Abstract Brief:
Blind and visually impaired students across India face challenges learning complex scientific diagrams. While teacher assistance is essential, the high student-teacher ratio makes it difficult to provide an engaging learning experience at scale. In this pilot study, we introduce IRIS, a novel TV remote-sized product designed for visually impaired children to explain the tactiles in audio format. Results show that IRIS helped students learn about scientific processes in regional languages and provided for a more comprehensive, holistic grasp of the concepts presented in the tactile diagram when compared to other methods. We propose IRIS as an assistive technology geared to make students self-reliant in learning tactiles with minimum assistance from teachers, thereby reducing their workload.