The Bulletin

Statewide Vision Resource Centre

Number 13, Friday 17th August 2001

The following issue of The Bulletin was prepared by Lea Nagel (Visiting Teacher, Eastern Region), Helen Caldow (Visiting Teacher, Eastern Region), and Deb Lewis (Co-ordinator, Statewide Vision Resource Centre).

Inside This Issue

Professional Development 2001

Combined Agencies Day (St Paul's School) - Monday 8 October
Visiting Teacher - VI PD Day - Friday 10 December

Term 4: VT PD Day 10 December - Mini Expo

The term 4 VT day will be the second Mini Expo.
Where: SVRC 360 Springvale Rd Donvale
When: Monday 10th December - 1pm to 6.30pm
Who: VTs, school personnel, family members, students with vision impairments, anyone else!
Followed by SPEVI Christmas Drinks
Further details will appear in The Bulletin as they come to hand.

Final Space Camp Meeting - 17th August

When: Friday 17th August at 2pm
Where: Statewide Vision Resource Centre 360 Springvale Rd Donvale
Why: Last minute planning - what to bring, final decisions about activities etc
Who: Students, parents and Visiting Teachers
Followed by: Bowling and a meal at Knox (details from Deb Lewis or at the meeting)
RSVP: (03) 9841 0242 or deblewis@svrc.vic.edu.au

Space Camp Fundraising

We are still several thousand dollars short - please call if you have any bewt ideas!

Visitors from Vietnam

SVRC recently hosted visitors from the Loreto Vietnam-Australia Program. The program aims to assist poor children through education. Among their projects is a school for the blind. The visitors were extremely grateful for the time given by the staff to explain all aspects of the services offered by the SVRC.

VT PD Day 13th August - Report

We all had the best day on Monday and we even had several visitors who were able to enjoy our program too!
Priscilla Robinson, epidemiologist from the Health Department, enlightened us about childhood illnesses: their transmission, their effects and what we can do to minimize our risk. She also broadened out vocabulary with expressions like "breach of skin", "herd immunity", "disease burden" and the "head lice scratch". She was an excellent speaker and one we were lucky to be able to secure.
Pricilla's talk, notes and PowerPoint presentation will be available for loan from the SVRC - please call to request a copy!
Several Visiting Teachers then shared their ever-increasing skills with their laptops by displaying the use of: Trevor Boyd compared and contrasted a range of enlarging and voice output software options for PC including OpenBook, JAWS, MAGic, WindowEyes, Read and Write, BigShot, WordSmith, and Browse Aloud. Hopefully, some kind person will write these products up - the variety is amazing! Selection can be made based on the needs of the student, student's computer skill level and computer technology available.
Meredith Walsh (who has now completed her Master of Special Education through Newcastle University) demonstrated her very sophisticated student information package. Visiting Teachers are able to prepare individual folders of information regarding student's vision impairment and the aids and equipment that they use for  class and subject teachers. Meredith developed this kit in response to her concern regarding students' under use of valuable and expensive equipment for which they had been funded. The kit will be available in paper format or on CD-ROM soon.
Finally, Nick spoke with great eloquence about his experiences as a VCE student with Stargardt's Disease. He explained how he can fit in a full VCE subject load, achieve a 95% average and still fit in debating, soccer, tennis and cadets. He didn't mention a social life! He hopes to study Arts Law next year.
Nick also mentioned a different way he records lessons to his laptop - he records up to 30 minutes per file and then saves them to the school server - I will investigate this and print the notes in a future edition of The Bulletin.
We also trialled an amplification/recording system for this Professional Development activity - if the feedback proves to be positive, we will probably arrange to purchase our own! If so, it will be easier to produce good quality audio tapes of our PD events!

Recording Voice on your Laptop

Here is Kay's approach to recording on your laptop:
1. Open a (or several) blank PowerPoint document(s)
2. Insert a Text Box and type the material to be read aloud into the Text Box
3. Go to Slide Show - Record Narration (and click OK on the dialog box that appears)
4. Each slide will come up - read the text as it appears (and click OK to accept the timings)
5. Go to View Slide Show to see and hear the presentation J

VTAC Guide 2002

Many thanks to Karen Goodall for the following information.
The 2002 VTAC Guide can be accessed by students with vision impairments.
Go to www.vtac.edu.au/.
Scroll down to VTAC library located on the right hand side.
Students may need to use the Magnifier to zoom in and enlarge the print.

Blind Cricketers Visit Rutherglen

Report sent by Visiting Teacher, Faye Squires:
Three members of the blind cricket team visited Rutherglen PS recently to demonstrate how this great game is played to both sighted and unsighted students and staff.
The day was the "brain child" of Integration Aide Michelle Wilson. Michelle is brailling student Nathaniel's aide. Michelle primarily organised the day. Staff organised delightful food aplenty, parents cooked a barbecue, and students and Integration Aides travelled from far and wide. Everyone enjoyed a tremendous day!
Sighted participants wore blindfolds. The "three David's" - the vision impaired cricketers were patient, caring and by days end hoarse! Appreciation of such an occasion was evident as all were given the opportunity to simulate blindness for a while. The Principal belted his foot instead of the ball when he was batting! Brailling student, Sam from Corryong, was the champ of the day displaying amazing athleticism and auditory discrimination as well as enjoying the opportunity to establish new friendships. It was a lot of work to organise but well worth the effort!
Nathaniel wrote:
The blend crekirt was as fun as.
At the crikirt I did los of running.
And I did sum bating.

