Great job getting this student caught up with your multi-sensory approach that was designed specifically for her!
This module has got me to thinking about the use of auditory books. It does not fit into the word recognition rope but it is very helpful to language comprehension. My own adult child could not have survived high school or college without auditory books. She loves reading with her eyes when she can. I have a co-worker who is insistent that we not call listening to auditory books, reading. He is not against the use of audio books just calling that reading. I have always debated with him but this module has me rethinking because of the interdependent relationship with decoding and language comprehension.
I really like the way you form an interest to the reading topic before the students start reading. I think the children would really enjoy the guessing what the story is about and what the device is used for. I can hear them going home and telling their parents all about a whisk.
- In what ways can educators incorporate real-life experiences and tactile learning activities to help students with visual impairments build their background knowledge and vocabulary skills, thus enhancing their reading comprehension abilities?
As a TVI I feel that there are multiple ways in which we can inocroporate real-life experiences and tactile learning activities to help our students with visual impairments, and we can do so while incorporating the expanded core curriclum. First and foremost using one of our greatest assets, the family, is a critical step in the process. Asking parents to share in daily journals things that their child might have done one evening or over a weekend is a wonderful way to create story boxes representing actvities that they did at home or out in the community with family or friends. In past years I have had families very invested in this process and they would collect items and send pictures of their adventures to allow us to create a story box that would then be shared between school and home.
Another way of incorporating real-life experiences would be to create lessons that the student and TVI do at school together (baking, washing dishes, purchasing an item in the cafeteria, etc.). Begin with an introduction of tools that are needed for the activity paired with braille and auditory vocabulary, participate in a step by step lesson, and then after create a story book or story box together about your experiences incorporating background and vocabulary knowledge, as well as the three remaining strands of Scarboroughâs Reading Rope.
A final way in which I would incorporate the childâs personal experiences, if the student receives Orienation and Mobility lessons this would be a wonderful opportunity to co-teach some community lessons to expand the childâs knowledge and experience and to follow up with future story books and boxes for repetition and retrieval of information to continue to build and learn from.
- How might collaborative planning and instruction between TVIs and general education teachers be structured to ensure alignment, particularly in terms of addressing the interconnectedness of language comprehension and word recognition?
Collaborative planning and instruction between TVIs and general education teachers has to be aligned for word recognition to make sense. For example, a braille student that is struggling with identifying the difference between braille letters âeâ and âiâ would need more practice with words such as âbigâ or âbegâ until they are able to correlate context clues and correlation with other words in a sentence. Beginning sight readers usually has a picture clue to help but for braille users sometimes the graphic can be confusing than helping. This makes it very important for TVI and general education to be in sync for word recognition. This past school year I did a functional vision evaluation on a kindergarten student who has low vision and he was having difficulties identifying the letters of the alphabet. For the letter âyâ he identified it as yo-yo and for the letter âsâ he identified it as snake. I was little confused until I saw the alphabet chart in his classroom and realized that he was identifying the letters by their picture that he saw on the chart. I am concern for him because now in our vision session he is struggling to read sight words and it is maybe because the phonological awareness is not developed and maybe that is the reason the alphabetic principle is not making sense to him. For example, the word âsoâ cannot be âsnake octopusâ and maybe it is the reason he usually tells me âI donât remember when we are doing sight words drills using flash cards. My take away for this student is that he did not need a visual next the alphabet letters until he was able to independently identify them.
I wholeheartedly agree that push-in is such an important part of what we do, and sometimes one of the most challenging to schedule depending on the age/grade of the child. Personally, I have found that it works best when given the opportunity to begin working with the student early in their education- I love when I get preschool students that I then can have for years and years to come! The transdisciplinary approach is my favorite environment to teach in as I find it extremely rewarding! Work smarter not harder- a motto that I always stress to my students. I am so pleased to have read this and to see the great success you had. The data from this would be amazing to support the need for and importance of collaboration time.
When possible, find ways to bring the book to life. For example, when the kids are reading about the lifecycle of butterflies. Let the students experience the butterfly life cycle by raising butterflies from eggs. The children can feel what is going on, by touching the different stages. Introduce the butterflies before reading about it. I would also incorporate art and craft activities and science projects to go alone with the reading.
I know our school does a good job at teaching letter sounds to the younger age children by singing songs that introduce the letters and their sounds. They all use the Better Alphabet song and the Secret Stories program to help with reading. It is really awesome to see the students that come to my special education classroom use the tools they have learned in the regular classroom to figure out unknown words. Each week, they learn a new secret for decoding and have different activities to reinforce it.
Maryann, I enjoyed reading your suggestions for some ways to expand background knowledge and vocabulary. In our school district we offer our visually impaired students a four-week summer vision program that is only for them and we cover most of your suggestions. The students seem to enjoy the art and nature exploration. While teaching over zoom in 2020-2021, for some of the students on my caseload we did counting and identifying money, individual budgeting that included grocery shopping and online shopping for clothes. This included going to the store actual website, searching for the item and putting items in the cart and spending within the budget limit.
Theresa, I like the way you break down your ways for collaboration especially the idea of zoom and google docs. Depending on the studentâs grade level and vision impairment, I usually try to get the textbook, handouts or word documents ahead of time to ensure that we are on the same page. I take pictures of word wall and also have the student show me their work, websites and reading program that they are using.
