ECC Family Project: Grocery Shopping at a Food Bank

Then my teacher lightbulb switched on. I quickly saw all the ECC skills that could easily be infused into this idea and I knew that I had another family project for you. I have designed this idea for children of all abilities and families of all types. 

Here's another great Expanded Core family project: grocery shopping for a food bank. I'll be honest, this is another idea that comes straight from my own life. I read an article about our local food banks and there was a profile about the families who are receiving their support. I was quite struck by this as it reminded me that for most of my childhood I was a recipient of support. I decided to look up their needed items. I made a commitment that every time I go grocery shopping this year, I will pick items to support the local food bank. 

Part one--food bank research 

 As a family, look up your local food bank and learn about it. You can be as detailed as you need to meet your child where they are. Learn about what food banks are and what needs they have. I also encourage you to have your child call the food bank and conduct an interview. You will find out what specific needs your local bank has and it works conversation skills. 

•  For moderate to typically developing students, have them use their tech skills and go online. Have them do the search on a device. I suggest a laptop so that everyone can read along with them (but you do what works for you!). 
• For symbolic level students, use real life simple pictures of a building. Use simplified language ("This is a food bank."). You can go to the site https://www.remove.bg/ and it will remove the background of a visually chaotic picture for free!

Gather your information from your research. You can have your child be the speaker (they call the food bank),  the researcher (they go online) or the secretary (they write the details and the shopping list). You can assign these responsibilities out to members of your family (this teaches career education). 

Find the food bank address in your community. Have a quick discussion about the location of the food bank (after you researched the address). Consider these questions: is the food bank in a residential place? Is it in a strip mall? Go on a map and look at the street. Is it located on a busy street or main road or a side street? Does it have a stoplight controlled intersection. This quick discussion infuses orientation and mobility skills. 

Part two-grocery shopping skills 

You have two options for this part. You can go to the grocery store or you can order groceries online. 

For both options, start with a grocery list. You can have this in Braille, large print or pictures. 

• Option A:You can have a bit of fun with this part if you have the time. Start with your grocery list and play a type of the price is right with it. I do this a lot with students and it is super fun. Ask everyone to make a guess of how much items cost. This lets you know how much knowledge your child has about money skills. Then move onto grocery shopping. 
• Option B: get right to grocery shopping. For in person grocery shopping, infuse AT skills by using an app such as Seeing AI or Be My Eyes. Divide your family into teams and work on the list together. Do not just put your child at the back of the cart and drag them around the store. Keep your child actively participating by giving them a specific task. For symbolic level students, give them pictures of what they are looking for. Let them put the item in the cart. 

For online shopping, turn JAWS on so everyone knows what's going on. Your child may be inexperienced with online shopping so be partners in this effort. **If you feel overwhelmed, do this: think of one thing your child CAN do for this and one thing you STOP doing for this. It will give you some direction.

For both in person or online shopping, the payment section is a good place for your child to be actively engaged. You can use paper bills--more ideal for students who have multiple impairments or teach about using a card. I try to make sure that my students have both the card reader experience at a self- checkout and with a cashier. Go at a dead time so you don't feel rushed. 

Last but never least, do the best you can! I've had so many grand ideas fail miserably when executed in real time. The focus is a family activity that helps the community. Pay attention to how your child does--are they way off with prices? Do they seem to not have strong internet skills? Do they not know much about grocery stores? Make some notes. Then call your teacher of students with vision impairments or OM instructor to work a plan to develop these skills. Pay attention to yourself--how much did you really help your child during these activities? Did you overpower during the lesson? All children can do something. Step back and let them do things before you jump in to help (easier said than done!). 

Can you imagine if just twenty families did this activity? We would help our local communities so much! 

Teach the Expanded Core Curriculum by Writing Letters to North Pole Friends

Writing letters to Santa Claus is a very popular activity for this time of year. However, you can include a lot more kids and A LOT more Expanded Core skills if you put a twist on this popular activity and write letters to North Pole friends. 
This twist give you a handful more opportunities for skills. Here are some ideas:
Learn about the post office and writing letters free matter for the blind

Addressing envelopes (almost a lost art at this time)

Learn how to write a letter with a greeting and a closing. 

Developing and practicing a signature. 

Make choices about the friend you want to write to (I gave my students Santa, Rudolf or Frosty) and what you want to say or write to that person

Teach about weather (what type of weather do you think the North Pole has?)

