MODULE 9

Students who are Blind and Low Vision

Learning Activities
Activity 1. Close your eyes tightly for a few hours. Better still, cover them with
an eye shade or a piece of dark cloth so that you cannot see anything at all.
Then walk around the house and look for familiar things that you use every day
in the bedroom, the bathroom, the sala and the kitchen. Next, do the usual
activities you engage in, such as cleaning the house, cooking, changing your
clothes, etc.

Write a report on your experiences as a person without sight. How well did
you do the usual activities? What problems did you meet? How did you solve
them? How did you feel about the whole experience?

 Blindness is a terrible and insuperable condition for anyone to live with.

Imagine, living in a world without light - in total darkness. Surely, this is a
heart-breaking and devastating curse! Doing this kind of activity made me
realize how difficult my life could be without my vision. Seeing complete
darkness, like being in a cave. It is harder than I thought because it loss
my independence in doing the things I wanted to do in my everyday life. I
wasn’t able to solve such problems because it needed a very long time to
be able to solve. I feel great and sad about the experience, I feel great
because I once experience the conditions of being blind. And, I feel sad at
the same time because it is really hard for some blind people to live in this
world without lights.
But for me, all the things that show living with blindness are not a curse -
if we would only make full use of the gifts that God has given to us and
the opportunities that come our way.

Activity 2. Visit a school where blind students are enrolled. Ask the principal to
allow you to talk to some of them. Ask them questions about the content of this
chapter.

 In November 6, 2021, Saturday morning at exactly 11:00, we interviewed

one gifted and talented student in Brgy. Can-Uguib Abuyog, Leyte.
Currently, she was 18 years old and studied Humanities and Social Studies
(HUMSS) at Abuyog National High School. She was Kyla Christine Habagat
a gifted and talented student, and has a dream of becoming a counselor
and a writer. Her disorder was in-born but she try to undergo operation,
for a while she was able to see but suddenly her vision were blacken
again. 

We ask the following during our interview:

1. What are the causes of your disorder (errors of refraction; imbalance of
the eye muscles; diseases; and trauma or accident)?
Kyla: It was in-born. And I don’t know the reason.

2. What are the Special Adaptations, Aids and Technology you use as a
Student? Are you using braille?
Kyla: from kinder to grade 4 I used braille method, now, I just let them
read if to me or I touched the copied letters and symbols at the back of
the paper. 

3. Did you find braille system difficult or easy?

Kyla: It’s okay. It was useful.

4. What are your ways to communicate to your teachers? Or other people

around you?
Kyla: Linguistics skills (talking), and gadgets 

5. How about in studying mathematics and science, what are your ways in
learning it?
Kyla: They read it to me. 

6. Did you join any face to face class before?

Kyla: Yes

7. Can you share your experiences when you were mainstream in regular
class before? Did you find it difficult?
Kyla: It’s okay. I experienced a little bit of discrimination, but I accepted
my differences there’s nothing we can do with it.
 8. How did your teacher make you as a students with visual impairment
feel comfortable in his/her class?
Kyla: I feel comfortable because they have the courage and patience to
read the lessons for me. They allocated enough time for it.

9. How about your textbooks? Did you receive the same with your well
vision classmates?
Kyla: when it comes to my textbook, I let my family or friends read irt for
me.

10. How about board work, tests, and homework?

Kyla: I can manage to write so I just let other person read the activities.

11. What can you say to the persons with a vision? To us?
Kyla: All of us may feel insecurities it’s up to us on how to handle it.

Evaluation
1. Describe how the process of vision takes place. Name and tell the functions of
the parts of the visual mechanism that enable man to see.
 Vision takes place in the occipital lobe of the brain. Vision takes place in
three conditions. The first one is when the eyes are stimulated by the light
rays or illumination which is the form of the mechanical energy. The
second one is the light rays are reflected from the objects in the visual
fields. And the third one is when the mechanical energy is converted into
nerve impulses which the brain processes into visual images.
 The light rays pass through the cornea, then the aqueous humor
chamber, then the pupil, the lens, then the vitreous humor. The lights
rays come to a clear focus on the retina. The optic nerve conducts the
visual images to the brain where perception of the virtual experience
takes place.

2. What can go wrong with the process of vision? What are the types and causes
visual problems?
 The thing that can go wrong is when your vision is blurred/low 
vision or a completely blindness. And the types and causes of 
 visual problem is the errors of refraction, imbalance of the eye muscles,
disease of the eye or the trauma or accident.

3. What are the differences between blindness and low vision?

 Low vision refers or means that a severe visual impairment in 
which the visual acuity is 20/70 or poorer in the better seeing 
eyes and cannot be improve with glasses. While blindness means totally
loss of sight.

4. How do students with visual disabilities manage to get an education in regular

school side by side with their seeing classmates? What special adaptations are
introduced to make mainstreaming possible?
 Before a visual disability student is part of the mainstream class, they
have been part of the special education program wherein they are well
monitored and prepared to be able to be part of a mainstream class.
Teachers of special education program have rules that they following that
can help their student to feel comfortable and participative in the
classroom. Once the student are already ready to be part of the
mainstream class the teacher enrolled them there.