Strategies for Improving Literacy Skills_2_0
Thank you very much for having me. I'm really excited to be here today. And I'm really hoping to give the participants and people watching this presentation some specific strategies to use with their students or their children that have a diagnosis of CVI or other form of brain damage related vision loss, that hopefully will encourage literacy skills.
So I'm very, very happy to be here today. And I really encourage questions from people in the audience, as they come up. And I'll try and answer them towards the end of the presentation.
I'd first like to ask the audience if they can just let me know what their background is. There should be some choices-- excuse me, I went too far. There should be some choices there if you can click on whether you're an educator or a therapist of a student with visual impairments, whether you're a parent, or guardian, or researcher, or a student working on certification. If you can just let me know.
I'm seeing that the vast majority of you are educators or therapists of students working with visual impairments, but I do see some parents out there as well. And I welcome you all. That's really great to know. Thank you for attending.
I'd also like the audience to just let me know of their familiarity with the CVI Range and Dr. Roman's 10 Behavioral Characteristics of a Child with Cortical Visual Impairment. If you just let me know that. Are you very familiar with that? You're somewhat familiar with it? Or if you've just never heard of it? OK. Great.
OK. Almost half of you are aware of the 10 Behavioral Characteristics and have heard of the CVI Range. Others are less familiar. And the reason why I ask is because this isn't going to be a presentation about cortical visual impairment and about what the characteristics are for children in phase one, phase two, or phase three. I'm hoping that you have a background on that.
I'll try and be aware of those people that checked the somewhat familiar box and give you a little bit of background. But really, if you want a good clear background on what the CVI characteristics are, take a look at Dr. Roman's book Cortical Visual Impairment by Dr. Christine Roman. And read up on it. This is one of your best sources that you're going to be able to use to find out information on that.
Or take a look at last month's Perkins presentation by Ellen Mazel. It was recorded on June 27. She talks about strategies to use with students functioning in phase one, phase two, and phase three. Or you can go to various places on the web to learn a little bit more about strategies to use and what phase one is when children are just beginning to use their vision. What phase two is, students that are using their vision for some functional purpose. And phase three, students that are resolving behavioral characteristics. But there are many places on the web that you can go to.
There's a really great site here at our Texas School for the blind and visually impaired, tsbdi.edu. It has some CVI web exercises. And in fact, I'm in there talking about strategies to use for the three phases of CVI. And there's various other places on the web, as well. And I encourage you to learn more about it.
This presentation is going to be divided in two parts. I'm going to, basically, be talking about strategies for pre-readers, and strategies for beginning readers. For the students that are in phase two, high phase two, and in phase three, a lot of the strategies for pre-readers are going to work for them very well. Generally, kids that are in phase three would be focused on, for the beginning reader skills that I'm going to be talking about.
Really, those pre-reading skills that can be started to work with kids even in phase two have to do with print motivation, direction, motor skills, print awareness, rhyming and phonological awareness, letter knowledge, matching, narrative skills, and vocabulary, among other skills. So be aware of those. I'm going to try and give you a suggestion or two to use for each one of those pre-reader skills that kids need to be aware of.
First of all, print motivation that's probably one of the biggest things that you need to be aware of. Kids need to be really excited, and happy about reading, and really get jazzed up when you bring out the books. So you need to make sure that book reading time is fun. You need to really ensure that you're using CVI friendly strategies. And I'm going to be talking about CVI friendly strategies throughout this presentation.
Keep your reading time short but do it often throughout the day. See if you can integrate it into everyday routines that you do with your child throughout the day. Create books that are predictable, something recognizable on every page. And I'll talk more about that throughout this presentation, because really, what happens is you have to create your own books.
They're not out there. Each child has their specific things that they cue in on, that they're attracted to, they are familiar with. And you really have to make your own books to do that. And bring in tablet technology to create your own custom books of high interest for your child or your students.
And one way that you can do that is, early on, if you find in phase one that your child is really attracted to Elmo-- and I'm going to be using Elmo as an idea throughout this presentation. But really, I've had students that are attracted to Big Bird, bright yellow.
