The Bulletin
Statewide Vision Resource Centre
Number 20,
Friday 10th December 1999
The following issue of The Bulletin was prepared by Deb Lewis (Co-ordinator, Statewide Vision Resource Centre).
Inside This Issue
Evaluation of SVRC Services
Space Camp Questions
Xmas Ideas
Children
of the Shipwreck Coast
Driving Camp
Staff News
Holidays for the
SVRC
Goalball – Rules of the Game
European Eyewear – New
Address
Borrowing Lists
Great Victorian Bike Ride
GDAV O&M
Services
Discovery Course for People with a VI
Win 95/98 Tips and
Tricks
Driving Clinic
VAF Speech Pathology
From the Internet
Woolly
Pens
Work Experience Student
Evaluation of the Services of the SVRC
Visiting Teachers will find a questionnaire included with their Bulletin this fortnight. We are always in the business of improving services to you and your schools and students. We value your feedback so please take the time to make your comments and post or fax back your responses. If you have already completed an evaluation form, thank you!
Space Camp Questions!!!
Here are the answers to the final Space Camp questions this
year:
1. What was Sputnik?
Meaning ‘space traveller’,
Sputnik was the world’s first satellite launched into space on
4 October
1957.
2. Who was Valentina Tereshkova?
She was the first
woman, a Russian, launched into space on 16 June 1963.
3. What were
the objectives of the Gemini Space Program?
The objectives were to
further advance the technologies, skills and knowledge needed for a lunar
mission.
Christmas Ideas
An article by Lynne Wannan (from Hop, Step & Jump in Bridge Road, Richmond) in the November 1999 edition of NoticeBoard, included the following gift ideas for students with special needs:
Water play – blow up pool, floating balls of different
sizes, squirter, floating creatures, boats, water wheels
Fun
toys – giggle ball (which rolls and giggles), groan hammer ($2),
squeezy and squeaky toys
Music – xylophone, glockenspiel,
keyboard, maracas, jingle bells, castanets, music tapes
Sporting
equipment – Totem or Orbit Tennis, bowling games such as skittles or
boules
Children of the Shipwreck Coast
This delightful book, which is a picture story book and a chapter book in one, is available in regular print and in braille for $19.95 from the Statewide Vision Resource Centre. Set in the Port Fairy area, ‘Children of the Shipwreck Coast’ is a story of adventure, friendship, courage – and the unselfish love of a dog.’ Order your copy now for Christmas!
Driving Camp
A report, kindly prepared by Strathmore Secondary College students and driving camp participants, Kathryn and Mitchell, on their way home with Visiting Teacher, Marlene Burrows can be found here.
As the report suggests, we are hoping to organise another driving camp for the end of term two next year.
Staff News
· Sue Reynolds from the Wodonga area will be leaving at the end of the year.
Faye will be picking up her brailling students in the new year. We wish Sue blue
skies and happiness in her retirement.
· Kirsty Jungwirth is off to England
at the end of the year. We will let you know the name of her replacement as it
comes to hand.
· Our own Phyllis retires next week. We all wish her well in
her planned travels – on bike and in caravan!
· We have a new braille
transcriber starting early in the new year. Emilie Butcher comes to us from
Roweville Primary School and we look forward to her arrival. Make sure to
introduce yourself to her next time you are in!
Holidays for the SVRC
The Statewide Vision Resource Centre will be closed between Christmas and New Year, reopening on Tuesday 4th January. Feel free to come in during the January holidays but please call first to make sure that someone will be hhere. You may also find the doors locked so please knock loudly or ring the bell.
Goalball – Rules of the Game
Here are the basic rules of Goalball, reproduced here by request. For those receiving the print version of the Bulletin, a plan of the goalball court is also attached.
The Goalball Court
The Goalball court is an indoor court
(usually the floor of a gymnasium) measuring 18 metres long by 9 metres wide.
The court is then divided into two halves and each half into three
sections.
Team Area: the first 3 metres after the goal line.
The team MUST defend the ball within this area.
Landing
Area: the next 3 metres after the Team Area. When the ball is thrown,
it must land before the end of the attacking teams landing are, otherwise a High
Ball penalty will be awarded to the opposition.
Neutral
Area: the remaining 6 metres between the opposing team's Landing Areas.
The half way line runs through the centre of this area.
