The following issue of The Bulletin was prepared by Lea Nagel, Visiting Teacher – Eastern Metropolitan Region and Deb Lewis, Co-ordinator, Statewide Vision Resource Centre.
A quick thank you to all the Visiting Teachers who have visited in the past month or so from the staff of the Statewide Vision Resource Centre – the security arrangements in here are a bit tighter and the staff possibly a little more frazzled and we really appreciate your understanding at this time!!! Thanks a k-zillion everybody!
Hey VTs – we have had our first couple of requests for alternative format materials (large print, braille, audio tape, disk) for 2003 – you win Jenny Williams!!! – can everyone else start making noises in their schools NOW – thanks!
Listed below are the details for the Eccentric Viewing Assessment. There is one space available so please let me know if you have any student who you would like assessed for their preferred locus of viewing. This is a free service to the VTs and to the students as the Resource Centre is paying for Dr Kerry Fitzmaurice to complete the assessment. Any child who has a bi-lateral central vision loss is suitable for this assessment and program. For further details or any questions please contact Annette Godfrey-Magee 9841 0807.
9:30-10:10 Rhys (Carolyn Mentiplay)
10:15-10:50 Lindsay (Carolyn Mentiplay)
10:55-11:30 Zach (Helen Young)
11:35-12:10 Chris (Lee Clarke)
12:15-12:50 Ben (Lee Clarke)
12:55-1:30 Nick (Carolyn Mentiplay)
1:35-2:10 Bianca (Odette Budge)
2:15-2:50 Available
The 2003 Space Campers have come back to Earth in Melbourne. They have reported having a wonderful trip to Disneyland in Anaheim, of course riding on the most daredevillish attractions, and enjoyed the amazing experience of Space Camp in Huntsville Alabama. Photos and more details to come….
And here’s the first reflections from chaperone Faye Squires:
Four students with vision impairments and two chaperones set off for space camp in Huntsville, Alabama, USA, on September 13th from Melbourne Airport. We stayed for 5 days near Los Angeles, in Anaheim, so that we could visit Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm and the San Diego Zoo. We then flew across America to Alabama, changing planes in Texas.
Overall a wondrous experience!
Upon asking each of the four boys to nominate a high point of the camp or trip, varied answers were given. Lachlan’s was meeting and working with the team, Ben enjoyed the missions, Matt liked the friendships fun and missions and Nathan liked the food and I suspect his pink teddy bear, which he and the rest of us, managed to carry back from California.
Can’t wait for more news and/or reports – so keep them coming in!!!
From: Marion Blazé, Advisory Teacher for Vision, Darwin (Formerly Education Officer for Vision Impaired, Victoria), September 2003
My current caseload provides heaps of challenges. I am supporting students with a variety of impairments, at various levels and from very diverse cultural backgrounds (pretty typical for a VT, you might say).
One of my students is a boy in secondary school with retinitis pigmentosa. I’ll call him Brett. Brett has less than ten degrees of field and acuities of 6/12. Other members of his family (cousins) have become blind by adulthood. He is obsessed with riding his skateboard and not at all interested in school work. In fact, he is very skilled at avoiding anything to do with work. The conversation keeps going back to skateboards. He is very bright and uses his residual vision extremely well. Most of his mates don’t know he is vision impaired, and Brett definitely prefers it this way.
Because of his diagnosis, Brett is learning braille. Actually, he is still capable of reading the dots with his eyes, but humours me by using his fingers. He knows the code pretty well, except for forgetting a few dot five words and contractions, and can read very slowly.
I have been trying to maintain his practice and increase his speed. At the same time, I have attempted to make braille reading vaguely interesting for Brett. This has been the biggest challenge. We’ve brailled several articles from skateboard magazines, but the vocabulary in these sometimes proves to be a bit unpredictable. I’ve tried sending him away with a card on which is brailled a question to be answered by the time he next sees me. This kept him curious for a while.
This term, I got Brett to provide me with a list of skateboard tricks (language with which he is familiar). For example, have you heard of a ‘switch frontside double kickflip to overcrook down a 9 stair to 180 heelflip to manual to slammit flip’? That’s one trick! We brailled this list several times in different order. The idea was that Brett would become familiar enough to read it fairly fluently and increase his tracking skills and reading speed. By changing the order I hoped to avoid Brett memorizing the list and simply reciting it instead of reading it. This worked well enough for Brett to ask me to braille a second list for the same purpose.
Brett is not an avid print reader, but he seems to have become interested in the Harry Potter and ‘Tomorrow’ series, which he reads in regular size print. We might try a combination of braille and print for reading one of these books. His braille reading skills are still too slow for him to attempt an entire text in braille, but if motivated by a good story, perhaps he’ll persevere for a few paragraphs at a time. I’ll also try a jokes book, which will only involve short burst of fairly interesting reading.
