Archived Information

# 

# Slaying Dragons 

Building Self-Confidence and Raising Expectations Through Orientation
Center Training

Sandy Tigges, Ph.D.

Dr. Tigges is Program Administrator in the Adult Orientation and
Adjustment Center, Iowa Department for the Blind, 524 4th St., Des
Moines, Iowa 50309. Telephone: (512) 281-1313. E-mail:
tigges.sandy@blind.state.ia.us.

In his 1919 fable, "The 51st Dragon," Heywood Broun describes the
exploits of Gawaine, a young student in knight school who is so timid
and fearful that he is in danger of being expelled. Instead, the
school's headmaster decides to take Gawaine under his wing and train him
to slay the countless dragons plaguing the countryside that year. In
preparation, Gawaine studies all about dragons and their habits, and he
practices beheading paper and wooden ones on the practice field.

When the faculty feels he is ready to confront real dragons, Gawaine is
given a diploma and a new battle-ax. The headmaster calls him to his
office for a few words of advice: "Here you have learned the theories of
life but, after all, life is not a matter of theories. Life is a matter
of facts. It calls on the young and the old alike to face these facts,
even though they are sometimes unpleasant. Your problem, for example, is
to slay dragons." Unconvinced, the whimpering Gawaine asks for an
enchanted cap to make himself invisible. The headmaster offers him
something better: a magic word. All Gawaine has to do is say
"rumplesnitz" and he can lop off the heads of dragons easily and
fearlessly.

The magic word works, at least for the first 49 dragons. Gawaine grows
so brave that he even slays one with his right hand tied behind his
back. He becomes so confident that, at night, he engages in long
drinking bouts at the village tavern. On the day he confronts his
fiftieth dragon, his mind has become so sluggish that he cannot remember
the magic word. As the beast charges, the word flashes into his mind,
but he has no time to utter it before swinging his battle-ax and
chopping off the dragon's head.

Puzzled, Gawaine goes to the headmaster's office for an explanation. The
headmaster laughs, believing that Gawaine has finally figured out that
his own bravery and not the word rumplesnitz is responsible for his
success: "It wasn't magic in a literal sense, but it was much more
wonderful than that. The word gave you confidence. It took away your
fears. If I hadn't told you that, you might have been killed the very
first time. It was your battle-ax that did the trick."

Convinced that Gawaine just needs to kill another couple of dragons to
get his confidence back, the headmaster drags him out of bed and into
the forest the next morning and shoves him into a thicket where a small
dragon is hiding. But Gawaine never returns. All that is later found of
him are his medals.

Like the knight school's headmaster, we at the Iowa Department for the
Blind's Adult Orientation and Adjustment Center give students magic
words by which to live: "It's OK to be blind." Unlike those of the
knight school headmaster, however, these words do not disguise hollow
confidence and insufficient preparation. Instead, we back them with
effective blindness training based on an approach that will give
students a solid foundation in the skills, positive attitude and
self-confidence they need to slay the many dragons they will encounter
as they strive to live independently and work competitively.

We use the words, "It's OK to be blind," to help students to progress
through the three stages of adjustment to their blindness: dependence,
rebellion and interdependence. Like Gawaine when he first began his
knight school training, students enter the center with a great many
insecurities, fears and low expectations, ranging from being afraid to
cross the street alone to worrying about ever holding a job, having a
family or being accepted socially. They will often accept more help than
necessary and will avoid such "dragons" as going up and down stairs and
crossing streets alone. Once they have overcome some of these fears and
have slain a few dragons of their own, they begin to gain confidence and
to realize that they can get about safely and efficiently and perform
day-to-day living activities competently. Proud of their
accomplishments, they often assert their independence by rebelliously
swinging their battle-axes against any sighted person who might offer
assistance. When students reach the end of their training, however, they
see that the magic words take on the substance of truth, reinforced with
the skills and self-confidence they need to slay any dragon they may
ever encounter. They come to understand the natural interdependence that
exists in society and begin to view an offer of help not as an insult
but as an opportunity to educate.

