"...concomitant [simultaneous] hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which cases such severe communication and other developmental and educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness."
This does not necessarily mean that a person who falls into this category is completely blind and completely deaf. It means that they experience some degree of vision, as well as some degree of hearing loss, and this degree of loss can vary from person to person. According to National consortium on Deaf-Blindess, this can "severely limit an individuals natural opportunity to learn and communicate with others."
(The following list was found on the Minnesota DeafBlind Project website)
(The following list was found on the Minnesota DeafBlind Project website)
Challenges that students have in educational and other settings include:
- Difficulty with communication.
- Distorted perceptions: Difficulty in grasping the whole picture or relating one element to the whole.
- Lack of anticipation: Difficulty in knowing what is going to happen next because the context normally provided through ‘overseeing’ or ‘overhearing’ information and cues is missing or distorted.
- Lack of motivation: The motivating factors may be missing from a situation, going unseen or unheard.
- Lack of incidental learning: Firsthand individualized experiences are a much more effective way for a someone who is DeafBlind to learn than incidental observation or group experiences.
There are a variety of assistive technology available for children who are deaf-blind. One type are voice output communication devices. These devices essentially "speak" for the child using recorded messages. On the California Deaf Blind Services Fact Sheet, these electronic devices are described as a way to provide "a child or young adult with their first true success at expressive communication using a formal system" and that "the device becomes an important component of the child’s expressive communication system, along with other possible expressive modes such as speech, objects, signed communication, pictures, gestures, etc." There is a wide market for different types of voice output communication devices - many different models with many different capabilities - but they are all similar in the fact that they offer a way to communicate with the world for a person that would not otherwise have the means to do so.
There are other assistive technology devices that aide in communication for the deaf-blind student. Pictured below is the Braille Sense U2, just one of many note taking devices that can be very useful for deaf-blind students to feel a sense of independence and competency in their learning environment and social world. These devices allow the deaf-blind to effectively communicate through the use of braille-topped buttons and vibrations. Dictionary, thesaurus, calculator, bilingual abilities, vibrations, text messaging, emails, internet search capabilities - these devices are a means of connecting to the world in a way they may have never known before.
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| Braille Sense U2 |
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