Writing to North Pole friends as opposed to just Santa means you can do letter correspondence into January (feel free to pick other North Pole friends).

Give different writing prompts (It doesn't just have to be about what you want for a holiday present--you can write about different things).

Literacy, literacy, literacy! Lots of of opportunities for literacy in a project like this.

I found these super cute mailboxes at Target (there's even a light in the outside). We set up the North Pole mailbox in the office with our secretary because that's where the mail is delivered at our school. However, if you are doing this virtual or just at home as a parent you can use your own mailbox. 

I provided students with three choices for their letters. Santa, Rudolf or Frosty. I whipped up these images on Canva. Notice that I used strong contrast for the pictures to make them friendly for low vision and CVI students. My amazing para took the next leg and put the tactile items on it. We LOVE the APH Carousel of Textures kit but you can also hit up a Joanns or Michaels for some tactile paper. She didn't do the whole picture tactile rather just the critical features of each to highlight them. 

Our students could write in any writing mode that worked for them (and then received a letter in return in that mode). We received letters in Braille, large print and pictures. Now this is the cool part, we had our high school students write the Braille replies. So if you are a teacher with older students, this could be a fun project that your high school students do for younger students on your caseload! 

I wanted to include pictures of how we did the picture letters because sometimes that is tricky for folks to know how to do. The above picture is the letter from a student that uses pictures. There are Braille labels over the large print with large clear pictures. We returned his letter in the same format and signed it from Santa with the same Santa picture (plus tactile beard) as the signature. 

Now we started this by writing letters to North Pole friends (again, I meant for this to be inclusive for students who do not celebrate Christmas) but can you see where you can keep this going in the new year? You can continue to use actual letters or you can keep practicing and learn how to transfer this to digital communication such as an email or have a lot of fun and move to Twitter!

Teachers, you can make this as a kit and send it to families and then work together virtually. Parents, you can do this in your home. It's an accessible activity that practically every child can participate in. Happy holidays! 

 

Support Independence for Students with Vision Impairments with a Teacher Feedback Group

Are you loving our mugshots? These are some of the awesome people on our team getting into our new teacher feedback group. Back story: we have some new teachers, veteran teachers and new staff that struggle with knowing when and how to step back to support our students with their independence. It's a common problem. It's often an unconscious problem. People don't realize how much they are impeding our students. My team has good intentions. They have hearts of gold and they work hard but we make the same mistake: impeding independence. 

I wanted to continue to give my team feedback but I didn't want it to feel punitive or create a negative environment. Giving citations is a popular strategy for students in general education. Sometimes they are called "speeding tickets". This inspired this idea!  

I wanted to do something that I could get teacher buy in with. I created the (above pictured) "independence violation". Teachers could observe each other and cite them when they are impeding independence of our students. We all know these offenses: carrying their books, helping them open containers, serving them food, getting them whatever and not making them get up---the list could go on and on. I needed us to get present about this hinderance. We aren't doing students ANY favors by doing so many things for them especially our students who are completely blind. They don't pick up on the incidental learning. They need all these little opportunities for independence.
Again, I wanted something that empowers teachers. Feedback for instruction helps with this. But it can go wrong if not handled the right way. People can be sensitive. Fortunately my staff and I have a collaborative environment and we support each other. But....I still wanted to have fun with this. Enter my funny officer and our mugshots! The team got where I was going with this and everyone jumped on board. 

Important: I didn't want to just do negative call outs or citations. I wanted teachers to develop to learn how to give meaningful feedback. I added a section to the citation ticket that says "rectify the offense". This allows us to shift from the violation to a solution. We created a bulletin board where we post our citations/solutions and once a month we get together and review them.
We have loved this idea and the positive outcomes are far reaching. Teachers are now going to be more aware of their interactions with students. Teachers will find new solutions for how to step back. Want a copy of my citation? Send me an email and I'm happy to share. Try this out with everyone--parents, teachers and paraprofessionals. We included everyone (even my secretary) on this! Anyone who has interactions with our students was included. We are hoping our feedback group will help us move from villains to heroes! 

ECC PTA

Join us for our May ECC PTA on Tuesday, May 21! This month our topic is learning all about augmentative and alternative communication better known as AAC for students with multiple impairments and blindness. This is another free meeting for our parents, related servers and teachers. We are very happy to have Breana Cannon as our special guest presenter. Breana is a speech language pathologist and also serves on our augmentative communication team. She has a fantastic understanding of  students with multiple impairments. Read this post late? No worries! You didn't miss out. You can still access the recorded webinar by registering:  https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdMdsZtaqYrpVrGtpHxt7uNKSo6aWBIUqw9ozkyR1Z4wkX_dQ/viewform?usp=sf_link

Join the ONH Discussion Group!