The training we provide at the orientation center is based on a positive
philosophy of blindness. In fact, this philosophy is the foundation for
all of the Department for the Blind programs, including Vocational
Rehabilitation, Independent Living, Transition, the Business Enterprises
Program and the Library for the Blind and Physically Handicapped. The
department is committed to the belief that center training must be an
integral part of the rehabilitation process, for rehabilitation can only
be truly achieved when consumers have reached their fullest potential in
personal independence, employment and integration into the community.
This approach is powerful, because it gives blind people control over
their own lives as well as responsibility for their own successes and
failures. This philosophy further contends that the real problem of
blindness is not the physical loss of eyesight but rather society's
misconceptions about it.

The majority of orientation centers in this country base their training
on the notion that the individual who has become blind is "broken" and
therefore must be "fixed," both physically and psychologically. The
training they provide is based upon the beliefs that the problems of
blindness are inherent in the blindness itself, that blindness imposes
upon a person severe limitations that cannot be overcome, that visual
techniques are intrinsically better than non-visual ones and that the
degree of one's success is inextricably tied to the degree of one's
visual acuity. Nurses and a psychologist are often on staff, and
emphasis is placed on the teaching of skills, avoiding blindness
techniques as much as possible and maximizing residual vision through
the use of low vision aids.1

The training we provide at the Iowa center, on the other hand, is
successful because we recognize that the problems of blindness stem not
only from the blindness itself but, again, also from public
misconceptions about its true nature. Center students must not only
learn the blindness skills needed to cope with the physical loss of
eyesight, but they must also adopt new positive attitudinal concepts to
replace the stereotypes that both they and society accept about
blindness. To accomplish these goals, students receive training that has
four objectives:

• Learn efficient and effective blindness techniques.

• Develop self-confidence and a positive attitude about blindness.

• Learn how to deal with public misconceptions about blindness,
including those of family, friends and employers.

• Develop strong work habits and appropriate social skills.

Training in Efficient and Effective Blindness Techniques

To learn the skills they need to function competently, efficiently and
comfortably, our students take eight hours of classes each day covering
home and personal management, cane travel, communications and industrial
arts. They learn non-visual techniques for cooking, cleaning, doing
laundry and sewing. They learn to use a long white fiberglass cane to go
up and down stairs, walk along sidewalks, cross busy streets and take
public transportation to wherever they wish to go. They practice reading
Braille and writing it with a slate and stylus, and they become
acquainted with such assistive technology as computers equipped with
speech synthesizers. They become comfortable with tactile measuring
devices and power tools, and then they choose a project of their own
that could involve woodworking, metalworking, welding or engine repair.

The training provided in each of these classes is rooted in the
structured-discovery method of instruction. First developed to provide
more effective instruction in the area of independent cane travel to
blind persons, this approach has been proven to be superior to the
guided learning approach used by traditional orientation and mobility
instructors, who themselves are usually sighted persons.1 In guided
learning --- commonly called route or point-to-point travel --- the
instructor continually provides very specific instructions and feedback
while closely monitoring the student visually. Teachers place strong
emphasis on rote learning, ensuring safety and maximizing the use of
residual vision. As a result, students do not develop the ability to
generalize what they have learned and become too dependent on the
instructor for help. Students are not expected to solve the problems
they encounter independently or to apply what they have learned in one
lesson to another.

The structured-discovery approach to travel training, on the other hand,
is based upon the concept of training teachers of the blind to teach
their students the same non-visual techniques that have proven to be
most successful by blind persons. Cane-travel students are first given
specific instructions that will allow them to master such basic
techniques as holding and arcing the cane. The focus then quickly shifts
to generalized instruction that emphasizes problem solving by providing
the students with only minimal information, forcing them to rely upon
themselves to explore their environment and gather and process the
information they need to move about safely, freely and efficiently.
Through this method, students learn more, retain it better and develop
greater confidence in their own ability to travel independently.

Through the implementation of the structured-discovery method of
teaching, the center emphasizes the use of alternative techniques of
blindness, high expectations and the development of self-confidence and
problem-solving skills. Blind students with residual vision and sighted
students training to be instructors receive lessons under sleepshades,
or blindfolds, from instructors who are either blind or who have also
received intensive blindness training under sleepshades. Students are
encouraged to rely upon their own ingenuity when they encounter a new
problem or situation instead of turning repeatedly to the instructor for
guidance and reassurance. After being taught a basic set of techniques,
they are asked to experiment, explore, solve problems and apply what
they have learned in one project to another as they move through a
progressive series of more and more challenging activities. Once shown
how to boil and drain pasta for one recipe, for example, they are
expected to figure out how to apply that training to the cooking of not
only pasta but of any food that must be boiled and drained. As a result,
they develop confidence in their own ability to solve problems and to
use techniques that will be effective no matter what level of vision
they have.

