kids, Walmart regularly has tandem bikes on sell for between two and $300. So they're not they're not completely You know, they're they're getting easier to find when my daughter was was little a tandem bike was so expensive. But I have seen them at Walmart for in the two to $300 range, which is which is pretty, pretty good for a tandem.

Unknown Speaker  
I've heard of a couple people that are fully blind using a unicycle with a cane, or using a skateboard. there's a there's a one that's pretty popular and now he uses a skateboard and a couple of them that I've seen on YouTube. And they use their cane just a either a roller ball or not. And they just use it really fantastically. So all options nothing's you know, off the table. A lot of kids learn how to echolocate, and ride a bike just fine. Regular bike, no really adaptive meeting they needed adaptations needed. They're just learning and listening. Some people will put like a little ticker on the someone else's bike so they can hear in front and know when they're stopped or know when they're going. So all different options for bike stuff

Unknown Speaker  
I got her also has a micro scooter. And so she because everybody on the block has one. And so she's learning how to maneuver that and balance and move back and forth. with it. She is not yet street ready, but is happy to try it out at home. And it's a great balance activity for her because she is terrified of bikes but she loves her scooter. And also along those lines, you can get their flat square plastic scooter boards, where you can roll around on the floor and you can put them on your you know, land your belly, land your back, sit up on him, you know, tie a rope and pull your stuffed animals, whatever, there's several different ones, we've gotten them off of Amazon and they're not terribly expensive. You often see him in occupational and physical therapy clinics. And that has been a great option as well for going back to the gross motor stuff, and we're coming up on the hour So does anybody have any last questions before we switch to the older kids and Richard and Emily's presentation any other Final Thoughts Sarah

Unknown Speaker  
will be posting a little bit more information on like games for the younger kids. Like board games type things. I had a topic here too that we didn't quite get to on educational poise, things that we just got for fun to use as toys but have been really fantastic as she's like learning math and numbers and grants and stuff like that. So well we'll put up put that in the list of the items and stuff on the different things. We have that comment about music toys, we could go on and on about music. You can't go wrong with music. What age for the music toys

Unknown Speaker  
I'll just mute myself um she's five and she loves love love music like she we have a drunk for her we have a keyboard for her. We have bongos for so short of like getting more musical instruments like I feel like all the baby all the music, toys and more kids are like babies and they have like lullabies and stuff for them. Just like I'm always looking on Amazon, I just trying to see if there's any other toys on that scene, that kind of music toys, but not necessarily instruments, but that would appeal to a five year old. Okay,

Unknown Speaker  
so one that's been fun for us is a, there's a couple of Bluetooth microphones that are really fun if your child likes sound, and likes to kind of practice with that, we can kind of shut the door when she's using it. But that's been a fun one, a Bluetooth microphone that you just plug in, and then they can kind of walk around with it. And that's been able to for her, it's been able to help her get more comfortable with her voice. He used to be a really soft talker. And that microphone has been a really big help with that. And shaker eggs are fantastic. And you can use them in all sorts of ways. They're just like a maraca. But instead of the handle, it just is an egg that great for all ages, and you can use them you know, later with games and playing games out in your yard. And with music, we've got a bunch of music stuff to a fun dish depending on kind of what the child likes. Most musical instruments need no adaptations. So like a bell sets the bells that you either ring like a handbell, they have ones that you tap that we've had when we since she was little, and they go through the whole octave. And then you can get like the others that the bigger expanded set. There's also the bells that like, like a xylophone type, but a real xylophone. Which is really fun. And no adaptation needed. It's just like the piano, they just learn how to how to use it that way. And I mean, you can't go wrong with a guitar. So yeah, anything that that they just that they're interested in, I think it's good to just follow that.

Unknown Speaker  
We also think we also

Unknown Speaker  
have a ukulele. And that has been really great because it's smaller scale, and you can get them for, you know, 20 or $30 I definitely recommend finding, you know, instruments that are more natural sounds instead of kind of the teeny, you know, baby infant toys sometimes. And then also making your own sound shakers, and putting different materials inside, you know, old film canisters, or old prescription bottles or whatever and making matching sets, and then your child can shake them and try to figure out which ones are sound the same or which ones are different. That's really great. Um, and had another Oh, the other two that we use for music related is an Amazon echo.my daughter is Mastering the Art of how to use those. And then a victor reader stream is a I don't know how to best describe it. But you can do podcasts and music and audiobooks and all kinds of other things on it. And it has relatively simple buttons and can be used through the teenage years and beyond. But that is also a great option. Yeah. Any other questions? Sorry. Go ahead, sir.

Unknown Speaker  
So yeah, so we'll be posting more ideas. So we will love to, you know, send that out when it's ready are posted on our in a PVC page. So you'll hop on that, and then we'll be posting a bunch of different ideas on how to adapt toys to just in a 30 seconds. 30 seconds, no.

Unknown Speaker  
Sasha, um,

Unknown Speaker  
I was gonna ask about the victor reader, because that's my daughter's favorite toy,

Unknown Speaker  
even though it's not really a toy, I

Unknown Speaker  
guess. But she has a victor reader. I think she's had it maybe two or three years. Does anybody know if like, recently we've noticed, like the battery

Unknown Speaker  
doesn't go as long as it used to, Is that normal?