I've had students that are attracted to Barney, solid color purple, or Clifford The Big Red Dog. This idea and this concept can be used with whatever it is that the target that the child is really attracted to. But I'm going to be using Elmo throughout this presentation. But it can be replaced for your student's favorite target.
So say your child is attracted to Elmo early on in phase one. You might want to tie a piece of Mylar ribbon around its neck. And you're going to be using that later on as they enter into phase two, and even into phase three. But for example, they really focus and attend to Elmo. They get very good at it during phase one. They're entering into phase two. Elmo, say, is a really strong target, a favored target.
So what you might do to start encouraging some pre-reading skills is buy three or four Elmo books like this. The inexpensive ones that are paper covers. You're going to be cutting them apart. I never thought that I would say that about books, because I love books. But you're going to be cutting them apart. That's why you get three or four of them.
And so to begin with you might cut out just Elmo. And take a piece of that red Mylar ribbon that you had around his neck and attach it to that first page. And all of your pages in your book are going to be about Elmo. And you're going to make up a story. So the beginning book might only have one target in it. It's simple. It's on a black page. And it's just Elmo.
Then you cut up the next book. And you're going to proceed to bringing a little bit more complexity. And you might bring in two targets, for example. And then you might make a third book, and eventually, hopefully getting to the real thing, and they'll be able to pick out Elmo. And again, this strategy can be used with whatever their favorite target is.
I know that oftentimes grandparents, and uncles, and aunts want to buy books and toys for your student. Make sure that they're aware of the types of books that might be beneficial to your child. There's not a lot of commercially prepared books out there that are going to work with children particularly in phase two.
But if they do buy books try to get ones with just one shape on them, one target for them to look at, and books that have reflective qualities in them, like this one. This is called Book Buddies. And it works very well with our students. Low in complexity. It has a favored color in it, probably, which this one does. Have red in it, or bright yellow in it. It has reflective qualities. And it has easy to turn pages that are the hard solid pages.
When the books have reflective qualities you can use light pairing techniques, or spotlighting techniques. Make sure, and have on hand, a really strong flashlight like 100 LED flashlight, like I'm showing you here. You can get these on Amazon. And you can spotlight your books in this picture that's being shown. I'm spotlighting it with an Ott lamp. But it's handy to use a high powered flashlight, because you're not connected by a cord.
So there are some reflective page books out there that have, kind of, a Mylar quality to them. And our kids seem to really benefit from those types of books. I'm going to be talking about books throughout this presentation. And I've tried to make a variety of books. I've used a bunch of different techniques to make books.
And what I have found to be most helpful in my book making efforts have been to use something that is called ProClick. And I use only the binding covers and the spine. And they're both black. The binding covers and spines are both black.
The pages, I think that they were intended to have the shiny side forward. Do not use the shiny side forward. Use the dull matte side forward in conjunction with your photos or your pictures when you're making your own books. There's a lot of advantages to this type of book making material. You can just take your scissors and you can cut the pages in half. You can cut the spines in half to work with these.
These spines just click shut. And why I really like them is in phase two, when our kids can only tolerate, maybe one target at a time, or maybe two targets, total, at a time, you can unclick the spine, pull out your two pages of the book, that-- maybe you're giving the child a choice of two toys and you're wanting them to touch upon the page that shows the choice of the item that they want to play with, and then you're going to give them the real toy. But then you can put the page back in its spine, and clip it back back together with all of the other toys pictured in your book. So I really like this technique.
And again, it's called ProClick and you can get it at Office Depot. I've used heavy black matte paper that you punch the holes in to put your spines in. It's not as kid friendly. These are sort of plasticized, so that drooling-- or if they put it in their mouth, they really hold up. They really stand up to kid treatment.
I've also created my own books, not only with ProClick, or with black matte paper. But I also use tablet technology to create my own books with apps such as Pictello, and Book Creator. And I custom make those books.
You're going to have to custom make the books, because there's certain favored targets that each child really loves, and they really tend to. And then you can create stories and books around those favored targets.
Every child is different. Every child is going to have a favored target that's a little bit different. When I was first creating this book for this child, who knew he really loves The Oball rain stick by Oball. And it does not have the qualities that you would think that a child with cortical visual impairment would attend to. But this is what his favored target was.
