[nabs-l] Fwd: Social skills and blindness

Wed Mar 5 08:10:56 UTC 2014

Sent from my iPhone

Begin forwarded message:

> From: <helga.schreiber26 at gmail.com>
> Date: March 5, 2014 at 2:03:41 AM EST
> To: "National Association of Blind Students mailing list" <nabs-l at nfbnet.org>
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Social skills and blindness
> 
> Hi Arielle and all, this is Helga! I just wanted to tell you that I am always very talkative, and I always interact with people all the time! I always interacted with people when I was low vision, but I was actually sometimes shy and very timid to talk to people. However, when I became blind 6 years ago, I started to communicate with students and people more than before, since I was blind, the people always ask me if I needed any help, and I always say yes, but not all the time though, but then when they help me, I always started a conversation with them, and I started to be les shy, and timmid. In fact, I became totally blind in the second semester of my freshman year of high school, and I actually had an assistant when I was in high school, who was very nice with me, and who actually took my shyness away from me, and we actually became very good friends! She actually always when I was in high school, she always was pushing me to talk to more with the students than with her, and in that way I learned how to be more open with the other students and people! So now when she comes visit me here in Florida, I always tell her that she open up my shel! LOL!! Meaning that she took my shyness away! So you can call this having a very good Social skills even though you are blind, or maybe not! I'm glad to share a little bit of my life experience with you all here! I feel that you are very good friends to talk to, guys! Hope to hear from you soon. Thanks and God bless!! :)
> P.S. If you want to talk to me more about my life experience, you can contact me off list ok? Only if you want of course! Thanks again! ;)
> 
> -----Original Message----- From: Mohamed
> Sent: Wednesday, March 5, 2014 12:40 AM
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> Subject: Re: [nabs-l] Social skills and blindness
> 
> You a bit remind  me of how I am.  I'm a big technoligy guy, and
> always am trying to learn about new things.  I've not really been
> normal.
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Arielle Silverman <arielle71 at gmail.com
> To: National Association of Blind Students mailing list
> <nabs-l at nfbnet.org
> Date sent: Tue, 4 Mar 2014 22:22:19 -0700
> Subject: [nabs-l] Social skills and blindness
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> OK.  Since it was brought up here, I feel compelled to share some
> of my
> experiences and controversial views on how blind people should
> learn
> social skills.  Some of you have heard this rant before in part,
> but I
> think it is important enough to bear repeating every few years.
> I
> guess I'm also curious if any of you have had similar experiences
> growing up or if the things I am about to advocate make any sense
> to
> others besides me.
> 
> I have been blind my whole life and I was always an introverted
> person.  As a child I had few close  friends, read a lot by
> myself.
> When I did hang out with kids my age I tended to be bossy and
> want to
> control what we were doing.  When adults came into my house and
> tried
> to interact with me in ways I thought were childish or silly, I
> would
> go to my room and read.  I never was one for a lot of physical
> affection, hugging, touching etc.
> When I was growing up it was assumed that all my undesirable
> traits
> linked back to my blindness.  So it was assumed that because of
> my
> blindness I had poor social skills.  There were goals on my IEP
> throughout elementary and middle school that dealt with my social
> skills and my TVI was tasked with evaluating my progress.  For
> example,
> in elementary school I would get graded on goals like "Shows
> interest
> in other children" or "asks others about their day".  In middle
> school,
> one goal on my IEP was "compliments others when she likes
> something".
> I am not even slightly joking.  My TVI would ask me every day to
> tell
> her how many people I had complimented that day and she wrote it
> down
> on her clipboard.  The number of compliments I gave was expected
> to
> increase over time.  Since I  was usually a good student and I
> liked
> and respected this teacher a lot, I tried my hardest to give her
> a
> good compliment report every day, by contriving situations where
> I
> could compliment my family and classmates.  I still don't
> understand
> what this had to do with my blindness.  If I complimented people
> less
> than my parents or teachers expected it was because that just
> wasn't a
> big part of how I liked to interact with people.  Had I been
> sighted, I
> wouldn't have been graded on such a silly thing.  She also read
> me
> passages from a social skills book as a way to teach me social
> skills.
> Eventually my TVI and I discussed this and she told me that my
> parents
> had really expected her to do these things and she did even
> though she
> knew they were ridiculous.
> When people in the blindness world talk about social skills, it
> seems
> they're usually referring to two things: skills at winning
> friends and
> influencing people (charisma, likability, popularity) or
> following
> social conventions like being places on time, attempting eye
> contact,
> etc.  (what Jedi refers to as "blending in").  By the first set
> of
> criteria, winning friends and influencing people, Adolf Hitler
> had
> wonderful social skills.  I think there are other social skills
> that
> are much more important for having lasting relationships: things
> like
> sharing, helping others in need, being sensitive to other
> people's
> feelings, respecting other people's opinions, not holding
> grudges.
> There are many sighted politicians who have absolutely terrible
> social
> skills by these criteria! These are all things that blind people
> can
> learn just as well as sighted people by listening to other
> people's
> conversations, talking about issues going on in the world, and
> actually being a part of close relationships.  I think the most
> social
> skills I ever learned was by becoming friends with blind people
> who
> were willing to be blunt and tell me if I was doing something
> obnoxious.  There is a lot we can learn about social interaction
> just
> by listening, talking and sharing with others.  Reading about
> this
> stuff in a book, or being required to engage in artificial
> interactions with others, doesn't help build these social skills
> in
> the long term.  Role-playing social interactions doesn't help
> when
> you're out in the real world and the thing you practiced feels
> really
> awkward and fake.
> On blending in, I do think there are certain nonverbal things
> that
> congenitally blind people should be explicitly told about so we
> can
> make informed decisions about whether or not we want to blend in.
> For
> example, of course blind folks should be told about which colors
> people usually wear together or what kind of clothing is
> appropriate
> for a job interview vs.  the movies.  But then, we still have the
> right
> to choose to blend in or not.  So  often it seems that blind
> folks are
> labeled as having poor social skills when the fact is that
> they've
> learned what is "appropriate" but chosen not to follow these
> norms for
> whatever reason.
> I realize now that my parents and teachers were unfortunately
> using
> blindness and the IEP system to try to change who I fundamentally
> was--to turn me into an extroverted, gregarious, charismatic
> person.
> It took a long time for me to realize that I was OK being myself,
> and
> that I was just reared in an environment where I didn't quite
> belong.
> Although I don't have tons of friends, I have great relationships
> with
> the friends I do have, a loving husband and co-workers who
> respect me,
> and I try to be the best person I can.  Most of  the things I
> learned
> to get me to this place came from my firsthand experiences making
> friends, my real discussions with others and a lot of trial and
> error.
> I don't think I missed out on the process because I am blind, but
> I
> also don't think the attempts to teach me social skills from a
> textbook were either effective or necessary.
> In closing, I hope that any good blindness center would support
> students in developing social skills--by giving them
> opportunities to
> make friends and have real social encounters--instead of
> indoctrinating them with lessons based on a narrow definition of
> social competence.
> 
> Best,
> Arielle
> 
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> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nabs-l_nfbnet.org/helga.schreiber26%40gmail.com hi guys! I just wanted to tell u that this one was my original email message, not the other ones ok? Thanks and God bless!! :) 