Reading and Students with Visual Impairments or Blindness

Students with visual impairments or blindness face unique challenges when reading. Yet with targeted interventions and accommodations in reading instruction and assessment, these students can become proficient readers. Understanding the characteristics of students with visual impairments or blindness that may affect reading is an important step toward the development of effective instruction and appropriate assessments.

This paper is intended to begin a discussion of the issues surrounding reading and students with visual impairments or blindness; it is not intended to be a comprehensive research review. The paper provides: (1) an overview of the characteristics of students with visual impairments and blindness, (2) a description of common approaches to reading instruction, and (3) assessment approaches and issues that surround the assessment of reading for students with visual impairments or blindness.

The paper is one of several brief papers developed to contribute to the process of conducting research and developing accessible reading assessments for students with disabilities. Creating accessible reading assessments based on accepted definitions of reading and proficiencies of reading requires knowledge of the issues specific to each disability and how they affect reading and the assessment of reading. The information in these papers was obtained through a broad review of literature and Web sites of national agencies and organizations, along with feedback and input from professionals in the disability areas. Each paper is intended as a first step to facilitate discussions that include individuals who do not know the disability, in this case visual impairments and blindness, and those who may know the disability but have not considered the interaction of the disability with reading or the assessment of reading through statewide testing.

Students with Visual Impairments or Blindness

Approximately 25,000 students 6-21 years of age in the United States received special education services for visual impairments in the 2000-2001 school year, comprising about 0.5% of school-age special education students (U.S. Department of Education, 2002). Most have low vision, which includes tunnel vision and partial vision. Some students with visual impairments can read print efficiently without accommodations. Other students may use some tactile and auditory adaptations, but many can read print with magnification (Assistive Technology Strategies, Tools, Accommodations and Resources -- AT STAR -- Web site). Only about 10% of children with visual impairments are blind and depend exclusively on tactile or auditory methods such as braille or audio text to read ( Erin, 2003).

It has been estimated that nearly 2,000 K-12 English language learners (ELLs) received special education services for visual impairments or blindness in 2001-2002. Thus, approximately 0.5% of ELLs with disabilities were identified with visual impairments or blindness (Zehler, Fleischman, Hopstock, Pendzick, & Stephenson, 2003). It is unclear whether these figures included those ELLs who are deaf-blind. The challenge of learning English and having visual impairments or blindness adds another level of complexity to learning to read and demonstrating reading achievement (Mueller & Markowitz, 2004).

Reading is most often thought to involve viewing print on a page or other medium such as computer screens, and then decoding that print. Because visual disabilities interfere with an individual's ability to see words on paper or other media, other modes of reading may need to be used. The degree of a student's visual impairment, along with the impact of potential additional disabilities, has varying implications for instruction, accommodations, and testing.

In recent decades, many educators in the United States have pushed for increased reliance on residual vision, and assistive technologies such as screen readers and magnifiers have become more widely available. These trends have led to a decline in the number of students learning to read proficient English braille (reflected in American Printing House for the Blind's annual distribution of federal quota). Considerable controversy has followed in the wake that has implications for reading. Some believe that proficiency in braille is essential for individuals with visual impairments or blindness to achieve satisfactory educational progress, and argue that learning to read and write are necessary in order to become self-sufficient in adulthood (Johnson, 1996). On the other hand, other advocates suggest that braille may not always be appropriate for every student with a visual impairment, and that other avenues to accessing print are just as important as braille.

Approximately 5,300 students use braille as their primary reading medium (American Printing House for the Blind, 2003). The Braille Authority of North America (BANA) defines braille as:

"a system of touch reading for the blind which employs embossed dots evenly arranged in quadrangular letter spaces or cells. In each cell, it is possible to place six dots, three high and two wide. By selecting one or several dots in characteristic position or combination, 63 different characters can be formed. To aid in describing these characters by their dot or dots, the six dots of the cell are numbered 1,2,3, downward on the left, and 4, 5, 6, downward on the right" (BANA Web site).

According to a study by Trent and Truan (1997), the age at the onset of blindness was the critical factor related to reading speed. Factors such as comprehension, degree of vision, methods of instruction, and attitudes toward reading or braille did not impact reading speed. The authors of the study also found that to increase braille reading speed, students should use braille daily and for a long period of time; early braille instruction was also an important contributor to speed. Rapid braille readers can decode as quickly as print readers ( Erin, 2003). Still, on average, braille readers read at about half the speed of print readers, at about 150 words per minute (Pring, 1994).

English braille is not simply a letter-for-letter translation of standard English print. To reduce bulk and improve reading speeds, many words in English braille have commonly used shortened forms called "contracted braille," which students usually learn in the upper elementary grades. The word mother, for instance, is often written as a two-cell contraction, and the word "have" is represented by the cell letter "h." Some prepositions (such as "to"), conjunctions ("and"), and articles ("the") are placed directly adjacent to the following word, with no space in between. Cells also do not always correspond directly with an English letter. For instance, "one braille cell means dis if it shows up in the beginning of a word, means dd if it shows up in the middle of a word, and means a period if it shows up at the end of a word" (Holladay & Kaysen, 2000).