Unknown Speaker  
I heard they last about three or four or five years, and then you have to get a new one with the battery. But maybe, maybe check with the company and see what they say. Okay, I think it's only warrantied for a year, if I remember correctly, but it's our daughter's favorite thing to Okay, um, just so you know, you can also connect it with with audible. And so you can have everything on there. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker  
that's great on the Amazon devices, we have audible and that has been fantastic to have just in the comments. A couple of people said, the hot potato cream is a great option where you sing the song and pass items back and forth until the music stops or pass the potato back and forth until the music stops. And then a sound frog which I think is the wooden one that has kind of a rigid back and then there's a little stick that you rub up and down. Also even Guitar Center has some pretty great international instruments like gourds that have, you know, that shake, or they have the beads on the outside and you can rub your hand back and forth. And it makes a great sound. Sometimes we even just go hang out at Guitar Center and explore the toys, or the instruments, so you don't necessarily have to own them. You can go try them out, and see which ones your kid enjoys. And that's been really fun. They have quite a selection at Guitar Center.

Unknown Speaker  
So Rain, rain sticks are really fun, too.

Unknown Speaker  
Yes, rain sticks are also really fun. Any other questions before we pass the baton? Okay.

K Banks  
Thank you, Sarah. Michelle, are you guys going to be able to stay on for questions a

Unknown Speaker  
little bit later, I

K Banks  
know, Emily and Richard are going to talk a lot about are going to talk about creating accessible toys from toys to buy off the shelf. So we might have some questions for you guys. Again, after after Emily and Richard.

Unknown Speaker  
Here, I can stick around. I'll be on. Okay. I wouldn't miss a presentation from Emily from Emily and Richard.

K Banks  
Awesome. I'm going to go ahead and again, give another door prize. Oh, let me get back to my random number generator.

Unknown Speaker  
It's the numbers 10.

K Banks  
Julie's iPhone, Julie's iPhone, if you could send me a message in the chat with your email. And I'll also post my email. If you'd rather contact me that way, you're going to get a $25 gift card to 64 ounce games, which was generously donated by Emily and Richard Gibbs, who are the owner of 64 ounce games and are about and they're about to speak with us. They're also both teachers of blind students. And they're generally just super awesome people. And

Unknown Speaker  
we're ready to hear from them now.

Unknown Speaker  
Hi,

Unknown Speaker  
I'm Emily Gibbs, and I am a teacher of mine students. I work for the National Federation of the Blind of Texas, where I'm their director of youth and education services. I'm also the president of the Texas Association of parents of blind children, and I'm co owner of six Browns games.

Unknown Speaker  
I'm actually not a teacher of blind students. Although I've talked to many blind students, I'm the life skills teacher who teaches at here or here in Texas. I'm a board game addict and and I've translated a bunch of board games.

Unknown Speaker  
So I'm going to put 60 grand schemes in the chat, basically, um, I joke that it is a self supporting hobby, we have our LLC, but we don't really make a lot of money doing it, we just do it because we think it's really important that everyone, blind people especially have access to board games. And we love board games, and we got frustrated because whenever we wanted to play what we considered fun games, um, you know, not necessarily the ones you hear all the time, not monopoly, not Scrabble, things like apples to apples or Ticket to Ride Settlers of Catan, those kind of games that maybe you don't hear about all the time, they're getting much more popular. But when we started this, you know, they were not at all mainstream, but we wanted to play with play them with our friends, we happen to know a lot of blind people. And we would get frustrated because our blind friends couldn't play these games. And so when we went to Richard actually had decided to design a game. He loves games, and he had created a game of his own. And we wanted to make it accessible for our blind friends. And so we went to a game companies saying, Can you make Braille cards? And it turned out that the manufacturers that make board games, they can't make Braille. And the manufacturers that can make Braille can't make board games. So when we tried to do both, we realized what a big mess it was trying to do that.

Unknown Speaker  
Yeah, it was a complete mess. And then we decided that it'd be more important for us and we ended up burning a Kickstarter. To start the business, it'd be more important for us to kind of bridge that gap and get to the point where blind people if they want to play a game, well, they can they can purchase and the system that we came up with is what we call accessibility kits. The way that works is you go to our website you purchase an accessibility kit and accessibility kit consists of Braille, Braille, transparent Braille stickers. And there's my daughter, um, parents, parent Braille stickers and and sometimes its sleeves. Some of our more complex will have 3d printed items, or laser cut items or anything that's necessary to make that particular game. So the accessible so they'll go to our website, they'll purchase the game, the accessibility kit from us, and we usually give a link to Amazon, although we do sell a couple of games directly. And, um, and they put them to, you put it together, and you end up with an accessible game at the end of the day.

Unknown Speaker  
So, we are working from home tonight, and we have five kids, so you might see more appearances tonight.

