Project Magnify: Increasing Reading Skills in Students with Low Vision

Abstract

Students with low vision, including those with multiple disabilities, are entitled to a comprehensive educational program that includes services from professionals in the field of visual impairment. This program should encompass a range of specialists and services that enable the students to complete current and future tasks in school, at home, in the workplace, and in the community. In particular, students with low vision require appropriate assessment, instruction, and adaptations to facilitate visual efficiency.Although students with low vision represent the largest subgroup of students with visual impairments (Kirchner & Diamant, 1999), their intensive instructional needs have not been clearly understood. As a consequence, comprehensive instructional strategies that are geared toward this specific population are only now emerging (Corn,

Interventions to improve functioning, participation, and quality of life in children with visual impairment: a systematic review

“…The available fulltext articles were screened on inclusion and exclusion criteria and assessed for eligibility. Together with articles identified through searches in reference lists of previously retrieved reviews and the gray literature, this resulted in 64 articles, describing 66 different studies (28 RCTs, 3,7,13,16,19,21,32, 33,39,47,50,54,56e58,61,62,66,69,72,78,83,85,93,98,111,121,124 18 non-RCTs, 1,2,6,11,15,20,27,35,44,51,55,65,74,75,82,89,96,104 and 20 before-after comparisons (BAs) 8 articles of McMahon and Kederis described 2 different studies. 57,58,70,71 The 66 included studies were published between 1964 and 2018, and 37 (56.1%) of them were published in the last decade (2008e2018) 1e3, 13,15,16,19e21,27,28, 30,32,33,35,39,40,43,46,51,54,62,65,69e71,73e75,78,82,83,85,89,91,96,98,104,110,111,124 ( Table 1).…”

“…57 Fourteen studies reported a cutoff criterion for visual acuity. 1,11,13,21,27,28,30,35,47,51,54,75,78,89 Slightly more often, studies reported the degree of visual impairment (e.g., severe visual impairment, legal blindness) or fulfillment of certain criteria for low vision (e.g., the criteria for low vision of the WHO or the ICD criteria). 1,6,16,20,39,40,44,50,56,62,69,75,90,93,96,104,110,111,121 In some cases, authors quantified the number of participants with a certain degree of visual impairment, that is, how many participants had visual impairment and how many participants were blind.…”

“…Studies investigating functioning and development had intensive (home-based) early intervention programs, 6,7,21,83 attention training, 15 creativity training, 2 prescription of low vision devices, 40,43 and admission to a care unit 119 as intervention condition. With respect to reading performance, interventions included (braille) reading training, 47,50,57,58 (training in) the use of optical aids, 26,35,110 and crowded training. 51 Studies investigating social skills used social skills training, 93,124 assertiveness training, 61 communication training, 44,72 and visual perception training 111 as intervention.…”

“…61 Several studies assessed the effectiveness of a program or training by using performance measures, such as studies evaluating reading performance by measuring reading speed, or viewing behavior by measuring visual performance or task performance. Reporting psychometric properties for these types of measures is less common, and only 3 studies 26,35,110 provided a reference to the reading and writing tests they used.…”

“…3,7,16,61,69,78,83,85 From all RCTs, the studies of Qureshi and coworkers and Platje and coworkers were rated as having the least risk of bias, 83,85 whereas the study of Sacks and Gaylord-Ross was rated as having the most risk of bias. 93 All BAs and most of the non-RCTs 1,2,11,15,20,27,35,51,65,74,89,96,104 were rated as having serious risk of bias due to confounding. For BAs, this is linked to the study design chosen, whereas for non-RCTs, most studies did not control or correct for all possible confounders.…”