Penalties
There are two types of penalties: personal
penalties and team penalties. In both cases only one player remains on court to
defend the penalty throw. A personal penalty results in the offending player
having to defend the court, the last player to throw the ball defends the
penalty.
Personal Penalties
1. High Ball: occurs when the ball
does not touch the ground before the end of the Landing Area (High Ball line).
2. Long Ball: occurs if the ball does not touch the ground in the Neutral
Area.
3. Eyeshades: if a player touches their blindfold, they will be
penalised. If a player needs to adjust their blindfold, they must ask the
referee's permission first.
4. Three Throws: a player may only take two
consecutive throws, if they take a third consecutive throw it is a penalty.
5. Illegal Defence: when defending, the first contact with the ball must be
made by a player who has some part of their body in the team area.
6.
Personal Delay of Game: when a player is re-orientated by anyone other than a
team-mate on the court
7. Personal Unsportsmanlike Conduct: awarded "should
the referee determine that a player on the court is behaving in an
unsportsmanlike manner." You'd probably have to behaving pretty badly!
Team Penalties
1. 8 Seconds: a player must throw the ball
within 8 seconds of his team gaining "defensive control" of the ball.
2.
Team Delay of Game: occurs if the team is not ready to start on the referee's
instructions or if the team makes a substitution at half time without informing
the referee.
3. Team Unsportsmanlike Conduct: awarded "should the referee
determine that any team member in the team bench area is behaving in an
‘unsportsman’ like manner."
4. Illegal Coaching: No one on the team bench is
allowed to coach at any time other than a time out or break at the end of a
half.
Infractions
Infractions are less serious than penalties,
they result in the control of the ball being turned over to the opposition. The
common infractions in goalball are
1. Premature Throw: occurs when the
player throws the ball at the start of a game, or after a break, before the
referee's whistle has been blown.
2. Step Over: The throwing player must
have part of his body touching the court when the ball is released.
3. Pass
Out: When passing the ball between team members, if the ball goes out of bounds
over the side line.
4. Ball Over: If a ball is blocked by a defender and
rebounds over the center line in the neutral area (the half way line).
5.
Dead Ball: If a ball becomes dead after touching a defending player, without
that team gaining defensive control of the ball.
European Eyewear
European Eyewear, suppliers of many high quality low vision devices, has moved premises. Their new showroom will enable clients to spend time seeing, examining and hands-on ‘playing’ with their huge range of magnification and low vision devices.
You will find them at:
3 Cottage Street Blackburn
Tel: 9877
7956
Fax: 9877 7405
Toll Free 1800 818 221
Borrowing Lists
For those who did not attend the Term 4 PD day, your Borrowing List is
attached. Please:
1. look carefully at the list.
2. let us know by phone
or fax if there are problems so we can make the problems go away. Problems may
include students on your list who are visited by someone else; items which you
have returned etc.
3. return anything that is no longer required.
4. let
us know if you are keeping items for 2000.
5. remember that equipment such as
braillers, cassette players etc are available for short term loan only! (ie not
for loan for the duration of the student’s school career!!!)
Great Victorian Bike Ride
A happy and healthy looking Jeni Blake dropped in this week sporting a tide mark tan on her legs from the bottom of her bike shorts. From all accounts, the 9-day adventure for 3 students with vision impairments and their support crew, sounds like it was heaps of fun, though rather tiring! They were up at 5.30am and on the road by 8.30am after eating breakfast and packing up tents. One day they rode over 100km in the blazing heat.
The Great Victorian Bike Ride will be along the Great Ocean Road in 2000 and promises to be another exciting adventure. Jeni has already put together her notes, pamphlets, letters for sponsorship and other essential information for those interested in joining her next year. A video is also available.
Guide Dogs Association of Victoria – O&M Services for Children and Youth
GDAV are launching their new branch of service – Orientation & Mobility for Children and Youths. Instructors attached to the service will work in conjunction with the Visiting Teacher Service, classroom teachers, integration aides, families and health professionals, to deliver tailored O&M services. These services will begin in January 2000. If you would like to make a referral, please phone Kaye Jones on (03) 9854 4450.