Unknown Speaker  
Um,

Unknown Speaker  
I was busy too, I'd

Unknown Speaker  
missed everything you just said,

Unknown Speaker  
I don't know what I just said.

Unknown Speaker  
Oh, so we do have a lot of experience adapting games and making games accessible. So we can talk a little bit about making off the shelf stuff accessible, it's really, some are really easy to do. Some are not the ones that we provide kits for we try to provide kits for ones that are not that they're not commercially available in Braille other places. So we don't do monopoly. We don't do Scrabble, we don't do you know, we don't do, um, you know, just playing cards or chess.

Unknown Speaker  
But let's say we do do, we have a lot over 100 different games. Now, we have settlers of Japan, we have a game called surah, which is a

Unknown Speaker  
grab one of the boards so Sure, well. So we do. So what happens is

E Gibbs  
so for instance, this is a board that we've made per ticket to ride. So it is, um, it's thermoform plastic, and it's clear, so it sits directly over

Unknown Speaker  
the regular board. It has all of the cities in Braille, as all of the, the routes in Braille. And so you would lay this directly over the board, and so you'd be able to play the game. And what's really important for us is so flying people inside of people can play the same games together at the same time,

Unknown Speaker  
right. Um, so Ticket to Ride is a big one. That's a really popular game. Um, we have Exploding Kittens, which is hugely popular. It's kind of like an uno type game, except it's a little bit more. It's like a hot potato uno, we have other we have a lot of strategy games, like dominion, where you build your own, it's kind of like magic and that you have a bunch of different options of cards, but instead you're building your own deck can during the game play, we have pandemic, which is you fight a pandemic, which would be good practice for right now. Another really cool game that we have is called blackice. Let me get that down because it has some 3d printed parts and stuff in it. So for this one year this one, it's just a territory control game. And in the original version, all the pieces are square. Well that's not technically different. There's no way a blind person can play that. The game itself comes with um, it has like Tetris type shapes and stuff. Um, but the game comes with a tray that has like these in depth in it already. So this is an indented trade has little pieces on it, but the pieces can fit. Our 3d printed pieces can fit directly onto the board like that. So one player will play as circles one player will play as X's one player will play as squares and one player, places Pentagon so they're all technically different, but they're kind of linked to gather. So a blind person can play with a sighted person feeling the board and it won't scatter around. And so a lot of our newer, some of our newer kits have, because we just got a new 3d printer, um, have these 3d printed out components too. We also support we make dice for role playing games like Dungeons and Dragons or other, like,

Unknown Speaker  
other role playing games? Yeah.

Unknown Speaker  
Um, we're happy to accept questions too. If you have any questions to ask us, we, um, I had a list, they asked me to talk about some technology too. So I have some list of technology for older kids that is available, especially something like the iPad, which is accessible right off the shelf. So this is, unfortunately, one thing we know well is wonky. As kids get older, their toys get more expensive and sort of their Christmas presents. And I'm sure you're understanding that too. So, um, one thing that's really nice about the iPad, I promised I would show us off, let's see, we can get it so you can see the camera. In settings. There is an accessibility option, I don't think you can see it. But so if you go into accessibility and go to voiceover, you can turn VoiceOver on, and this is right off the shelf. So right off the shelf, you can turn on and actually listen to

Unknown Speaker  
portrait voice

Unknown Speaker  
and voiceover

Unknown Speaker  
turnover, alert, important. OK, button, photos, settings, page, one of two Doc, Chrome mail, Gmail, Google Calendar files doubletap to open.

Unknown Speaker  
So and I actually

Unknown Speaker  
suggestions, settings

Unknown Speaker  
right out of the box talk to you, which is not what voiceover you know, everybody has iPhones, everybody has iPads, and blind kids can use them just like everybody else. And so that's fantastic. Um, some other really great options for technology or for presence as Christmas would be the Braille code jumper from a pH it is a really neat coding system they just developed for blind kids. Again, it's a little on the pricey side, but it teaches kids to code, which is fun and important. The Victor reader stream which they talked about already, it allows kids to listen to audible audiobooks, music. It's great for all ages. And then I also had listed the sensation of Blackboard and the intact sketchpad. And both of these are kind of lower tech ways for kids to draw tactfully. Thank you. Sensational Blackboard is just it's a hard background with almost like a rubber topping. And you can draw on paper with a pen. So it doesn't really need anything high tech, but it makes raised line drawings. The intact sketchpad uses the kind of plastic e paper that is used in the more high tech drawing sketch ability. It's available from a pH, but it makes really clear graphics, and it's a little bit pricier because it needs a stylist and has a magnet system, but it's really a really great way to draw. And finally, APA just released a little 2020 character Braille display called the chameleon Braille display. And it is very pricey, but it's not. It's cheap for a Braille display. But braille displays are very pricey, but it's very good. I've heard fantastic things about it. It connects via Bluetooth. It has some note taking features, some reading features for books, connects to your phone or your iPad. And it comes in fun colors which braille displays don't usually do. It's geared towards kids. Um, thank you. So it's a really, it's a really great kind of entry level Braille display. that's available to

Unknown Speaker  
see them

Unknown Speaker  
any questions?

