Literacy involves the ability to gain access to written information. Information which is communicated needs to be stored so that it can be refered to again later. This means that for the blind person, literacy involves all methods of acquiring, storing, and accessing information and all methods of communicating one's own ideas, opinions, and needs. Literacy includes the ability to use Braille, print, and computers as well as the ability to use readers and recorded materials to gain access to and acquire the most knowledge from information. This definition implies that education empowers students to direct and control their own learning, to awaken their intelligence.
Many tools exist to enable a blind person to obtain, store, retrieve and communicate information.
Not all of these tools enable the blind person to learn how to spell or how a printed page appears. These elements of literacy are foundational to the blind person's ability to communicate well with others, blind or sighted. Braille literacy has become an issue of great concern to blind adults, parents of blind children, and teachers of blind students. Authors state that an increasing number of blind people are growing up illiterate and that Braille is the answer to this problem. Of particular interest are the difficulties faced by students who have low vision and can read printed letters, even if the letters must be very large and reading is very slow.