Developing Self-Confidence and a Positive Attitude About Blindness

Through learning and practicing their problem-solving skills, students
develop confidence in themselves and a more positive attitude about
their blindness. As a result, they raise the expectations they hold
about their own capabilities, leading to vocational goals that are more
fulfilling and more likely to be achieved. The learning of skills and
the development of self-confidence and a positive attitude are
inextricably intertwined. A student who walks around the block alone for
the first time becomes eager not only to advance to crossing streets but
also to take his or her children to the park after completing the
center's training program.

Developing self-confidence and a positive attitude about blindness are
critical to a student's progress. Without self-confidence, students will
not use the blindness skills they have learned, and without a positive
attitude they will cling to the negative misconceptions and stereotypes
about blindness. The vast majority of students begin their training with
very negative attitudes about their vision loss. Often, many of them sat
at home for years --- cared for by their friends and families --- rather
than admit that they are blind, especially if they still have some
remaining vision. Sometimes they will refuse to recognize that blindness
has had any detrimental effect on their lives, even though they no
longer read, drive, work, go out or take care of their homes. Many
believe that the adjustments they have made --- limited as they are ---
are the best that can be made under the circumstances. Others look for a
quick fix, usually through technology, so that they can ignore the
devastating effects blindness has had on their lives. Lacking
self-confidence, they avoid taking risks because they fear failure and
do not expect success.

Self-confidence is a difficult concept to define. Self-confident people
have positive, yet realistic, views of themselves and their situations.
They trust their own abilities, have a general sense of control in their
lives and believe that, within reason, they will be able to do what they
wish, plan and expect. They take risks and remain positive even when
they fail. Because they accept themselves, they do not feel the need to
conform just to be accepted by others.

Adult students at our center have defined self-confidence in a variety
of ways, as evidenced in a group discussion held on September 15, 2003.
One student said that it is what allows you to walk instead of crawl
through life. Another said that self-confidence is knowing that you are
capable of doing things with dignity, like taking public transportation
and going through a buffet line without a mishap. A third said that it
is what allows you to participate fully in school, work and the other
things in life. A fourth student put it best: "You know you have
self-confidence when you can trust yourself to figure out how to
overcome successfully the fears and challenges you must face every
day."2

The development of self-confidence and a positive attitude about
blindness are linked. Students must learn that they and not their
families, friends or society as a whole should control their attitude
about themselves and their blindness. In his 1982 book, Strengthening
Your Grip, Charles Swindoll described the importance of attitude this
way:

"The longer I live, the more I realize the impact of attitude on life.
Attitude, to me, is more important than the past, than education, than
money, than circumstances, than failure, than successes, than what other
people think or say or do. It is more important than appearance,
giftedness or skill. It will make or break a company, a church, a home.
The remarkable thing is we have a choice every day regarding the
attitude we will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past. We
cannot change the fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot
change the inevitable. The only thing we can do is play on the one
string we have, and that is our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10
percent what happens to me and 90 percent how I react to it. And so it
is for you \... we are in charge of our attitude!" (p. 126).

The development of self-confidence and a positive attitude about
blindness are the focus of every class in the center. This process is a
lengthy one, because it requires students to make a 180-degree
turnaround in their attitude. For this reason, students train in the
center for an average of six months. They must come to trust the
teachers who are demanding so much of them, and teachers must learn to
gauge the right levels of sensitivity, encouragement, prodding and
confrontation that will help each student achieve this objective.

The story of Janice is typical. Throughout her training, she struggled
with the notion that she could become competent as a blind person and as
a result had to be told constantly to keep her sleepshades down. For
their final cooking project --- a seven-course dinner --- students are
expected to write their menus and recipes in Braille, take the city bus
to the grocery store, purchase their groceries from lists they have
written in Braille, and prepare and serve the meal for their families
and friends. As she confronted this dragon, a tearful Janice became
paralyzed with fear and threatened to pack her bags and go home. Letting
her avoid this dragon was not an option, since it would undermine any
self-confidence she had acquired and make it easier for her to hide from
the next dragons she would inevitably encounter. Reasoning,
encouragement, and prodding had no effect on her. Finally, taking the
risk that she might run, as the program administrator I resorted to
confrontation and called her a quitter. At first she was angry, but
after thinking about it for awhile she decided that she had to prove me
wrong. She unpacked her bags and successfully went to the store, bought
her groceries and prepared and served a wonderful dinner to almost 50
people.