Unknown Speaker  
Does anybody have any questions for us?

Unknown Speaker  
Um, we can do another

Unknown Speaker  
door prize, or

K Banks  
18 sorry, I've got a countdown farther this time.

Unknown Speaker  
3456 910 one

K Banks  
Sabrina's iPad Sabrina, if You can leave your email down in the done in the chat box. Um, we'll send you a $25 gift card for 64 ounce games.

Unknown Speaker  
So I'm gonna put our email in the chat box, too, I think one thing that's really kind of intimidating,

Unknown Speaker  
what have you put mine, because

Unknown Speaker  
one thing I do that's really intimidating about these kind of games, the kind of games that we adapt is that nobody's ever heard of that. They are a little bit more

Unknown Speaker  
obscure.

Unknown Speaker  
I mean, they're really good games, but they're not quite, some of them are you've probably never heard of. And one thing that we really like to do is when people contact us, we're happy to talk to you about kind of what your kids like, or what you like, and help you pick out a really good, great game for your family.

Unknown Speaker  
Right. And another thing is that on our website, any of the games that we do have on there, I think that just about every one of them have what we call it, you've got your hands on this game, which is a little podcast that you can listen to, and I'll talk about what I like about the game, what's good about the game, and stuff like that. And it also has linked to boardgamegeek, which is the community that has a bunch of dis descriptions of different games that we offer. And, and just the wide world of board games that are out there, that that we're trying to help blind kids, um, be able to access we have the, we have games for every store, we have. We have strategy games, we have luffing games, we have family games,

Unknown Speaker  
we try to carry a wide range, because we want to have games for every level, we have good games for preschoolers through adults. And so if you want to contact us, we will absolutely help you find something that's right for your family. And it doesn't happen to have to be one of our games, you know, if we're happy to recommend other things, if we don't carry something that, you know, that we know about.

Unknown Speaker  
And I don't know where I'm, um,

Unknown Speaker  
so, for the bananagrams, do you just do kits? Or can you put the game kit on the game itself if

Unknown Speaker  
you don't know, Braille? Okay. Um, that we don't really, I don't think we have to do assembly Oh,

Unknown Speaker  
we used to offer assembly, that's what I was asking about. But, um, we now we have a lot of kids.

Unknown Speaker  
Um, but bananagrams in particular, would be fairly easy to assemble with no real knowledge, as it's just the alphabet. So if you printed off the alphabet, you could easily do it and it's in alphabetical order. So we that want to come up with a grid that you can put the pieces in as you're playing, so that when you knock it, or when you're trying to feel that it doesn't move around on you. So the pieces actually will fit in there. But as far as, um, if you're interested in games, we have some games that are particularly good for either no Braille or low Braille. Um, although I think that learning the best one of the best ways to learn Braille is playing games. But the options sero is a great one, because that is gives players a, it's a

Unknown Speaker  
servo is great for tracking you, it has cards that have lines on them. And so the point of the game is to use your piece and follow the line across the board and not fall off the edge of the board. So I really like as a teacher, I really like board games as ways to practice different Braille skills, especially because they really, there's a lot of good skills that you learn with board games like light touch, turn taking. And so we don't you don't need Braille for but it really is a good game, for tracking and for light touch. And plus, it's very fun. And so we actually have used serow in the bell program, and it's worked very well.

Unknown Speaker  
Um, another option that's really good for um, no Braille would be strategy game would be carnism. That is a game where you have little and our version of it's kind of pricey because it's completely 3d printed. It almost pretty much replaces the entire game. But it had you put these pieces together? Right? I don't know where it is. Um,

Unknown Speaker  
another one I would suggest would be, would that we've already shown you blocks.

Unknown Speaker  
Yes, that would be. Let me see. It's okay.

Unknown Speaker  
So will these be listed in the email, we listed some of them, we could definitely make sure that we list other ones.

Unknown Speaker  
But we try not so bad games. So if you go on our website and browse, I will recommend, or I would highly recommend everything that we're selling pretty much because I love games, and I wouldn't have picked them up Braille if I didn't think that they weren't great games. Yeah, um, do

Unknown Speaker  
you have anything else you'd like to talk about?

Unknown Speaker  
Um,

Unknown Speaker  
although,

K Banks  
do you guys have any suggestions for things that parent or parents can maybe just buy off the shelf at Target or send a link to grandma from amazon.com of just something, you know, super readily available that a parent might be able to get, and either easily make accessible, or is something that a parent wouldn't think of as being accessible, it can be games or toys.

Unknown Speaker  
Okay. Um, let's see there, I know that there is a really fantastic version of Twister, that's all tackle. So that's straight out of the box. It comes with there. And also one thing that I have adapted many times is connect for, if you drill holes and half the pieces, you don't have to or so it's already pretty easy to make accessible.

