Objective: To encourage children to make use of the vision they have

• This module builds on Module 6
• We make sense of what we see with our brain. For this reason, understanding what is seen can be improved with experience and with familiarity of a situation or environment, but it cannot be physically changed.
• Visual development is a process of maturation, as a child gains more experience with impaired vision and acquires concepts and cognitive schema. This educational approach is based on exposure and explanation. A teacher does not really know what a child is experiencing visually, no matter how thorough the FVA (Module 4). Repeated observations reduce assumptions about a child’s visual abilities and build understanding.
• Since different children experience vision loss differently, educators cannot make assumptions about what children can or cannot do visually. Rather than push the child to use vision, allow him to demonstrate what he can do visually. Observations and discussion are always key.
• Visual abilities follow a sequence of simultaneous development (see also Low Vision Online):
• Attention, to awareness, to understanding
• Lights, to people/faces, and then objects
• Fixation or focus, to following or visual pursuit
• Near (close to the body), to far (away from the body)
• Peripheral, to central
• Parts, to wholes
• Simple, to complex
• Large, to small (or gross, to fine detail)
• Concrete (real) objects, to two dimensional representations, to line drawings
• Low vision devices, including those that can be purchased in local shops (such as magnifiers and binoculars), can assist with both near and far tasks (see Module 21).
• Light awareness and light perception are helpful for mobility and traveling; use natural light for determining direction. Sensing light after walking by buildings can warn of an intersection. Try changing the balance of natural and artificial lighting and the child’s position in relation to it.