CVI Study Group - September 2017 This video is posted online with the following chapter markers: Chapter 1. Strategies for Literacy Chapter 2. Diane Sheline Case Study Chapter 3. Planning for future webinars Description of graphical content is included between Description Start and Description End. Transcript Start [Music] Fade up from black. Animation: Text for TSBVI transform into braille cells for TSBVI. [Music face out] Fade to black. Chapter 1. Strategies for Literacy Lynne: Hi. Sara: Hi, everyone. Lynne: Welcome to the first CVI Study Group of the '17‑'18 school year. I'm Lynne McAlister. Sara: And I'm Sara Kitchen. Lynne: Today we want to talk with you about the-- some of the information that we learned when we were in Boston last March to see Christine Roman present on CVI Phase III, specifically. So ... we were there March10th and 11th and it was very, very cold. Christine talked about many things, it was a two‑day presentation, we're not going to have time today to talk about all of that. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Today’s Agenda Content: • Welcome. • Christine Roman March 10th and 11th 2017 at Perkins School for the Blind-Overview • Salient Features and Comparative Language • Student example • Planning for next 2 study groups! Description End: Today we're going to show you, talk about salient features and comparative language. And then Diane Sheline is going to share a student example, so you can see what kind of an illustration of what we've talked about. And we also want to plan for the next two study groups. [ Slide end: ] Sara: Right, we'll use about the last 10 minutes to do that. Did you get a chat? Is there a chat? Lynne: Nope. Sara: Okay. Making strange sounds. Okay. So let's look at the next slide. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Assessing and Supporting the Student in Phase III CVI - C. Roman, 3/10-3/11/17 Content: • Phase III CVI-general info. • Specific literacy strategies: o Salient Features o Comparative Language • Social Skills Description End: Lynne: So Christine Roman talked about Phase III CVI general info. She went over all of the CVI characteristics and talked specifically about how they manifest in Phase III. She talked about salient features and comparative language as being strategies for literacy. And she talked about social skills. She also touched upon CVI and autism. And how those two things are sometimes confused, but very, very different. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Today we will cover Content: • Salient Features • Comparative Language • Example of teaching a student using these strategies Description End: We don't have time today to talk about all of those, but-- so today what we're going to cover are salient features, comparative language, and show you videos and talk about examples-- an example of teaching a student using those strategies. At the end of the webinar, we will have several polls to talk about future study groups. [ Slide end: ] Sara: Right. If you-- I don't think we're going to have a whole lot of time for discussion during this particular Study Group. So if you have questions during this one and you want to continue the conversation, and keep talking about-- about comparative language and salient features, and literacy, we'll have time to enter that during the polling at the end and also if you want to talk about the social skills aspect of teaching students with CVI, and additional information, of course. Anything else, like if you want to look at your student. Of course, we always want to look at real students. And keep in mind that we will send you a video permission form, if you do that, but we won't record these. We don't record our CVI study groups. You've got to be there, you know. You're there or you're square. So that make help if you have parents who are a little iffy about-- about sharing video of their kids. Because we don't want that to be an impediment for us learning more about-- every time we see a kid, we learn more about CVI. And it's good. So please, if you have a student that you can share video, we love to do that and analyze together as a group. It really helps us all learn. Lynne: So I'm going to begin by talking about salient features. Salient features are the defining elements of a visual target. Sara: Like in the slide we have‑‑ [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features and Comparative Language Content: left-side photo: Figure 1: Picture of an assortment of differently colored and sized plastic animals. right-side photo: Figure 2: Picture of an assortment of black and white striped plastic animals of various sizes. Description End: Lynne: Such as in the slides. Christine Roman talked previously about using toy animals, specifically to point out salient features. She would give an example of telling a kid to sort them and then see how they were sorting them so you would get a better idea of what they were seeing as they do it. Pointing out and being able to see salient features within an object, help build the-- the ventral stream, which is the what stream. So it's kind of a win‑win situation because by pointing out salient features, you strengthen the ventral stream which improves the ability to see salient features and improves literacy skills. Sara: That's right. It's building a visual library. Lynne: Correct. So for this, it's really how are these objects all alike. How are they different. What makes them different. And different details about them. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features and Comparative Language Content: Figure 3: Table showing the progression of building a visual library with visual targets: first objects and images are known and recognized visually, then the salient features are noticed and filed in the brain, then novel versions can be identified noting similarities and differences to known objects and images. Description End: Sara: On the next slide, we kind of have a progression. Right? Lynne: Yes. With he have a progression of pointing out the salient features. You start with known objects that the student is familiar with. And you start pointing out salient features of known objects. And we're going to talk about that in more depth later. But after you point out the salient features of known objects and the child can-- can point them out to you, then you start-- you then go to novel versions of the known objects. So these could be different-- different types of the same object, such as an example of different-- a different fork, a different cup. It could be a drawn version of a fork or a cup. [ Slide end: ] It could be a photograph, if that is novel to the student. And you point out those same salient features to the child. Sara: Right. And on the images side of that, you usually start with a photo of a real object that is familiar and then you can even, like, look at it from a different perspective. And it can look like something else. Lynne: Right. You can put it in a different background, you know. It can make it look-- but no matter how you view it, you know, a fork is going to have the same salient features. Always. No matter, you know, if it's big or little or baby. Sara: It can be two tines. Lynne: It can be two, but there are going to be tines or it wouldn't be a fork. Sara: Something that splits a fork in the road or‑‑ Lynne: Right. Something that identifies that object, always. Okay. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features Content: • Learned in children without CVI incidentally or through joint attention/visually directed communication • Defining elements/characteristics of the target • True or nearly always true of the target • Includes 2 to 3 descriptors (but not more) • For CVI purposes, target visual features only • Helps Individuals with CVI o Solve the problem of Novelty o Build/increase use of the Ventral Stream (search for specific visual details) Description End: So in salient features, they are learned in children without CVI incidentally through joint attention, visually directed communication and we're going to go into a little more depth about this later, give you an example. But an example of a child pointing to a small dog and saying, "Cat." And so then you discuss what is it-- what is or is not a cat about this small dog. And so that is a joint communication. But if a student has a visual impairment, they may never notice that small dog that's a little far away, so that conversation may never take place. Sara: Right. Lynne: You define elements, characteristics of the target. These elements have to be true or nearly always true of the target. And‑‑ Sara: Don't pick the exception. Pick the rule. Lynne: Pick the rule, that's a great way to put it. Sara: Start with a rule. Lynne: Two to three descriptors but no more. Sara: Like what would it be for a dog, floppy ears. Lynne: Well, we're going to talk about the conversation of salient features, how it takes place. Sara: I'm jumping ahead. Lynne: Visual features only, which we're going to give you an example of that on the next slide. By doing these things you solve the problem of novelty. So the more the student can see salient features of different things, when they are confronted with a-- with a new-- a new cup, a new fork, it's no longer that novel because they do have that visual memory of the salient features. [ Slide end: ] And so as they build like Sara said the visual library, that-- that does away with novelty. Slowly chips away at visual novelty. And then once again, you are building the ventral stream, which is then building your ability to see the salient features. So you are practicing it, you are using it and then it gets stronger. Sara: Turns from a dirt path into a super highway eventually. Lynne: Eventually, which is what you are going for. Sara: Yeah, that was the analogy that Dr. Roman gave us. That I liked. Lynne: Yes. So salient features, if you start with a student and say, okay, sort these objects, they might start with color. That's pretty common. Color, you know, goes way back in their visual development. So your goal is to sure, you know, color is going to be an important visual anchor for these guys for a long time. Sara: Probably forever, right? Lynne: Forever, but you now want to move on and have them notice other details about the object. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features Content: • May start with color • Focus on visual characteristics, for example, zipper; “It has teeth like a smile on its side.” Not action; “It pulls up and down”. • Even if item is known (like a fork), point out salient features: provides a framework for other forks in other contexts, like a fork in the road, or a forked tongue. Description End: You focus on visual characteristics, so the example in the previous slides of a zipper. You don't want to say well the zipper goes up and down. You want to point out what the zipper looks like. So we did some practice of this when we were there on salient features of pictures. And it's not as easy as you think. Sara: No. [ Slide end: ] Lynne: Because, you know, you kind of instinctively want to talk about what it does. Or the sound it makes. Sara: Uh‑huh, all of the different features. Lynne: So dogs bark. But that's not visual. So you have to really concentrate on the visual features, visual salient features of an object as you describe it. And then pointing out salient features, another benefit of it is that, you know, language we use a lot of-- of similes, so Diane-- actually this is an example that Diane Sheline provided with us. [ Slide start: ] repeat previous slide So the fork, what is a fork? And then, okay, well, what is a fork in the road? What is a forked tongue? How are those things the same because they still have the salient features of the fork. [ Slide end: ] Sara: Yeah. So I guess maybe to help hone that skill, you would think of other things that have that and think about what is it that makes that visual characteristic that visual characteristic. Like with the zipper, how would you describe the visual part of a zipper? Like teeth, like a smile? I mean, it's not-- you know, what we-- how we usually interact with zipper is to zip them. We don't actually look at them. But it's a row of inter‑‑ Lynne: intertwined teeth. Sara: Yeah. Lynne: Metal. Sara: See it's hard. But a zipper does have teeth, just like a smile. Lynne: Like a comb. Sara: She's better at this than I am. Lynne: Comparative language is when you use salient features to pound out how things are the same and how they are different. So that focuses the students' attention on the features because it draws from their experience. So, you know, Christine had a story of the child saying, pointing at the Yorkie and saying "Oh, a cat." The parent saying, well, it's small like a cat. And it has four legs like a cat. But you see his ears are not pointed out and stand up like a cat's. And you go into more and more detail about the difference between a dog and a cat. Sara: He has a short tail. Lynne: He has a short tail. The Yorkie has long hair. Some cats have long hair, you know. So you would have to-- to use the moment and really, you know, draw upon the student's knowledge. So if you