Accessible Test

Appropriate Intervention Techniques

Formerly: Best Intervention Techniques

(Continued)

Purpose

To provide educators and interventionists with a video that displays and discusses appropriate practices for interventions with young children who have visual impairments.

Project Staff

J. Elaine Kitchel, Project Leader

Dr. Amanda Hall-Lueck, Lead Consultant

Dr. Toni Heinze, Consultant

Carol Roderick, Research Assistant

Terri Gilmore, Graphic Designer

Background

There are many interventions and steps practitioners take when they perform functional vision evaluations on very young children with vision impairments. Today, practitioners see very complicated children who have neurological, cognitive, and physical deficits as well as vision problems. Guidelines are needed to identify appropriate practices, and to provide guidance to the practitioner who is dealing with children with disabilities that range from uncomplicated, to very involved and medically-complicated.

Dr. Amanda Hall-Lueck, an educator and researcher in the fields of low vision and early childhood, proposed and worked on this project. The resulting video/DVD is expected to be of great assistance to the practitioner who is seeking to find ways to resolve function of the visual system and lead the young child through appropriate developmental stages. The product will be primarily helpful to students who are planning to become teachers of students with visual impairments.
Drs. Hall-Lueck and Dr. Heinze videotaped interventions they performed with young children who had a wide range of abilities. Once the raw footage was obtained, Dr. Lueck wrote a script to accompany it. The footage and script were turned over to the project leader for development of a professional-style video. Dr. Hall-Lueck also developed a short sample video to use at professional conferences.
Work during FY 2009

The taped material was put into DVD Format and sent to five expert reviewers. This was done to determine the accuracy of the content, and the feasibility of using footage that was problematic due to audio and video interference. Editing of the script has been completed, but other edits are underway as cutting and film editing continue.

Work planned for FY 2010

Video clips will now be merged with story boards, introductions, credits, voice-overs and music. Editing will continue until the video is considered to be complete enough to review. The video will then be reviewed by expert reviewers. Once the review is done, suggested changes will be made and the presentation will be closed captioned and fitted with video description. It will then be duplicated and made available for sale.

Determining Appropriate Visual Reading Media

for Students with Low Vision

Formerly: Optimizing the Reading of Text

(Continued)

Purpose

The purpose of this project was to conduct basic research to determine visual accommodation needs, requirements, and strategies of students with low vision when reading passages of continuous text. With the research now done, the focus shifts to the development of a decision tree based on the results of data analysis.

Project Staff

J. Elaine Kitchel, APH Project Leader

Dr. Amanda Hall Lueck, Project Consultant & Researcher

Ian Bailey, O.D., Consulting Research Optometrist

Helen Dornbusch, O.D., Consulting Research Optometrist

Paul Bither, O.D., Consulting Low Vision Optometrist

Background

This was the third in a sequence of studies on how magnification, accommodation, and the visual reserve affect reading efficiency in students who already know how to read.

Production of reading passages was completed. The team developed comprehension questions for the selected passages and conducted pilot testing. Data were collected, analyzed and published.
The data analysis was incorporated into a report and published in the Journal of Visual Impairment and Blindness in 2006. A decision tree to help teachers and interventionists select appropriately-sized learning media for students with low vision is now being developed.
Work during FY 2009

A model of the decision tree and a User’s Guide were developed and reviewed by APH. Some pieces of the decision tree were not fully accessible when APH staff tried to open them and this problem had to be resolved. Editing began on the User’s Guide. Since the product is technically very complex, the project leader suggested that a low vision optometrist who is not involved in the development of the product, and who is familiar with the needs of teachers, review the product for feasibility and usability. This review has been set-up and will take place in October 2009.

Work planned for FY 2010

The user’s manual will be completed, edited and formatted after the expert review is complete. A CD of both the decision tree and the manual will be developed for purposes of accommodation. Once these processes take place, the project will go into production phase. It is planned for this project to be completed in FY 2010.

Developmental Guidelines for Infants with Visual Impairments, Revision

(Continued)
Purpose

The authors of “Developmental Guidelines for Infants with Visual Impairments” asked for an opportunity to review the latest research and use it to update the product. The APH PARC Committee agreed that it was important to bring the product up to date and to improve the quality of the edits, so the revision was approved. The book itself provides consumers with a comparison between infants with visual impairments and infants with typical vision, their learning styles, learning needs, and appropriate interventions.

Project Staff

Elaine Kitchel, Project Leader

Frank Hayden, Technical Researcher

Amanda Hall-Lueck, Ph.D., Consultant

Laurianne Matheson, Research Assistant

Rosanne Hoffmann, Ph.D., Research assistant

Background

The first edition of Developmental Guidelines was made available in 1999. Since that time, significant research has been conducted in the areas of early childhood, child development, and development of children with visual impairments. The authors, Drs. Amanda Hall-Lueck, Deborah Chen, Elizabeth Hartmann, and Linda Kekelis requested the opportunity to update the material in the book.

Work during FY 2009

The data collected from expert review underwent analysis. Literary and usage editing were conducted. The text and photos were laid out and post-layout editing was accomplished. Braille transcription and proofreading took place and all media were brought into compliance with final edits and accessibility guidelines. HTML coding was done and approved as were Braille ready files, and DAISY-compliant audio files. Files were turned over to production.

Work planned for FY 2010

Production of the new edition will take place and the product will be available for sale in print, braille, Braille-ready, HTML, and DAISY-compliant formats.