The written word is not just being seen but heard and felt
Chair of CILIP’s Carnegie Kate Greenaway Awards’ working party Jake Hope explores the many ways in which children’s literature is being made more accessible by being freed from the realm of the visual and released into the other senses.
T
HE CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals are the oldest children’s book awards in the United Kingdom.
Following the Diversity Review the Awards underwent in 2018, it became clear there was progress that could be achieved through making the awards more accessible.
A long-standing relationship with the Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB) has meant that titles shortlisted for the Carnegie Medal have been made available in braille and large print formats widening participation of young people with visual impairment in the Awards Shadowing Scheme. In recent years, the winner of the Carnegie Medal has been presented with a copy of their book printed in braille at the winners’ ceremony. The Awards are building new relationships with Calibre and the ClearVision Project which means that we are able to increase the accessibility off er, making shortlisted titles available in a variety of formats to widen audiences and reach. In partnership with Calibre, the Awards will now see audiobooks created of Carnegie shortlisted titles and in collaboration with ClearVision, braille interleaved editions of the Kate Greenaway winning books. RNIB, Calibre and ClearVision are part of ‘Share the Vision’ a coalition of UK organisations partnering to improve the quality and accessibility of library services for people who are
visually impaired or print disabled. More information about the partnership and a range of resources are on the Reading Sight website https://readingsight.
org.uk/. It was a pleasure to be able to talk with ClearVision, the RNIB and Calibre about their organisations, the work they do and the ways this enriches the library off er and indeed the lives of so many readers.
Former Children’s Laureate and twice winner of the CILIP Carnegie Medal, Anne Fine has been a patron of Calibre and ClearVision for around 20 years. We met to discuss ClearVision, a small but incredibly active organisation based on the site of Lindon Lodge School in London. Anne was instrumental in helping to set up ClearVision. She spoke about visiting her nephew at Linden Lodge where she met Marion Ripley. Having the opportunity to talk with the then Children’s Laureate about an idea she had was too good an opportunity to miss and Marion spoke passionately about her aim to set up a postal library of braille interleaved children’s books. Struck both by Marion’s passion and the impact the idea could have, Anne explains how she and Lois Beeson, who then acted as secretary for the Children’s Laureate, contacted a number of high profi le authors – J. K. Rowling, Jacqueline Wilson, Philip Pullman and Terry Pratchett and thanks to their generous support and donations ClearVison was born.
The charity holds a library of 14,000 braille interleaved children’s books catering for children from birth until they are independent readers. The
Jake Hope (
jakehope@gmail.com @Jake_Hope) is a reading development and children’s book consultant. He has chaired numerous book awards including the prestigious CILIP Carnegie & Kate Greenaway Medals and has judged nearly every major children’s book award in the UK. Alongside delivering training and international public speaking on books and reading, Jake is an active reviewer and a passionate advocate for libraries, books and reading. He is chair of the Youth Libraries Group.
library includes fi ction and non-fi ction in braille and Moon, another tactile alphabet, and books are made available across the whole of the UK and Ireland. They are carefully produced so that the braille, which also includes descriptions of the pictures, does not obscure any print. This makes them ideal for sharing between children who have little or no sight and their sighted parents or conversely, between parents or guardians who have little or no sight and their sighted children. Enabling families to have materials that still allow the sharing of books together
Autumn-Winter 2019
Jake Hope
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09/10/2019 16:06
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