Sensory Efficiency

Sensory efficiency skills include instruction in the use of residual vision, hearing and other senses including use of tactual, gustatory, and olfactory input to identify one's personal possessions or use hearing and other senses to identify people. Areas the student may need instruction in or consultation in include maximizing their use of vision, developing gross motor skills, developing fine motor skills, developing strength, stamina, and endurance in legs, arms, and hands, identifying textures tactually and underfoot, identifying kinesthetic and proprioceptive sources and identifying olfactory sources. ​

Visual Efficiency Skills

This page provides an overview of skills for visual efficiency. These include visually attending, tracking, shift of gaze, scanning, visual discrimination, visual motor, and visual closure. ​

Visual Attend & Scan Activities

Visual attending skills are important skills in laying a foundation for all other vision skills. This page provides suggestions and strategies for helping students visually attend and scan. ​

Visual Tracking Activities

Visual tracking skills will help a student read as well as prepare them for safe and efficient travel.  This page provides suggestions for encouraging students to use their vision to the highest extent possible.

Visual Discrimination Activities

Visual discrimination is the ability to recognize details in visual images. It allows students to identify and recognize the likeness and differences of shapes/forms, colors and position of objects, people, and printed materials. This page provides visual discrimination activities.

Visual Motor Activities

Visual motor skills are the skills to coordinate eyes and feet as well as eyes and hands. It is the coordination of vision with the movements of the body. A student with a visual impairment may need assistance in developing and facilitating gross motor movement, pointing to a destination or object, and in performing fine motor activities. This page provides visual motor activities.

Optical Device Use

Many students who have visual impairments will be print readers and will use print as their primary mode of communication. The Teacher of Students with Visual Impairments (TVI) will assess the student's functioning and determine what non-optical devices will assist a student in accessing print and instruct the student in the proper use and care of the devices.

Tactual Readiness

The development of tactual exploration and discrimination skills are necessary for future braille readers as well as for students who may not be able to learn formal braille but can learn to discriminate objects by touch to help make sense of their world or to use for communication. This page lists the general order of the development of tactual skills.

Developing Skillful Hands

All students need to develop strength and dexterity to complete everyday tasks. It is important for students to manipulate materials and develop their fine motor skills. This page provides suggestions on ways to develop skillful hands.

Auditory Readiness

Listening skills are important for everyone, but especially for students who are blind or visually impaired. This page provides strategies in developing a students auditory readiness, a skill needed to lay a foundation for listening skills. ​

Listening Skills Instruction

Since listening skills will be a major source of information for a student who is blind or visually impaired, it is important to develop good listening skills when the child is young. This page provides strategies for developing listening and auditory skills.

Resources to Support You in Teaching Students who are Blind or Visually Impaired

ECC Instructional Resources

On Demand Presentations

Purchase VI Job Posting

Braille Jewelry

Live Presentations & Workshops

Free Membership

Sign up for free membership to access the FREE downloadable handbooks and handouts on the Free Printable pages (Program printables, FVLMA & Service printables, and VI AT printables) along with access to the Goal Bank pages. Simply click on the Log In | Register link in the navigation bar. If you haven't joined yet, you will be prompted to create a password. ​
If a child can't learn the way we teach, maybe we should teach the way they learn.  ​​​-Ignacio 'Nacho' Estrada