Join us for the ONH Discussion Group! The ONH Discussion Group is a free resource group to learn about optic nerve hypoplasia (ONH). We increasingly see more students with ONH. ONH is another spectrum vision impairment. Many of us in the vision impairment education community struggle to understand the educational implications from ONH. 

That is why I created the ONH Discussion Group! Come and learn in our free Zoom meetings about resources, strategies and information about ONH. Each month we have a different topic related to ONH. Parents, teachers and related servers are all invited to join and contribute to the group. 

Join the distribution group email: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe6MGUdqsFd8ho59kCqd-Kb5SfWF3f6iUBWJ2KTZe4nX7-AZw/viewform?usp=sf_link . The distribution group email will send updates and meeting information for monthly Zoom meetings. We also have an ONH Google Drive resource folder.  

Join us!

ECC PTA: A PTA for the Expanded Core!

Graphic that says ECC PTA on a chalkboard with school books. 

A PTA for the ECC? What? Why? How? YES! A PTA for the ECC!! I wish I had a better title but I don't because everyone knows that a PTA is and I can't risk too many unknowns in this new startup PTA.

Why an ECC PTA? Because we need more when it comes to partnership with providing Expanded Core instruction! Parents, family and home life are such an integral part of teaching the Expanded Core and it is one of our weakest areas. We need to find ways to strengthen it. There is so much authentic learning that happens outside of the classroom or an itinerant's janitor's "office". The Expanded Core is our key to living a thriving, meaningful life. We must find ways to connect our 9 areas to parents, the living room, the mall, friends, sports, restaurants---everywhere! We as teachers need more help. We need our parents and families to become true partners in ECC knowledge. Too much is on the line for our students. Our educational model is kinda working. We need to do better. We have to think outside the box on how we reach everyone--teachers, students and parents about the Expanded Core. Viola! We have an ECC PTA! The sole purpose is to provide blindness specific skills and intensive Expanded Core information, resources, training and build a community for our families. The unemployment/underemployment rate for people with vision impairments is still between 70-80%. We can change that statistic! The Expanded Core is a major player to change that statistic! We have to do things differently because too many good, smart, talented students with vision impairments grow up to sit at home and do almost nothing because they don't have the developed skills to live a thriving adult life.

Parents, I invite to take a good look at your child and see if they have the Expanded Core embedded in their lives. This does not mean that your child is perfect. I am a mom. My kids are not perfect. I do my best to teach them, encourage them, hold them accountable, etc. I know that my kids will not listen to me all the time and need others "in the village" to teach them. I tag others in at times to be the teaching piece I cannot be because I am the natural enemy. But the difference between my kids and your kids is that my kids have incidental learning. They can see things and learn by watching even when it is not intentional. All students with vision impairments need the ECC because it fills in the missing pieces when incidental learning isn't happening. It is not a reflection of poor parenting.

We opened our ECC PTA up to all of our divisions--from babies to post high and then we thought bigger. We opened it up to outside of Utah. We have some live sessions where we meet together but we also are creating an format where a lot of it is a digital community. We are recording webinars, newsletters, interactive pieces for sure but something that would allow parents to be involved no matter where they are.

Our ECC PTA doesn't have major time commitments. There is no fundraising or selling popcorn. It is established for the purpose of building a community for our families. It doesn't matter if your child is typically developing or has additional disabilities. The Expanded Core still applies to you no matter what!

The first thing we covered is to learn what the Expanded Core is and why it is critical that parents/guardians understand it. If you are new to my blog, that is the first thing you need to do. Read more posts on the ECC, email me for my tip sheets or do a Google on the Expanded Core Curriculum for students with vision impairments.

The second thing is to have a resource toolbox. My blog is just one tool. Your TVI is another excellent tool. I also suggest to invest in the book ECC Essentials from AFB Press (sold by APH on APH website or Amazon. I'll link it!). We will have a book club posting on this in a few weeks. I also facilitate social media on the ECC. Follow 9MoreThanCore on Facebook and Instagram (same name, different content).

