Click for: smaller text | larger text | Hi-Contrast

Introduction

Peg Palmer is a preschool teacher for the Board of Education and Services for the Blind in Connecticut. She presented a thin slice of her approach to environmental adaptations at the 2005 ADVISOR Workshop presentation - adapting the nursery school or the preschool special education classroom for the totally blind or Braille-reading child. Unfortunately, there was not enough time to adequately address students with low vision and cortical vision impairments.

Peg Palmer explained that many individuals who end up working directly (and the most) with young blind students have no formal training in the field. The focus of her presentation was on a consultative model, with some direct teaching involved, to help adapt the classroom for the totally blind child.

In Connecticut, all children who are blind or have visual impairments attend their local community nursery schools or their home schools for preschool special education.CT does not have a school for the blind, but instead uses a centralized state agency (BESB) that provides a mostly consultative service approach. As a result, Peg Palmer and her colleagues work with teachers who have blind/visually impaired students to help them adapt the environment for those students.

Introduction

Goals and Common Misconceptions

Adaptations

Resources