Chapter 11: Visual Disabilities

Opportunities for a Better Future

• Vision
  • Is a distance sense
  • Is a channel used for learning
  • Alerts people to danger
• People with visual disabilities
  • Use residual vision
  • Often find mobility a challenge
  • Frequently face considerable stereotypes and bias
  • Make up about 0.05% of all schoolchildren

Thinking About Dilemmas to Solve

• How school districts will meet IDEA mandate to offer braille instruction to those who need it when there are insufficient members of teachers available who know how to teach this skill to students
• How the general literacy levels of blind and low vision students who read print can be increased
• Ways to eliminate bias and discrimination experienced by people with visual disabilities
• How instruction in life skills can be included when students are fully participating in the general education curriculum
• Methods of improving the employment rates for this group of people

Low Vision and Blindness Defined

• In the normal visual process:
  • Light rays enter the cornea
  • The iris responds to the intensity of light
  • Light passes through the pupil to the lens
  • The lens focuses light rays onto the retina
  • The retina sends messages along the optic nerve to the brain

Low Vision and Blindness Defined

• Visual efficiency:
  • Is how well people use their sight
  • Is influenced by visual acuity and peripheral vision
  • Varies greatly among individuals
• Can be divided into:
  • Low vision
  • Blindness
• Can be classified by:
  • Severity
  • Age of onset
• Students with low vision may use sight for reading
• Students who are blind cannot use vision and are educated through other sensory channels
  • Acuity
  • Normal vision is said to be 20/20
  • 20/70 means this person can se at 20 feet what people with normal vision see at 70 feet

History of the Field

• Blind people were accepted in early societies; possibly the first group of individuals with disabilities who did not face inhumane treatment
• Students with visual disabilities were one of the first groups integrated into general education classes in the U.S.

Brief History

• 1829: Louise Braille adapts French military code
• 1829: The New England Asylum for the Blind opens (Perkins Institute and Massachusetts School for the Blind)
• 1862: Snellen test is developed
• 1900: First public class begins in Chicago
• 1921: American Foundation for the Blind is founded
• 1947: Hoover cane is developed
• 1975: Kurzweil Reader is invented
• 1997: IDEA requires braille be considered as a reading option

Prevalence

• Children with visual disabilities comprise 0.04% of the school-age population
• The number of students remains stable
• Prevalence figures vary by state because:
  • Many are unidentified
  • Definitions vary by state
  • Many are counted in the multiple disabilities category
  • Of access to medical technology

Causes and Prevention

• Substantial number of children have a genetic cause for their visual disability
• Medical technology can now correct or lessen the impact of a visual disability
• Medical technology contributes to the number of visual disabilities by increasing the survival rates of premature babies and those with multiple disabilities
• Many visual disabilities can be prevented or lessened through:
  • Medical technology
  • Visual screenings
  • Safety measures
  • Access to health care

Characteristics

• Visual information contributes to the acquisition of social skills
• Lack of good interpersonal skills can have a lifelong impact
• Characteristics attributed to people who are blind include:
  • Low self-esteem
  • Socially immature
  • Isolated
  • Passive
  • Withdrawn
  • Dependent

Early Childhood Education

• Effective preschool programs should promote:
  • Basic communication and interaction patterns
  • Play
• Students who are blind or have low vision are two years behind sighted peers in play skills
• Exemplar preschool programs:
  • Are structured
  • Have secure atmospheres
  • Include many play opportunities
  • Are informal and homelike
  • Have broad instructional opportunities
  • Include interaction with peers without disabilities
  • Support the family
  • Support literacy skills

Elementary Through High School

• The majority of students spend the majority of their time in general education classrooms
• Curriculum targets should include:
  • Life skills
  • Skills for independence
  • Literacy
  • Orientation and mobility
  • Sports and recreation
• Methods of reading and writing include:
  • Braille (less than 10%)
  • Enlarged print
  • Print to voice translations

Elementary Through High School

• Braile-to-print and print-to-braille is readily available through computer technology and makes access to the general education curriculum easy
• Braille is less popular today because:
  • Unavailability of teachers who know how to use or teach braille
  • Increasing availability of audiotapes
  • Immediate computerized print-to-voice translations
  • Difficulty in both cost and time of getting braille versions of books

Elementary Through High School

• Accommodations and modifications are determined for each student and may include:
  • Changing a teaching style
  • Allowing students to position themselves where they can benefit most from instruction
  • Elimination of obstacles and hazards
  • Providing consistent organization, expectations, and consequences

Collaboration for Inclusion

• Over 85% of youngsters attend public school
• Only 8% attend residential center schools
• Collaborative services from visual disabilities experts should be available to all students
• Itinerant vision teachers can help general educators to structure the learning and physical environment
• All teachers should be aware of their language
  • Avoid vague language and be careful to use terms that concretely name their referents.
• Extended time is an important accommodation in inclusive settings

Transition through Adulthood

• Bias and discrimination remain barriers to employment commensurate with abilities
• Blind and low vision students have one of the highest high school graduation rates of all students with disabilities
• As a group, they tend to be under-employed due to discrimination and sometimes a lack of:
  • High level of literacy
  • Social interaction
  • Self-advocacy
• Many adults feel that their access to recreational, leisure, and cultural activities is limited.
• More events are becoming accessible because of changes in attitudes and the ADA law

Families

• Parents must help their children develop skills such as:
  • Communication
  • Independent living
  • Mobility
  • Sensory development
  • Fine and gross motor skills
  • Cognition
  • Social skills
• Parents and educators need to develop strong partnerships

Technology

• Computers provide access to printed information through:
  • Electronic books
  • Closed circuit television (CCTV)
  • Talking books
  • Braille versions of texts
  • Kurzweil 1000 readers
• New technology includes:
  • Visual aids: enlarged print displays, large-print books
  • Audio aids: Braille n' Speak, talking books, watches and clocks, audiodescriptions
  • Tactile aids: labels, maps, books
• Barriers to assistive technology
  • Cost
  • Information

Challenge Question

• What types of technology are available to assist deaf people, and what advances might the future hold?
  • Assistive listening devices: both digital and analog hear aids (BTE, ITE, ITC, CIC), FM transmission devices, audio loop, telecoil
  • Telecommunication devices: captioning, text telephone (TTY), telecommunications relay service, voice carry over
  • Speech-to-text translations: real-time translations (college lectures, courtroom proceedings, business meetings), real-time captioning, C-PrintT, speech recognition
  • Alerting devices: special signaling devices for alarms, doorbells, telephone rings