Laptop Safety

Advice on using your laptop safely:
www.sofweb.vic.edu.au/notebook/using/docs/ohs%5Fadv.doc
For details on the DEET policy on laptop computers:
www.sofweb.vic.edu.au/itb/inits/nft.htm

New Book from RVIB

"I'm Posting the Pebbles" - Active learning through play for children who are blind or VI. This is a new book published by RVIB and written by Liz Haughton and Sandie Mackevicius. The cost is $25.00. Order forms available from SVRC.
RVIB has an extensive list of pamphlets available on a wide range of topics. A copy of the list is available at SVRC.

Programmable Scrolling Mouse

Robert brought in the following information:
This mouse is available from Kmart for about $30. It has many features but the most important for us to know about is the Zoom facility. Place the cursor in an application that is Microsoft 97 compatible, hold down the Ctrl key then zoom in or out as required.

Odd Spot

Specially commissioned Braille posters with the theme of equal opportunity for the blind were displayed this winter at the Truro Leisure Centre in England and at the University of Alberta in Edmonton. However sighted people could not read the posters because the words were only in Braille, and the blind could not read the posters because in both locations the limited edition posters were hung on the wall behind glass to "protect" them!!

Disability Awareness Booklet

This publication is aimed at raising the awareness of disability issues is titled "Who's Included?". Available at www.discver.tased.edu.au/whosincluded

Complete Creative Writing

Jeni Blake has found this program very clear and teachers specific writing skills. The cost is $33.00. Areas discussed include: Try your local computer software supplier for your copy.

Vision Australia Foundation

RPH, Radio for the Print Handicapped provides an excellent service for people with vision impairments.
Tune in to 1179 AM in Melbourne, 107.5 FM in Mildura, 88.7 FM in Bendigo, 101.7 FM in Albury/Wodonga and 100.1 FM in Shepparton. You will hear daily and local newspapers, books, magazines, special information programs about entitlements from government and service organisations, descriptions of television dramas and major sporting events.
Below is a list of Tuesday evening programs, as a sample of the variety that RPH offers:

18.00 The Children's Hour
18.55 Highlights of Evening Television
19.00 Opinion Pages Selected from The Age and The Australian
19.40 Today's Editorials The Age, Herald Sun and The Australian
20.00 Music World
20.30 Water Rats Simulcast audio with Channel 9 incorporating audio description
21.30 Letters to the Editor
22.00 Book at Bedtime
22.30 The Entertainers
23.00 BBC World Service to 06:00 AM

To find the RPH program on the internet, open the Vision Australia Foundation website: http://www.visionaustralia.org.au/ scroll down, then click on Listen.

Live Theatre for People with Vision Impairments

Vision Australia Foundation offers a free service to theatre-goers with vision impairments: Audio Description. A person with a vision impairment attending a designated live performance, can sit wherever their ticket takes them, and listen to a live audio description through an earpiece provided. Other patrons are not able to hear this. The description begins 15 minutes before the performance begins, with a reading of the program and an explanation of the stage and costumes. Audio Description is available at the Playhouse, State, and Fairfax Theatres at the Victorian Arts Centre, the Princess, Her Majesty's and Regent Theatres in Melbourne.
Vision Australia Foundation also match up volunteer Theatre Companions with people with vision impairments who live in their area. The companion transports the person with vision impairment to and from the performance, and the pair enjoy the theatre experience together.
Some tourist venues, such as the Old Melbourne Gaol and Como have Audio Description on audio cassettes.
For more information regarding this service, contact Marjorie West at Vision Australia, Kooyong on (03) 9864 9222.

Ten Pin Bowling

Is anyone interested in Ten-Pin Bowling? There are some fantastic opportunities for vision impaired and blind people who wish to get some basic coaching, or perfect their play to represent Victoria or Australia.
In November 2001 a team will be picked to represent Australia at the first world championship in Finland 2002.
Coaching clinics are being set up; the first has already started at Box Hill Bowling Centre on Saturday mornings to teach participants how to bowl straight. The head coach Mr Tony Goodwin is very enthusiastic, and will be coaching the group. Once Mr Goodwin has mastered the art of coaching blind and low vision bowlers with information from a coaching manual and video from the Australian Blind Sports Federation, we will run some train the coach seminars to start groups at other centres
Of course not everyone will want to do competition and so for much social activity is more important. The aim is to have two groups, one who want to be in competition and be in tournaments and the other group which just wants to do it for fun.
David Macfarlane who is himself a vision impaired ten-pin bowler has taken on the task of helping to get this project started. David is doing a recreation course at Box Hill TAFE and is doing a 40-hour placement with Peter Rickards at Kooyong. One outcome of the project will be to try and set Ten-Pin Bowling up as a sport under Blind Sports Victoria, and to set up a steering committee to take the sport to other centres.
We are also putting together a newsletter about what is happening which will be sent via e-mail and other formats. If you would like to know more contact
David Macfarlane H 9762 1213 M 0419 573 354
E-mail agentbigdave@hotmail.com or Peter Rickards Vision Australia Foundation W 9864 9237 or email Peter.Rickards@visionaustralia.org.au/.

Road Rules Update

Marion Blazé, who has just renewed her licence, has supplied us with a road rules update.

Braille Correspondence Course - Maths

The first three lessons of the Braille Maths Correspondence Course - being written by Jenny Pearse and Deb Lewis, is now available. Covering the basic process signs and layout, the course will eventually form a valuable resource for those who complete it. If you would like lesson 1, please call Jenny Pearse on 9841 0242.

SVRC News

Staff News

If you have something you would like included in The Bulletin, contact:

Deb Lewis (who can be emailed at deblewis@svrc.vic.edu.au)

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Web editor Lyn Robinson. Last updated July 2001
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