have a cat at home, you could point out the differences between that dog and your cat, which is a little less overwhelming as all cats. Sara: Yeah. Lynne: Start from their base of knowledge says yes. An apple versus a strawberry, an apple is like a strawberry but they are both red. You put apples in pie, you can put strawberries in pie. You can talk about the differences, I guess they should be visual differences. Sara: More round, the strawberry is more pointy on one end. The seeds are dots. They could tell the difference that way. Lynne: Right. See, I was just describing the apple versus the strawberry in non‑visual terms, which is really get caught into. Sara: Yes. Lynne: So there's many other examples of that. And Diane will show you in her videos that are coming up. How she did that. Sara: With letters, I believe, right? Word shapes. Chapter 2. Diane Sheline Case Study Lynne: Uh‑huh. So in the videos that are following, Diane is going to talk about and show you some things, such as choosing high interest words. Diane is going to talk about literacy and literacy activity she did with a student in Phase III. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features, Comparative Language and Literacy Content: • Choose high interest words (high interest to the student) • Initially choose words with very different shapes and lengths • Outline words close to the edges of the letters in a preferred color Description End: She chose high interest words to the student. These words were very different shapes and lengths. And she outlined the words close to the edges of the letters in the student's preferred color, which was red. The salient features chosen to point out the details in the word were chosen by the student. They discussed the shape of the word and initially, as you'll see, she really says "I don't want you to read the word. I want you to look at the shape of the word." [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Salient Features, Comparative Language and Literacy Content: • Salient features of a word should be determined by and belong to the student • Discuss word shapes. Assist with familiar image comparisons if needed. • Don’t forget about context clues and phonemic awareness Description End: And, also, she's going to talk about context clues and phonemic awareness. So Diane, are you ready? [ Slide end: ] Diane: I'm here. Can you guys hear me? Lynne: Yes, welcome. Diane: Thank you. I'm glad to be here. Lynne: You are here, right here. [ Laughter ]. Sara: So let's put-- are we starting with your PowerPoint? Diane: Yeah, can we go ahead and take a look at the first slide. Who is it that's operating the slides? Is it Andy? [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Case Study: Thomas right-side photo: Thomas Description End: Sara: There we go, do you see it? Diane: Okay. All right. I just wanted to share with you a student that I recently worked with and through these few slides that I'm going to share with you, I'm hoping that you'll get an idea of this technique of "Shape reading", for lack of a better name. I'm not sure what to call it exactly. But I'm going to call it shape reading. Let me introduce to you Thomas. At the time that I was working with him, Lynne was there as well, he was in the seventh grade. He's now this school year in the 8th grade. His diagnosis of CVI is secondary to an occipital brain bleed that occurred shortly after his birth. Thomas at that time was a non‑reader. And in fact, he hated reading. And everything associated with reading. He became very distressed when he was expected to work with anything dealing with literacy. He had a CVI range completed and he was found not-- not by us, but by his TVI was found to be functioning at the high end of Phase III. When Lynne and I were working with him, we administered the Phase III extension chart. We found that he did, you know, fairly well in most areas, except for the following-- he had difficulty in these areas: Discriminating, recognizing and identifying pictures or symbols when presented against a highly complex background. Discriminating, recognizing, identifying black and white lines on pictures. That gets back to what Sara just said a little bit ago. That it's easier for students to recognize color photographs of real familiar items first. And then, also, the recognition and identification of targets, at 15 or 20 feet or further. He had a real difficult time. And that has to do with all of that complexity that's out there in the distance. The target just blend in with it, whatever is out there in the distance. So I'm going to show you in a few slides here a little bit more about this technique that I'm going to call shape reading. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: • Have the student choose a few (or up to 10) favorite, high frequency words. Description End: And it's-- it came about because of-- I had already heard of this technique being used. I tried a few things but I was able to refine it after Sara and Lynne and I went to Dr. Roman's presentation last March out at Perkins. To begin with, as Sara and Lynne mentioned, you want to choose to begin with, a few words. I chose up to 10-- I asked for up to 10 words to be chosen that are kind of favorite words of Thomas' or high frequency words or words that were-- he's very familiar with. Words that he uses very, very often. And those words that he chose and his mother sent me-- Oh, wait a second, please go back one slide, not quite yet. Back one slide, please. The words that he chose were these meaningful words that he choose were Batman, Xbox 1, stop, dad, mom, sweet tea, [indiscernible], pap, WWE and iPad. Next slide. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: • Start by outlining the entire word in red (or the student’s preferred color). right-side photo: Figure 4: Picture of the word "Mom" in bold, outlined in red, then traced on black paper and cut out. Both the shape and the paper from which it is cut are shown. Description End: Okay. So what we did was-- both Sara and Lynne alluded to this, I started by outlining the entire word in red or you can use the student's preferred colors-- color. Kids with brain injury, it's been documented and people have observed, that students with brain injury and Cortical Visual Impairment often see the shape of a word first. Not the individual letter. And Dr.Roman suggested again and she kind of talked about it at that two‑day training, and, again, we start with a thick red outline. Now, I would like to point out that there's three-- three shapes here in this-- in this illustration and they are presented on a white dry erase board. I would like you to look at the one that is outlined in red when I'm talking about this. That is a printed off word that's been printed off from the computer and printed on a magnetic sheet. And I have directions that-- that you should have been sent by email how to do this, that give you more information on this. So then once it's printed off on that magnetic sheet, I outlined it in red trying to pay attention with my own eye what would be a strong salient feature of the shape of that word. And what your goal is, to gradually decrease that red line to a thinner red line and then to a black line and then to a dotted line and then a thinner dotted line and then you remove the outline altogether. Then your next step is that you-- you outline it in red with the red Sharpie marker, you take an X‑Acto knife, you cut out that shape so that it's a magnetic piece with the word "Mom" on it outlined in red. You take that piece and lay it down on top of an eight and a half by 11 sheet of black card stock paper. And then trace around it with a pencil. And then again use your X‑Acto knife, you don't want to dig in to that M‑O‑M with scissors. You need to use your X‑Acto knife so that 8 and a half by 11 sheet becomes a puzzle board and then you have a puzzle piece that's in the shape of M‑O‑M. I hope that you are understanding there's three pieces that need to be displayed. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: “Wehn you raed, you dno’t raed evrey leettr in ecah wrod. You look at the wrod as a wlohe.” --The example above found in the book, “Speed Reading for Dummies” by, Sutz and Weverka Description End: Take a look at the example that you can find in the book "Speed Reading for Dummies", take a look at those words there. Whether you realize it or not, probably you recognize many of those words that are on the screen by their shape. You should have been able to read the following. When you read, you don't read every letter in each word. Word as a whole. So research indicates that the order of the letters in a word doesn't really matter. What matters is the first and the last letter in a word. If that's true in the right place, you often are very lucky at reading the word. Next slide, please. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Keep in mind; • The first and the last letter (shape) are most important • Lower case letters have more distinctive shapes • Discuss context clues (especially when there are pictures) • Development of phonemic awareness will still be crucial Description End: So that previous example shows you to some degree reading words is just recognizing shapes and the first letter-- first and last letter of the word are the most important letters for recognizing the word because these letters define the word's shape more than others. And this is really important here. Word shapes matter in reading. Researchers [Audio cutting out] not sure that I'm pronouncing the name right, Bouhouis and Bouma, they suggest that recognizing the word first, last and middle letters, they call it component letters. They say it's the most important. You need to remember to emphasize the first, last, middle letters when you are talking about salient cues for the student and when you are outlining it in red or whatever the student's preferred color is. Next slide. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Start with 2, distinctively different words (shape, length, letters that extend below or above the line, etc). Description End: So what you want to do is you want to start with-- when you are beginning this process with a student, like we did with Thomas, I did ask the mom-- to begin with-- because I wanted to-- two very distinctly different words. And that might have to do with their shape, the length of the word, the letters that extend below and above the line, et cetera. You want to start [indiscernible] very different word. Recently, let me just tell you a quick story. Recently I was working with another student, not Thomas, but another student that we were working with shape reading on. And I decided to use his first name and the word book because he likes books. And I just didn't think through it all the way, but his first name starts with the letter B and ends with the letter K. The whole process, printed off the letters, the words on a magnetic sheet, outlined in red, tracked them on the black, paper cut them all out. Then I all of a sudden looked at the words and thought oh, my gosh, I'm not listening to what I preach. Those were not two very, very different words. They both began with the capital B, the word book with a capital B, which was a mistake. Don't do that. When you can, use a lower case letter. They both ended with a K. So I had to scrap that idea and started with a different word to go along with his first name. Next slide, please. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: left-side photo: Figure 5: Picture of the word "Xbox" in bold, outlined in red, then traced on black paper and cut out. Both the shape and the paper from which it is cut are shown. right-side photo: Figure 6: Picture of the word "Batman" in bold, outlined in red, then traced on black paper and cut out. Both the shape and the paper from which it is cut are shown. Description End: So these are the two words that I started with, Thomas and these-- these are the three pieces of-- of materials that I created. And, again, that word, each of those words, Xbox and Batman are separate pieces. Those are displayed on a white magnetic dry erase board or a flip side of an All in One Board. An All in One Board I'm sure most of you have heard me talk about. Has the velcro compatible black side on one side and then you flip it and it has the magnetic side on the other side. So clearly these are very distinct actively different words. Particularly at the beginning of the word and the end of the word, one word is clearly longer than the other word. Okay. In the next slide, don't switch the slide yet. Hold on a second. But-- but if you can go back one slide. The next slide I'm going to show you a short video where I'm introducing the shape of the word Xbox to Thomas and encouraging him to come up with salient features that defines the shape of this word. These three salient features that he comes up with, will then be recorded in his visual dictionary or a script for word shapes. Towards the end of the clip, Oh, sorry about that. Towards the end of the clip, I encourage him to select the shape that will fit into the corresponding puzzle board. Remember I'm calling that eight and