A variety of center activities help students build self-confidence and a
positive attitude about their blindness. We tell students that "a class
is a class is a class" --- that everything they do while at the center,
day and night, contributes to their training. We expose them to many
ordinary experiences that they thought no longer possible, like grilling
steaks, shopping, going to a museum or play, bowling, camping, hiking
and canoeing. Just as important as formal classes are their walks to a
local restaurant for dinner and their long conversations in the evening
about their blindness, fears and plans. Veteran students give tours to
prospective students and serve as mentors to new ones. By participating
in speaking engagements at schools, clubs and service groups, students
become comfortable talking about their blindness and develop the
self-confidence they need to educate the public.

In a discussion group we call the "Business of Blindness," we deal
directly with the subjects of our philosophy and of skill and attitude
development. An essential part of center training, the group discussion
provides students with an open environment where they can talk about
their hopes, fears and problems and where they can challenge the
prevailing negative myths about blindness and the devastating impact
these myths can have on their lives. "Business class," as one student
put it, is "the glue that holds everything together."2 Most important,
it is where they will come to accept their blindness and truly believe
those magic words: "It's OK to be blind."

As the center's program administrator, I serve as facilitator for the
class. I liken my role to that of an orchestra conductor, but sometimes
I feel more like I'm sitting on the lid of a pot ready to boil over. I
must maintain an atmosphere of openness and respect so that students
feel comfortable talking freely and sharing some of their most intimate
feelings with each other. Through questions, comments and active
listening, I guide the discussion of that day's topic. My goal is not to
give them the "right answer" but to teach them how to discover it for
themselves. After all, when they complete their center training, they
must be able to solve similar problems on their own.

To achieve this goal and maintain interest, I use a variety of formats
and media. I invite competent blind persons to talk about their jobs and
the effect center training has had on their lives. We watch movies and
go to plays featuring blind characters and we read articles and short
stories that I have gathered from magazines, journals, newspapers and
the Internet. To expose students to a variety of blindness techniques
for reading, I read to them in Braille, use readers and play cassette
tapes.

The subjects we discuss come from a variety of sources. I maintain a
large outline of resources and am always on the lookout for new items to
add to it. While I try to plan ahead, a topic may come up that needs to
be discussed immediately, such as a student's negative encounter with a
sighted family member. We may have an expert explain Social Security
incentives or a blind person talk about consumer organizations. Each
October, we talk about Iowa's White Cane Law and the effect of similar
legislation on their lives. We explore the purpose of center training so
students will have a better understanding of the program and their
involvement in it.

Gradually, students come to understand that once they have developed
self-confidence, a positive attitude and good blindness skills, the real
problem of blindness is not the loss of vision but, again, the
misconceptions both they and the public hold about it. Blindness is no
longer the controlling factor in their lives, and they begin to make
important life decisions based not on it but on their interests, talents
and abilities. Instead of being ashamed of their vision loss and the
blindness skills that represent it, they view their blindness as another
one of their personal characteristics, like their height, their age or
the color of their hair.

Dealing With Public Misconceptions About Blindness

As students begin to learn effective and efficient blindness skills,
develop self-confidence and overcome their own misconceptions about
their blindness, they become frustrated by the negative treatment they
receive from family members, friends and the general public. They grow
angry when their spouses do not let them go down the basement stairs to
do the laundry, a friend asks them not to take their cane on an outing
or a waitress speaks to their companions rather than directly to them.
Students come to recognize that there is not only a need to change these
notions and their manifestations but that they share in the
responsibility to help bring that change about.