Hi Jill,
I love your ideas about incorporating nursery rhymes into lesson planning and reading instruction. Not only do they help build background knowledge and vocabulary, but nursery rhymes are engaging for young children. I also like the idea of using something familiar to parents, so they can easily practice early literacy skills at home. Nursery rhymes can support the multi-sensory approach to instruction by using actions and movement. They also teach concepts, like colors, numbers, and shapes. Thanks for sharing! ~Lacey
Hi Novlette,
I thought you provided some great examples regarding the necessity of collaboration between the general education teacher and the teacher for students with visual impairments.
I am curious if you included a learning media assessment with the functional vision evaluation of your Kindergarten student. I think about the lack of exposure to environmental print and if he might benefit from being a dual media student.
Thanks for sharing! ~Lacey
Sharing the example of a placing a brush in the Braille Box and the ways that the concept can be explored and expanded on with the student was eye opening for me. It has inspired me to work on a list of other objects that can be placed into the box that have multiple meanings and uses. I can envision incorporating the braille/mystery box into a once a month activity for a student that I see 2x weekly. During the initial presentation, I gather what he currently knows about the object, perhaps guide him to think of other ways the item may relate, and then from that, come up with additional activities in the coming weeks that would further expand his knowledge/experience with that particular topic based on his interests and needs.
Collaboration with the classroom teacher is key and that often depends on how much planning and preparedness the classroom has put in. Like you, it is beneficial to get ahold of book titles, poems, essays, etc, well in advance so that we can effectively evaluate the literature to know what pre-teaching may need to be done, whether it be to provide background knowledge or introduction of braille contractions not previously learned. However, that may not always be the case. Learning about the interconnectedness of language comprehension and word recognition as used in the example of the Reading Rope, provides a nice talking point to share with teachers to help explain the importance of having materials ahead of time. Ensuring that we as the TVIâs, have time evaluate the material and provide pre-teaching, increasing student understanding.
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Lacy,
Yes, I also did a LMA. It is interesting now that I have him on direct service and have the opportunity to explore more with him. He is great at identifying items such as everyday items, animals and numbers on a busy worksheet but is very week with his alphabet and sight words identification and reading.
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- In what ways can educators incorporate real-life experiences and tactile learning activities to help students with visual impairments build their background knowledge and vocabulary skills, thus enhancing their reading comprehension abilities?
Theme units are popular in the primary grades and can provide educators with an easy way to incorporate both hands on/tactile learning activities and real-life experiences to help build background knowledge and vocabulary skills. While teachers in a classroom may be used to relying on visuals to assist with teaching concepts, it is important for the TVI to encourage and perhaps provide suggestions for the use of additional hands-on materials, that may provide more of a multi-sensory approach. Ensuring that when presenting materials/objects for the student to touch and explore, that they are as close to the real object as possible, including smells and taste when possible. When exploring the items, it is important for the student to be exposed to terminology that is used to describe the item. This would be a good way to have the classmates provide feedback as well. In addition, having sound clips or recordings to further enhance the experience is important. Lastly, whenever possible, when new themes/topics are introduced, information should be sent home to the families so they can continue to reinforce the concepts at home, adding to the real-life experience.
I love the idea of having themes of story boxes. This not only gives the student multiple ways to explore the same objects, but it also gives the TVI more options. If a class is studying snow, you could bringing in a series of stories such as The Snowy Day, Ten Ways to Hear Snow, etc. The teachers I work with are usually happy to have more resources for the whole class.
Maybe you could also add suggested activities and songs to go along with the theme and the items. Also, adding links to read aloud videos of the books could be helpful.
Hi Jeff. I loved that the students had the opportunity to go to a horse stable. Many kids with typical vision have a good understanding of horses from books, TV, and seeing horses from a car. Our students who have visual impairment do not get this incidental learning. This makes me realize the importance of collaborating with teachers regarding field trips to make sure there is a hands on component. It is also important to share resources with parents.
In Vermont we have âKaylaâs Directoryâ which is an online list of services in Vermont for people with special needs. I have a young student who has done indoor rock climbing, horseback riding, swimming, skiing, and kayaking through different adaptive sports associations. I share this resource with parents. Check out kaylasdirectory.org if you want to see what types of things they list. I donât know if other states have something similar.
- In what ways can educators incorporate real-life experiences and tactile learning activities to help students with visual impairments build their background knowledge and vocabulary skills, thus enhancing their reading comprehension abilities?
Educators can incorporate real-life experiences and tactile learning activities to build background knowledge and vocabulary skills by :
- Having âfield tripsâ before a lesson to explore information that will be presented. This could look like a class walking on campus to find trees or plants for a science lesson on the structure of a tree/plant. The student would need to have access to their low vision tools (magnifiers, monoculars) or having the ability to touch and feel the trees/plants.
- Encouraging the student and classroom teacher to have the student participate in as many activities as possible. For example, getting their lunch through the lunch line. This experience allows the student to understand the concept/ vocabulary of: line, tray, container, payment, etc. The TVI could also work on ECC skills during lessons such as but not limited to cooking and home care skills (making a bed, cleaning dishes, etc.).
How great that the students were able to have a real-life experience with the horses. It is great whenever our students get these opportunities! You are correct in that it is difficult within the school day to provide these opportunities. However, it is important to remember that they do not always have to be so grand. For example, if a student is working on a lesson about momentum they could have a field trip to the playground and go down the slide with and without a weight to compare the momentum they had going down the slide.
Itâs great when you have classroom teachers willing to share their lesson plans with you. I have had teachers share their lessons plans in the past, however, it was quite overwhelming to decipher their lessons, materials that needed adapted, vocabulary, and concepts to work on, as well as the many other students on my caseload. Did you have a method that worked well for you when looking at the lesson plans?