A picture of the cover of the book ECC Essentials

Amazon link: https://www.amazon.com/ECC-Essentials-Teaching-Curriculum-Impairments/dp/0891284982

Shop APH Buy at Shop APH

Last but never least, join the ECC PTA! Click here for the registration link. 

Teach the ECC at a Cowboy Dude Ranch!

 Yeehaw!! Howdy partners, let's teach the Expanded Core Curriculum out on the range!  We spent four days at the Rocking R Dude Ranch and got country strong on our ECC skills. Many programs look to do a variety of programs for our students. Going to a dude ranch was a first (but definitely not a last) for me! First, let me tell you that this was not designed to be any kind of luxury country getaway for students. I wanted students to dig in their boots to cowboy life with the ECC. It was a hit! Each day we did real chores (emphasis on the word "real"), spent time developing true global concept development and we had some serious fun! Students had to brush and prepare their horses, lead them to the arena and then learn how to ride. They got up early to watch and be part of the early morning care with the horses (watching them with the wranglers was awesome!!).

Student brushes a horse in the early morning. 

As usual, I did receive a slightly panicked phone call from the owner when he saw that I was bringing a large group of students with vision impairments (everyone is always a little concerned...) but after our discussion, we knew that this was a good idea! Once we got there, I definitely knew it was a good idea!! I spent time reviewing activities and working accessibility needs prior to us arriving. My awesome staff spent the first day on pre-teaching alongside of the ranch staff. 

Female student sits on her horse listening to instruction from a dude ranch staff. 

Always remember to request (or bring) multiples of items so everyone gets lots of hands on to help with concept development. We had a ton of lassos, access to all the saddles, brushes, etc. so that true concept development could happen. Students didn't just touch one part of the animal. They learned about the food, its shelter, its weight, leisure activities, etc. Each group traded trivia questions that they came up with. 

Female student has roped a practice bull with her lasso while another student gets up close to a lasso with a staff member. 

My FAVORITE thing to do is to help students see how the ECC is EVERYWHERE in their lives! Repeatedly throughout the day I worked with every group about how and why their activities were ECC skills. We have definitely gone past the easy point of simply stating "this is independent living skills because I am eating," (that's just our starting point...). We really dig in to why the cafeteria is a place for ILS skills, what about what they are doing, we dig into every single aspect so that they can see how it is SOOOO much more than independent living skills because we are eating. In fact, we always discover how so many areas of the ECC can be tied to one activity. It always opens their eyes to seeing how the ECC is truly all day, everyday. 

Students are in a circle for lawn games playing a game. 

Female student walks her horse into the arena while an adult staff leads on the other side.

I loved being at the dude ranch because it allowed all of my students to connect to the world in ways many of them don't get to experience. They had to problem solve while riding their horses. They had to work their teamwork skills as they were tubing down the river. They saw how important it is to care for an animal in real time. Of course many students have had animal interactions before. But this  opportunity allowed them to go bigger and bolder. They had plenty of time as no one was rushed through anything. We even had a real rodeo where all the students (and a very slow riding teacher named Robbin) did barrel racing and pole bending. 

Female student is hands on with goats with an adult staff member

I always love doing programs in the community for a variety of reasons. One, it helps the community see ability instead of disability with our students. They learn so much about accessibility and ability of people with vision impairments. I always offer to do free trainings, leave tactile maps, etc. so I leave the facility more accessible for the next blind person.  Two, the more I do things in the community, the more my students learn about what's available in the community. Three, I hope that it creates the opportunity for my students to return to the location with their family and friends outside of a program/camp. 

a female student is on a barrel to simulate riding a bull while other students pull attached cords at the corners of the barrel for the simulation

I could go on and on about our daily activities and how fun (and so educational) they were. Our evening activities matched the day with ECC fun! We had campfires (who doesn't love a good fire and camp songs?!) as well as learning how to line dance with a live country band! I secretly love line dancing because it is such a fun way to teach so many orientation and mobility skills! 

A group of female and male teenagers stand together with their life jackets on before going tubing in the river. 

The magic of camp can continue as long as we work hard to connect skills from camp to the real world at home. This is the part that often is a negative for camps and programs for our students: it's not in the student's real world. How do they keep their skills going? Where are they going to get a horse again? Well, the horse I can't help with but the skills part I can. Even though we were at a dude ranch, I kept focusing on the take away lessons and skills. We do this every camp and program. How can you take home what you are learning at camp? How can I empower parents to help keep the magic going? We have to close the loop and help students learn to generalize their skills to other environments. First I focus on the immediate environment but then I start leading to master in many environments. It's an important part of all our programs!

