By: Carmen Willings teachingvisuallyimpaired.com Updated October 30, 2017
Accurately, easily and independently identifying money can be challenging for students who are blind or visually impaired. There are strategies and tools available to help the student who is blind or visually impaired learn this important skill. When teaching students to sort and identify coins, it is important to provide hands on experience with real coins. Coins can be distinguished by feeling the size differences and the smoothness and roughness of the edges.
Students need to have repeated experiences discriminating and using money. Arrange for the student to make purchases from a vending machine, identify stores that sell certain items, schedule fund raising activities, and use shopping lists. Repeated exposure and real life situations to use money will provide a greater opportunity for learning and applying those concepts.
The Coin Abacus makes counting various combinations of coins and dollar bills simple for students of all ages. This electronic teaching tool helps students of varying educational abilities master the task of counting money. Students will experiment with different coin combinations in order to reach the target amounts on the screen. The coin abacus can be easily adapted by gluing real coins on the abacus.
System for Identifying Bills
In addition to learning to identify coins, it is also important for them
to learn to identify and organize paper money by denomination. This is
considerably more challenging than discriminating coins. If a student is unable to see the numbers on bills, they can use electronic devices that identify bill denominations or they can use a system for marking bills for later identification. The following is a way of identifying bills by the way in which they are folded.
A $1 bill is left unfolded.
A $10 bill is folded in half lengthwise to make a long rectangle (and inserted in a wallet with the folded side up, so other bills are not inserted in the crease and lost when a $10 is pulled out.
A $5 bill is folded end to end to make a square.
A $20 bill is folded into fourths (and may be placed in a separate compartment of the wallet).
Other Ways to Identify Money
There are now other ways to identify money including electronic devices that can identify bills,as well as an app on the ipad/iphone!
The Click Pocket Money Brailler allows the user to mark $1-$100 bills with braille for identification by pressing the tabs on the corners of the bills.
The iBill Talking Money Identifier is battery operated and identifies current currency. It recognizes all US paper currency in circulation and announces denominations in a female voice. It features easy operation with just two buttons.
Shopping & Budgeting
Learning to shop and maintain a budget are important life skills the student will need if they want future independence. Encourage the student to develop a budget for groceries and meals. Provide the students with opportunities to be a part of creating shopping lists. The lists can be written, brailled, typed or recorded. If you are able to take field trips to the store, plan opportunities to take the students shopping. Otherwise, encourage parents and caregivers to take their child shopping.
Grocery Shopping
Inform the student that some grocery stores offer telephone or internet shopping. Shop when the stores are less busy and use a store map to locate sections of the store. Discuss the characteristics of foods in the produce section, discussing the feel, the texture, the size, the color, etc. Once back home or at school, help the student create labels to identify the foods.
Create opportunities for the student to plan, budget and shop for meals with the following objectives:
Given a reasonable budget for a meal, the student can choose a meal that either they or an adult will prepare and complete a grocery list for the items needed to prepare the meal.
The student can price the items needed for a meal, making use of a customer service representative, if necessary, to find the items on the list and discuss whether budget will cover the cost of the groceries.
The student can compute the budget needed for groceries for one day, then for a weekend, and then for a week.
Budgeting Tips
Be Realistic About Your Budget. Encourage the student to project how much money they will need for a purchase and be realistic. Project low for income and high for expenses.
Identify the difference between "Wants" and "Needs" to help stay on a budget. Teach the importance of prioritizing needs over wants.
Don't make impulse purchases.
Always pay bills on time to avoid late fees.
Additional Resources
Check Writing Guide Although not too many people continue to write checks, being able to access money and pay bills by writing a check, is an important skill to learn for independence. These check writing guides help students who are blind to fill in each section of a check independently.
This Money Line, available from Slide-A-Round Math Manipulatives, was developed by Jim Franklin who is a special education teacher. This money number line is accessible to students with low vision as well as those who are blind.
Money Identifier Apps
The LookTel Money Reader by IPPLEX is currently $9.99. It instantly recognizes currency and speaks the denomination, enabling people with visual impairments to identify and count bills.
