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| Home - Course Descriptions - Core Curriculum - Documents |
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Core Curriculum
The Expanded Core Curriculum for Blind and Visually Impaired Youth
The core curriculum consists of knowledge and skills related to academic subjects and expected to be learned by a student by high school graduation. There are many versions of the core curriculum. Each state assumes responsibility for minimum standards for high school graduation. This core curriculum becomes the foundation for almost all learning, from kindergarten through high school. Sighted students experience and learn concepts casually and incidentally but the student with a visual impairment requires systematic and sequential teaching. The core curriculum for visually impaired students is not the same as for sighed students. It is much larger and more complex.
The Existing Core Curriculum
The Expanded Core Curriculum
Compensatory or Functional Academic Skills, Communication Modes
(Note: Compensatory skills are those needed by blind and visually impaired students in order to access all areas of core curriculum. Mastery of compensatory skills will usually mean that the visually impaired student has access to learning in a manner equal to that of sighted peers. Functional skills, however, refers to the skills that students with multiple disabilities learn that provide them with the opportunity to work, play, socialize, and take care of personal needs to the highest level possible.) Compensatory and functional skills include such learning experiences as concept development, spatial understanding, study and organizational skills, speaking and listening skills, and adaptations necessary for accessing all areas of the existing core curriculum. Communication needs will vary, depending upon the degree of functional vision, effects of additional disabilities, and the task to be done. Children may use Braille, large print, print with the use of optical devices, regular print, tactile symbols, a calendar system, sign language, and/or recorded materials to communicate. Each student will need instruction in order to master these skill areas.
Orientation and Mobility
It has been said that the two primary effects of blindness on the individual are communication and locomotion. Students need to learn about themselves and the environment in which they move from basic body image to safe, independent travel in rural areas and busy cities. Orientation and mobility teachers instruct students in the skills of safe and independent travel.
Social Interaction Skills
Almost all social skills used by sighted children and adults have been learned by visually observing the environment and other persons, and behaving in socially appropriate ways based on that information. Social interaction skills are not learned casually and incidentally by blind and visually impaired individuals as they are by sighted persons. Social skills must be carefully, consciously, and sequentially taught to blind and visually impaired students.
Independent Living Skills
This area consists of all the tasks and functions persons perform, in accordance with their abilities, in order to lead lives as independently as possible. These needs are varied, but they include skills in personal hygiene, food preparation, money management, time monitoring, organization, etc.
Recreation and Leisure Skills
Skills in recreation and leisure must be planned and deliberately taught to blind and visually impaired students. Most often sighted persons select their recreation and leisure activity repertoire by visually observing activities and choosing those in which they wish to participate.
Career Education
Many of the skills and knowledge offered to all students can be of value to blind and visually impaired students. They will not be sufficient, however, to prepare students for adult life, since such instruction assumes a basic knowledge of the world of work based on prior visual experiences. Career education must provide the visually impaired learner the opportunity to learn first-hand the work done by professionals in the work force and will provide opportunities to explore strengths and interests in a systematic, well-planned manner. Because unemployment and underemployment have been the leading problem facing adult visually impaired persons in the United States, this portion of the expanded core curriculum is vital to students and should be part of the expanded curriculum for young children.
Technology
Technology is not a curriculum area; however, it is added to the expanded core curriculum because technology occupies a special place in the education of blind and visually impaired students. Technology can be a great equalizer. Technology enhances communication and learning.
Visual Efficiency Skills
Through the use of thorough, systematic training, most students with remaining functional vision can be taught to better and more efficiently utilize their remaining vision. The responsibility for performing a functional vision assessment, planning appropriate learning activities for effective visual utilization, and instructing students in using their functional vision in effective and efficient ways is an integral part of the expanded core curriculum. |
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Kathy Davis, Director Outreach Services Penland Building, 335 Ashe Avenue, Raleigh, NC 27606 Phone: 919-715-4257, 919-715-4342, 1-800-LEA-EYES |