Annie cannot talk, nor make fine-grained movements with her hands. However, thanks to eye-gaze control technology she can do many things: playing games and having fun, drawing, communicating through symbols, learning the alphabet, taking photos…She can do many things on her own.

Annie is using a Tobii PCEye Mini eye-gaze control device and Communicator 5, a software for communication, since she was 6. She has this device and software thanks to the Bulgarian-British foundation “St. George” which secured the funding for their purchase. In this way the foundation gave her the possibility to work with this system everyday and thus to develop herself and be independent.

We continue to work with Annie by creating new educational applications for her and therefore help her in learning new skills.

In 2017 these activities were possible also thank to the support of the Agency for people with disabilities and the project “Assistive technologies for eye-gaze control – increasing the efficiency of their use in Bulgaria”.

In 2018 Annie is already seven years old and is learning more and more things – by now she can use the possibilities of eye-gaze control to their full extend – she can play games, choose and play her favorite Internet songs and movies by herself, to control the TV etc.

Now, in 2019, Annie started school. She is a first child in Bulgaria to attend a regular school using eye-control technology to speak, write, and participate in class.

This post is also available in Български.