Discovery Course for People with a Vision Impairment
Trish Potter from Bendigo sent an article by Natascha Rassekhi of Outward
Bound Australia:
‘In April 1999, 10 young people (aged 14-17 years) with
vision impairments took part in an OBA Discovery Course. The participants came
through the Canberra Blind Society and the Royal Blind Society and with the
exception of travel costs, the course was fully sponsored by the Variety Club of
NSW. Seven action filled days, saw the initial group of individuals mould into a
team of friends.
Each participant took on the challenge to question their limitations. With much enthusiasm they took on rock climbing, abseiling, a ropes confidence course, bush cooking, expeditioning, community service, a raft building exercise, a music workshop, they slept under the stars and went on a journey of self discovery. I saw personal fears overcome, leaders emerge, talents discovered, feelings of compassion, friendship and understanding openly expressed. I saw pride and exuberance, as participants came together for a final presentation and received their certificates…
OBA is currently increasing its focus on courses especially designed for people living with physical and/or intellectual disabilities, known as Discovery Programs. These courses take groups of up to 12 individuals, together with an appropriate number of attendant carers, on a journey of self awareness, to discover the depths of their previously untapped potential.
Further information can be found by calling 1800 267 999 or going to their website at www.outwardbound.com.au/.
Win 95/98 Tips and Tricks
This tip is from the October 1999 issue of PC Update:
‘If you are running the MS Office 97, or newer Office 2000, suite then you may wish to consider uninstalling Find Fast. You can do so by running your Office CD setup routing and deselecting Find Fast. The idea behind this feature is good – it indexes every file in your Office suite so that you may retrieve them by doing keyword searches. But it takes a lot of computing power to review and index every Word document, Excel spreadsheet, and PowerPoint presentation you have on your hard drive. Unless you use that feature often, you would most likely rather have the increased performance you get by channelling that power to other applications.’
Driving Clinic
The Herald Sun, 3AW and Holden are sponsoring a 1-day defensive driving clinic
which covers:
- defensive driving
- emergency control
- skid
control and prevention
- emergency braking
Jeni Blake highly recommends the driving clinic, which she attended last year, and says it would be useful for VTs and anyone over 18 years of age. It costs $99 and will be held on December 11, 16, 17, 18, and 19. The best way to secure a place is to visit the office at 1349 High Street Malvern to complete the paperwork.
VAF Speech Pathology Services
Vision Australia Foundation has recently introduced a Speech Pathology Service which includes client services, consultancy and workshops. The costs for services are individually negotiated and depend on the amount of time required. Contact Rosie Miller and Andrea McQueen at the Vision Australia Technology Service on (03) 9864 9524 or email http://afbky.vicnet.net.au/
From The Internet
More discussion on the provision of large print or regular print with a low vision aid:
From: Wilkinson-Mark on Tuesday, November 23, 1999
In
Iowa, during the 1989-90 academic year, approximately $93,000 of large print
materials was produced for students in Iowa. Following a review of all children
in Iowa, by a low vision team, who were receiving large print, the total cost of
providing large print materials during the 1998-99 academic year was $3269. The
findings of the Iowa Low Vision Service team supports the findings of many
authors who have found that large print is often recommended without objective
data to support this recommendation. The Iowa Low Vision Service team has noted
that large print has a number of distinct disadvantages versus other learning
modalities.
Disadvantages of large print include the following:
·
The total head-sweep needed to read large print can be time-consuming and
tiring.
· Because of their size, large print books often do not fit into
school desks or lockers.
· Their size and weight make them difficult to
carry.
· There are few large print books in publication. For example, the
University of Iowa Libraries report there are 3,926,853 titles in their
holdings. Of these, 89 are large print and 76 are Braille (Wayne Rawley,
Director, Administrative and Access Services, University of Iowa Libraries -
personal communication, November 1999).
· The format of black and grey on
white eliminates all the colour that is available in regular books.
· It is
expensive.
· Photocopy enlarging emphasises imperfections in letters and
pictures.
· Fractions, label on diagrams, etc. are not enlarged to large
print size.
· The student may not be able to independently access regular
print materials resulting in functional illiteracy.
· Limited choices are
available in large print for pleasure, fun reading. Based on this information,
why is large print available?
· Why not? It's free.
· By providing it,
schools feel good about doing something for the visually impaired.
· It is
what has been done for years.
· Adult's perception of the value of large
print ("my grandmother uses large print").
· Eye or other doctors recommend
it, often without measuring the students near acuity.
· The general education
teacher wants it.
· A parent wants it.