Get your cowboy boots on, grab your hat and head to a dude ranch for down on the range ECC instruction!!

Use the Expanded Core to Teach Financial Literacy

A major part of independent living skills in the Expanded Core is money management. Money management skills are part of financial literacy. All youth need solid financial literacy skills for adulthood. We all know what happens when you don’t have good money skills! 

Many of our students receive ECC money management skills in terms of money identification skills. For example, folding money and using apps to identify it. However, there is so much more that our students need! Let’s incorporate the other ECC skills areas to help build a solid financial literacy skills foundation!

I recently started a distance education program with our school. The students do a majority of their learning at home and attend sessions over distance ed technology with me. They also come to campus for two full days of intensive hands on learning. 

I didn’t want to recreate the wheel with writing a financial literacy program for students. That can be super time consuming! I researched several programs and came away with a winner: Orange Owl Academy! There are several solid financial literacy programs but Orange Owl covered areas that many programs lacked. Orange Owl covered growth mindset, comparison of costs and had the most opportunities to implement ECC skills (beyond money management). 

Here’s an example of how I infused ECC: There is a section in the program where Teacher Taylor from Orange Owl asks students to think about their future home. I was able to implement transition skills, career ed and orientation and mobility into this whole session because we discussed transportation considerations, roommate living and access to work. 

Orange Owl has all videos that are accessible and a workbook. The workbook was a bit of a challenge for converting to .brf files (there were a lot of tables) but thanks to my faithful colleague, Becky who converted everything. We had a fully accessible workbook. 

We spent two full days on campus and that is where we targeted blindness specific skills. I also brought in some young adult blind mentors who helped lend some experience, tips and tricks for my students. 

The price for Orange Owl is $69.97. Our school paid for the subscription. The bonus is that our students and their family could do this together. We invited parents and siblings to do the course. The distance ed piece were weekly Zoom (like Skype) meetings. We did Orange Owl + the Expanded Core for 8 weeks. Each weeks has a theme that works with the Orange Owl curriculum. The Expanded Core piece is based on the EVALS assessment and the skills from the ECC. 

As the teacher, using the Orange Owl Academy curriculum helped me to focus on the ECC. I didn’t need to recreate the wheel with what financial skills to teach. It was a great partnering for me as I had students from all over the state participate in the program. 

Are you ready for the best news? 

I have spoken with Teacher Taylor from Orange Owl and we would love to invite more students to join! Families or schools will buy the subscription and can do the Expanded Core work with me. Please contact me, robbin.keating@gmail.com for more details. The Financial Academy can be done year round. I had some students who were able to get school credit for this. 

Here is the link for Orange Owl Academy to check out the program: https://www.orangeowlacademy.com

Make Your Own ECC Skills/Assessment Binder

Hi friends, A few weeks ago I decided to organize all my ECC assessments because I am always referencing them when writing lesson plans and activities. For every single thing I do with my students, I always reference my ECC assessments, EVALS and ILSA. I have previously scanned all my ECC tools into Google Drive and made them editable pdf files so I can use them easily. But accessing the digital files was tough when I am laying out all my resources. The answer came when I decided to compile all my ECC tools--skills, screening tools, assessments, examples of each area, etc.  into an easy to use binder. I've LOVED it! I use it all the time and all my tools are at my finger tips.

I whipped up a fun cover for my binder with an at-a-glance list of everything in my binder and hole punched all my copies. It took me about 20 minutes to make it all happen.
Here's what I have in my ECC Resource binder:
First is my areas and skills of the ECC handout that we made for our teachers. This is an at-a-glance of each of the 9 areas of the Expanded Core. This way I can always look for how each of the ECC areas can come up in school routines or activities.

Picture of the areas & skills of the ECC handout.   