a half by 11‑inch black card stock that we cut the shape out of, a puzzle board. I'm encouraging him to fit a shape into that puzzle board. So this is the first time that I've asked him to do this, in this film that's coming up. So he's somewhat unclear. But after working through it once, he understands what I'm asking him to do. You will see in a later video, when I ask him to do this for the second word, Batman, he complies immediately. I'm using the shapes I developed shown in this photo right here. All of which have magnetic strips on the back of them. I am using an APH All in One Board, the white side, which is magnetic. I'm using these materials shown in this slide and I'm able to place the target up on that board, which brings it into Thomas' best field of view and he's able to easily manipulate these targets or as easily as he's able to rhetorically. Thomas is seated at a table and we're going to see five videos in this presentation and these materials that I have just listed to you are going to be used in each clip. Next slide, please. And show the video. [ Video start: ] Diane: Xbox, that's the shape of Xbox, the word Xbox. Do you notice anything about it that's unusual for that shape? Thomas: Ummm ... Diane: Anything interesting about that shape or the word Xbox? Yes. I thought so, too. Do you know what that reminded me of, it might not remind you of it‑‑ Thomas: Pacman [ Laughter ]. Diane: Pacman. It does. But interestingly enough, look over here. A Pacman now. A big Pacman mouth and a little Pacman mouth. Thomas, that is awesome. So that shape, that's your own shape when you look at the shape of the word Xbox, it has-- I would say a Pacman mouth on either end. Can you show me the two Pacman mouths, put your fingers on them. There and there. Exactly. Xbox has a Pacman mouth at the beginning and the end. And would you say I'm going to-- I'm going to show you another shape of a word. Would you say that Xbox is a short word or a long word? In comparison. Thomas: Short one. Diane: Yeah. It's a short word. And it has a Pacman mouth at the beginning and the Pacman mouth at the end. This one is a longer word. But I'm-- we're not going to talk about that shape yet. Don't look at that shape yet. Thomas: Okay. Diane: Because we're only looking at this shape with the Pacman mouth at the beginning and the end. Okay. You've got two shapes there. Two shapes. And I'm wondering which shape might fit in here. Thomas: [Indiscernible] Diane: No. Here's your two choices. Here's your two choices. Which one of these two choices might fit in here? How do you know? How do you know? Thomas: Because I have looked at this, and then looked up. Diane: Well, let's go back to our Pacman mouth. Could this small Pacman mouth fit here? Why don't you take it off and see if the whole thing fits. It's magnetic. See if it fits. Like a puzzle piece. Good. Thomas: I don't do well with puzzles. It does fit. You got the right one. You got the exact right one. Excellent. Okay. I'm going to take this back. Mom, Thomas came up-- [ Video end: ] Diane: Next slide, please. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Collaborate with all team members, parents and caretakers Description End: So you can see he came up with the three salient features that describe what that shape looks like to him. And he helped and pretty much came up with those three salient features. So you can-- you see how important it would be that you need to have [indiscernible] collaboration with the entire team that works with that student, you know, be it the resource room teacher, the TVI, the parent, you all want to be on the same page for this and you need to teach the entire team what this is all about. And how to do it. It's very, very difficult to explain to somebody how to do this. Over the internet or by email or over the phone. I don't want you to change the slide yet. But in the next short video clip that I'm going to show you, I would like you to take note at the end what this student's mom says from the background. She's saying that's totally different than how I did it‑‑ Sara: Diane, can you talk real-- right into your phone speaker? They are having a hard time hearing you in the production booth. Diane: Okay. Is this better? Sara: Yes. Thank you. Diane: Okay. I'm sorry. Thank you, thanks for letting me know. Sara: No problem. Diane: So I-- I think that it's very important that you collaborate with all team members. Everybody needs to talk-- to be sharing what those salient features are. We don't want Thomas to go to his classroom setting and then the teacher and he comes up with three totally different salient features. Once salient features are developed for a word shape, stick with those and start recording them in a visual dictionary of some sort. So in the next video clip that you are going to be watching, I want you to pay attention because towards the end the mom says, oh, my gosh, that's totally different than what I thought you meant or something along those lines. So it just points out the fact that you really need to demonstrate this one‑on‑one with parents, care takers, other teachers. It's very difficult to explain over the phone. Let's go ahead and see that next clip. [ Video start: ] Diane: We're not worried about what it says, we are worried about the shape and the salient features. Can you show me, when I have got this one up, can you show me the two Pacman mouth? There, where else, there? Of course your idea was that it was short in comparison to this one. It's a shorter word. Should we look at this word? Thomas: Yes. Mother: My approach was completely-- it was "How are you going to use it?" So you need to know what it is. [ Video end: ] Diane: Okay. Next slide, please. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: If several different people are working on literacy, everyone needs to be familiar with and add to the Script or Visual Dictionary. Description End: So teachers, parents and all of the team members are going to need to be using the same language to describe each word shape. The salient features, which are hopefully going to be determined by the student, are-- need to be-- really need to be carefully recorded as a script or in what I would call a visual dictionary. I don't want the slide to change quite yet, but in the next video the second word shape is presented to Thomas. He's-- he's encouraged to come up with two or three salient features to describe the word shape for the word Batman. [indiscernible] features he came up with, try to repeat them again and again, probably too much. I encourage the TVI as we're going to stick with these descriptive words as we move forward. We also work again with that [indiscernible] board that I'm talking to you about, which is just that 8 and a half by 11 black piece of card stock. Thomas is encouraged to locate the empty puzzle space with the shape Batman into it. As you can see in the video, he does this promptly and without hesitation now that he has a better understanding of when I expect him to go. We're going to go from that into a following short video and I'm demonstrating how I reinforce the three salient features that Thomas developed for the word Batman. If can he with see the next two videos right now. ‑‑ if we can see the next two videos right now. [ Video start: ] Thomas: [indiscernible] Diane: At the beginning. A tall-- you said up. So I think what you are saying is tall and it extends above the line, up. Thomas: Yes. Diane: Oval shape that comes up above the line at the beginning and the cave at the end. You have to remember that. Do we have it‑‑ I do. Diane: That's what we're going to stick with. Okay. It's very, very interesting that you came up with a cave at the end. You know the reason why? Thomas: Why? Diane: Guess what this word is? Thomas: Batman. Diane: Oh, my gosh! It is. How did you know that says Batman? It does! It has an oval shape that sticks above the line. At the very beginning. And it has a cave at the end. Okay. I'm going to give you two shapes and I know that you said that you are not so good with puzzles. But I am wondering which-- I'm going to leave that there. Okay. I'm going to put it down here. Okay. Which one-- where does it fit? Yep, that's it exactly. It fits right there. There is that oval shape that sticks above the line. And the cave at the end. That was so awesome. [ Video end: ] [ Video start: ] Diane: You've got the oval shape in the beginning that stands tall and goes above the line. You've got the cave at the end. Take a look at the word Batman. Does it still have those same shapes? The cave at the end, but you got a-- you've got to picture it in your mind like that, as black. And you know where to fit it in and find the shape that it goes in up here, perfectly, perfectly. Okay. We're going to move on to the next‑‑ [ Video end: ] [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Make up a simple story with the target SHAPE (word) and have the student visually locate it, touch it or highlight it. Description End: Diane: Okay. So in the next video that I'm going to share with you, how I'm going to visually encourage for Thomas to search for the shape Xbox, Pacman mouth at the beginning and the end, short word, with a short story about Xbox 1. Keep in mind this student very much disliked reading up to this point. Anything that had to do with literacy, he really, really did not like, did not want to do. You know, he fought it. So it's very interesting to see this next video. He appears to be enjoining searching for the shape and he knows that it represents the word Xbox. So really he is-- he doesn't know it, but he is reading and he think [indiscernible]. At first, I worried that giving Thomas an entire page of print would be too much complexity. And I tried using some blocking techniques. But you are going to see in the video how he removed the black paper that I was using for blocking and clearly he wants to have the entire story exposed. He scans each line, immediately locates all of the shapes that define the word Xbox throughout the story. Please note how again, again, those three salient features that Thomas came up with to define the shape of the word Xbox. Let's take a look at that next video. [ Video start: ] Diane: Thomas, I want you to see if you can find-- okay, mom, I want you to see this, too. I want you to see, do not reach-- I want you to find this shape in here. Thomas: [Indiscernible] Diane: I didn't want all of the other things to show. Just in that first one, I want you to see if you can find the shape, the Pacman. Oh, my gosh! Hold on, let me get the yellow highlighter. Mom, you don't mind having all of these sentences showing. My gosh, that was excellent. You found the shape. Mother: He uses glasses as well, I'm not sure [indiscernible] Diane: Thomas it doesn't bother you if I have all of these sentences out, is that okay? Okay. Can you look the a the second sentence? And see if you can find the shape and put your finger on it? That's it. And so what does that shape say? Thomas: That it's Xbox. Diane: Yes, it does. Is there any other word that says Xbox in the second sentence? We're only looking for the shape. Only for the shape. Nope? I don't think so. Let's take a look at the third sentence. Is there any word that says Xbox-- oh, that was so fast! Oh, my gosh! That was faster than I was ready to find it. Is there any other shapes that say Xbox in the third sentence? Yes or no? Thomas: No. Diane: No, there aren't. How about in the fourth sentence? Are there any shapes that say Xbox? No, I don't think so. Let's take a look at the next sentence. I guess that I could pull it down here. I don't even think that there are any here. Are there? Thomas: No. Diane: Do you see any other shapes that-- oops, so quick. Thank you. You're right. I think on this half a page, did we miss any? You scan and look for the shape, only the shape. Remember we've got to have a Pacman mouth at the beginning, a Pacman mouth at the end and it's a short word. Are there any other shapes that say Xbox? Thomas: No. Diane: None, you're right. Okay. I've got a note down here because I wanted to share that with your mom, but I don't want you to have be bothered by that there. I'm going to leave all four sentences out here. I put the print because I want to let you know, if you do this, the one that works really well is Century Gothic bold, 24 point font. Thomas, read four whole sentences here. I'm going to see if you can find-- I wasn't even ready. All right. Do you see any other shapes that say Xbox? Thomas: [Indiscernible] Diane: Tell me what-- tell me the salient features, what describes that shape? You can came up with it. Three things. Thomas: Pacman mouth. Pacman‑‑ Diane: At the... Thomas: beginning and the end. Diane: And it's a? Thomas: Short word. Diane: Those are the three things. Can you remember that rule about that shape? Thomas: Yes. Diane: Okay. I want you to look carefully to see if I tricked you at all. Is there any other shape in here that says Xbox? Oh, you got it. All right. You got all of them. You got all of them. That was incredible. So let's read this. What it says. Here it says‑‑ Thomas: Xbox. Diane: Here it says. Thomas: Xbox. Diane: Here it says. Thomas: Xbox. Diane: You can tell because of the shape. You can tell because of the shape that has Pacman mouths at the beginning, Pacman mouth at the end, short word. Those are your three descriptors. Can you remember that? If I come back again soon, are you going to be able to remember those are the three? I love those three descriptors. Thomas: Yes. Diane: All right. Perfect. [ Video end: ] [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Title: Literacy Strategies for Students who Visually Function in Phase III Content: Additional thoughts and suggestions regarding CVI and Literacy to consider. Description End: Diane: Okay. I just wanted to leave you with some additional thoughts, some suggestions. Remember all members of the student's team need to know the descriptor or the defining salient features of each word that the student has come up with. I could start listing these in what I might call a visual dictionary. Research indicates that lower case text is read faster and that's just because there are more unique patterns of sending, ascending and neutral characters in lower case. And also research indicates that we recognize the words component letter. Then use that visual information to recognize the word. Specifically, that would mean the words first, last, and middle letters. So you really want to keep that in mind when you are doing the outlining and really trying to highlight the key salient features about-- of the shape of that word. And I don't know if you heard it there when I was sharing with mom, but I prefer to use Century Gothic bold as my-- as my font for printing out words. Arial is also good, Aphont is also good. But I really like Century Gothic in bold best. Okay, that's it for me. And if you have any questions, just go-- type them in. Back to you and Sara and Lynne. Sara: Thank you. Lynne: Thank you very much. It was really great being there that day, Diane, watching that. Seeing how Thomas when you initially we talked about reading and his face just fell, and then at the end when he was so excited and smiling and beaming, you know, that was such a great-- nice difference. Sara: Experiencing that success. Lynne: For him. Sara: Yeah. Chapter 3. Planning for future webinars So as promised, I believe we have some polls, is that our next slide? Let's see where-- Oh, there's Diane-- okay. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Next Study Groups-October 23rd & December 11th, 2017 Content: What should we do for the next two study groups? • (Poll 1) More from us about “Assessing and Supporting the Student in Phase III CVI” - C. Roman, 3/10-3/11/17? (YES/NO) Description End: The next poll is for our next Study Group, which is coming up pretty quick, since this one was the-- the postponed due to Harvey. Lynne: Yes, the hurricane Study Group. Sara: It's October 23rd. So we wonder what should we do for the next two study groups and that's October 23rd and December 11th. Do you want more from Dr. Roman, you can just answer that one with a yes or a no. So let's bring that poll up or look it already is up, sorry, didn't see it. And go ahead and enter your-- your information into there, just a yes or a no. No name is required, no identifying features are required. No salient features of you like your email. [ Laughter ]. So we have two votes for it. Three votes for it. Okay. Good. So let's look at-- do you all want to leave that poll up and get another one, too? Everybody hasn't had a chance to vote or maybe everybody who can vote has. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Next Study Groups-October 23rd & December 11th, 2017 Content: What should we do for the next two study groups? • (Poll 2) Volunteer to video your student? If yes, please write your name/email address and either October or December in the poll. (Fill in the Blank) Description End: We have a second poll and this is just for-- for if you would like to volunteer videoing your student in-- during the December group maybe perhaps, since it seems like there's a lot of interest in that October-- and that October group is coming up quick. So if you would like to volunteer and video your student, please write your name and your email address and then write whether it's October or December. Actually, just-- we'll just assume it's December. Because we would have to have the video by, like, next week or something. [ Laughter ]. Lynne: Right. If you do want to volunteer your student, if you are new to this Study Group, what we do is we watch it. We all watch it together. And then we discuss our thoughts and then we brainstorm some ideas that you might take back to use in the classroom. And then ask you to come back to the Study Group and let us know how that worked. [ Slide end: ] Sara: It's not a critique of your teaching or anything like that. It's more we look at the student to see what CVI characteristics we see. So it's nice for us to be able to all put our heads together and work together because we know sometimes folks are-- don't have a chance to do that. Have other teachers of the visually impaired look at their student with them. And so it's nice to be able to process together. Also, as I said before, we learn every time we do that. So if you want to think about it a little bit and when we come back together on October 23rd, you might have, you know, thought well maybe I do want to do that. And really it's my favorite thing to do. With the kids. So‑‑ Lynne: It's really nice. Especially if you have a student in Phase III, which we know the least about. And it's really nice to have access to-- to all of the smart people that are in this group with all of their ideas because it's challenging teaching literacy. It's very-- to a teacher, it's stressful because, you know, literacy drives the education really. And so we think it would be really helpful for you and for us. For some video of a Phase III kid. Sara: Yeah. Or any phase where they're at, really, honestly. Lynne: Yeah. Sara: Anybody that you are wondering about or you need help with, just want some suggestions. That's what we're-- that's what our Study Group is about. [ Slide start: ] Description Start: Title: Next Study Groups-October 23rd & December 11th, 2017 Content: What should we do for the next two study groups? • (Poll 3) Other topic relevant to CVI? Write your name/email by your topic so we can contact you with questions. (Fill in the blank) Description End: And in-- in the third poll, if there's another topic that you find you would like to focus on next time, you know, it could be more about literacy. So this would be-- you wrote yes or