Probably early on it was the auditory quality and then later on it was the visual quality. He was so used to looking at this favored toy that once his vision developed and came along this is what he tuned into.
And so we would make books around his favored toys, which this was one of them. And I never would have known that unless I had a talk with the parent and really understood, exactly, what it is at home that he uses his vision for.
So communication between the home, and with the parents, and caretakers is really, really important when you're working on literacy skills. And this was really a helpful toy for this particular student. And I never would have guessed that it would have been an Oball.
But by the way, as a side note, I found quite a few kids with cortical vision impairment that really like the Oball products. And it's just a side note. I'm not sure why. But that's what's happening. That's what I'm seeing.
With that tablet technology, what particularly with this Pictello program, you can take photos of your favorite targets on the iPad, and then bring them into this program. And you can record your own story.
You can record concepts about each one of the targets that you've got in there. I usually talk about the salient features of the products. And now that I'm looking at this, this picture up here isn't exactly the Oball, but it has the Oball in this story, and it's similar to the Oball, as well.
OK. I'm going to show you a clip of a little boy that is in phase two. And I'd like you to note a couple of things as you're watching this clip. This child that's in phase two really needs a strictly controlled environment, including black background. I use the Invisiboards from APH quite often, or just black sheets.
When his mom is working with him you'll note that she's wearing a black cape to create contrast between the target that she's showing him so that it really stands out. We've turned the student away from the windows.
We've reduced the overhead light level. The walls are plain. We've reduced the noise. The child's only given two choices at a time. That's about what he can tolerate right now. He still needs one or two targets at a time. But that's getting better with him.
And when the choice is made-- really note this-- he's encouraged by the mom to reach out and grasp it. She was working with food. And she doesn't just put the food right to his mouth. She sets it in front of him, and waits, and encourages him to reach out and grasp the food.
He has to look at it, and reach for it, and grab it. And you know, we've used some spotlighting techniques in this clip. And please note the distance the target is from the child. He still needs it within about 24 inches, or within arm's reach. OK. Let's take a look at this clip now.
[SNEEZING]
Oh, bless you. Bless you.
OK. We turn off the overhead light.
OK.
Which ball do you want to play with? The big ball, or the small ball? Big ball that has the rain-maker rattle, or the smaller ball. Can you touch one?
[BABBLING]
Which one do you want to play with?
[BABBLING]
OK. OK. Thank you for letting me know. There it is. There it is.
[BABBLING]
Nana, nana. More banana. Here you go.
[BABBLING]
Here it is.
[BABBLING]
Nana. Banana. Ba--
[BABBLING]
Juicy. Here you go. Some more juicy. Juicy. Take a break. Take a break. Breathe. Juicy.
[BABBLING]
You know, one of the things that she was wearing in there is a cape. I would encourage everyone to get, like, a nurse's cape. This one happens to be in cotton. And it just snaps at the front.
It really is helpful to have the instructor or the parent to have a cape like this handy that you can just change into really quickly. And it helps to create contrast between you and the target that the child is taking a look at.
Direction is an important concept for pre-readers to learn. Left, right, top, bottom, front, back. The tote book that is in the APH tote kit has some good suggestions in there. And there's many other ideas out there to teach direction to kids.
One of the things that I found for motor skills, working with motor skills, is our kids have a hard time turning pages of a book. If you take the bumpers, the little clear plastic bumpers that you would put behind picture frames that you hang on the wall, and put them between each page up in the upper right hand corner it helps separate those pages and gives little fingers a chance to get behind those pages and turn them a little bit more easily, and work on those motor skills.
Motor skills also come into play when you're using books on the tablet. It's really hard to find those triangles that are at the top of the page, particularly with Pictello. And what I've found that is if you get something called a Fling-- I'm sure they're for some kind of gamers that play different games. I'm not sure, exactly, how they use them.
But this is how I use them I would take a piece of red Mylar contact paper, and cut a circle out of it. Or some new things that are out there is this red, shiny, glittery fabric that you can get at Hobby Lobby cut a circle out of it, and glue it on the top of the Fling.