I also keep several sections of EVALS in my binder.  EVALS is a comprehensive assessment for students with vision impairments developed by TSBVI. I love EVALS because it is specifically written for students with vision impairments. Too often I meet teachers that borrow from other disability groups and use their assessments. The problem with borrowing those assessments is that it doesn't cover the unique needs of students with vision impairments. Our students require a special sequence of skills. I use the Exit  Assessment (both for students that need on-going support and will not need the support). EVALS comes as a kit with other tools in it: 

• Two books of evaluations for the ECC areas
• One book of evaluations for academic subject areas for Practical Academics and Basic Skills students
• Independent Living Skills Assessment and On-going Evaluation
• TAPS Comprehensive Assessment and On-going Evaluation

Every TVI must have access to EVALS! I can't say it enough--I use it for all my planning! If you are unfamiliar with EVALS, you can read up on it (and purchase it) here: http://www.tsbvi.edu/curriculum-a-publications/3/1030-evals-evaluating-visually-impaired-students

I also keep a copy of the entire Independent Living Skills Assessment (ILSA) because I also consider it a helpful tool. I use ILSA a lot to see the sequence of skills in each section. I also like it because it has the age group target so I can look forward and backward for each group of skills. The ILSA is a little out of date with skills (like they reference using a phone book) but it still has a lot of valuable use to it. I like to share the ILSA with parents because it shows them what skills by what age are ideal for students. I often copy a few pages and send it home and ask parents to fill it out to see what kind of skills students can do at home. 

I also keep a copy of my ECC worksheet that I use with my teachers. I use this worksheet when reviewing ECC skills instruction during everyday school routines. I use this worksheet when I am planning lessons and activities. I always outline how the activity meets the areas of the Expanded Core in my lesson plans. 

Other items that I have that are not pictured are an ECC screening tool developed by Karen Blankenship. You can get the screening tool from the website EA Rubrics. Here is the link for it: http://earubric-001-site1.mysitepanel.net/ecc-needs-assessment/. EA Rubrics has a lot of valuable information for teaching the essential assessments for students with vision impairments. The essential assessments are a functional vision assessment (FVA), learning media assessment (LMA) and the ECC screening tool. 

I totally recommend that all vision professionals create an Expanded Core assessment/skills binder. It makes referencing skills and evaluating skills easy. Plus it helps me really know the areas and the skills. I have memorized several areas because I reference them often. 

Parent Mobility Resource

I am so excited to share a really great resource with you! Two of our super amazing orientation & mobility instructors have started a website all about OM skills. It has videos and lots of good tips for cane travel. The best part: it's all written for parents! The language and instruction is very parent friendly. 

This is definitely a resource you want to save and use over and over. 

Check it out: http://parentmobility.com

I love the O&M skills tab where they break down O&M skills by grades. It lets parents know according to grade level what skills are appropriate. 

The other thing that I love is that both mobility instructors, Bethany & Linda, are not just instructors but have personal ties to the field. They bring their understanding of the vision impairment community to add to the resources. 

Connect With the ECC on Social Media

Logo for the 9 More Than Core social media groups

Hello friends!
I am so excited to announce my newest project, 9 More Than Core! I wanted to find a way that ECC resources, support, ideas and discussion were more accessible to parents and teachers. My lovely school, The Utah Schools for the Deaf and the Blind, were way supportive of this new initiate. I will also have a website that is on the way!! Woot, woot for more ECC support!! You can find me on Facebook and Instagram by searching for 9 More Than Core. I am pretty faithful about posting regularly. I am also still sharing ideas here on The Bee so check back for more ideas and projects. I look forward to connecting with more of you on social media!

Recreate with Recreation

Hi friends! I know it has been a long time since my last post but I have been crazy busy with summer programs. Whew, it has been a fun summer!! I wanted to share this post about getting out for some awesome recreation activities for students with vision impairments. It was another great year for Camp Abilities UT. This year I went with the theme of "passport to recreation" and each day we ventured to a new recreation activity. We spent time with the students discussing what recreation is, how they can do it and most importantly, WHY recreation is important for everyone! The picture below is  the front of the Camp Abilities UT shirt. 

It can be a challenge when you are first thinking about recreation activities that work well for students with very little to no vision. I have a few thoughts that I consider when I am planning recreation activities for my students--both my younger elementary students and my older middle to high school age students. First, I think of interest level. For example, are students interested in physical recreation activities, solitary recreation or low key (but interesting and fun) recreation? It is easy to just assume that recreation is going to be sports or physical activities. There are so many options (many that require minimal modifications or support) for youths with vision impairments! Gardening, cooking, theater, book groups, board games--and so many more are great options that are not physical.  The picture below is bowling with the black lights on. One of our students is getting a quick coach from one of our lead teachers as he throws the ball down the lane. 

Most of this post will discuss recreation activities that are community based. I am always looking for ways for students to be more active in their communities or future college campus. I think it is important for our kids to have connections that will help them be visible and active in their communities. 