Braille in languages other than English represents those languages, and braille users in those countries have their own usage conventions. English language learners in the United States who have learned a version of braille based on their native language may not be familiar with the conventions of English braille. Furthermore, according to one braille translation company (see Braille Plus Inc, at http://www.brailleplus.net), braille in other languages may not have a contracted form.

Students with visual impairments or blindness may begin the process of learning to read with different life experiences and preparation from students without visual impairments. Written language is a pervasive part of the visual environment from a very young age for most children with normal vision, but a child who is blind often encounters written words for the first time in school. In observations of a young reader with congenital blindness, Pring (1994) found that the student progressed through similar learning stages as students who learned to read print, but did not develop awareness of whole word patterns. Instead, the student continued to "sound-out" braille words symbol by symbol. Pring suggested whole word recognition might still occur among more advanced, proficient braille readers.

Readers with visual impairments or blindness and readers without visual impairments show few differences in their linguistic and cognitive processes related to reading. Both types of readers use syntactic, semantic and contextual clues to become proficient readers. Individuals who are blind or visually impaired simply face a barrier to accessing print (Koenig, 1992). Still, low vision, or a diminished perceptual field has implications for developing reading fluency at both lower processing (efficient recognition of distinctive letter features, orthographic information, and sight word recognition) and higher processing levels (syntactic, semantic, and text discourse structure). Students with assistive visual technologies such as magnification and screen readers can often develop proficiency in processes like phonemic segmentation, blending, and decoding and gain enough automatic processing using these proficiencies to develop proficiency in vocabulary and comprehension.

Instruction for Students with Visual Impairments or Blindness

Students with visual impairments or blindness often require adaptations or accommodations to access regular education classrooms and curricula. Examples include contrast and color highlighting, steady lighting, varied time requirements, optical devices, monoculars, hand-held magnifiers, or auditory materials. Students who are blind may use adaptations such as raised maps, real objects, or other tactile materials ( Erin, 2003). Other accommodations for students with visual impairments or blindness may include specialized instruction that is not part of the general curriculum, such as mobility training or instruction in brailling.

Students with low vision can often read standard print comfortably with decreased viewing distance or by using a hand magnifier or other optical devices. Large print material increases the apparent size of the object through a lens system. However, using a hand magnifier can result in physical strain and blockage of lighting. Students who depend on large print books for most or all of their reading materials are often disadvantaged because of the limited availability of large print materials. Students with low vision can avoid the disadvantages of using only one strategy by acquiring a variety of efficient literacy tools that incorporate a range of technologies. Many people with visual impairments or blindness use assistive technology, which consists of computer programs that speak the text on the screen or magnify text in the word processor. Braille embossers can also turn text files into hard-copy braille, although the availability of this technology may vary by language.

Koenig and Holbrook (1995) developed a procedure called the Learning Media Assessment to determine the best media for a student to use for reading and other learning activities. The educational team or teacher can use the procedure to identify primary and secondary media to help a student learn to read and write most efficiently.

Assessment of Students with Visual Impairments or Blindness

The relatively low performance of some students with visual impairments or blindness on academic tests may be due to lagging reading skills (Corley & Pring, 1993). Yet some children with low vision read as well or better than their peers without visual impairments or blindness (van Bon, Adriaansen, Gompel, & Kouwenberg, 2000). Despite some explanations that suggest specific eye anomalies are more detrimental to reading performance than others (von Bon et al., 2000), it is unclear which factors contribute to the variability in reading achievement of children with low vision. In fact, the finding that some children with low vision read very well suggests that factors other than visual impairment affect student performance.

Students with visual impairments or blindness rely on a host of supports and accommodations to read in the classroom, yet these same supports and accommodations may not be available for state assessments. Although nearly every state offered English braille as a test accommodation in 2003, the use of braille in 11 states was restricted or had implications for scoring and aggregation (Clapper, Morse, Lazarus, Thompson, & Thurlow, 2005). In other words, some students in those states had the option to take tests in braille, but those students might automatically receive a non-proficient score or their scores might not count. Large print was allowed by nearly all states as an accommodation without restrictions.

Read-aloud accommodations, which are often used by students with visual impairments or blindness who are not using braille or print enlarging technology, were more controversial in states' accommodation policies (Clapper et al., 2005). Although nearly all states allowed tests to be read aloud, only three permitted read aloud accommodations with no restrictions; 31 states permitted test questions to be read aloud only under certain circumstances, and many of these states prohibited read aloud accommodations on reading tests. In 14 states, read aloud accommodations had scoring or aggregation implications.

State policies on accommodations for students with visual impairments or blindness mirror common assumptions about reading. Most people agree that large print and English braille should be considered standard valid accommodations on reading tests for students with visual impairments or blindness, presumably because these accommodations still entail a decoding process similar to reading print. Because read aloud accommodations, such as human or screen readers, bypass the decoding process, many people consider them to be invalid measures of reading. Still, research is scarce on how these accommodations affect the reading process for students with visual impairments or blindness.