The Fling then is attached to your iPad where the little triangle is. Kids typically have a hard time finding that little triangle to press. But if you can attach this Fling it's much easier to swipe your hand, and press on this red Mylar target here. Let's take a look. In the next clip that I'm going to show you I've just introduced this fling way to turn pages to this student. And you can take a look at how we've done that.
Would you like to see another picture.
Yay. Yes. Let's have Miss Diane help you. Let's touch them together. There's your ball! Good job! Yay!
[CLAPPING]
Good job! Should we see another picture?
[BABBLING]
Should we touch it together?
Should we touch it together? Let's touch the red spot and see the next picture.
Look here. We touch it together.
Do you see I'm trying to do a hand over hand?
Then he doesn't break it. Yeah.
Yeah. And I would much rather try and do a hand under hand--
Then it will--
Let's touch.
[GASPING]
Yay. Oslyn, good job. Yay.
He's really made a lot of progress, that little young man. I'm really pleased with him. Print awareness. Kids need to understand that print on a page represent words that are spoken. They need to know how to follow words on a page, and how to hold a book. Again, let's use a favored target as an example here, like Elmo.
When you start writing out words to kids, point out the salient features of words. For example, for Elmo, when I started working with one of my students with recognizing the print word, Elmo, I talk about the capital E at the very beginning of the word. And we talked about how it sort of looks like a table on its side, and it has three legs sticking out.
And so always point out those salient features. And then keep that description of the salient features the same so that when you transfer over to the book that has Elmo in it, with each of those words, one word on each page, you can talk about those same salient features in those words on those pages.
Here, for rhyming and phonological awareness I talk a lot about families, word families, or groups of words that have similar salient features and patterns. In this example that I'm giving you I was discussing with my student the family of A-T words. And we talk about the shape that A-T makes when it's in a word.
And so we created a book about Elmo again. Elmo's cat, Elmo's hat, Elmo sat. And so they can pick out that salient feature of the shape of the A-T words in each of these pages in the book. And again, I used Pictello create this book using the A-T family of words.
Letter knowledge. Make sure that you if you're doing some sorting with letters, any types of sorting, if you get the APH trays you can adapt them a little bit with red duct tape and red dividers in the middle. Make sure that you've got good color contrast and you take away a lot of the visual clutter from your table area.
And even before that, when you're sorting them into three or four different piles, matching, just understanding the concept of same and different, you might-- again, these bowls that I'm showing in the picture come from the tote kit. And they've got a lot of good materials in the tote kit that you can use with literacy, with our students, in the area of literacy.
And one thing that I want to point out I use quite often is a black mat. And this black mat is really called a Drymate gas grill and deep fryer mat. It's for out in the backyard under your gas grill. But it has a nonskid backing. It can be thrown in the wash. It's perfect size to set up on a table. And I just really like it. And I'm always telling people about that little thing that I use.
Narrative skills. With our kids that are in regular classrooms we often use felt board stories to create stories. And really this doesn't work with our kids that have a diagnosis of cortical visual impairment. So I use, oftentimes, the all in one board from APH and then create my own stories with their favorite targets. And I put Elmo up here, and real balloons. You can connect them with Velcro.
And just create your own stories with their own favored targets. And ask them open ended questions. What's going to happen next? What do you think is going to happen in the story? Those types of things. Vocabulary. You know, make sure that you discuss the salient features of all objects in particular.
And for example, if you're trying to talk to them about a spoon you might discuss the salient features of that spoon. That it's white. That it has a bowl-ish type of a thing on one end. And then when you introduce the word, you might be talking about that there's two O's together in that word. And you might outline them in red and talk about how they look like two eyes.
And then when you come upon that word during everyday routines, such as you pull out your box of spoons forks and knives for going on a picnic, you might point out, oh, there's that word? What is that word again with the two O's in it? Relate it to everyday things that are happening in your environment.
Strategies for beginning readers. Once those pre-reading skills are mastered, and the student is resolving the behavioral characteristics, and they're in phase three, more of a formal reading program can be considered or introduced.
You need to take a look at the most current functional vision evaluation and learning media assessment so that you can determine the best font that the child uses. I've been very happy using just Ariel.
Or APH has a font that you can download. They don't have a lot of curlicues on them, and it's just plain. You need to determine the most appropriate print size. I've found that 18 to 24 or point font works best, but your student might need larger or smaller.