Free. The EyeNote app is a mobile device application to denominate Federal Reserve Notes (U.S. paper currency) as an aid for accessibility for people who are blind or visually impaired. Users can have the denomination of a note scanned and communicated back to the user.
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TVI's Guide to Teaching the ECC: An Activities Based Curriculum for Teaching Students who are Blind or Visually Impaired
$50.00
Written specifically for fellow itinerant Teachers of Students with Visual Impairments (TVI’s), this book consists of over 400 activities and topic areas of discussion for instructing students in the Expanded Core Curriculum. The activities are age-neutral and multi-sensory and therefore can meet the needs of the broad range of students served on an itinerant caseload serving. The activities can be individualized to the students various learning modalities and scaffold in order to challenge students but ensure success. Select those activities that align with the student’s learning objects based on the student’s unique visual needs and academic and developmental level.
The core activities listed in the Activity section can be adapted to each thematic unit. These include:
Object Characteristic Activities
Quantity & Number Concepts
Time Concept Activities
Environment & Job Awareness Activities
Listening Skills Activities
Reading Foundation Activities
Reading Fluency Activities
Braille Basics Activities
Writing Activities
Tactual Efficiency Activities
Developing Skillful Hands Activities
Visual Efficiency Activities
Optical Device Instruction Activities
Recipe Activities
In addition to the core activity areas, each of the 32 Thematic Units incorporates additional unique ECC concepts and skills providing you with a years’ worth of activities. These units are cyclical and can be used repeatedly to help students build on prior knowledge and develop a deeper understanding of concepts. Each unit includes suggestions for activity adaptation associated with the unit. These include lists of objects, possible community based experiences, environmental print, poems, children & young reader books, children's songs, pop culture songs, movies, and websites.
Unique Concepts within the Units include:
Self Advocacy Activities (e.g. advocating for safe classroom, presenting to class on visual impairment, requesting help and more)
Social Skills Activities (e.g. Being bullied or teased, giving and receiving compliments, body language, "I" messages when upset and more)
Recreation & Leisure Activities (e.g. exploring interest areas, getting involved in clubs and sports, playing games, and more)
O&M Support Activities (e.g. Suggestions for community based experiences, dog guide information, locations in the school, bioptics, ride sharing, traffic signs, and more)
Independent Living Skill Activities (e.g. chores, being responsible, using tools, recipe suggestions, hygiene, staying healthy, labeling foods and products, and more)
Sensory Efficiency Activities (e.g. unique sensory experiences related to the unit, unique optical device activities, and more)
Compensatory Activities (e.g. organizing materials, study habits, and many unique concepts related to the unit)
Career & Vocational Activities (e.g. job awareness, completing applications, job task suggestions, and more)
Although the intended audience of this resource is fellow Teachers of Students with Visual Impairments, special education teachers may find these activities beneficial to the students in their classrooms as the activities are multisensory and include life skills and concepts needed by all students. This resource, however, is not intended to take the place of a Teacher of Students with Visual Impairments (TVI). Readers are advised to consult their own TVI’s regarding instruction in the ECC and the unique visual needs of the student’s served in their programs.
Note: This curriculum is a digital pdf download. Once you make your purchase you will be directed to an order confirmation page where you will find the download link. This download will also be included on the receipt sent to the email address you provide. The pdf download can be found directly under the order number.
Each download is intended for single instructor use per copyright. Thank you for helping me preserve the content and not distributing copies to third parties.
Product details
Digital pdf download: 364 pages (11 pt font)
Publisher: Teaching Students with Visual Impairments
Visual Efficiency & Magnifier Fluency Grab & Go ECC Supplements
$20.00
This workbook is a pdf download that can be printed on demand for use with students. It contains five different types of worksheets for developing visual motor skills and near magnifier fluency skills particularly with the use of a video magnifier. As a supplement to the TVI’s Guide to the ECC, the worksheets correspond to each of the 32 ECC Thematic units. The worksheets, along with a list of environmental print for each thematic unit, are designed to help students refine their visual motor skills while reinforcing ECC concepts presented in the thematic units.
Visual Efficiency & Near Magnifier Fluency Worksheet Details:
Digital pdf download: 210 pages
Publisher: Teaching Students with Visual Impairments
