Personal Museum Tour Guides for the Deaf
Wednesday July 23, 2008
Not exactly, but it seemed like an appropriate title. I enjoyed reading this Forbes.com article about the experience a group of Pennsylvania School for the Deaf students had in trying out GPS Rangers made by BarZ Adventures Inc. As reported in my previous post on the NTID Reunion, the GPS Rangers are hand-held devices that play programmed video as a person walks around, and also has caption display capabilities. (The devices can also be used with other languages besides American Sign Language). As the article points out, having the GPS Ranger as an option reduces the need to depend on interpreters for tours.
I would love to have a GPS Ranger for a "ghost tour" of Old Town Alexandria, Virginia. I've never been on this popular "ghost tour," which I know has interpreters. What appeals to me about the GPS Ranger is the idea of being able to go at my own pace without having to struggle to keep up through an interpreter.
Comments
so i guess the big question is how much can you use that? is there only certain venues? that would be great for like going to games. i dont like having interpreters since then you miss out on stuff. from what you say you can look up and down as you want to. so how available is this? or is it limited range wise?