Determine the placement of materials. Is it over to the left? Over to the right? Central? Is it flat on the table? Which it usually isn't. Is it up on a bookstand? Usually, it is. Do you need to use supplementary lighting, such as spotlighting or backlighting? Or what type of blocking materials would you use?
With your supplementary lighting, APH offers a nice, natural light that you can order from APH. I've found that I really like the OttLites very well. There's one that's battery operated. And there's one that plugs. I've had a lot of success with them. And they're very durable. And of course, I've shown you my flashlights. But you can also use just a high powered flashlight that you'd get from Lowe's or from Home Depot.
In this picture we were using an OttLite. It really helps this particular student focus on the target of interest. And you need to make sure and watch out for glare. Raising materials up on a bookstand is very helpful. And the bookstand helps to alleviate some of those issues with glare. Use of blocking materials are going to vary.
My favorite blocking materials that I use are just simply black paper that you take and you cut windows out of depending upon the size of the targets that are on the page that the child's looking at. But there's many other different window markers and blocking materials that you can use, in addition to a bright line marker from APH that you can order. Sometimes these are helpful for our kids.
But [INAUDIBLE] what we've found to be most helpful of all are the window [INAUDIBLE] personally, out of heavy black paper. Do not laminate them. They create glare if you laminate them. Keep it flat, black paper that does not create glare. OK. I'm going to show you a short clip of this student using blocking materials right now.
Elf.
Elf.
That's lean. Lean. A. And. Land.
Good for you.
Else land.
Else land wait a second. This is the name of something. So they had to capitalize both letters, and I wanted you to be familiar with it--
Is it the entire page, again?
No, it's not. But I'm hoping that you can catch it in the story, when we read the story.
Dad.
Do it again.
It is late, said Dad. Go to sleep.
What was his boy's name again? Let's break it from left.
"Gu-lane." "Glan"
Glenn. Glenn. His name is Glenn.
Went to sleep.
So Glenn went to sleep. And remember what the story's titled? What's the title of the book?
This young student that was in that clip-- also we use a lot of just using the fingers along with the markers and the blocking devices. There's lots of ways that you can use to create more white space. And I've got them listed here. But creating more white space is oftentimes crucial for our kids.
When there's too much print on a page you've got to break it down and figure out how you can create more white space. Here's a variety of techniques. I'm going to be moving fairly fast, because I have a lot still to share with you.
Photos. Be careful about the type of photo that you use when you create books. I've found it's most successful in the beginning, particularly in phase two, to use color photos of favored targets. And to do that you need to work closely with a parent or caretaker to figure out what the favored targets are. You can either use it in black and white or color. But I've had most success with color.
It really helps kids move from recognizing the 3-D target to a 2-D target, the picture of it, and that it can be represented in a book or on a tablet. But I found that the best thing is to photograph that favored target against the black background and really have high, sharp, good contrast.
You can use black and white illustrations. The student that was in the video clip that I just showed now responds very well to black and white illustrations. But look at that illustration. It's very plain. It's very simple. So any program that you choose, you need to really make sure that the pictures are simple and that the child can identify what is in them, what is in the pictures.
Color illustrations, make sure that you cut out a lot of the clutter that's in them, especially when you create your own books, like I did with this Elmo book that was specially created for a student.
Kid's in phase three still have difficulty with complexity. The student that was just shown in the clip actually created a book herself with my help. And she wanted to take a picture of her cat.
Well, she took this picture of the cat but she's unable to see the cat in the picture. There's too much complexity. So be very careful about your photographs that you use in your books to make sure that the target really stands out. I'd like to show you this video clip with some pictures in it right now.
Where do you think they're going to go?
To Elf Land.
So--
[INAUDIBLE] on in Elf Land.
Yes. And what did we call these things up here?
Trees.
Let's take a look at the iPad, Zoey. Take a look at the iPad, sweetie. Take a look at the iPad.
Ooh.
What was this word for those things?
Plants.
Plants. What do you think is happening in this picture?
Much closer. That Dad is helping that little boy get tucked in to it.
You're right.
Bedtime.