Unknown Speaker  
And, yeah, hot or elmers, glue and hot glue and other tape or are your friends if you're wanting to do that, obviously, we have the kits that you can buy and attach the games to but if you're trying to do something, but for some reason we don't offer, just being able to mark off parts of the thing and add Braille on to important parts are very good. Um, and if you have a Braille writer, I mean, a very common thing is just take cards and put them in the Braille writer and type it up yourself. Um, I know, a lot of my blind gamer friends will do that for games that we don't offer yet. And they then obviously have to have some knowledge of Braille in order to do that. But that is definitely an option just sticking the cards in the Braille writer itself, or using a slate and stylus depending on which you prefer.

Unknown Speaker  
I know a lot of my, I know several of my adult blind friends that are really into card making right now. And so I know a lot of I know, arts and crafts aren't thought to be you're particularly wind friendly, but they can be very tactful, because the different papers have different textures. And so do the different stamps. And so you can get something called a die. A die cut machine or an embossing machine that actually embosses pictures on the paper. And so I have, I think three or four close blind friends who all make cards now because they like messing with the different tackle options that they have. And I always think it's really fascinating because it wouldn't be something that I would think of straight up usually that's very tackler very accessible, but apparently card making this

K Banks  
Sarah um, Michelle, do you have any suggestions for

Unknown Speaker  
off the shelf toys and games that

Unknown Speaker  
people might

Unknown Speaker  
fat big fat brain toys I just noticed started selling things at Target. And this, the few that they have are more geared to the younger crowd like probably four and under ish, except they have some good fidget qualities to them. And they're they had these little silicone things that you squeeze in a pop. They had a spinner Were the pieces would spin up and down, but it was still contained on the post. And they had the dimple, which is a silicone piece that pops in and out back and forth. And they have versions that have Braille numbers on them that you can get from the website. I haven't seen those in target. And I'm Sarah, what is it is it smart, smart travel games,

Unknown Speaker  
smart, smart games,

Unknown Speaker  
more games, also have some great accessible games.

Unknown Speaker  
They're all tactile, and there's some travel like smaller but really, really cute, really well done. I just found out about that company this year. So we might get one for

Unknown Speaker  
next month.

Unknown Speaker  
I've started a little and oh, PBC wish list on Amazon. It's only small, but it'll grow. I think that later this week. And it's a public list. So we can maybe add to it. And people can put different ideas on there, too. So,

K Banks  
um, one thing that I was one of the things that we've used in Bell academies in the past have been these kind of big stepping stones. And we would lay out they're shaped like a turtle shell. And kids could use their canes to find them and kind of jump across from stone stone, they're kind of like, I guess comparable to a balance beam. But instead of a beam, they're like kind of this concave. turtle shell, it's it's actually a turtle shell, I'll post a link in the in the chat. But we've used those with our, with our blankets at Bell, I'm trying to think of other just, we can definitely add to that Amazon list. And get that list to everybody.

Unknown Speaker  
For the younger kids are those learning Braille and you're wanting to use actual, like, actual size of Braille, not jumbo Braille or something. Target also sells the I've got it here. Hold on a sec. It's the I forget the name. It's a rubber wood though little tiles, they have numbers and letters. And then it has a tactile representation with the different leaves for the numbers. So they have one through 10 and set and they're just small tiles like the Roman cube shape, or size. And then the backside of the letters, they've got alphabet and numbers, those are really cute for the younger kids. And then just and then they have the tactile letter that's like a engraved like, set in. So they can feel the actual tactile letter to and use that and learn that as a skill to but it was actually like Braille sized.

K Banks  
But I I pulled up my my Amazon wishlist for my bell program and some of the things that we we had for our kids were Wicky sticks, which everybody everybody knows about Wicky sticks, but there's actually a brand called empresa that's much cheaper. And though in the wiki, I think they're better quality, and then Wicky sticks, um, plastic balancing monster feet, these are really fun. I'll post a link to my to our URL, I'll send my wish list to you guys so that you can add it to yours. I'm clicking play foam Pogo jumper. It's like it's really easy to use. It's like a foam block on the bottom. And it's got a kind of thick rubber band string. And when the kids jump on it squeaks and it's it's pretty fun. Wouldn't Tetris brain teaser puzzles, geo boards. blankets really like geo boards. It's not something you usually like think about right off the bat. But yeah, blankets. My daughter always really liked to boards. Nuts. That's

Unknown Speaker  
all different shapes of them too.

K Banks  
Yeah, and things like um, I like tactile we had a tactile puzzle that was animals and the animals kind of fit together. That one was kind of hard for the kids but um, the older kids seem to really like that one.

Unknown Speaker  
I think Maxi aids sells those and also seedlings has some of those puzzles there wood and then have little like the the Braille dots are metal. Yeah, never really nice texture. Those are really, really well done.

K Banks  
And a lot of stuff from Melissa and Doug.

Unknown Speaker  
That's just what I was gonna say they're sound puzzles.

Unknown Speaker  
They have a lot of stuff. Also, learning resources has a lot that are really fantastic. You could just add Braille to them like all of their little animals that physical plastic animals that you fit together. They have like the alphabet letter. That's capital M On one side and a lowercase on the other side, you could just attach the Brill the learning locks is a really fun one. It has a key with a letter and then

Unknown Speaker  
the

Unknown Speaker  
lock that it you know, coordinates with and so it has all 26 keys. Yeah, it's there's all sorts of companies and we'll add that to the email too. There's just so many products that it's hard to do, you know, to showcase a lot of them, but all sorts of fun ones will add on to that list. So watch for it.