Here are some fun recreation activities that our kids can do with friends and family with minimal modifications:

1. Bowling: bowling is great because you can have fun with any level of it. You can be on a league and be competitive or like many of us, just go and laugh at yourself for being a bad bowler! The main modification is that our kids just need to know where to line up to walk straight. We do bowling every year and all of the kids love it!! Our elementary age kids to high school have a great time bowling, listening to music and chatting with their friends. I usually spend half the time with the lights on but then we go for black light bowling. We have a wide range of visual needs and the black light doesn't really take away but usually adds to the fun for the students. 

The picture below is of four bowling balls in a square formation with a folded white cane on top of them. 

2. Ropes course: take a challenge on a high ropes course or a low ropes course! We took on an adventure course that was waaayyyy up high!! I usually like to do a quick preteach for my students that have no vision of just what the course layout is or footing sequences they will need to use (i.e. walking across a broken bridge).  The picture below is of the adventure ropes course with all the different routes you can travel on the course.

3. Stand up paddle boarding: SUP has become a huge hit in the Camp Abilities circuit and for many people in general! The only thing SUP requires is decent balance and a fun attitude. We go paddle boarding with KoliFit Fitness. They are a fantastic club that have taken us out on some fun adventures. The only equipment needed are the paddle boards, paddles and life jackets! Preteach moment: the kids get on the board on land (to check out the layout/size of the board) then onto shallow where they kneel initially to establish their balance. Fun for the whole family or out with friends! The picture below is two students on paddle boards. One student is kneeling with instructor behind them paddling and the other student is standing while paddling on their own. 

4. Wibit: You may be wondering what a wibit is...it's a giant water inflatable playground or obstacle island to play on. So many kids (and adults) have a blast playing on the wibit. Our local rec center has Wibit Wednesday where everyone can go play on the wibit at night. There are different wibits but the standard one is pictured below. It is long and stretches across the width or length of the pool. It's enormous and has a variety of different obstacles such as a slide and things to climb over or around. We do a quick preteach just to make sure students have an idea of where and how to travel the wibit. We sometimes put an adult staff member in the middle for verbal coaching. I let students go one by one or sometimes let them race depending on their comfort level. Our rec center Wibit Wednesday is every week throughout the year so even in the winter, we can still have pool fun!

5. Archery: Yes, archery! It may require a little bit more hands on learning but it is a very doable option for our kids. One quick modification is that we put a sound source to identify which location to aim. We have used a standard sound source from APH (available on quota funds) or wireless bluetooth speaker. Archery is a nice option because much like bowling, you can be on a team and compete or you can do it for fun and increase your skills. The picture below is of a young woman with a bow aiming at a target. 

6. Fencing: FENCING!! This was a new idea that was way fun! Special note: fencing does require a lot of technique to do competitive footwork and it does help to have a good fencing coach. However, for some fun recreation fencing was a great choice! Fencing is a sport that does not require vision. Whisper coaches can stand behind the athlete and provide coaching. We did a long preteach session to work on footwork (i.e. lunge, retreat, etc.). We did foil but we also considered epee. Low vision as well as our Braille reader students successfully participated fully. Lots of fun! The picture below is two students in fencing attire in a one on one competition. 

7. Horseback riding: This is a popular option and many of our students have done it before. It is a fun option for students of lots of ability levels. We were fortunate to have a young adult man who has no vision come and ride with us. There is more than just being on the horse for our students. We took time to brush the horses, feed them and just spent time with them. The picture below is a student riding a horse while an adult leads it. 

These 7 activities are fun recreation options that our kids can do with their families and friends. But don't think that there are just 7! There are so many options. Feel free to share more ideas with me. There are many advantages for recreation for everyone; not just people with vision impairments. It recreates us physically and emotionally. It is important for our kids and young adults as it is a designated area of the Expanded Core Curriculum!

On-the Go-Learning Resource

Hi friends,
I want to share one of my fave resources for my educational teams. Check out On-the-Go Learning from Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired (TSBVI).  They have archived webinars on a variety of topics including the Expanded Core Curriculum areas.  I took some screen shots so you can check out all of the different options.

