Visual Impairments Factsheet (for Schools) (for Parents) (2024)

FAQs

What do people with visual impairments struggle with? ›

Vision loss can affect one's quality of life (QOL), independence, and mobility and has been linked to falls, injury, and worsened status in domains spanning mental health, cognition, social function, employment, and educational attainment.

Living with low vision can be challenging and isolating, making daily activities such as reading, cooking, and navigating unfamiliar environments difficult. It can also impact one's mental and emotional well-being, leading to feelings of frustration, anxiety, and depression.

Visual Impairment

Permit lecture notes to be taped and/or provide enlarged copies of lecture notes where appropriate. Make available large print copies of classroom materials by enlarging them on a photocopier. Convey in spoken words whatever you write on the chalkboard. Read aloud subtitles when using media resources.

Volunteer together in your community. Volunteer opportunities are a great way for kids to learn work skills. Connect with other families and build relationships with other students and adults who are Blind and Visually Impaired. Share your struggles and concerns and find out what others are doing well.

Alter the physical environment of the classroom.

o Allow the student to move to the place where they can see and/or hear best. o Be aware of the lighting, more or less may be necessary. o Do not teach in front of a window, glare can be a problem. o Re-orient the student whenever physical changes are made.

Students with visual impairments: Have limited ability to learn incidentally. This affects how they form concepts and develop schema or frameworks for understanding new ideas and vocabulary that provide essential foundation skills for comprehension and abstract reasoning.

Lack of knowledge amongst the general public combined with low expectations of what people with sight loss can achieve are considered to be the main issues. Employment is the second biggest priority for blind and partially sighted people – both getting a job and staying in employment as they lose their sight.

What are the most popular resources for visually challenged people? ›

The National Library Service (NLS) for the Blind and Physically Handicapped is one of the largest resources for adapting printed material for use by people who are visually impaired or blind.

Low vision is a vision problem that makes it hard to do everyday activities. It can't be fixed with glasses, contact lenses, or other standard treatments like medicine or surgery. You may have low vision if you can't see well enough to do things like: Read.

Options may include eyeglasses, contact lenses, and eye drops or other medicines. In some cases, surgery may be required. For instance, cataracts are often treated by removing the clouded lens and replacing it with an intraocular lens (an artificial plastic lens that requires no special care and restores vision).

Personal impact

School-age children with vision impairment can also experience lower levels of educational achievement. Vision impairment severely impacts quality of life among adult populations. Adults with vision impairment can experience lower rates of employment and higher rates of depression and anxiety.

Vision impairment may be caused by a loss of visual acuity, where the eye does not see objects as clearly as usual. It may also be caused by a loss of visual field, where the eye cannot see as wide an area as usual without moving the eyes or turning the head.

Visual impairment typically affects a person's ability to perform tasks, which in turn leads to activity restriction and potentially to reduced participation in society. Reduced social participation is a contributing factor for depression in adults with visual impairment.

People with some kind of visual impairment do lose the ability to do some everyday tasks, such as drive a car, but many individuals with vision loss still lead full independent lives. Many still go to work every day, have families, and participate in different recreational activities in their community.