no about Christine Roman's material. If you would like to say which part that you are most interested in, more on literacy, you want to do half on social skills. I think the social skills area is pretty interesting, too. And we see-- we see kids a lot of times who are-- their social skills are highly affected by their CVI characteristics. And how do we approach that? Lynne: Right. Christine also touches upon autism when she's talking about the social skills because that frequently comes up, may come up, that a student has autism when in fact they just don't have social skills or the ability to get that incidental learning about how to interact with other people. Sara: So poll No. 2, if you could share what topic you are most interested in for the next time. I'm sorry, Poll No. 3. Somebody wrote that Dr. Roman's new book is coming out soon and we might spend some time reviewing changes made in the new book and maybe specifically look at some particular sections, hey, Diane, you wrote that. I figured it was you. [ Laughter ]. And, you know, if it's out, whenever it does come out, it would be good to see. [ Slide end: ] I know that she has given us some-- some sort of indication of what some of the changes might be. And you also wrote teaching literacy to a child who doesn't speak, I think-- that would be interesting, Diane. You said that you have a child who has a trach tube and doesn't speak. Okay, something else popped up, how to design and implement adaptations for students with CVI and multiple disabilities who are in Phase I and II. That's from Cameron. Cameron, if you want to-- what would be the best thing for us, if you have students in particular that you want to look at who are in Phase I and 2, we could look specifically at them, how to adapt for them in their environment. If you could video them in their environment, that would probably be the most telling thing for you, in particular, it's going to apply-- the thing with specific strategies, we can talk about specific strategies, Diane has a lot on her website, www dot strategytosee dot com, for kids in Phase I and II. You might find that generally helpful in the meantime for general suggestions. For your students, as for any kids, it's going to be specific to them. Lynne: Right, very specific. Sara: In Phase I you're going to control the environment. In Phase II you are going to provide a lot of opportunities for them to act upon objects. If you go to active learning study groups, some of those things can be really helpful to allow kids in Phase II to be able to act on their-- their things that they are seeing as well. So they are integrating all of that sensory information‑‑ Lynne: [indiscernible] Sara: And there is a specific thing that you can find on Diane's website called a CVI den which really targets the vision, but it also targets acting on objects. And it really-- it really-- blend those two together, just for kids who even if they don't move very much at all. CVI den is really something to look it. Not very expensive. You can make one, she has the directions on how to make one. They are very easy to follow. I followed those directions and made a CVI den and it was very, very helpful. Kids respond so well to the CVI den. Lynne: If you do want to videotape your student, I think we have put together kind of a video protocol for that. Sara: Yeah. If you do want to video. You will put your email on there and then, you know, you can decide that next time, too. If you want to. And we'll email you and share information with you on how to-- you know, really-- it's-- sometimes it's hard to pick up the right information in a video because-- especially if you are having someone else video it who is not focused on vision. It's difficult to get the target and the student's eyes into it. In Phase I it's usually the target is closer so you can oftentimes get them both in a smaller frame. But, you know-- in Phase II, you know, I would really consider, you know, the-- the CVI den and thinking about that. And even-- you could even introduce the CVI den in Phase I. I think. Because everything is so controlled in the CVI den. It's a black tent and goes around the student and it's really most of what the interfering stuff is in the field that they don't use as much anyway. That's where they come into the tent. So the lower field is where most of the clutter is. They are not going to necessarily see that. You can also put the flaps over. You won't be able to see what they are doing then. But they-- then there's a couple of visual targets in there and they hang down far enough for the student to, if they move at all, they can see the results of their movement. They can see the slinky with a light on it moving or something glittery like a pom pom perhaps. Lynne: A visual room in a way. Sara: Two items, it's not so tactile but it's very visual and it does respond to the child's initiation. So I would recommend trying that out. And you could even video, you could build one and try it and video that. Lynne: Diane says the CVI den is especially helpful for a student in Phase I, someone who needs much control of the sensory environment. Sara: Yeah, yeah, unless they can't look when something is touching them at all, you know. But I think most‑‑ Lynne: Even when we have seen kids that were almost like that, the CVI den is so visually attractive‑‑ Sara: It was amazing how much they were looking. Lynne: Very amazing. Sara: Really noticing the results of their own activity and their focus was just stunning. I mean, it was just-- it's just such a great tool for kids. And they can begin to learn that they can affect their environment that way. That the thing that they are touching is also the thing that they are seeing. And it just starts to build that connection. They can repeat it as many times as they need to build the neurological connection. Lynne: So do you all have any questions or any more comments, any more ideas for topics. Sara: I think our poll number 3 is still up. And this is our first Study Group, think about whether you want to video, think about whether you want to share and we'll-- we'll revisit and poll again next time. On October-- what date was it? 23rd or something. I'm not sure. Lynne: I would have to look back. October 23rd. Sara: October 23rd. All right. Well, thank you all for joining us and thanks, so much, Diane, for sharing your video. Lynne: Diane says thank you for having us today. Sara: Yay. Take care y'all, we'll see you next time. [ Music ] [Silence] Fade up from black. Animation: Text for TSBVI transform into braille cells for TSBVI. Fade to black.