You can also check it out here: http://www.tsbvi.edu/on-the-go-learning

There two other things that I really like about these webinars: transcripts and chapters. Transcripts are common but they aren't always included in everything. I like to have them to handout to families or teachers (although watching the webinars are pretty rad, too!). I like that you can use transcripts for notes, too!  I also love that they list the chapters with the time so you can advance to different sections of the webinar. This is especially helpful if it is a 50 minute webinar. Some colleagues may lose interest so being able to tell them to advance to a designated time is really helpful. 

Bookmark this TSBVI site and share it with your educational teams!

Cheat Sheets for Teachers on the ECC

Hi friends, This week I am talking about some Expanded Core handouts that I made for my teachers. I spent a lot of time with a variety of teachers from outreach (or itinerant) to our deafblind teachers and listened to how they explained the Expanded Core. I noticed that they had a grasp on the ECC but seemed to have trouble with having the ECC points quick to say. I spent time with our support staff and realized that they also had the same issue. I am so proud of all my colleagues because they have been working so hard at learning the Expanded Core. I thought about how I could continue to support them and viola! I created some cheat sheets that they could use to explain the Expanded Core and have as a quick reference. 

I have two cheat sheets. One has points about the ECC such as why we need it, how to implement, how others can teach ECC areas and a bit about the nine areas. The other is dedicated to a synopsis of each of the nine areas of the ECC. I spent time on all our great sites such as Paths to Literacy, ECC Advocacy and TSBVI to create the best synopsis of each area. 

These handouts are also useful for sharing with education teams and families. Our TCVIs (teachers for children with vision impairments) must be able to convey why we must teach the ECC to parents and education teams. I find that many good teachers can't express it successfully and as a result, there's not much support for ECC instruction. I hope my cheat sheets help our teachers and support staff continue to develop their understanding of the ECC and help them get everyone else on board. I am happy to share my cheat sheets. You can email me at robbin.keating@gmail.com and I will send you a copy. 

Nike Flyease...For our kids, too!

Have you heard of the line of shoes that Nike put out for kids with disabilities? They came out a bit ago but I thought it was a good idea to share it because I was worried that people in our community haven't heard about them.

Here's the story behind the Flyease:

I learned about them from our awesome friends, Kristi and her son Jimmy. Jimmy can't wear them (yet) because they were not available in his size.

Why Flyease? Check out this great article:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/nike-flyease-shoe-technology_us_55a3eec6e4b0b8145f731bde.

**Read this first before you go and buy these**

It is important for our kids to learn how to tie their shoes. It can be a very difficult skill to master. I have taught the (sometimes dreaded) shoe tying lesson several times. It requires concept development, fine motor skill work, practice and a cookie for stress! Encourage our kids to master this!! Work with your occupational therapist on this. However, we do have a population of students that cannot master this skill for a variety of reasons. It's tough to find slip on shoes as our kids get older (especially in high school). It's also really tough to find cool shoes for our kids (again, especially high school age). 

The price point is a little higher than a lot of parents would like to pay. They are about $100-$130. 

Here's the link for the most current offerings of the Flyease from Nike:

http://store.nike.com/us/en_us/pd/zoom-lebron-soldier-8-flyease-basketball-shoe/pid-11029270.

The Unique Connection

I have been recently studying up on development in young children with vision impairments. I have been loving it. It reminded me of a video that I had shared on Facebook awhile back. In the video, the children are blindfolded. They are then brought up to a line of women. Their mother is in the line of women. Each child has to identify their mother by touch alone. Watch how tender it is to see these sweet little children identify their mothers without using their sight. 

I wanted to share this video for several reasons. Most importantly, I wanted to share it for every mom who has a child with a significant vision impairment. The sweet moms who don't get to make eye contact to evoke a smile from their babies. These sweet moms (and dads) worry how their new infant will see them, connect with them, identify them. I always share with these sweet families that their child can see them. They just learn to see them differently. It's through their touch that blind babies and infants learn who mom and dad is. Take heart, your children know who you are. 

I also want to point out how important touch is in general. Touch allows babies and infants with vision impairments to know their caregivers. Touch also teaches these kids about the world and we must not overprotect them. No one ever said touch must be with the hands (although that is the first thing we think about). Touch can be accomplished using feet, arms, belly and legs. Random touch doesn't help much but purposeful, consistent, meaningful touch does wonders! Even for our most impaired-body students. It may take several (and I mean like 100) times before those little limbs respond, but keep going! Use soft blankets, interesting textures, etc. to elicit interest.

Parents, siblings, friends, all caregivers, hug those little ones who have sensory impairments! Enjoy them and encourage them to see the world with touch :)