K Banks  
I'm Derrick lock boom, just asked, Can you briefly discuss what the no PVC offers as membership? And do we have a convention? Um, is Carlton available?

Unknown Speaker  
Or I can talk about it.

K Banks  
Carlton, just a minute, see if she unmute herself, she might be away from our computer.

Unknown Speaker  
Okay,

K Banks  
I'll go ahead and answer that. So the no PVC offers as a membership, a community of like minded and of individuals, of parents, teachers and friends of blind children. We have a Facebook group, which all of that is free to join. If you do join us at we call it the twig level, I believe it's I'm not sure of the donation amount,

Unknown Speaker  
I think well, dollars, although I'm sorry, I want another zoom. But it's $12.

K Banks  
Thank you so much. Okay, so at $12 you do receive a, a license to zoom, um, jaws or I forget what the third

Unknown Speaker  
is a fusion,

K Banks  
fusion jaws fusion, you get a one year license to one of those programs for your child. And we do hold a conference every year, we hold a conference at the NFB national convention, it's held in tandem with our Ark, our conference is held in tandem with their convention, they run parallel to each other. And together, our national convention is going to be Stan's COVID, across our fingers that we that we get to meet together again, our national convention will be held mid July in New Orleans. If because of COVID, we can't have a national convention together face to face, we will more than likely have a convention online. That's what we did this year. And if you can, if you can get to New Orleans and make it I will tell you, it's the best thing I ever did for my daughter. We went to our first convention when my daughter was nine, and it opened up a whole new world for us as far as what I thought was possible for her. Um, it was just great to be with thousands, literally thousands and thousands of blind, blind adult mentors and see professionals and people who are really living the life they want. They're not letting their blindness hold them back. So if you can get to a convention, I highly suggest it. nfb does offer first time. First time attendee scholarships. We can post more about the first time attendee scholarships on the Facebook page. I don't have a link for that right now. And I don't think that they've opened up applications for that just

Unknown Speaker  
yet.

K Banks  
So that's what I've got about that. Someone asks, Where will you put Where will we post the gift ideas from the zoom? We're going to send out the gift ideas and an email if you posted your email in the chat. And we'll also send it out in our newsletter, I believe, and we'll we'll put a post on Facebook too.

Unknown Speaker  
Um,

K Banks  
so yeah, a few different ways to get that but it'll be it'll be available to

Unknown Speaker  
to everyone. Okay, do

K Banks  
we have any more questions?

How about we give away one last door prize. This one is the grand prize door prize. It's gonna be a, um, your choice of either Exploding Kittens or bananagrams. Um, with both the accessibility kit and the game. Um, let me get back to my random number generator. I'm sorry, I got to talk in and

Unknown Speaker  
did this already. Sorry, sorry, sorry. Number nine.

K Banks  
Oh, it's components again, Cam I'm gonna draw again. Sorry. Number four. I'm Ethan. Ethan, if you can post your email down in the chat, or send me an email, or send a private message to me, um, either one is fine, we'll get you we'll get your address and get you get your your game sent out. Um, so I guess if nobody Sarah has a few more toy toys to share. If Emily, Emily, in return, do you have anything else you want to share? We kind of got off track there. Sorry, guys.

Unknown Speaker  
Well, that's okay, that was fine. Thank you for having us, we really appreciate it. And we really enjoyed being a part of this.

K Banks  
We really appreciate having you, thank you so much, everything you've shared has been so invaluable. Um, Sarah, you want to share some of the toys?

Unknown Speaker  
Sure. One that was fun. For us there is the you know, like the baby Mozart type toys. There's one that's a cube.

Unknown Speaker  
Um, it's a like, seven inch square, you know, square cube. And each side plays a different instrument. And this was great for when our kid was tiny baby. And that's a giant button. So she can push the button. It plays the whole Symphony like all six instruments at the same time, if you push one of the buttons, and then you can push each button at a different like time, and either you can add it into the symphony or take it away. And that's really, really great for the auditory, you know, sensitivity and, and just discrimination. So lots of play that you can do with music with that she used to sit on it, because it was just the right height for her when she was tiny. And she would love it because she could sit on it, turn it over, and then you sit on it, and it would stop, sit on it again. And it would start it's a really, really cute one. So then later, as she got a little bit older, we let it kind of grow with her. And we added Braille with cuff pain. And so it has the letters of the name of the instrument as well. So she got that brown and put to another one that's ready accessible off the shelf is the symphony, that be toys brand Symphony. It has like it's a puzzle. And it's a really, really well done toy, in that it has like an orchestra, an orchestra stage, well a stage for the instruments to go on their electronic. And that is actually a puzzle as well with like 15 different shapes. It's about the $55 range, and it is sold on

Unknown Speaker  
Amazon.