· The teacher of the visually
impaired does not have data to support a more appropriate choice than those
listed above. It should be noted that large print might be helpful for selected
activities. Such as:
- facilitating the student's ability to read exponents
and other small number notations in math books
- as a transitional tool for
students whose primary literacy medium is switching from print to braille.
-
standardised timed educational testing (e.g. Iowa Test of Basic Skills, Iowa
Test of Educational Development)
For the aforementioned reasons, it is important that the decision to provide large print to a student be made, by the child's educational team, following a low vision assessment provided by a low vision practitioner.
Woolly Pens are Here!
This new product from Quantum, which we have been eagerly awaiting, is now available. As reported in the November edition of Link Magazine:
‘There are all kinds of devices to make long lasting tactile drawings – but they are bulky, expensive and complex to use. Many people have expressed a need for a simpler solution for creating temporary drawings…
A Woolly Pen is a drawing implement that dispenses wool as it is drawn across an A4 size pad, that has a contrasting surface. The wool sticks to the pad, leaving woolly lines where the pen has been. Thus a texture is created that can be felt by almost anyone. There is a small, safe blade that is used to cut off the wool, when the line drawn is long enough. Woolly Pens are reusable. The pen can be used to teach a tiny tot to print their name, or to explain the horrors of parabolas and gradients to senior students. The uses and possibilities are endless. Included in the Woolly Pen Kit, are simple shapes such as a house, a circle etc, just to get started.’
Costing $49 per kit plus $7 p&h, you can order yours from Quantum by phoning (02) 9686 2600 or faxing your order form to (02) 9686 2855.
Work Experience Student
Year 10 student, Husein from Mill Park SC, has been at the Statewide Vision Resource Centre this week on Work Experience with his Integration Aide, Jenny. He has been involved with many of the activities of the Centre including brailling, braille proof reading, tape copying, filing, shredding, sorting, packaging and participating in the Volunteers Morning Tea.
Below is his article for The Bulletin on his transition to the Senior Secondary Campus next year.
VCE 2000 7/12/99
At Mill Park Secondary College which is the Senior Campus. During the early commence week I have met some people they are, Jully Wryen who is going to be my Help and Human Development teacher plus Jully Wryen is a careers officer and she find jobs for the kids which jobs they like. Another teacher that I met was Jealene Kite and she’s a welfare counsellor Mr Stutid, Mr Redden who is the principal of the Senior Campus, Miss Costadaloe which we had for the English classes during the week and she might be my English teacher.
On Tuesday last week we had a speaker he was interested a lot in cricket and football. He had a disc in his back and he have to go to the swimming pool very early in the morning so his back would be better plus he did a number of other things like for instance, coaching for the cricket team, working at the radio doing reports for the newspaper, and going to school to finish his certificate.
After a while he was dropped for going in the Victorian cricket team he and his wife lost their dream home. Who he had his ups and downs, but that doesn’t matter, but main thing that he said and even it impressed me a lot and that was to plan your time when you are at school, don’t do anything at the last minute and when things go wrong, don’t give up home.
For next year which is going 2000, I am going to do four subjects and they are, English, Help and Human Development, Music Performance and Vet Office.
I am a keen worker, very confident starting off a new adventure but I am a little bit nervous about starting at the Senior Campus next year.
The things that will be easier for me at the Senior Campus they are, verandahs wherever you are walking around the school, the school is in a circle which is a bit similar to the football ground, there is no rail to push over when I get inside the library.
The challenges that I have to face are, attendance card how to put it in and out of the machine, the metal plates, the poles, gates and the open area when it starts before the verandah.
At the start of year 2000 I’ll have less subjects than all the other students. I’ll have extra time to do my homework or to develop more on my subjects, but if I have a day off and instead going home all time probably, the Statewide Vision Resource Centre may be an option for me to come one a week for work experience.
Like the Statewide Vision Resource Centre because the people like me and I like them as well. Also in fact I liked the variety of jobs that were given to me.
Husein
Work Experience Student
Mill Park Secondary College
Finally
Have a safe and happy Christmas holiday break. See you all back in the new
millennium.
Regards from Deb Lewis (on behalf of the staff of the Statewide
Vision Resource Centre)
If you have something you would like included in 'The Bulletin', please contact:
Deb Lewis (who can be emailed at deblewis@svrc.vic.edu.au).