Pediatric Visual Impairment Research

Have you ever felt confused, overwhelmed, or lost when it comes to the ins and outs of your child’s transition to school? This installment of Feeling This Life is for you! Through this silly episode, Megan and Sonnie, both moms to preschoolers with visual impairments, go head-to-head to answer as many questions as they can about the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Kathy Mullen, director of education at VIPS and IDEA expert, shares everything a family needs to know to be empowered for the transition from early intervention to school based services.

Dr. Cathy talks with Amanda, mom to Ava, about embracing life when parenting a child with complex needs. Amanda shares vast wisdom and perspective about what it means to embrace life as a parent and about how to help your child thrive. Jenny, Paige, and Dr. Cathy then reflect about Amanda’s attitude and story, the impact of involving family in home visits and therapy, taking breaks, and not vacuuming for your home-based providers.

Juanita Miles, preschool director at VIPS, shares the story of how her vision has changed as she lost, gained, and then lost her sight. She shares insights she gained along the way, opens up about how it felt to lose vision and how she accomplished her goals when she wasn’t sure she could. Jenny, Paige, and Dr. Cathy reflect about Juanita’s resilience.

Jenny, Dr. Cathy, and Paige reflect on reading “For the Benefit of Those Who See”, by Rosemary Mahoney. Topics that come up include learning about the world using all our senses and blind content creators. Jenny touches on how the students at Braille Without Borders (the school where Mahoney teaches) validate her experiences.

Jenny interviews mom and physical therapist Jamie Shake, who is visually impaired. Jamie shares how her visual impairment impacted her schooling, and how her vision is just a regular part of her day at work. Jamie shares her love of mowing grass. Jamie and Jenny talk about the use of a smartphone as a low vision device. Paige, Jenny, and Dr. Cathy reflect on Jamie’s wisdom as they discuss smartphones for accessibility and their own lived experiences with advocacy.

Dr. Cathy interviews Dr. Phangia “Nana” Dewald, an orientation and mobility specialist. Cathy and Nana talk about the importance of orientation and mobility in a child’s early years and the impact that service can have on a child’s development. Jenny reflects on her experience advocating for orientation and mobility services for her daughter, and how she felt as she spoke up. Cathy, Jenny, and Paige then share their thoughts about how orientation and mobility, grief, and advocacy intersect.

Jenny interviews Carrie Garnett, her daughter’s teacher of the visually impaired. They discuss their experiences around confusion when a child is able to see something they “shouldn’t” be able to, and when a child struggles with seeing something they “should” be able to both at home and at school. Paige, Dr. Cathy, and Jenny reflect about the factors that influence a child’s functional vision. Jenny shares how her feelings of need for control have been impacted by being “stumped”.

Paige interviews Hailee Raymer, mom of a daughter with a visual impairment and complex needs. Hailee talks about how her time at the pool with her daughter taught her a new way to connect, and gives advice to other families about what to expect when fostering social skills in their children. Jenny, Dr. Cathy, and Paige talk about the potential for each moment to become an opportunity for building a strong foundation for social development.

Dr. Cathy interviews Dr. Penny Rosenblum about what to expect when teaching your child orientation and mobility skills. Dr. Rosenblum is a professional in the area visual impairment, and has a visual impairment herself. She shares practical ideas for helping your child to become an active traveler.

Listen as Brooklyn Spirito, mom of two girls who have a visual impairment shares her story of advocacy as she and her husband journeyed to find an accurate vision diagnosis. She dives into her grief and tells about learning to thrive. Dr. Cathy shares information about a vision screening for infants.

Welcome to the first episode of Feeling This Life! This season on the podcast, Paige, Dr. Cathy, and Jenny will be talking with various guests on “what to expect” when you have a child who is blind or visually impaired. In this episode, Dr. Cathy interviews pediatric ophthalmologist, Dr. Robert King to get an idea of what parents should expect when visiting the eye doctor for the first time. He discusses what tools the doctor uses, what tests he performs, and why he performs them. Paige, Dr. Cathy, and Jenny conclude by chatting about what parents can do to be prepared for their child’s visit to the eye doctor.

This podcast features Paige, a Teacher of the Visually Impaired at VIPS; Jenny, the VIPS Family Services Coordinator who is also a mother of a VIPS graduate; and Dr. Cathy Smith, the Director of Research at Anchor Center for Blind Children. In this episode, the hosts talk about why they wanted to create this podcast. Each lady provides a unique perspective and hopes to support families by providing them with resources, community, and hope during these difficult or unknown stages of life.

The Neonatal Assessment Vision European Grid (NAVEG) statistics are showing it to be a credible screening instrument in several hospital neonatal intensive care units (NICU).

WEBINAR: The Boehm-3 Preschool (available from American Printing House for the Blind) is the only validated tactual assessment for this population. Administration tips for the Boehm-3 preschool Tactile and Big Picture version.

WEBINAR: Early visual skills in pre-term and full-term infants are an early sensory system to develop to support the infant’s learning potential. In this presentation, Dr. Catherine Smyth, Director of Research at Anchor Center for Blind Children, will describe the project, and report on their current findings.

WEBINAR: This presentation will focus on supporting family-centered practices, include naturally embedding opportunities, to improve easy adaptations of the home environment and activities within the families’ daily routines.

It's More than a Touch: Early Tactual Development in Infants and Toddlers by Catherine Smyth, PhD; Director of Research; Anchor Center for Blind Children

The purpose of this research was to conduct a validation study of the Boehm-3 Preschool tactile version, which was designed to allow young children with visual impairment and who use their tactile abilities as their primary modality to discover and interpret the world to demonstrate knowledge of concept understanding.

Long before the Mealtimes Routines Intervention project (see below), the staff at Anchor Center for Blind Children began to explore mealtime experiences with families thorough a Gerber Foundation grant.

The Parenting Interactions with Children: Checklist of Observations Linked to Outcomes (PICCOLO™) is a strengths-based measure of parenting that predicts children’s early social, cognitive, and language behaviors.

Vision loss in children whose eyesight may be 20/20 requires new diagnostic and teaching strategies.