KVIN Fortnightly News Roundup Issue 3
18th May 2020
KVIN will be compiling a fortnightly roundup of the news and information we have been sharing for visually impaired people in Kirklees. Here you can find out what we have been doing and how you can get involved.
Contents;
- Our service
- Useful Information and Sources of Support
- Keeping Busy
- Tech News
1. OUR SERVICE
Kirklees Visual Impairment Network is a charity run by and for people with visual impairments, we aim to make sure people can continue to live full and independent lives when they lose their sight.
Normally we run face to face drop-in services where people can visit us for peer support and technological help, at the moment these aren’t happening, but we are still doing lots!
Here is a summary of what we are doing;
- Remaining active on our social media channels to give updates.
- Actively posting in our KVIN Support What’s app group, this virtual group is for anyone with a visual impairment in Kirklees to join. If you would like to join this group, contact us and we will add you.
- Making regular phone calls to volunteers and service users.
- Providing group chat sessions on a weekly basis, if you would like to join these, contact us and we will get you into the chats.
- Providing technical support for using your smart phone, tablet, or laptop, if you are having any issues or would like to learn something new, get in touch!
- Provide practical support such as food shopping or prescription collections and dropping at your doorstep, contact us if you need help with this.
- Referring service users to other support services as required.
During the Corona Virus outbreak, our offices are closed but we are working and are contactable.
We are a friendly team and would love to welcome you to the group, please use these details to reach us;
- General email enquiries: info@kvin.org.uk
- Christine Stephen 07765 344244 christine.stephen@kvin.org.uk
- Claire Drake 07708 054245 claire.drake@kvin.org.uk
- Mark Owen 07564 681920 mark.owen@kvin.org.uk
- Sam Heaton sam.heaton@kvin.org.uk
- David Quarmby 07828 212555 david.quarmby@kvin.org.uk
2. USEFUL INFORMATION AND SOURCES OF SUPPORT
We are sharing sources of information and support that might be useful at the moment. This information is available on our website by following this link or by finding the news items at www.kvin.org.uk.
If you have been struggling to get delivery slots for your supermarket online shopping, you can try calling the priority numbers listed at this link on our website.
We have shared information from West Yorkshire Trading Standards Scam Alert on our website so that it’s accessible for people with visual impairments to get the information to stay safe, read here.
If you are in need of support, please contact any staff member at KVIN, we are here to help!
KR Talking News
We would like to highlight KR Talking News, which is being continued to be produced at the moment by Kirklees Transcription Service. Here’s what they say;
‘Hello and welcome to our first KTS Podcast! Now although the office is not open and we are unable to deliver the KR Talking News at the moment, we thought we would try to share some information which you may find useful and a feature or poem to lighten your week. So, what’s on this edition? Well, we bring you Information from Infosound about large piece jigsaws, we’ve got a short poem from author and poet Rudrani, Jeff has some contacts information you may find useful and we have a short story read by one of our volunteer readers Helen. So, all you have to do is click one of these links, and you’ll be ready to listen in!’
FOR GENERAL ACCESS FOR SMARTPHONES
To keep up to date with KR Talking News, follow their Facebook page here.
3. KEEPING BUSY
Each week we are running 3 Zoom chats a week lead by our volunteers for our service users to have chance to socialise and get technology support. In April 2020, 32 KVIN service users spent a total of 13,483 minutes on Zoom. We ran 17 sessions; some were group and others were one to one support. On average, our service users attended 10 session spending 7 hrs 3 minutes per person attending.
Here is a photo of one of our Zoom chats, it’s a screen shot showing boxes for each person, you can see everyone’s faces through video chat.
We have been sharing lots of links and information to help people keep busy during lockdown. Take a look to read more about how you can keep yourself busy;
Look forward to in the next issue to find out how Digital services like radio, TV and podcasts can help you beat lockdown boredom.
Wellbeing Activities
We have partnered with local mental health charity Support to Recovery, who promote positive mental health. They have developed some activities that people can try at home which will promote their wellbeing and mental health during this time of social isolation. These packs are available for anyone to download and use, we have a Word and PDF version that can be downloaded.
Click here for more information and to download the pack.
4. TECH NEWS
Here at KVIN we have a team of staff and volunteers with visual impairments who are able to help you to use technology such as using your smart phone, tablets, and laptops. We can help with magnification and voiceover tech so that you can keep using what you have and can also share some handy apps that might help you out too.
We can also help with audio books and smart speakers like Amazon Echo. Whatever you are struggling to use or would like to try, we can offer help and talk you though your options.
You can listen to our fortnightly Tech Podcasts from Dan and Mark to hear the most recent news from the accessible technology world.
Here are some links from what they discuss so you can find out more;
- Continuing his podcasts, Dan talks about the latest free audio books service from Calibre, listen to the Tech Tutorial here.
- Voice Dream Scanner: an app that will read letters and most paper documents to you, they have discounted there software to £5.99.
- Seeing Solutions, we discuss the talk from Phil Ward during last weeks Zoom chat.
- Sight and Sound Webinars: Dan discusses the latest technology being demonstrated by sight and sound, who distribute technology on behalf of other companies subscribe at the following link.
If you would like to receive the KVIN fortnightly news roundup straight into your mailbox, sign up here.