[blindkid] Knowing when they should know what when

[Heather Field]

Hello Penny,
Except for the reading and math standards adopted by California, I don't 
think there is a guide. It's difficult to imagine such a guide given that 
each blind child is so individual and unique. I liken having such a guide to 
having a special educational standards scale for tall children, children 
with English as a second language, children born as preemies etc. If I 
attempted to create such documents, people would point out that the 
classifying feature which I was using was only one characteristic and that 
so many other issues factored into the educational equation that it was 
quite unrealistic to use only one characteristic to determine what level of 
achievement and which skill sets particular children should have.

There are blind children who love to read but who don't much like 
technology. There are those who love technology but are very unmotivated to 
keep a tidy room dress with care, eat with manners etc. Still others may be 
highly motivated in all areas but they have fluctuating vision or have 
recently lost their vision. Still others love languages and history and 
writing but don't much like mathematics. Some children are just plain 
brighter than others while some parents push their children much, much 
harder than other parents. Some parents have very low expectations for their 
children in educational areas. How could a set of standards for the 
achievement levels of children with vision loss possibly be expected to deal 
with all these contributing factors?

It sounds too simple to be true and certainly doesn't give any guidelines, 
but I believe with all my heart, on the basis of over 30 years teaching 
blind students, that age-appropriate is the best measure and target. Find 
out what other children of your child's age are doing and aim for your child 
to have average competence in those areas at the same age. Even if your 
child does not achieve age-equivalent performance in all areas, you will 
find that they will be a lot closer to the general norm than if you were 
using some watered-down, lower set of expectations. It so important for us 
all to remember that as soon as blind students enter the work force there 
are only two standards which they can meet: cannot perform the job, or can 
perform the job.

Peer equivalent expectations will keep everyone on course for where they 
need to end up. This is also a helpful achievement guide because, as you 
observe the achievements of same-age sighted children, you will see that 
there is a fairly wide range of ability in most areas in the range called 
"normal". This gives you a better picture of your child as an individual. 
Blindness is never the defining factor in achievement. What a child with 
vision loss achieves results from a complex mix of educational and social 
opportunities, parental expectations, childhood experiences, the students 
natural aptitudes, appropriate training in life skills and so much more. 
Despite the powerful myth to the contrary, even the amount of vision 
possessed by a child is not proportionally correlated with their success. 
There are many low vision and partially sighted individuals who are 
unemployed, live at home with elderly parents or alone, and they are 
unmotivated to improve their situation. And, there are many people with no 
usable vision who are employed or looking for employment, married or living 
in share situations, volunteering in the community and doing their bit to 
make the world a better place.

All that to say, I would trust your instinct and expect age-appropriate 
behaviour and formal educational achievement from your blind children.
Warmly,
Heather field

-----Original Message----- 
From: Penny Duffy
Sent: Tuesday, September 18, 2012 8:50 PM
To: NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List,(for parents of blind children)
Subject: [blindkid] Knowing when they should know what when

Does anyone know of a document that gives guidelines on what a blind
student should be learning when.  LIke technology, braille and other skill.
I know i have seen something like this i am just have a hard time finding
it.
-Penny
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