One could question whether this is an accurate representation of how accommodations affect the reading process for students with visual impairments or blindness. Decoding an English braille version of a passage of text is not directly comparable to decoding the same text in standard English print, but how this non-comparability plays into the assessment equation is unclear. The fact that English braille uses contractions and other "shortcuts" might suggest that students have a short-cut version of text that would be easier to read. On the other hand, the complex use of the same cell to mean different things depending on the position within a word or sentence might suggest that students have a more complex decoding task than decoders of standard print. Other research has indicated that braille reading demands a greater level of phonological awareness and memory than print reading.

To date, given the relatively small numbers of students who use braille versions of state tests and the expenses associated with creating those versions, states are not offering braille tests in other languages. This appears to be true even if the standard English print version of the text is translated into a standard print version in another language. Also, the availability of "contracted" versus standard braille versions of the assessment may be an issue for some students who are accustomed to using one form over the other.

Issues also surround the use of reading accommodations for students with low vision or blindness. Oral presentations require the development of attention and memory skills beyond those used in traditional decoding. The default enlarged print size in a test booklet may or may not be the optimal size for a student's level of visual impairment. Extended time is almost always a needed accommodation because of the format differences. As with all students, accommodations for students with low vision or blindness must be familiar and used prior to the testing situation.

Summary

The intent of this brief paper is to highlight issues surrounding reading and students with visual impairment, including those students with blindness. While not a comprehensive review, it is intended to give enough of a sense of the characteristics of the students, general instructional approaches used with them, and assessment approaches and issues to generate discussion about the possible ways in which more accessible assessments can be designed for those students who are proficient readers given their visual disabilities or blindness. This paper is part of the background for research on accessible reading assessments conducted by the Partnership for Accessible Reading Assessments, and for discussions among collaborators on the National Accessible Reading Assessment Projects (NARAP).

References

American Printing House for the Blind. (2003). Distribution of eligible students based on the federal quota census of January 6, 2003.

Assistive Technology Strategies, Tools, Accommodations and Resources (ATSTAR), a collaboration of Austin Independent School District, Austin Community College, University of Texas Austin, Austin Harvard School, Sylvan Learning Center, Far South Community Schools, and Region XIII Education Service. Retrieved August 2005, from the World Wide Web: http://www.atstar.org/info_disabilities_visual.html.

Braille Authority of North America (BANA). http://www.brailleauthority.org.

Clapper, A. T., Morse, A. B., Lazarus, S. S., Thompson, S. J., & Thurlow, M. L. (2005). 2003 state policies on assessment participation and accommodations for students with disabilities (Synthesis Report 56). Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, National Center on Educational Outcomes. Retrieved August 2005, from the World Wide Web: http://cehd.umn.edu/NCEO/OnlinePubs/Synthesis56.html

Corley, G. & Pring, L. (1993). Reading strategies in partially sighted children. International Journal of Rehabilitation Research, 16, 209-220.

Erin, J. N. (2003). Educating students with visual impairments. Eric Clearinghouse on Disabilities and Gifted Education (ERIC EC), Digest #E653.

Holladay, D., & Kaysen, J. (2000). American braille basics. Duxberry Systems. Retrieved August 2005, from the World Wide Web: http://www.duxburysystems.com/resources/about_amer_braille.asp.

Johnson, L. (1996). The braille literacy crisis for children. Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness, 90, 276 - 278.

Koenig, A. J., & Holbrook, M. C. (1995). Learning media assessment of students with visual impairments: A resource guide for teachers (2 nd Edition). Austin, Texas: Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired.

Koenig, A. J. (1992). A framework for understanding the literacy of individuals with visual impairments. Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness, 86, 277-284.

Muller, E., & Markowitz, J. (2004). Synthesis brief: English language learners with disabilities. Alexandria, VA: National Association of State Directors of Special Education Inc.

Pring, L. (1994). Touch and go: Learning to read braille. Reading Research Quarterly, 29, 67-74.

Trent, S. D., & Truan, M. B. (1997). Speed, accuracy, and comprehension of adolescent braille readers in a specialized school. Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness, 91, 494-500.

U.S. Department of Education (2002). Twenty-fourth annual report to Congress on the implementation of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Washington , DC : Author.

van Bon, W., Adriaansen, L., Gompel, M., & Kouwenberg, I. (2000). The reading and spelling performances of visually impaired Dutch elementary school children. Visual Impairment Research, 2, 17-31.

Zehler, A. M., Fleischman, H. L., Hopstock, P. J., Pendzick, M. L., & Stephenson, T. G. (2003). Descriptive study of services to LEP students and LEP students with disabilities (No. 4 Special topic report: Findings on special education LEP students). Arlington , VA : Development Associates, Inc.

Acknowledgments

This paper was developed through a collaborative effort of numerous members of the PARA staff. The contributors are listed here alphabetically: Kristin Eisenbraun, Christopher Johnstone, Sheryl Lazarus, Kristi Liu, Danielle Matchett, Ross Moen, Mari Quenemoen, Rachel Quenemoen, Sandra Thompson, and Martha Thurlow. In addition, we had the invaluable assistance of a member of the General Advisory Committee for the National Accessible Reading Assessment Projects (NARAP), Jean Martin, who is President of the Association of State Consultants of Blind/Visually Impaired.

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