Unknown Speaker  
And then each one has a totally different shape. And then it has a different shape for each bottom of each instrument. It's super, super cute. And it's been fantastic for years. So it's a puzzle and you can put the the instruments on the stage. And then there's also an orchestra pit. So they can has different settings. So you can say it'll, it has a light up setting which is not accessible, but everything else is and it will light up the different instruments that are accompaniment, the ones that are the the melody instruments, it's really really well done. So that's really great for learning instruments, learning sounds, it's all electronic, but it was also very, very fantastic. The buttons are nice and big, easy for kids to use. They can turn it off into an avant and it plays like 13 different songs. Another one that's really cute for pre for learning, like pre literacy, and letting the kid get accustomed to this like the shape of a brailler and the Braille keys is a murarrie pop piano m i r A Ri pop piano it has six keys just like a brailler but it doesn't have of course the spacebar so it's a little musical piano It has different settings it looks like as I'm pulling it up now fat brain toys has a version with that is also six keys. But I think I like the shape of the other one better because it's more like a brailler it has the same shape as with Perkins Brailler keys does. So that doesn't require any finger strength but they can play with it. And it does like different it is like a funny sounds like a goofy you know like crashing sounds for each one. Or it just plays like through music or the other one is like different sound effects. So it has three different settings. What we did is we unscrewed it has little stars that pop in and out the It looks like the fat brain version is called. It has balls instead of stars. The other ones are like a 3d star. And I actually unscrewed the little case that it comes with. So it's like those little games that you might you may have played with, like the little rings that you pop around on the little handheld item for those that are sighted, but it has a little cover, and it pops them like a pipe organ, it pops the little items up and down, but so that it would be accessible to her, I just took off the case completely. And so she could play with it, and they would pop around the room, and she'd have to go find where they went. So that's a really, really cute one, especially because it has six keys just like a brailler.

Unknown Speaker  
So tons and tons of tons that's ready to go off the shelf that are super, super fun learning resources. leapfrog has a lot of great ones we did for Braille learning, we could go on and on about like Braille games and Braille stuff for little kids. But we really, really like the LeapFrog brand. And any of those that have like the apple letters that they do an audio feedback. As soon as you press the key, we just added Braille onto the the keys, we have one that says Scout, so it's a leap frog brand. And that has the little scout you know character that says press the letter A, and she had to find the Braille letter A and then press it and it would say you did it and you know, cheers for her and stuff. So that was really self guided with Braille. And she called it her her Braille computer when she was little. So we could go on and on. But I want to make sure that we're making good use of everyone's time too. So

Unknown Speaker  
plantoys makes a lot of great ones. I'm sorry, a lot of companies are just really, really fantastic. I'll go ahead.

K Banks  
And just a second, I just wanted to ask Ethan one more time to send me his email address so that we can get him this prize.

Unknown Speaker  
I got it.

K Banks  
You got it. Michelle, thank you.

Unknown Speaker  
Go ahead, Sara.

Unknown Speaker  
So plantoys, a lot of the companies that make wooden toys are actually really, really fantastic. Like those disorders. Either the shapes orders, or the ones with multiple posts, and then you can get different, different rings for them. So it's like the ring stackers were fantastic. That's a Melissa and Doug had one that has like five different shapes. They have like one circle, two rectangles, three triangles, and then they just kind of go back and forth. And it's just that tactile discrimination, you could always add browse the site or texture so that they all match if you wanted to. But some of those Yeah, those musical toys have been really, really, really fantastic pop, it is a no brainer, but it's ready to go. And it's all you know actions based and you can get one of the benefits that there's a lot of different pop up versions. Now one of them does just you can change the settings, so it just does the sound effects instead of giving the instruction. So that's kind of a neat one. They have many buffets as well, so little travel size version. at Target, they have a toy that's called a puppet. And it's looks like they're now selling one, the puppet one is around one. So if you're ever I used to live in New Jersey for a few years, and we played the sugar packets game at diners. And anyway, so it's the puppet version of that and you have to like pop the different silicone dots, they now have one with silicone letters. It's not Braille, but it's a grid instead. But you could use that for different learning things. I think that's a, I think it's a it's the letters and the numbers in there. So you could use that as well for something for learning later or for math. Similarly to like how you do a 10 a 100 board with a couple of companies that make some really, really good educational toys or tools. And we use this every week with school, especially doing school from home learning resources has what's called 100 number board. It's a 10 by 10 grid. It's plastic and we use it every like every time we play a game. We pull it out and makes up a different game to use with it but has little tiles that are not drilled, so you'd have to either drill them or you could use it not drilled and just have fun with it with your child like using small items, whether they like putting coins in and filling the whole thing, because it's an actual tactile grid, the front has numbers one through 10, one through 100. And then the back has a grid as well, but it doesn't have any numbers on it, it's yellow, and then they sell it. So that you can, it has all the tiles as well, one to 100. So you could borrow them later with just the simple Braille sticky label sheets. And if you have a child that picks off the labels, you'd want to use a little bit of superglue so that they adhere really well and come off. So we use different like, like bingo little tokens, and we'll play a game called guess my number. So she does this at school with her teacher with a whole class, the teacher guesses a number between, you know, a range of 10. And she puts one token in one of them that we've had we have you build the number inside of and then she puts the the teacher says I've got a number between you know, 11 and 20. And then she puts the token in each and then each child on her resume class guesses a number and then she has to narrow it down. It's Nope, it's not it's not 11. it's larger than 11. So she's using her you know, deduction, deductive reasoning skills as well. So that hundreds board is really really great for the younger kids to play different numbers game with or learning their their math. Another one is 10 trains. So if you do from kindergarten up, preschool on up, they'll use sighted kids would use a 10 frame, which is a grid, it's like a two, two rows and five columns. Well, there's a tactile version you can buy. And they're called 10 trains. And they cook together so you can group different, you know, groups of 10. And I think it's a package. If you buy a package of them, you can get unifix cubes to go in there. It's a unifix brand. unifix cubes are fantastic. There's different versions of those as well, like. So that's a really great one for counting and stuff. Also, like pom poms, just anything that's a different texture that they can play with. is great. But a lot of those companies that do learning, learning and educational games have a lot that are actually pretty.