In the center, we provide students with a variety of ways to learn how
to deal appropriately with negative attitudes and reactions toward their
blindness. In Business Class, we explore the origins of these
misconceptions and talk about the best ways to deal with them. Our
students are often surprised to learn that their own behavior can
perpetuate or help dispel these myths. We encourage family members to
visit and sometimes even to attend classes under sleepshades. Giving
tours of the center and participating in speaking engagements gives
students opportunities to practice educating the public about their
blindness. Training is frequently provided in such public settings as
malls, restaurants and parks so that students will become skilled at
handling negative public reactions to their blindness.

The ability to cope with these uncomfortable situations tactfully is
critical to future success in job interviews and in workplace
situations. Most of the students who come to the center are vocational
rehabilitation consumers of the Iowa Department for the Blind and will
either go to school or to work upon completion of their training. At
least twice a year we hold a "Job-Seeking Skills Seminar" for students
to explore careers that meet their talents, interests and abilities.
They also learn techniques for dealing appropriately with blindness
issues in the resume, in the job interview and on the job itself.

The Development of Strong Work Habits and Appropriate Social Skills

Many students come to the center with low expectations about themselves
and what they will be able to accomplish as a blind person. Lacking
self-confidence, they sometimes avoid the risk of failure by
procrastinating, getting too involved in the problems of other students
or refusing to try at all. Burdened by the low expectations of their
families and teachers, students who have been blind since an early age
have often not been expected to support themselves at all and so were
never taught the strong work habits and socialization skills necessary
for them to become fully integrated into the lives of their families,
workplaces and communities. Unless they receive training that raises
their expectations, students will leave the center only to live on the
edge of life, going through college with few or no friends, surviving on
Supplemental Security Income or Social Security Disability Insurance,
and unable to develop the social contacts so important for success in
the workplace.

Center training helps students build their expectations in a variety of
ways. We constantly remind them, both subtly and overtly, that they will
not just work but that they will do so successfully and at their fullest
potential. We treat them like adults, giving them keys to their own
private rooms and to the building that houses the center. We teach them
how to manage their own budgets and medications and to contact staff
that live in the building only for emergencies. We expect them to attend
their classes on time and to do their best in them. When necessary, we
teach them such social skills as table etiquette, ballroom dancing and
communicating in social situations. Fashion, makeup, hairstyles and
other aspects of grooming may also be covered.

We also raise expectations for students through what we call "the three
have-to's" of the orientation center. In order to participate in
training, students must agree to take all of the classes, wear
sleepshades if they have any residual vision and carry their canes at
all times. Students who do not agree to these requirements can choose
from other training options, such as individual and group training in
their home communities or attendance at another orientation center that
they feel better meets their needs. These have-to's are designed to help
students confront and overcome the biggest dragons they face as a result
of their blindness: the fear of injury, the fear of failure and the fear
of being identified by others as blind. If students are not given
opportunities to overcome their deepest fears, they will never believe
they can and they will suffer the fate of Gawaine --- being eaten by a
small dragon that leaves only their meaningless medals behind.

Students are required to take all of the classes. Orientation center
training is like a jigsaw puzzle --- the pieces must all be in place
before the whole picture can be seen. Not taking a class is like losing
one of the puzzle pieces and therefore losing the total effect of the
training. If students were allowed to pick their classes, they would
choose the "safe" ones, like Braille and computer. They would avoid the
classes where they fear injury, like burning their hands on a hot stove,
cutting off their fingers with a power saw or losing their lives to a
speeding car. Students receive individualized instruction within each
class to meet their needs. A young blind man who has never been in the
kitchen must learn both how to cook and how to use the blindness
techniques for cooking. A newly-blind woman who has prepared meals for
her family for years, on the other hand, needs only to learn the
relevant blindness skills. A diabetic student who has been sedentary for
years may need frequent rest periods as he builds up his stamina.

To help dispel the "can't see, can't do" fallacy, students who have any
residual vision must receive their training under sleepshades. In order
to determine the effectiveness and efficiency of the blindness
techniques they are learning, students must practice them constantly
under sleepshades until these skills become habitual. When they take
their sleepshades off, they can then combine the non-visual techniques
they have mastered with visual ones to their greatest efficiency. They
will also come to understand that the problems faced by the partially
and totally blind do not differ significantly. Without the use of
sleepshades, they will constantly want to rely on and attribute any
successes they may have to their remaining vision, no matter how poor
and inefficient it may be. Those students who have the most success are
the ones who have the maturity to see the relevance of sleepshade
training to their lives, come to understand that the degree of their
success is not contingent on the degree of their vision and replace
"can't see, can't do" with "I can do it --- I just have to figure out
how."

