Ever wonder where braille literacy blocks come from, or those "beeping eggs" at Easter time? Look no further than Edmonton, Alberta!
Meet the Cyber Eagles Team 10544 — a robotics team that competes in the FIRST Tech Challenge, where students in grades 7 to 12 design, build, and code robots to tackle a new challenge each year. Through this program, members develop problem-solving skills, explore STEM, and engage in community outreach activities, such as coding camps.
The Cyber Eagles have built a strong partnership with CNIB, starting with the creation of over 300 beeping eggs for the first fully accessible Easter egg hunt in Western Canada for children and youth with sight loss and their families. The Beeping Eggs Project is modeled after The Rachel Project in the USA, where children and youth who are blind or have low vision are able to participate in the fun Easter tradition by locating hidden large, colourful eggs through audible beeps. When the Cyber Eagles also recognized a need for braille tools, the team designed large format braille literacy blocks, which the team 3D printed and distributed to several provinces across Canada. So far, the team has printed 14 sets of braille literacy blocks for CNIB Alberta/NWT, and four for the Alberta Society for the Visually Impaired (ASVI). The blocks were so well received that the Cyber Eagles have since printed an additional ten sets of each for Saskatchewan, Nunavut, Manitoba, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, with the intention to make these available for al provinces.
Interested in 3D printing your own braille blocks? Now you can! Find the template here, just in time for Braille Education Month in January: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:6279798
To learn more about Cyber Eagles Robotics, visit CyberEaglesRobotics.ca.
Image description: A robot sits beside a stack of braille blocks on a table.