An added incentive for Brett will hopefully come in the form of a ‘credit’ for his braille learning. The body which administers the final years of schooling in the NT is actually SSABSA – the Senior Secondary Assessment Board of South Australia. They have a scheme called ‘Community Studies’ which allows students to gain credits for learning which takes place in the community. For example, if a student has to miss school to tend to an ill parent, they are given credit for learning the skills associated with providing this care, provided they can show evidence of this learning. Brett’s school is applying for this form of credit for learning braille, so that it adds to Brett’s year 11 and/or 12 scores. I am hoping that, once this is formalized, it will provide added motivation for Brett to further develop his skills.
My question to my learned colleagues in Victoria is – ANY OTHER IDEAS???? If you have any suggestions, no matter how trivial, please email me. I feel I am teetering very close to the stage where Brett may reject braille altogether – so I’m willing to try almost anything!
THANKS
Marion Blazé, Advisory Teacher for Vision, Darwin Email: marion.blaze@nt.gov.au
It’s been an eight year tradition – the Combined Agencies Day at St Paul’s School – on the first day of term 4 – and participants were treated to another high quality day of interesting presentations, yummy food and excellent colligation!!! Participants came from RVIB, Department of Education & Training, St Pauls’ School, Guide Dogs Victoria and other organisations associated with the education of students with vision impairments.
A particular highlight was Dr Avril Brereton’s session, ‘Understanding autism in the child with visual impairment’. She indicated that the core problems in autism, a neurodevelopmental (brain) disorder include:
Another speaker featured the ‘Happy Kids… Children’s Health & Educational Products’ which includes such book titles as:
Other titles are also available – cost per book is approximately $2.50 (less for bulk orders). An order form is attached to the print copy of The Bulletin or you can contact Smart Arts Multimedia on (03) 9572 3629 (ph/fax).
The Great Victorian Bike Ride is happening again this year from Mt Hotham to Mornington from 29th November to 7th December 2003. We have managed to reduce the costs by teaming up with another school to stay the night before the start in a ski lodge which is only $15 instead of $40 and we are hoping to have a driver to take us to the start so we don’t have to pay the Bike Victoria bus costs. Currently, the cost will be $455 per student including insurance.
We have places for two more students. Secondary age is ideal. Families are welcome with parent support. It is much cheaper to be part of a school group than to go on GVBR as an individual or family. Training will be offered according to need. Please contact Jeni Blake ASAP if you are considering going or would like to come on a training ride and try it out. You do not need to be fit, just able to ride a bike, but it is in your rear’s interest to condition up your buttock muscles and a few training rides will help this immensely and we can iron out any bike problems before we go. Contact Jeni Blake 0428 134660.
Source: Circular 274/2003, Michael Kane, Acting Director OSE
To increase safety for school students, arrive alive! school speed zones are being introduced outside all Victorian primary and secondary schools between October 2003 and November 2004. The arrive alive! program aims to reduce the 250 casualty crashes that occur outside schools each year. The campaign is about changing community attitudes towards speeding in high risk areas and ensuring that motorists slow down around schools. Key features include:
Schools in the most densely populated areas, where children are most at risk,
will be the first to have the new zones installed.
Information kits are available by calling 1300 360745 or go to: www.arrivealive.vic.gov.au/
Dan Jellinek, the editor of E-Access Bulletin, has emailed to invite new readers to take a look at his free monthly bulletin. E-Access Bulletin is an email newsletter on access to technology by people who are blind or who have vision impairments. Dan’s hope is to build readership and so increase potential for sponsorship to augment the support they receive from RNIB.
I took a quick look at E-Access Bulletin and found it easy to navigate with lots of links. It is based in the UK, with topics that are definitely international.
One article noted that Vodafone UK and the RNIB will be launching a ‘speaking
phone’ this January: a combination of the Nokia 9210i Communicator with
German-developed TALX speech software technology (see http://fastlink.headstar.com/vod)
Another article noted that: The proceedings of 'Braille in the age of digitisation',
a seminar held in Copenhagen in April this year (see E-Access Bulletin, May
2002), are now available to download in HTML or Word formats. The conference
advocated teaching children Braille in a rich multimedia environment: (http://www.ibos.dk/braille)
To enjoy this free monthly bulletin, go to www.headstar.com/eab or to subscribe, e-mail eab-subs@headstar.com with ‘subscribe eab’ in the subject header.
News from Rachel Morgan, O&M Instructor, Children’s Mobility Services, GDV
Thirteen seriously psyched-up shoppers descended onto the streets of Melbourne for Guide Dogs Victoria’s “Shop til you Drop” junior program in the first week of the September school holidays. The emphasis for this program was to discuss and practice the mobility and social skills that are used when shopping.