You're right. I think that that's exactly right. He's in his bed. And here's his blanket. Here's his pillow. And his dad telling them to-- probably tucking them in, and getting ready for bed. So let's see what's going on.
It is--
So for this student, black line drawings are easiest to interpret. And what I've done is I highlight key characters consistently throughout the story. So for this little boy in the story his hair is highlighted in yellow. And I've done it throughout the story. It's very easy for her to locate that boy throughout the story.
I use Sharpie pens, highlighters, markers a lot to draw attention to specific key features. I use highlighter tape quite often. But the two biggest things that I use most frequently are a yellow highlighter pen and a red Sharpie. And there's different ways that you can use that.
For example on this picture here I just am highlighting the outline of the cat. And I've talked about the salient features of these words. The A-T is outlined. And I don't know that you can tell it very well, but it was when I was talking about the shape that A-T together makes. And we were talking about that family of words, the A-T family of words.
I want you to look at this McDonald's, and how McDonald's has been so brilliant. They have paired color, bright, bright yellow with a specific symbol that we know of as the golden arches, or the M. And this pairing has a synergistic effect. And it helps the child identify the target or the object.
Even with kids in phase three they have difficulty with distance viewing. Still, in phase three, they have difficulty with distance viewing. But I've heard parents say time and time again, but you know what? It's really interesting we can be 200 meters away from McDonald's and the child can spot the McDonald's coming up.
And that's golden arches. It's the combination of the color with the memorization of the shape. And you can use that same idea when we're using literacy, and taking our Sharpie markers, and making sure that you're using those colors and shapes together to point out specific things to our children.
OK. Try to use tablet technology in conjunction with your chosen literacy program. And you can do it in a variety of ways. I've used book creator to create books and then convert it to iBooks. And then I email that iBook home to the parent. They download it onto their iBook. And then they're able to follow through with practice at home. And take a look at this clip right here that we've got coming up.
The A says its name because of the I.
[INAUDIBLE]
Let's take a look and see what we've got here.
This? [INAUDIBLE] forgot that. He didn't know it was off.
I didn't know it was off.
"Tr-ay."
"Tr-ail."
Trail. Trail.
Let's read the whole sentence again.
The elf ran past Glenn. And went up the trail.
Here's the trail. Do you see the trail on that page?
Right here.
Yes.
And right here. Right here.
Yes. What was this word on the iPad again?
Plants.
Quit scanning.
Also, Elf Land, we had as some of our words. Elf Land. Can you find the two words Elf Land? OK. Perfect. Very good. OK. The next word that I'd like you to try-- Can you get it to erase?
I got it. We wrote the word Elf, and how about the word land?
L-A-N-D.
L-A-N-- Oops.
What happened?
I don't have enough room. When we shake it what are you going to do differently this time? This time when you write the word land. We'll start way over here. Look at the book if you forget how to spell it. Very good.
And that's just some ideas of how you can incorporate using the iPad or tablet with your literacy program. Also, take a look at choices of print and background color. These different choices were created in book creator. And let the child choose what works best for them.
I would like you to note the following. We've been using PowerPoint presentations and smart boards in conjunction with some of our students' literacy programs. And we've really had some success with some of our students.
In this next clip is a shot of a young man that's nonverbal. And he has just done absolutely tremendously well. And we're so proud of him. But I'd like you to note a couple of things when you watch this. It happens to be about mathematics. I didn't have a clip showing literacy. But we use it with literacy, as well.
We've reduced the overhead lighting in the room. I want you to notice the angle of the student. We make sure that he's using his best field of view when he looks at the PowerPoint presentation.
The distance the student is from the screen, and of course, this is all going to vary depending upon your students needs, the number and the size of the targets, and the activities, the movement and bright color of the targets against the black background, and the pattern that the cursor makes as the teacher moves it. Take a look at this clip and see what you think.
Oh. We're not getting the audio here. What is happening, he clicks to respond. The teacher is saying, which is greater or more? She's saying one, two, three, four. And then she's circling the four. And you can see those. It must have been during Halloween. There are witches there. Or one, two. And she pauses, gives him time.
