Braille Set and Play Packs:
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Lego is making a set of Braille bricks available for purchase for the first time. The special Legos feature letters and numbers in print and Braille form.
In an effort to be more inclusive, Lego is rolling out a first-of-its-kind set designed to help those with vision disabilities learn to read.
The company said this month that it will make Braille bricks widely available for the first time.
The new “Lego Braille Bricks — Play with Braille” set includes 287 bricks in five colors, which work interchangeably with traditional Legos. Each brick features a printed letter or number and raised studs in the pattern of the corresponding character in the Braille system.
The Braille bricks are aimed at children ages 6 and up and they’ve been “designed so that anyone who is curious about Braille, be they blind, partially-sighted or sighted, can have fun getting to know the Braille system at home with their family members in a playful, inclusive way,” the company said.
The Lego Group indicated that it worked in collaboration with blind organizations around the world to develop and test the Braille bricks. Since 2020, the specialized Legos were offered to schools and other providers serving children with vision impairment at no charge, but the company said it moved to make them commercially available in response to global demand.
“For the blind community, Braille is not just literacy, it’s our entry to independence and inclusion into this world, and to have Lego Braille bricks made available for the wider public is a massive step forward to ensuring more children will want to learn Braille in the first place,” said Martine Abel-Williamson, president of the World Blind Union. “And because it’s based on a product that so many families already know and love, this is really an invitation for all family members to have fun building tactile skills and getting familiar with Braille using the same tool.”
This is the not the first time that Lego has introduced a product aimed at being more inclusive of people with disabilities. The company previously offered a minifigure of a boy in a wheelchair and earlier this year various characters with disabilities were added to the Lego Friends collection.
The “Lego Braille Bricks — Play with Braille” set will be available in English and French starting Sept. 1 on the company’s website for $89.99. Versions in Italian, German and Spanish are expected early next year.
Article 2
Archive 2
Building with Lego bricks has stayed a formative and important practice for kids around the world, partly because it’s so easily enjoyed by anyone, regardless of location, language, or ability. Now the company has made its Braille Bricks, a learning toy for children with visual impairments (or who just want to learn the script) available for purchase by anyone who wants them.
The set was introduced back in 2019, but only as a kit that was distributed for free to limited recipients, like people and organizations specializing in teaching kids with vision impairments. After a couple years of feedback, Lego has decided to make the set widely available.
It’s a 287-piece box of special bricks, most of which are of the standard 2×4 variety, which allows room for each letter of the 2×3-dot Braille alphabet and a visible label. This allows them to be teaching tools for sighted and vision-impaired; there’s also a reference sheet with the letters and bricks in order, and a set of starter projects to get things moving.
“For the blind community, braille is not just literacy, it’s our entry to independence and inclusion into this world, and to have LEGO Braille Bricks made available for the wider public is a massive step forward to ensuring more children will want to learn braille in the first place,” said Martine Abel-Williamson, president of the World Blind Union, in Lego’s announcement of the set’s availability.
The set is part of a gradual progression of expanding specialized Braille learning tools from schools to homes. There is also, for instance, a new push to make refreshable Braille displays available and affordable, which would enable e-reader-like functionality as well as composition capabilities.
Accessibility is being baked into more digital products as well, though there are still countless challenges in making sure people with disabilities can interact intuitively with some of the more complex web apps and services.
The Play with Braille Lego set will be shipped in early September but is available for preorder in English and French now for $90.
Article 1
Archive 1
New Lego Set To Feature Braille
Lego is making a set of Braille bricks available for purchase for the first time. The special Legos feature letters and numbers in print and Braille form.
In an effort to be more inclusive, Lego is rolling out a first-of-its-kind set designed to help those with vision disabilities learn to read.
The company said this month that it will make Braille bricks widely available for the first time.
The new “Lego Braille Bricks — Play with Braille” set includes 287 bricks in five colors, which work interchangeably with traditional Legos. Each brick features a printed letter or number and raised studs in the pattern of the corresponding character in the Braille system.
The Braille bricks are aimed at children ages 6 and up and they’ve been “designed so that anyone who is curious about Braille, be they blind, partially-sighted or sighted, can have fun getting to know the Braille system at home with their family members in a playful, inclusive way,” the company said.
The Lego Group indicated that it worked in collaboration with blind organizations around the world to develop and test the Braille bricks. Since 2020, the specialized Legos were offered to schools and other providers serving children with vision impairment at no charge, but the company said it moved to make them commercially available in response to global demand.
“For the blind community, Braille is not just literacy, it’s our entry to independence and inclusion into this world, and to have Lego Braille bricks made available for the wider public is a massive step forward to ensuring more children will want to learn Braille in the first place,” said Martine Abel-Williamson, president of the World Blind Union. “And because it’s based on a product that so many families already know and love, this is really an invitation for all family members to have fun building tactile skills and getting familiar with Braille using the same tool.”
This is the not the first time that Lego has introduced a product aimed at being more inclusive of people with disabilities. The company previously offered a minifigure of a boy in a wheelchair and earlier this year various characters with disabilities were added to the Lego Friends collection.
The “Lego Braille Bricks — Play with Braille” set will be available in English and French starting Sept. 1 on the company’s website for $89.99. Versions in Italian, German and Spanish are expected early next year.
Article 2
Archive 2
You can finally buy Lego’s Braille Bricks
Building with Lego bricks has stayed a formative and important practice for kids around the world, partly because it’s so easily enjoyed by anyone, regardless of location, language, or ability. Now the company has made its Braille Bricks, a learning toy for children with visual impairments (or who just want to learn the script) available for purchase by anyone who wants them.
The set was introduced back in 2019, but only as a kit that was distributed for free to limited recipients, like people and organizations specializing in teaching kids with vision impairments. After a couple years of feedback, Lego has decided to make the set widely available.
It’s a 287-piece box of special bricks, most of which are of the standard 2×4 variety, which allows room for each letter of the 2×3-dot Braille alphabet and a visible label. This allows them to be teaching tools for sighted and vision-impaired; there’s also a reference sheet with the letters and bricks in order, and a set of starter projects to get things moving.
“For the blind community, braille is not just literacy, it’s our entry to independence and inclusion into this world, and to have LEGO Braille Bricks made available for the wider public is a massive step forward to ensuring more children will want to learn braille in the first place,” said Martine Abel-Williamson, president of the World Blind Union, in Lego’s announcement of the set’s availability.
The set is part of a gradual progression of expanding specialized Braille learning tools from schools to homes. There is also, for instance, a new push to make refreshable Braille displays available and affordable, which would enable e-reader-like functionality as well as composition capabilities.
Accessibility is being baked into more digital products as well, though there are still countless challenges in making sure people with disabilities can interact intuitively with some of the more complex web apps and services.
The Play with Braille Lego set will be shipped in early September but is available for preorder in English and French now for $90.