We explored the social skills that make a good customer, investigated how a
checkout counter works in a supermarket, found our way around new supermarkets
and shopping centres, and dealt with people and obstacles in crowded environments.
Kim Hazeldine, Occupational Therapist, ran money handling exercises and a money
quiz and was an invaluable part of the program.
On Wednesday, the students had to prepare the mini fete stall that they had
planned the previous day. The students split into small groups, and purchased
the goods they were to sell. They then prepared the goods and set up displays
to advertise their products. The fete was well attended by Guide Dogs Victoria
staff who were very impressed with the range of goods on offer, excellent customer
service skills and most importantly the smiles of satisfaction on the students’
faces.
Sinead was voted “Best Shopkeeper” by the staff, with all other students receiving numerous votes for their customer service and money handling skills. Well done everyone for a fantastic job! Students reported that they thoroughly enjoyed this experience and felt that they had a better idea of how to be a good customer from being on the other side of the counter.
After this action-packed day, students went to the Royal Melbourne Show to experience shopping in the exciting (and crowded!) atmosphere that only the Show can offer. Show bag purchasing and participation in games at side stalls were popular pastimes. A few happy students won some great prizes at the stalls!
On the final day, students used public transport to get to Northland Shopping Centre. They caught a train to Rosanna Station and a bus to the shopping centre. This was followed by yet more shopping and surprisingly everyone survived the intense shopping experiences to return to the Guide Dogs campus. Thanks to all students for contributing to a great program – the instructors were particularly impressed with your stalls! Well done.
2nd Australasian Orientation and Mobility Conference – Gold Coast, Queensland
All the instructors from the Children’s Mobility Service will be attending the Australian O&M conference this month (17-19 October 2003). Attendance at this conference will assist instructors to develop skills and knowledge in the field, form networks throughout Australia, gain teaching strategies and ideas and meet up with other instructors. Because our field is so small (there are approximately 170 instructors in Australia and New Zealand) we value the opportunity to meet other instructors from throughout Australia.
Guide Dogs Victoria O&M Morning: Experiencing Vision Loss in The Community For Parents, Teacher’s Aides and Teachers: 28 October 2003
The Children’s Mobility Service at Guide Dogs Victoria is running an Orientation and Mobility morning on Tuesday 28 October. This program is designed to increase awareness of the issues that students with a vision impairment experience, when travelling within the community.
Participants will work in pairs, taking turns to wear simulators and follow a set route around a dynamic, suburban area. The route will involve a start point and end point using written directions, with questions to answer along the way. The questions serve to highlight and pinpoint areas of difficulty that we would probably not even consider when working with students with a vision loss. Please contact Deb Lewis SVRC 03 9841 0242 or Rachel Morgan on 03 9854 4469 for further details.
Sydney 2003: 1-5 December 2003
The Children’s Mobility Service is running the Sydney program again this year. All applicants were required to submit an essay outlining why they should be offered a place on the program. We received quite a number of applications and it was a challenge to decide who would be offered a place.
We will be in Sydney from Monday 1 December to Friday 5 December. We look forward to a very exciting week away with the students organising the week’s activities. The accommodation is in Woolloomooloo and this provides a great base from which we can explore Sydney. While we do lots of walking, the train station is within a short walking distance, as are bus stops.
The attending students and their parents are required to attend an information session at the Guide Dogs campus in Kew prior the trip. The session will provide an opportunity for the O&M Instructors to meet the students and their parents and to finalise trip details and arrangements.
We look forward to a fantastic week and we will report in our adventures in our next newsletter.
Guide Dogs Victoria CMS Christmas Party: 16 December 2003
The CMS Christmas Party will be held on Tuesday 16 December at the Guide Dogs Victoria campus in Kew. All students, parents, Visiting Teachers and Integration Aides are welcome to attend. We will have a BBQ lunch and Santa may even show up! It’s a great opportunity to get together and catch up with friends or even make some new ones. The celebrations will begin at 12pm with a tour of Guide Dogs followed by lunch and Kris Kringle.
Invitations will be sent out closer to the date.
‘GDV goes CBD’ Program (previously known as ‘City Limits’): 5-9 January 2004
This is a week long program in Melbourne for senior students with vision impairments. The program is aimed at students who are looking to expand and develop their current mobility and independent living skills, and who are beginning to develop an interest in travelling within the city (CBD). The participants will live at Guide Dogs Victoria’s accommodation facilities in Kew for the duration of the program. ‘GDV goes CBD’ will provide an opportunity for students to review and consolidate the following skills within the Melbourne CBD:
Proposed Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) Weekend
The CMS team is planning to conduct a weekend program (Friday evening - Sunday afternoon) for students who have RP and their parents. The program will be aimed at providing information about RP and practical advice regarding mobility issues. This would include practical Orientation and Mobility sessions as well as guest speakers. Accommodation at the Guide Dogs Victoria campus will be available for students and one family member. The weekend will hopefully be in February or March 2004.