He has a long latency period. And she pauses and she says, which is more? And so he's clicking. And he is saying he's ready. And then she's saying, which is more? She's waiting, waiting. Is it four? And then he is clicking to indicate that yes, it is four. And his teacher gives him praise. And she does it with a shake of the pompom.
So it's just an example of how you can use PowerPoint presentations and smart boards with our kids, even with our kids that are nonverbal. But I'll tell you what. That young man, he's non-verbal, but he communicates very, very well.
Two of my favorite programs are the Mac and Tab series, and the Edmark Reading Program. The Mac and-- excuse me. It's called Primary Phonics Series. I always call it Mac and Tab, because the first book in the series is called Mac and Tab. But it's called Primary Phonics Series. And the Edmark Reading Program.
I'd like to talk to you a little bit about the advantages and the disadvantages of-- just the advantages of it. There is black and white line drawings in the primary phonics series. The photos and black and white draw a line drawings are easy to highlight and outline. The primary phonics series have a lot of white space. And usually school districts have the Edmark program.
I'd like to just take a quick minute and see what kinds of literacy programs that you have found to be beneficial when working with your students with CVI. If you can just let us know that and share it with us.
I know I kind of sprung that on you, didn't I? And I'm not going to be real surprised if you haven't found very many literacy programs that work. And I'm not seeing any yet, because there's not a lot of them out there.
But what I'd like you to do is try some different programs and maybe email me at Strategy to see-- and let me know the programs that you've used, and whether you've had success with them. And I'm still not seeing any answers.
Oh. Reading A to Z. And I'm not familiar with it. And I'm going to try it. I See Sam. I actually have tried I See Sam. I like that little series, as well. There's little tiny books, I think, with stick figures, I think.
SWRL. And I'm not sure what that one is. But we'll give it those a try. And somebody's used Edmark before, as well, I see. OK. Great. Thank you for sharing those responses. I'm going to move really fast here because I want to have some time for some questions at the end. And I'm running out of time.
Using mnemonic devices with your students is very helpful. In our reading program I've used the Bed mnemonic device. And if you're not familiar with it you can look it up. But it's basically having the child make a bed with their fingers and picturing this picture in their head. And they can tell if they're getting B's and D's mixed up. Let's take a look at this next clip and you can see how she uses that.
D. Is it a D or a B?
D.
It's a D?
It's a D. And what does a D say? What's the--
Duh. Duh. Dream.
Dream. Dream.
Dream.
OK. Go to the next page.
There's many mnemonic devices out there that you can use. Give that a try. That seems to be very helpful for some students. Remember to reduce or eliminate distracting sensory input, when you can. And just a quick clip to show you that, let's take a look at this sensory input difficulty that this student has.
Oh. I think we're not going to get sound here again. And I apologize for that. We were working at home here. And the ice maker dropped ice. And it totally distracts my student. And also, it happened to be that dad was changing out the batteries on the fire alarm. And the fire alarm went off. I'm sorry you didn't get to have sound on that.
But the point that I'm trying to make here is that students, even students in phase three, continue to have difficulty with prioritizing and deciding which part of all of this sensory input that's coming in is what they need to focus on.
So try and reduce multi-sensory input even for kids in phase three so that they can focus on what you're trying to teach them, the visual things you're trying to teach them. I also want you to really slow down. Take some time while you're teaching your students to so that they can process what you're showing them.
And I talked about different technology, different apps to use. My favorites are Book Creator, iBooks, and Pictello. You can go to perkins.org, webinar section for some other ideas of apps for tablets to use with kids with cortical visual impairment in particular.
I'm going to let you read this on your own. I'm going to have several things on my website. And one of them is going to be a listing of materials used in this presentation. And I'm also going to have up soon, creating CVI friendly books, some pointers for you to use, as well as strategies for promoting literacy skills, and students with cortical visual impairment. And so you can go to my web site and see those things.
So I'm really hoping that I've given you some strategies that you can use to promote literacy in your students. This summer might be a good time to start collecting all these different materials, and maybe to make some books.
The most helpful strategy that I have found, regarding literacy, is that you create CVI friendly child specific books and materials. And to do that, you're going to need to create them yourself. I'm sorry there's no other way around it. They're not available for purchase on the market. You really have to create them yourself.
