Visual Impairment in the Schools
From the book Preface...This book is designed to provide a foundation for a better understanding of the structure and function of the eye and common eye disorders in children, and approaches to assess and enable students with low vision to maximize their visual learning in educational programs. The book is primarily designed for students who are preparing to be teachers of children with visual impairments and practicing teachers who want to update their knowledge concerning children with low vision. It is also intended for use by orientation and mobility instructors, special education and regular classroom teachers, support personnel, and parents who desire to know more about the special needs of children with visual impairments. A basic fundamental understanding of the eye and visual learning should be helpful in working with ophthalmologists, optometrists, psychologists, and other specialists who are concerned with assisting the child with visual impairment to function more efficiently. The book is also designed to provide a broad enough foundation to meet the diverse backgrounds of the personnel who work with children with low vision in educational settings, but simple enough so that the reader is not overpowered by the medical or psychological complexities.Chapter 1 describes the children with visual impairments who are the subjects of this book. Background information about demographics, terminology, and structure and function of the eye is explained so that the causes of visual impairments can be understood.Chapter 2 provides a description of the eye's early embryonic development. Protective measures for the eye and visual perceptual development from birth to age seven are delineated as a foundation for an understanding of the assessment of functional vision and its educational implications for children with impaired vision.Chapter 3 shows how the visual system is evaluated by an eye specialist. The information in this chapter is designed to help the vision teacher or other professional to a better understanding of the report of the eye specialist's examination in planning educational approaches with children with low vision.In Chapter 4, information is presented regarding the basic optics of the eye and lens systems, optical defects and corrective lenses and ocular motility problems. Many children with visual impairments have refractive errors causing nearsightedness, or alignment errors causing loss of binocular vision.Chapter 5 is an overview of the most common diseases that affect the areas adjacent to the eye or the surface layers of the eye itself. Orbital disease and abnormalities of the eyeballs, the structures that secrete tears and the outer layers of the eye are discussed.In Chapter 6, diseases of the internal parts of the eye are examined. Internal diseases are those affecting the structure and function of the enclosed area of the eye and its central nervous system connections.Chapter 7 considers vision screening to identify children with vision problems. Vision screening has proved reliable in detecting many types of vision problems among preschool and school age children. Children who fail vision screening tests are referred to eye specialists for diagnostic exams.Chapter 8 deals with the control of environmental factors such as brightness, contrast, and size of image so that the most efficient and comfortable seeing can take place.Chapter 9 describes how children with impaired vision can be enabled to function more efficiently with the proper use of appropriate optical and nonoptical devices. Training procedures are outlined for both near and distance optical devices. Chapter 9 was written by Anna Bradfield, Stephen F. Austin University, and Randall T. Jose, University of Houston School of Optometry.Teachers should find Chapter 10 to be most helpful in providing guidelines and specific procedures for the functional vision and media assessment of students. A framework for assessing the functional vision of both students who are cognitively delayed and students who are academically age appropriate is provided.The content of this book is based upon many years of experience in the classroom and in the preparation of teachers of children with visual impairments. It is hoped that this foundation will help teachers and other concerned persons to better assist their students with low vision to function more efficiently in the classroom.The authors wish to express their appreciation to several people who contributed in the preparation of this text. Special recognition is extended to Jayne Harley and Marvin Sanford for their contributions in communication, typing, and photography, and to Karen White for her work in critiquing the manuscript.Rebecca BurnettRandall HarleyG. Allen LawrenceLaRhea Sanford