[blindkid] alternative parenting guide
Sherry DeFrancesco
sdefrancesco at optonline.net
Tue Jul 20 04:25:02 UTC 2010
Wow Richard! Thank you for taking the time to point out all of these
important aspects of parenting a blind child. Driving will not be an option
for us as we will be blind parents, however, the same rules will apply
while on the bus or train or in the cars of friends/family. I will keep this
message to share with sighted adults that may be driving with our family in
unfamiliar areas.
We do anticipate challenges with the teachers/schools, but will deal with
each situation as it arises.
Thanks again.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Holloway" <rholloway at gopbc.org>
To: "NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List, (for parents of blind children)"
<blindkid at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Monday, July 19, 2010 11:43 PM
Subject: Re: [blindkid] alternative parenting guide
>I agree with Jim on this. In our house, we treat our kids the same as
>much as possible and we expect from all of them basically the same things,
>at least on an age-appropriate basis (our kids range from 4 to 16 at this
>point with our blind child falling in the middle at not quite age 8). This
>is our goal unless there is a specific and compelling reason not to do so
>on a particular issue.
>
> In our case, the most likely thing to "excuse" something from our blind
> daughter is that she didn't have the information or the number of
> reminders & cues which her sighted siblings had to such a point that she
> could not be expected to be held to the same standard and that is
> generally a short-term excuse. The long term remedy to that is to provide
> the needed information. That is the one case where I think parenting is
> to be modified-- In fact that is for me the most frustrating part of
> parenting a blind child but it also means there is generally a cure. The
> real challenge as the parent of a blind child is to convey the
> information she needs or perhaps that she deserves to have is a better
> way to put it. Off the top of my head, blind kids are way more likely to
> eat a meal while facing away from a table, for example. Why? Sighted kids
> watch people sit and face a table as they eat from birth. They have
> experienced this hundreds, or in fact probably thousands of times before
> they are ever expected to do this "properly" on their own and they also
> have a built-in reason to do so; they're looking at the food they plan to
> eat. Socially, blind kids are not going to fit in if they face away from
> the table or sit sideways at meals, etc., but how are they going to know
> this is what everyone else is doing? We have to tell them, right? At lest
> we do if we want them to fit in socially in a world where there is an
> awful lot of sighted bias...
>
> If you have ever seen an audio described movie, where they tell you what
> is happening with a voice-over when the actors are not speaking, that's
> what a lot of our lives are like with our daughter (we are the describers
> in this case). Here's another simple example: WIthout our giving our
> daughter extra information, a drive to the store or across town or across
> the country is a very different thing than it is for a sighted child. To
> balance that out-- at least to the degree possible, we try and tell
> Kendra what is happening outside the car. The windows are generally up so
> few sounds come in. The air conditioning is generally recirculating
> mostly so smells aren't very meaningful. I don't do this all the time,
> but at least sometimes, I point out that we are passing houses about this
> fast-- then I count them off: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5... and now there's a 7-11 on
> the left and a bank on the right. Then on another trip, I discuss cross
> roads, or traffic lights we're passing, or phone poles and power lines as
> I count the poles. The list is nearly endless for driving alone because
> as those of us who see as we ride or drive know, there are new things to
> observe on most every car ride even of we've driven the route 1000 times.
> (Also, now and then a drive with windows open helps a little.) This
> brings up much dialogue and many questions. Likewise, when you walk into
> a room, there can be a quick briefing as to who and what is there and
> what is going on.
>
> Longer-term, I presume there will be more and more of a building of a
> knowledge base where fewer and fewer things will need detailed
> description all the time. At least that has been the trend so far in some
> areas. When our child is not being successful, the first thing I try and
> put to the test is what information did my child not get as compared to
> her sighted peers and how can that most reasonably be provided, and
> further, do we need to provide that or is there a reasonable way for her
> to get that on her own?
>
> Say that she is missing a toy that was misplaced. If I know she had it
> last and put it somewhere, she needs to try and locate it on her own
> before I go on a quest for it, just like with the other kids. On the
> other hand, if I know that her little brother moved something to a
> completely different room, then she is at a considerable disadvantage so
> yes, at age seven I'm likely to help a lot more quickly in that case. I'm
> sure there are many examples which are far more to the point but
> hopefully that will be at least slightly useful. In this case, I want her
> to learn to solve things on her own but not to get so frustrated that she
> gives up. She should try to remember where she left something but her
> guessing where a 4-year-old hid her doll is unreasonable.
>
> In our particular case, it seems like the school does a little better
> with filling in academic gaps than social ones but missing information
> causes problems in all areas. One final example possibly worth a mention:
> On a practice exam question, when asked, Kendra decided that of the
> following three items: 1) People, 2) Dogs, and 3) Elephants, #1, People
> would be the largest. How could this be? Well, she's seen and experienced
> people and dogs. Clearly, people are larger. She's seen elephants too--
> only all she has seen is a little toy elephant and somehow, nobody ever
> thought to tell her that an ACTUAL elephant is quite a lot larger that a
> plastic toy. Think of that example and expand on it. Imagine that all you
> have ever seen between a tiger, and elephant, a whale and a dinosaur is
> handheld plastic models or toys of each. Which is lager? Which is softer?
> Which is most brightly colored? Which likes the water? Again, the list is
> nearly endless. This is my primary parenting challenge in a nut shell.
>
> I'm probably belaboring to excess the point as I am prone to do but
> honestly, almost every blindness parenting challenge I have encountered
> can be tied back to at least some degree to a lack of the information
> that my daughter gets from the missing incidental visual learning which
> her sighted siblings and peers all enjoy every day. It is up to the
> parents, the teachers and technology at hand to fill these gaps as well
> as well as possible.
>
> Richard
>
>
>
> On Jul 19, 2010, at 9:50 PM, Jim Beyer wrote:
>
>> Hi Sherry,
>>
>>
>> I don't know if there is such a book. If there was, we probably would
>> have
>> all read it when our kids were toddlers as well.
>> In my opinion, blind kids don't need alternative parenting techniques;
>> they
>> need what all kids need...good parenting.
>> Our basic rule was that we would treat our daughter and hold her to the
>> same
>> expectations that we had for her sighted brothers. Only if she proved
>> beyond
>> any doubt that she was incapable of success in some area would we offer
>> assistance/accommodation.
>>
>> My humble opinion
>> Jim
>
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