For further information about any of these events please contact Rachel Morgan on (03) 9854 4469.
As you may be aware, investigations are underway into modernising the delivery of audio materials to people with difficulties accessing print, including people who are blind or have low vision.
According to the Royal Society for the Blind of South Australia Ltd (RSB) website, “services currently in place for the print-disabled consist of a labour intensive network involving the distribution of talking books to clients via an operator-assisted library service. The costs associated with such a system are substantial.
The Australian government outlays over $5 million per annum for the existing postal concession, which equates to approximately $250 per reader per annum, to maintain and manage the system.
There are also significant costs involved in both the supply of media material for clients and the maintenance of client audio equipment. In terms of client satisfaction, the current services offer only a limited range of transcribed material and the delivery and retrieval process involved often necessitates substantial waiting times in accessing the requested material. It is estimated that the true cost to the community is in the vicinity of between $800 and $900 per annum per reader.”
“BiTS offers a significant reduction in distribution costs with increased benefits to clients.
Audio-Read provides a secure digital multicast system that delivers talking
books, newspapers, learning material or any type of text via satellite transmission
and is available in indexable audio, braille or enlarged text on a standard
television monitor.
The system delivers data at approximately 15% of the current cost of media distribution.
An unlimited range of digital text is available for transmission 24 hours a
day, 7 days a week, to an unlimited distribution area - remote areas of Australia
are equally as accessible as urban centres.
Audio-Read technology uses Broadband technology, therefore an audio book can be downloaded in less than 5 minutes. And because it’s digital, there is no deterioration in quality with repeated use. As the system requires only one master copy of data, cost and storage requirements are minimised. Books may be ordered for next day delivery and magazines will be available prior to release at news-stands. The global capabilities of the BiTS network ensures a wider range of information to a wider number of users in an unlimited number of languages.”
Further information can be found at: http://www.rsb.org.au/bits.htm
Here is news of a pilot project between Royal Society for the Blind of South Australia and Audio-Read Pty Limited: Books in The Sky (BiTS).
The participants in the BiTS pilot project include 8 clients of the Royal Society for the Blind (RSB) and 4 members of the Burnside Public Library. Each participant has been issued with equipment to enable them to play digitally stored talking books that are delivered via satellite. They are able to select from a sample catalogue containing 62 titles, which include a wide selection of reading material of both fiction and non-fiction. Having surveyed the participants after 4 weeks of using the BiTS system, the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive and can be summarised by the following:
Since the RSB first began to test the feasibility of this exciting new technology, Audio-Read Pty Ltd has signed an agreement with the Royal National Institute of The Blind UK (RNIB). The RNIB will use around 40 participants to evaluate the BiTS technology for the delivery of newspaper and magazine services. The trials in the UK will commence later this year. This announcement by the RNIB is a demonstration of their confidence that the Books in The Sky system provides a viable bridging technology from audio cassette to an efficient and affordable talking book delivery and playback system.
Stay tuned for the results of the full evaluation!
VCE study scores (relative positions) are scaled in order to calculate Equivalent National Tertiary Entrance Ranks (ENTERs). Attached to the print copy of The Bulletin is the 2002 scaled means and standard deviations as well as the ENTER subject scores corresponding to a selection of VCAA study scores.
Visiting Teacher Helen Caldow recommends the autobiography of Donna Willliams, a woman with autism, who offers an account of her early years, and who eventually went on to study at university
(Thanks to Trevor Boyd, fountain of information, for this one)
Jim Allan has alerted us that the TSBVI has a braille periodic table of elements, ready to download and emboss! To pick it up, go to: www.tsbvi.edu/braille/index.htm. There you’ll find a list of elements with other data in atomic number order, and a list of elements with other data in alphabetic order “all free download, no password, no nothin’ just dots... come getcha some!! Jim” (That’s the Jim that we know and love from Space Camp!!!)
Guess who’s had baby number 2!!! Our very own Yvette – a little boy, Reid Wallace (to add to the collection which includes 3 year old Pearl). Apparently, everyone is doing very well!
Pencil these dates in to your new diaries – hopefully we’ll have the year’s program ready for the next edition of The Bulletin.
Thanks to proof-readers Dianne Skillern and Lea Nagel.
Deb Lewis (who can be emailed at deblewis@svrc.vic.edu.au).