How does dial-in actually work?
This service enables visually and physically disabled individuals to "read" (hear) the morning paper, yesterday's paper and selected other publications - any time of day or night, seven days a week. Using their own touch-tone telephones, they can access all of the available publications, whenever they choose to do so. Audio dial-in instructions.
Each day, starting early in the morning, volunteers read the Washington Post and USA Today into a computer: news and editorial pages, sports, the larger ads, special sections and the weekly supplements including TV listings. Pictures, charts, graphs and cartoons are fully described.
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With their touch-tone telephones, callers can:
Callers can use convenient speakerphones and call waiting. Individual ID numbers allow access only to eligible callers. There is free telephone access throughout Maryland, DC and Virginia. The toll-free line is provided by the State of Maryland in Maryland and in other jurisdictions with the generous support of WETA.
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You can dial (301) 625-1987 for an audio version of the daily radio schedule. You can also click on Audio Program Schedule where the schedule is broken into individual days. For text version please select one of the following links.
Full Text Version of the Metropolitan Washington Ear's Radio Reading Schedule
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Text Version of Current Book Schedule
Audio Version of the Current Talking Book Schedule
If you live outside the Washington, DC metropolitan area and would like to know if there is a radio reading service in your area, go to http://iaais.org, International Association of Audio Information Services, for a complete listing.
Audio description for live theater and opera performances in selected theatres in the Metropolitan Washington Area and audio description soundtracks for films, videos, Imax films and museums. We also provide audio description training.
Dr. Margaret Pfanstiehl, The Washington Ears' founder and president, and her husband Cody, developed the art and technique of Audio Description in 1981. Since then they have trained many describers here and abroad in the art of "talking pictorially" to make theater, television, films, museums and exhibits accessible to people with little or no vision.
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The Ear produces audio description to make documentaries, museums, IMAX films and indoor and outdoor exhibits accessible to people who are visually impaired. We train audio describers for these venues. The Mashantuket Pequot Indian museum, Ellis Island museum, National Building museum and the Statue of Liberty museum offer audio described tours.
From 7pm to 9pm volunteers look up items from the Yellow Pages and the Washington Post classifieds. Please call (301) 681-7188 and a dedicated volunteer will help you as best they can.
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The Ear provides an audio version of the National Symphony's printed programs on the Dial-In service. The Washington Ear also provides full schedules of the Strathmore Mansion and Music Center on the Dial In.
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In 1985 The Ear produced the first-ever Braille/raised-line/large print atlas of an entire state -- Maryland -- accompanied by historical, demographic and geographic data on three voice-indexed audio cassettes. The Ear also produced a Greater Washington Area raised-line and large-print atlas containing 14 maps and 250 entries.
THE METROPOLITAN WASHINGTON EAR, INC.
12601 Tech Road,
Silver Spring, MD 20904
Phone (301) 681-6636
Fax (301) 625-1986
information@washear.org
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