Picture perfect

Published Thursday 20 March 2008 at 12:45

Not so long ago, one of our young blind members won through to the national Braille reading finals, competing against children who were older than she was. Her teacher said that this success was due to Living Paintings’ touch and sound books, which not only encourage Braille reading, but make great use of intonation and description.

Living Paintings produces ‘feely’ versions of popular children’s books, and educational packs for blind and partially-sighted children. All of these feature a spoken commentary to help guide the fingers through the main features of the tactile pictures.

We are extremely fortunate that so many actors and broadcasters, such as Derek Jacobi, Timothy West, Joanna Lumley, Neil Oliver and Angela Wynter generously lend their voices to these productions. This is clearly of benefit to speech and language development in the blind youngsters who so enjoy them. However, we are always searching for new voices (and funds) to meet our young members’ voracious appetite for new publications from our free library.

If any readers of The Stage are interested in helping us with future titles, I would be delighted to hear from them on 01635 299771. More information about Living Paintings can be found on our website www.livingpaintings.org

Liz Davies

Production manager

Living Paintings

Kingsclere Park

Newbury

Berkshire