Students Who are Blind or Partially Sighted

1. Students Who are Blind or Partially Sighted How much did you trust your partner at the start? How much did you trust your partner at the end? What is the difference between going alone and being guided by another? What ingredients are needed when trusting and working with someone else? What did your partner do to help you feel safe and secure? What could your partner have done to help make you feel more safe/secure? What communication strategies worked best?

2. Students Who are Blind or Partially Sighted “If there was only one thing about sighted people that I could change, it would be to make them think of me as just a normal person who can’t see. So that when I do something normal, like find a CD and slip into the player and turn it on—stuff like that—nobody will say ‘Isn’t that something?’ When we blind people do ordinary things, it’s because we’re ordinary people. It’s not like we should be in a circus.” - Corey P-N., age 29, blind from birth

3. Students Who are Blind or Partially Sighted “If there was only one thing about sighted people that I could change, it would be to make them think of me as just a normal person who can’t see. So that when I do something normal, like find a CD and slip into the player and turn it on—stuff like that—nobody will say ‘Isn’t that something?’ When we blind people do ordinary things, it’s because we’re ordinary people. It’s not like we should be in a circus.” - Corey P-N., age 29, blind from birth

4. Legal Blindness is 6/60m. The person must stand at 6m or less to see an object which normally can be seen at 60m. • A person whose visual field is reduced to an angle of 20 degrees or less at its widest diameter is also considered blind. • A person with a distance acuity of 6/13m or less in the better eye is partially sighted. Definitions

5. True or False? • People who are blind have no sight at all • People who are blind use Braille as their primary method of reading • Individuals who are blind automatically develop better acuity in their other senses • Almost every person who is blind would benefit from the use of a guide dog • If students who are partially sighted use their eyes too much, their sight will deteriorate • Students who are blind automatically become good listeners • Instructing children in mobility techniques should wait until elementary or even secondary school age

6. Classifications • Near Normal Vision • Able to function without special training, but will use corrective lenses • Moderate Functional Impairment • Requires specialized aids and lighting • Reduction in Central Vision • Moderate field loss; may qualify for special services as legally blind • Low Vision • Even after correction, vision is lower than normal, although is usually helpful • Poor Functional Vision • Standard correction is of little or no benefit. Usually strong reading aids and other technologies are needed • Blind • Total field loss as well as total detail loss; may distinguish between light and dark

7. Working with the Resource Teacher for the Visually Impaired • Many students who are visually impaired spend the majority of the day, if not all of it, in the regular classroom. • While many of their learning opportunities do not need a great deal of adjustment, there are still interventions and techniques that may be necessary. • Since the percentage if students who are visually impaired is very low, it is not always a reasonable expectation that all classroom teachers will have the specialized knowledge needed to effective to that student. • Because of this, it is uncommon for boards to have what would be referred to as itinerant teachers or resource persons for the following types of things…

8. Working with the Resource Teacher for the Visually ImpairedContinued • Explanation of the student’s impairment to educators at the school level • Assessment of the student’s residual vision • Provision, training (teacher and student), and integration of specialized equipment • Strategies for instruction • Provision of Braille • Socialized and adaptation strategies • Orientation and mobility information • Available resource support materials and organizations

9. Stealing From The Blind What would you do?

10. Classroom Checklist of Possible Vision Problems • Appearance of Eyes • One eye turns in our out at any time • Reddened eyes or lids • Encrusted eyelids • Frequent sties on lids • Eyes tear excessively • Complaints by student • Headaches in forehead or temples • Burning or itching in eyes after reading • Nausea or dizziness • Print blurs or moves after reading a short time • Behaviour signs of visual problems • Head turns while reading across the page • Loses place often during reading • Needs finger or marker to keep place • Tilts head abnormally while working at desk • Rereads or skips line unknowingly • Too frequent omits or substitutes words • Complains of seeing double

11. Behaviour signs of visual problemsContinued • Misaligns number columns regularly • Squints, closes or covers one eye • Orients a worksheet unusually • Must feel things to understand • Disorderly placement of words or drawings on page • Blinks to clear view of chalkboard after near task • Squints to see chalkboard • Holds book too closely • Avoids all possible near-centred tasks • Closes or covers one eye when reading • Rubs eyes a great deal

12. The Case of Lori • What are the concerns of the school officials? • Should Lori be in a regular classroom? • What are the advantages\disadvantages for Lori and for her classmates? • What should her program be?

13. Strategies for the Classroom • It is usually very beneficial for a teacher of a regular class with a student who is blind or partially sighted to establish the practice of holding regular, informal, and private discussions with that student to work out special means of communication. • It may be necessary for a teacher to set up the classroom with the expectation that physical arrangements will not be altered, at least for a significant period of time. While this may contradict a style a teacher likes to follow, it may be a necessity for simple reasons of safety • At the same time, there is the student’s normal need to be physically mobile, to explore, to expand his/her capacity, as well as the need to perceive the self as both part of and separate from the environment. A great deal or professional skill is demanded of teachers and educational assistants in marrying this need with the obvious requirements of safety and efficient function described above. The key phrase is responsible independence. • Common Sense. A student with partial sight, for example, should always be permitted to sit near the chalkboard, to borrow or photocopy notes. (Yet the exceptionality need not be emphasized. If other students are blindfolded in an activity, the student who is blind should be too.)

14. Strategies for the ClassroomContinued • Teachers, assistants, and fellow students with sight often have to make allowances for communication style. The students often place great value on the expression and tone of the teacher’s voice. Also, if an individual who is blind responds to a communication with total silence, it may be because he or she is taking in and interpreting available cues. This, too, requires adjustment from the teacher. • “Blindisms” are characteristic mannerisms such as rocking, head shaking, hand shaking, and eye poking. Most advocates suggest that teacher and educational assistants adeptly discourage these behaviours, for they may isolate the student as different in a way that goes beyond merely being blind. • Many people who are blind have grown to associate physical contact with being guided. Gestures such as patting and hugging may have negative connotations for some students, or may be misinterpreted. When an individual who is blind is being guided, let him/her be the one who maintains and controls the physical contact. • When individuals who are blind are lost or disoriented, they may need to be repositioned in order to work out direction. In this situation, it is important to make the person who is blind understand where he/she is first. Once the student in oriented as best as possible, then explanation about direction can follow. • A tactful classroom buddy or advocate is always helpful, but this arrangement should never be an unnaturally long-term arrangement. • Perhaps the single most important role a teacher plays is being the classroom leader in developing a positive attitude.

15. ~ A true teacher knows your weaknesses but shows you your strengths; feels your fears but fortifies your faith; sees your anxieties but frees your spirit; recognizes your disabilities but emphasizes your possibilities. ~ William Arthur Ward As teachers we don’t have the power, our studentsdo. Let’s help them to realize that….