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How to read braille by touch

Reading braille with the fingers is a different skill from recognising it by eye. This is what the research and the teaching literature say about it, and which letters the shapes themselves make easy to confuse.

Two hands are faster than one

In a study of blind readers who read the same kinds of text with the left hand, the right hand and both, “all subjects read faster with the two hands than with the faster hand alone” (Mousty and Bertelson, 1985). The same study found no overall advantage for either hand: which hand was the faster one differed from reader to reader.

Four ways two hands share a line

A model of hand movements set out by Kusajima in 1974 is still in use, according to Paths to Literacy, which describes four patterns for readers who use two hands:

Left hand marks. The right hand reads the line while the left waits at its beginning, then drops to the next line and waits there.
Parallel. Both hands stay together along the line and move down together.
Split. Both hands read together until near the end of the line; the left then drops to the next line while the right finishes.
Scissors. The hands read independently. The left reads the first half of a line and the right takes over in the middle; while the right finishes, the left is already reading the start of the next line.

The same source names the split and scissors patterns as the most efficient.

What a finger does when it is unsure

Teachers watch for scrubbing: the finger moving up and down over one character instead of passing across it from left to right. Paths to Literacy reads it as a sign that the reader is having trouble identifying that character and needs more practice with it. In fluent reading the hands move smoothly across the line.

The letters the shapes make alike

Some confusions are built into the cells. These are computed from the 26 letters themselves.

Mirror images. 4 pairs of letters are each other’s reflection: d ⠙ and f ⠋, e ⠑ and i ⠊, h ⠓ and j ⠚ and r ⠗ and w ⠺.

One dot apart. 51 pairs of letters differ by a single dot, and every letter has at least one such neighbour. f, g, k, l, m, n, o, p and q have 5 each.

For each letter, the letters one dot away
Letter	Cell	One dot away
a	⠁ dot 1	b, c, e, k
b	⠃ dots 1-2	a, f, h, l
c	⠉ dots 1-4	a, d, f, m
d	⠙ dots 1-4-5	c, e, g, n
e	⠑ dots 1-5	a, d, h, o
f	⠋ dots 1-2-4	b, c, g, i, p
g	⠛ dots 1-2-4-5	d, f, h, j, q
h	⠓ dots 1-2-5	b, e, g, r
i	⠊ dots 2-4	f, j, s
j	⠚ dots 2-4-5	g, i, t, w
k	⠅ dots 1-3	a, l, m, o, u
l	⠇ dots 1-2-3	b, k, p, r, v
m	⠍ dots 1-3-4	c, k, n, p, x
n	⠝ dots 1-3-4-5	d, m, o, q, y
o	⠕ dots 1-3-5	e, k, n, r, z
p	⠏ dots 1-2-3-4	f, l, m, q, s
q	⠟ dots 1-2-3-4-5	g, n, p, r, t
r	⠗ dots 1-2-3-5	h, l, o, q
s	⠎ dots 2-3-4	i, p, t
t	⠞ dots 2-3-4-5	j, q, s
u	⠥ dots 1-3-6	k, v, x, z
v	⠧ dots 1-2-3-6	l, u
w	⠺ dots 2-4-5-6	j
x	⠭ dots 1-3-4-6	m, u, y
y	⠽ dots 1-3-4-5-6	n, x, z
z	⠵ dots 1-3-5-6	o, u, y

The practice drill on this site offers the cells one dot away as its wrong answers, for that reason.

Paper first, then a display

Paths to Literacy reports that beginning skills are best taught to young readers on embossed pages, where they learn hand movement and finger positions as well as how sentences and paragraphs are laid out. A refreshable display shows one line at a time, and readers typically use one hand on it, with the thumbs on the navigation keys.

A screen cannot be felt. This site can show what each cell is and let you test whether you recognise it; reading by touch needs embossed paper or a display. The one-page chart is the place to start with the shapes, and the next guide covers how braille gets onto paper.

Sources

Everything said here about which dots make which cell is computed from the tables this site’s translator uses, and checked before each change to the site.