You've got to look closely at the child's favorite targets, especially in the beginning, in phase two, and build upon that. Make your own books out of that favored target, from what your parents report to you is the favored target, the thing that they alert to the most frequently.
Make sure and work closely with the child's parents or caretakers. I've learned more than I could possibly tell you from the parents of my students. They are the ones that really can clue you in on everything about their child. And if you're a teacher, encourage the parent or caretaker to get involved, if you're finding that these techniques work.
There needs to be carry over. It has to be done throughout the day in naturally occurring routines. It can't just be done at school for a few hours during the day. It has to be done throughout the day, throughout the child's routines at home, as well as at school.
If you're a parent or caretaker, create some of these materials and use them. Show them to your child's CVI teacher. And encourage him or her to get involved, if you're watching this and you feel that more can be done with literacy in your program.
But the most important thing about this is that you've got to create books yourself, depending upon your child's needs and and what motivates them. Robin, I'm sorry. I've talked quite a bit. Are there any questions that I can quickly answer? I know that we're getting close to the end of our time.
Thank you so much, Diane, You're correct, we are almost near the end of our time. But there's so much information that people are hungry for. And you're actually getting very kind thank yous in the Q&A, which I'll share with you later. There are a couple of questions.
This question actually came in before we saw the video of the smart board. But it was specifically about nonverbal students and whether there were any special techniques. It was great that you included that video that we could see that. Do you have any other brief comments about students who are nonverbal?
You know, kids can communicate in so many different ways. They don't have to be speaking to communicate. And I think that you have to try a wide variety of different things. Maybe I can post things on my website, some different techniques that we've used.
But kids that are nonverbal, if they're able to reach out and touch, obviously, some of those early books that we created have revolve around food, and around drinks, and different things that the child is attracted to.
And someone might say, well that's communication skills. But no that's actually that transference of-- it is communication skills, but also being able to go from a 3D object, the cup sitting in front of them, to a 2D representation in a book format. And that leads to future literacy skills.
So that young little boy in phase two was communicating beautifully by touching the pictures, on both the iPad and the pages of the book, and then my other student by clicking in response to different things. Thanks for asking that question.
And then just kind of a technology question. A lot of people are very interested in the iPad and the tablet technology. Do you have a recommendation, if someone were going to purchase a tablet, is there thoughts about how much memory you should allocate for these kinds of apps and approaches? Or do they take up the same amount as any app?
You know when I got my iPad-- I'm not that clever in the area of technology. And I rely on my husband and my kids to help me quite a bit. But I got a lot of space on my iPad because I knew I was going to be using it quite a bit for these different programs. And I told you the three that I liked the best. And there's lots of different sites out there that talk about different apps to use.
But I think that you need to be careful about how you use the iPad. I use it in conjunction with a wide variety of other things. It isn't a one shot does everything miraculous tool. I think it is pretty miraculous. And I love the backlighting qualities of it. But make sure you use it in conjunction with your other literacy programs that you've got.
And I can't tell you-- I don't even know what the terms are, but I got 32 something or other in my iPad, rather than what we--
[LAUGHING]
That's one of those terms. Yes. 32.
Yeah, one of those terms.
So that's toward the middle range.
Yeah.
We are at the end of our time. And you'll start to see some people drop off. So I want to make sure I get the opportunity to thank you properly, Diane, for sharing your information with us. Diane's web site is Strategy To See.
A special thank you to Cheryl Sokalaski, Ron Joe Baron. Everyone at region four who sponsored this presentation and supported us from Texas. Thank you so much. It was really key to being able to put that together.
Perkin's e-learning webinars are recorded. And you'll be able to find this recording, as well as a PDF of this PowerPoint so that you can refer to it. It's a lot of information on the slides.
Diane is also providing a couple of other hand outs, which we will post, as well, comparing some of the brands that she demonstrated, and some of the programs that she named by their brand. Join us next month. You'll start to get some information about the August webinar coming up.
Please do give us your feedback within the survey when you receive our thank you email. It's extremely important to us to here what kind of topics you want to know more about. And people you'd like to hear from. From all of us at Perkins School For The Blind in Watertown, Massachusetts, my partner Phong and I, this is Robin Sittons, and have a great afternoon.
Thank--