Unknown Speaker  
Sara, do you want to talk about the dominoes game that you guys created? Oh,

Unknown Speaker  
I'm so excited about that. So we are especially director at my child's school gave, they use games to do math. And they use the 10 trains a lot. They use some a lot of different tactile methods to do their math all the kids do not just her because she's blind, but they used.so her she adapted as a mini set of dominoes. So instead of her searching around on the domino to count each side of the numbers, it's a mini set from Dollar Tree. So they're only $1 and you she added puff paint dots to them. And so she can feel just like you would drill under her one finger and she can hold it, you know, one little Domino tile, she couldn't hold it, one finger on one side one finger on the other side and read it just like she would Braille and say instead of searching around and like scrubbing the top for it, she would just touch it and say with one finger and say that's four, four and six and four is six is 10 and so that's a really been a really really fun thing for her and they're so inexpensive and pretty simple cafe does take like two a day to two days to dry so give it a little dry time but that's a super easy one. But he got a sock in as well

Unknown Speaker  
apparently worn 150 thousand but not all

Unknown Speaker  
on our on our list so little stocking stuffers. Okay, where

Unknown Speaker  
is a little more?

Unknown Speaker  
A little less expensive? What or I would we've got what a couple five or so minutes and tell me to wrap up Kimberly, is it okay to ask maybe what other educational toys have been helpful for families? I know a lot of other families are schooling from home it might be kind of nice to hear.

Unknown Speaker  
Yeah, helpful for them.

Unknown Speaker  
Real quick. I

K Banks  
just wanted to talk about the independence market and some of the things that you can get for your child there as far as gifts for Christmas or, or toys and games that they have. I know they have a tactile, you know, or they do have tactile you know they have a tactile Rubik's Cube. They have a tactile map of the United States. You can get monopoly from the independence market, you can get balls that make all sorts of noises from independence market, Braille labelers watches. It's really great. And I am on mute. Okay, sorry, I thought I was muted for a second. It's a really great resource right now, the catalog is not online, but you can call the NFP independence market or email them. And these wonderful people will will tell you all about the things that they have. You can even get helpful things like measuring spoons, and measuring cups. Just so many awesome accessible items that you can use with your kids.

Unknown Speaker  
Trying to figure out a tactile ruler, that's been our favorite from there. Yeah, so a full page slate and stylus is our favorite. They also add talking thermometer.

Unknown Speaker  
Um,

K Banks  
but hopefully, I know that there is a plan to get the catalog up and running online soon. But for now, if there's something that you need to call the independence market and ask them, and they really are wonderful, and they will spend, they will spend time with you on the phone telling you all about the things that they have. So yeah, Sarah, what was what was your question for our guest? Oh, I

Unknown Speaker  
don't know if we have enough time for it. But maybe if people will post anything on the NPC page, if there's certain things that have been really helpful as far as educational toys. I think that'd be great. Or maybe just post that in the in the chat. Yeah, we know, we can add it to our list.

K Banks  
We have a few more minutes. If anybody has anything that's been, you know, helpful for them that you'd like to share. If not, I'm going to go ahead and let you guys know that we're going to try to host webinars on the third Thursday of each month. Next month, our December webinar will be on December 17 at 7pm. And we're going to be talking about accessible holidays and craft ideas and how to deal with family during the holidays, cuz I know some of us have probably had to explain things to our grandparent or moms and dads and aunts and uncles about our blind kids. And we're going to talk about about how to do that. So I'm really looking, I'm really looking forward to that and hope everybody can join us there. If we don't have any more questions, I'll go ahead and close it up. I just want to thank Sarah Michelle, once more. Thank you so much. And thank you, Emily and Richard. Also, thank

Unknown Speaker  
you.

K Banks  
Thank you so much Emily and Richard and 64 ounce games for donating the gift cards for our raffle for our door prize. And thank you to everybody for joining hope to see you next month, December December 17 7pm.

Unknown Speaker  
Thank you. Thanks, everybody.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai