[nagdu] O&M skills

Julie McGinnity kaybaycar at gmail.com
Thu Jan 30 19:52:16 UTC 2014


Hi Tracey,

I agree with you, and that's a great speech.  I think it's great to
work on O&M skills, but some people just have a harder time with
directions and orientation.  Does that mean this should stop them?
No.  But it does mean that they have to ask for help more often when
finding a particular place or navigating somewhere for the first time.
 It's about independence: getting where you need to go with no
inconvenience to yourself or others.

The tools we use to do this don't matter as much as that we are
getting out there and doing what we want to accomplish.  We all know
people who's skills may not be as good or who may not do things the
"right" way--or so we think, but let's work harder to encourage those
people who don't go anywhere, feel like they can't travel, or are too
afraid to get training of any kind.  Those cases to me are truly sad.

On 1/30/14, Darla Rogers <djrogers0628 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Tracy,
>
> 	I couldn't agree more, and sadly, we will see more peo9ple without
> skills perhaps as good as yours or mine, but if you can do what you need to
> do, in a manner that is comfortable for you, far be it for me to judge your
> independence or lack thereof.
> Darla & Handsome Huck
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: nagdu [mailto:nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org] On Behalf Of Tracy Carcione
> Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2014 1:03 PM
> To: NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users
> Subject: [nagdu] O&M skills
>
> While I agree that good orientation skills are an excellent thing, and make
> using a dog a lot better for both partners, I've known some people who
> didn't seem capable of finding their way out of the proverbial paper bag,
> and yet used the dog effectively to get where they wanted to go.
> A late lamented friend of mine always seemed confused about which way to
> go,
> but he travelled all over the country and the world, going places I'm sure
> I'll never go.  Was he the ideal dog user?  No.  Did he get where he wanted
> to go, when he wanted to get there?  Absolutely.  Yet he was sneered at by
> people who seldom stepped outside their familiar routes.
>
> I recommend people read, or re-read, Jernigan's essay, The Nature of
> Independence, which I'm sure is somewhere on nfb.org. Dr. Jernigan argues
> persuasively that getting where you want to go when you want to go is the
> quintessence of independence, and judging others for how they accomplish
> that goal is not particularly useful.
> All I'm trying to say is, we can encourage people to improve their O&M  to
> a
> high standard, and help them find the resources they need to do so, but not
> look down on them if they're unable to do it, or assume that, if their O&M
> doesn't seem excellent, that they are not independent people getting where
> they want to go.
> Tracy
>
>
>
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-- 
Julie McG
National Association of Guide dog Users board member,  National
Federation of the Blind performing arts division secretary,
Missouri Association of Guide dog Users President,
and Guiding Eyes for the Blind graduate 2008
"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that
everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal
life."
John 3:16




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