Use of Blindfolds for People with Low Vision

STRATEGY OR CONCEPT?
FUNDAMENTAL TRUTH OR PERSONAL CONVICTION?

Phil Hatlen, Superintendent
Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired

The use of blindfolds in the teaching and training of all legally blind students has become a topic of discussion in the past few years. At a recent conference, Anne Corn and Phil Hatlen were invited to present their positions and opinions on education of legally blind students with remaining vision. They were members of a panel that took the position that many legally blind students will benefit most by utilizing remaining vision as their primary avenue of learning. Another panel took the position that every legally blind person needs to learn the skills of blindness, and should learn them while
blindfolded.

I have heard the issue of use of blindfolds described many times as a strategy, not a concept.  And I have heard it said that the strategy is wrapped in a much larger concept.  If so, I have no objection to the use of the blindfold under certain conditions to assist in developing a concept.  This leads me to wonder what the concept is.  I think it has to do with independence, self-esteem, personal autonomy, pride, and confidence.  Once more, I think we would all agree that these are highly desirable goals that we all strive for.  So, where do we part company on the strategy of using blindfolds with low vision persons?

I am left with one very obvious, very significant difference in the practices being promoted in rehabilitation compared to those common in education.  And that is that we differ regarding the definition of “blindness”.   In order to better understand the definition used by educators, I’d like to give you a very brief history of the movement away from the legal definition of blindness toward a more functional one.

When I first began teaching in the mid 1950s, we used the legal definition of blindness to determine services for children.  Therefore, any child who was legally blind was taught Braille reading and writing.  However, we never blindfolded them, and wouldn’t have even thought of that.  Imagine our surprise when we began to find students who read Braille with their eyes, students who would sneak into another room in order to read print, and students who outright refused to learn Braille.  Orientation and mobility was not a problem at that time, because there was no such profession, and in our intense desire to succeed at academic mainstreaming, we seldom gave a thought to how the student was going to travel independently.  I know this sounds strange, but believe me, that was the status of things during the crunch of rlf kids whom we were attempting to serve in entirely new service delivery systems.

I often tell the story of the boy who was strongly resisting reading Braille, and was quite good at reading it visually.  So, one day I placed a piece of cardboard between his head and his hands so he couldn’t see the Braille visually.  He struggled for a moment, then began to read more fluently than I had ever before heard him.  I was amazed!!  I looked at him, and he was reading the print book that was in my lap.  This serves, as a graphic example, to illustrate the misgivings many or us had regarding teaching Braille to all legally blind students.

Until the late 1950s, education and rehabilitation both used the legal definition of blindness when determining the services a child or adult would receive.  Then education moved to using functional definitions of blindness and of low vision, and the population of children learning Braille changed dramatically.  Over the next few decades, this movement strayed off sound educational paths at times.  There were instances when a very small amount of available vision was viewed by the educator as enough reason to avoid skills of blindness..  An influx of optical devices, together with a change in practice among eye care doctors led to an over-dependence on these devices in some cases.  Some educators observed that “…reading one-inch high letters at 20 words per minute on a CCTV is not literacy…”.  Thus, the practice of utilization of low vision has at times resulted in unsound educational practices.

But these mis-uses of remaining vision were rare.  For the most part, the freedom to use vision as the primary avenue of learning made a dramatic difference in the self-esteem, confidence, and motivation of students who were functionally low vision.

Why is it that rehabilitation, social security, and medicine didn’t move to functional definitions?  I can only share with you that the opinion of educators has been that moving to a functional definition for adults would be a nightmare when it came to figuring out who qualified for benefits as a blind person.  So, our impression is that services for the adult blind maintained the legal definition of blindness so that there would be no change in medical and financial benefits.  I’m ready, along with other educators, to be corrected on this impression if we are wrong.  I must add that it has not occurred to me until recently that perhaps a sizeable portion of the rehabilitation profession actually considers all persons who are legally blind to be functionally blind.

My wish is that professionals in rehabilitation understand the commitment made years ago by educators to the utilization of vision for legally blind students whose primary avenue of learning should, in their opinion, be vision.  To understand this is to give credence and respect to the position of educators regarding their definition of blindness.

In the summer of 2000, I gave a presentation at the International AER Convention regarding what I considered (1) Fundamental Truths in our Profession, and (2) Personal Convictions.  There are very few fundamental truths, because they must have universal acceptance, have been supported by solid research,  have been tested by time, and must be humanitarily sound.  Most of our beliefs about our profession, yours and mine, belong in the Personal Conviction category, and I suggest to you that the use of blindfolds with legally blind persons is a Personal Conviction, not a Fundamental Truth.  In like manner, the decision of most educators to not use the blindfold in such circumstances is also a Personal Conviction.

We must energetically support our personal convictions, because only by doing so can we enter into dialog with others, and learn from one another.  But, if you expect me to support your right to personal convictions, and to respect and honor them, then you must do the same for me.  If you dismiss my personal convictions and hold hard onto yours, then you have cut off dialog, discussion, and potential progress toward a Fundamental Truth. 

Exchanges such as this morning are healthy and allow us to grow as a profession, allow us to serve visually impaired persons better, and provide us with information that may assist in shaping our personal convictions.  I congratulate NCSAB for providing this platform.

In discussions regarding the use of the blindfold with legally blind persons, regardless of the amount of useful vision they have, I believe what I have heard is:

1. Those who are legally blind but functioning primarily as visual learners are at risk for developing a low self-concept, having low self-esteem, and having a lack of independence and confidence.
2. Therefore, the primary purpose in using the blindfold is to assist in developing within the individual a strong self-concept, high self-esteem, independence, and confidence.
3. Some of these persons have progressive conditions that will result in further vision loss, and should begin developing the skills of blindness as soon as possible.
4. It is preferable to teach skills of blindness while the low vision person is under blindfold, and then integrate the learning from that experience with the visual learning the person may have or be able to develop.
5. There are congenitally legally blind persons who attempt to function as low vision persons through school, only to discover as adults that they are seriously lacking in basic life skills.
6. The avoidance of teaching blindness skills to low vision persons illustrates the lack of acceptance of blindness by the teacher.

There are undoubtedly other reasons that you may have for using blindfolds on persons whom educators would describe as low vision, and it might be helpful sometime to enumerate them.  But, for now, let me take a few minutes to address each of the reasons I have provided.

1. As is true of many of you, I have encountered some legally blind adults who were educated and were treated as low vision persons while they were in the educational system who should have been given the opportunity to learn blindness skills.  Some should have mastered Braille instead of struggling with print.  Some should have been taught independent living skills, relying primarily on sound and touch, instead of using very limited vision to perform tasks.  Some low vision persons could have benefited from instruction in cane travel, but only got instruction in how to use a monocular.If I could do it over again, I would have taught them differently.  But, unfortunately, I didn’t teach them at all, for I have always believed in blindness skills having equal value to vision skills, and would have provided these students with blindness skills.  But I wouldn’t have put them under blindfold to do it.  I would have stressed tactual and auditory skills, in harmony with the use of remaining vision.  Does this work?  Research in multi-sensory learning says it does.  Anecdotal information on literally hundreds of products of such teaching says it does.There are even a larger number of legally blind adults who were educated as low vision students, relying primarily on visual functioning and learning.  Anne Corn has (or will) describe this population in her presentation.  They represent a major portion of visually impaired adults in our population today.  For the most part, they are self-confident, have high self-esteem, and are happy, productive, successful members of our society.  And if they are not, there are other reasons why persons may not have these characteristics.  These individuals have seldom, if ever, had a blindfold on.
2. It seems to many of us that the use of blindfolds is to assist low vision persons in re-defining their identity.  The proponents believe that these individual's self-identity should be that of blind persons, not sighted persons, not low vision persons.  My experience, and that of Anne’s, is that low vision persons are very capable of developing identities as low vision persons.  They would be the first to say that they are not sighted, nor are they blind.  Many, if not most, have found a very comfortable place in this world as low vision persons.  To date, I have not been persuaded to change my personal conviction on this topic.   
3. Progressive eye conditions present a very serious and difficult position for us.  I agree with those who say that preparing for the experience of blindness might be a very good thing, and might make the transition much more comfortable.  In these cases, wouldn’t learning the skills of blindness be a good thing?  Emphatically yes!  Where this issue becomes sticky is the opinion of many educators that the more visual experiences that the child can carry into the experience of blindness, the better will be her spatial orientation, her social skills, her understanding of the world beyond arm’s reach.  I strongly urge blind persons, educators, and rehabilitation professionals to come together around this topic and have some good, productive discussions that might lead to better practices than we have now.
4. Educators believe, and researchers support, the approach of multi-sensory learning.  There is a great deal of experience and anecdotal evidence that, for children, learning tactual and auditory skills while concurrently implementing visual skills, leads to maximum learning.  My example of the boy who read Braille with his eyes is not an example to promote the use of blindfolds.  Rather, this boy needed to use his vision for reading, which he did, and eventually learned many skills of blindness without ever using a blindfold.
5. There are many examples of adults who were made to struggle with print in school, only to discover as adults that Braille was their best medium.  I’ll not dispute this point, because I have known a number of such persons.  I would suggest that sometimes the educational system makes mistakes, just as the rehabilitation system does, and that there are examples when utilization of vision was carried much too far.  We could have an entire morning on the topic of why this happened and will probably continue to happen.  Suffice it to say at this time that all of us need to reconsider the service delivery systems now in use by education.
6. I have a strong temptation to ignore and not dignify this possible reason with a response.  With the exception of a very few misguided teachers, people in my profession have high expectations for blind students, firmly believe that blindness does not, in and of itself, lead to any limitations in learning, accept blind children and adults as equal members of society, and give the respect and dignity to blind persons that they deserve.  When a teacher of blind and visually impaired children differs with you in certain personal convictions, be very careful how you define this teacher.  In all likelihood, he is a strong professional who believes in what he is doing, in the children he is serving, and realizes that his ultimate goal is to make himself dispensable.