Finally, students must carry the long white fiberglass cane --- better
known as the Iowa cane --- at all times. To become proficient travelers,
students must constantly practice using their canes. By doing so, they
also become desensitized to public reactions to their blindness and to
being identified as a blind person. The cane then becomes for them both
a tool for safe travel and a symbol of pride and independence. Because
they can be easily hidden away, folding canes and cane holsters are not
permitted.

Students do not receive training at the center for any fixed length of
time. While the average stay is six to eight months, some students stay
fewer months and some stay more. Students themselves are responsible for
evaluating their progress and for determining when their training is
complete. As the center's program administrator, I meet with students
and their vocational rehabilitation counselors at critical times during
their stay to discuss their progress and goals and to determine if any
modifications in their program need to be made. Students usually decide
to leave the center when they can competently and efficiently use their
blindness skills, when they have the self-confidence to put those skills
into practice, when they thoroughly understand and have a positive
attitude about their blindness, and when they are aware of and able to
deal effectively with public misconceptions.

The Bottom Line

The success of the orientation center and its program can be measured
through statistics, through continued relationships with the center and
through the long-term positive effects the training has had on the lives
of former students. After completing their training, students may attend
college or a vocational training program, enter a new career or return
to a former job. The center is an integral part of the services offered
by the Iowa Department for the Blind, and the department's success in
providing meaningful services that lead to jobs for consumers is also
the success of the center itself. The figures for the 2000, 2001 and
2002 federal fiscal years tell the story. In those years, 171, 175 and
140 vocational rehabilitation cases respectively were closed
successfully rehabilitated (Status 26). Consumers who developed
Individualized Plans for Employment during those years had an over 83
percent chance of successfully getting a job. They could expect to earn
an average of over \$12.40 an hour, and about 68 percent of them would
become the primary source of support for their families.

The program's success can also be seen in the relationships that develop
when students begin their training and continue long after that training
has ended. New students notice quickly that, when they enter the center,
they soon become members of the orientation center's "family." This
membership continues after they complete their training. Center staff
often contacts former students to see how they are doing, and former
students frequently contact staff to talk about their latest news or get
some advice. Students who have shared the center experience sometimes
become lifelong friends. The center itself promotes this unity through a
quarterly newsletter detailing the activities of the center and its
graduates and through the annual Orientation Alumni Day. Each fall,
students host a day of activities for former students culminating in an
evening banquet and dance. An average of 200 people attend each year,
and many of these are some of the center's strongest supporters.

Most important, though, the center's success can be measured in the
long-term positive effects the training has had on the lives of former
students. Participation in the orientation center is a life-altering
experience for most students. When they complete the program, they find
that blindness is no longer the controlling factor in their lives. They
have internalized the truth that "It is OK to be blind," and they know
they are well equipped to slay any dragons they might encounter. One
former student put it this way:

"I had decided to come to the Orientation Center after completing my
high school education. I was led to understand that by attending this
program, it would help me to raise my GPA \[grade point average\] in
college. After being in orientation for a few weeks, however, I had
discovered that my motives were in the wrong place. This program's
purpose is not to prepare me for college, but to prepare me for life and
how to live it as a confident blind person. This program works on the
attitudes of blind people, helping them to become confident, capable
people by letting them know there is life after blindness. Although I
have been blind since birth due to cataracts, this program has helped me
form a different attitude about my own blindness, as well as other blind
people. I have learned that it is OK to be blind, because I know that it
does not make me any less of a person. The classes in the orientation
center are made up of Braille, home ec \[economics\], shop, technology
and travel. All of these classes combined are not merely to teach the
techniques of blindness, but to build confidence by the use of them. My
stay at the center has not been an easy one, but it will be one I will
take with me and use for the rest of my life."2

Notes

1\. This information is based on the author's understanding from years
of experience touring orientation centers for blind adults and studying
the subject; thus, no specific source is given.

2\. For reasons of confidentiality, the author is unable to give the
names of center students who are quoted in this article.

References

Broun, H. (April 13, 1919). "The Fifty-First Dragon." New York Tribune.

Swindoll, C.R. (1982). Strengthening Your Grip. Waco, TX: Word Books.