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Classroom Connection to the Media Representation 

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Classroom Connection to the Media Representation 

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In the media, people with visual impairments are often portrayed at "helpless". People believe that there is a barrier between the disability and what the person is capable. This misconception is also translated into the classroom because that is what students see in the media. Students can feel like they should just do everything for a student who has a visual impairment. When, in fact, students who have visual impairments are just as capable.

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Enlarge print on activities and worksheets/magnification pages: this would be an accommodation for students who have a partial sight visual impairment. By enlarging the print, students are able to feel more confident about doing the activity because they are able to comfortably see the what the activity is showing or what it says. This is not something that teachers can only do when giving physical copies of worksheets or activities out. Whenever there is something on the Smart Board that is being projected, teachers can make sure to enlarge the print on that as well.

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Provide and utilize manipulatives (puzzles, blocks): these can be used to help students conceptualize what is happening within math problems. For example if the class was working with fractions, the manipulatives would help students feel what the whole would be (let's say 5/5) and feel what it would be like to have part of that whole (let's say 3/5). With the manipulatives they would be able to feel the difference between the two groups and physically count the difference.

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The IDEA's Special Education Categories: Visual Imapirment Including Blindess

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Visual Impairment, including Blindness

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Braille is everywhere this month! January is National Braille Month, in honor of Louis Braille's birthday, and World Braille Day is celebrated on January 4. If you made a New Year's Resolution to learn braille this year or you want to brush up your skills, check out these free resources for learning braille.

Dots for Families
These lessons are designed to help families of children who are blind or visually impaired to learn the basics about braille.

Braille Courses
Hadley School for the Blind offers courses 10 braille courses for those who are blind and 6 for those who are sighted. There are courses for Adult Continuing Education, Professional Studies, and Family Education.

BRL: Braille Through Remote Learning
Free online instructional program for families, teachers, and others interested in learning braille on their own. The course is comprised of three parts:

Introduction to Braille

Braille Transcribers

Specialized Codes

UEB Online
Free online course from the Royal Institute for Deaf and Blind Children (RIDBC) in Australia.

Introduction to UEB
Free course via YouTube videos from Wisconsin Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired.

Additional Resources

UEB Quick Reference Sheet
This two-page document is a "cheat sheet" for those who know braille, but need a quick refresher on some of the changes in UEB.

The ABCs of UEB
This free resource from BANA (Braille Authority of North America) is designed for those who already know the braille code, but who would like to learn about UEB. There are many other resources and updated on the BANA site, so be sure to check there regularly!
See also Braille for Sighted Classmates and Family Members.

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Free Online Resources to Learn Braille - Paths to Literacy

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Paths to Literacy Free Online Resources to Learn Braille. For teachers, families, and others interested in literacy for children and youth with visual impairments

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416 East Thornhill Lane

Palatine, IL 60010

Local Telephone:( 312) 409-1605

820 North Orleans Street, Suite 208

Chicago, IL 60610

Local Telephone: (312) 440-0699

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 621-4002

639 38th Street

Rock Island, IL 61201

Local Telephone: (309) 794-7506
Blind Service Association
17 N. State Street,Suite 1050

Chicago, IL 60602-3510

Local Telephone: (312) 236-0808

8038 MacIntosh Lane

Rockford, IL 61107

Local Telephone: (815) 332-6800

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 545-0080

TDD/TTY Telephone: (815) 332-6820

1850 West Roosevelt Road

Chicago, IL 60608

Local Telephone: (312) 666-1331

TDD/TTY Telephone: (312) 666-8874
View Multiple locations
Local Telephone: (312) 541-8400

Email: bill.jurek@chicagolighthouse.org
Easter Seals
230 West Monroe,Suite 1800

Chicago, IL 60606-4802

Local Telephone: (312) 726-6200

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 221-6827

TDD/TTY Telephone: (312) 726-4258

1845 E.Hovey Ave.

Normal, IL 61761

Local Telephone: (309) 452-3088

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 890-1180

2300 Childrens Plaza

Chicago, IL 60614

Local Telephone: (773) 880-4346

158 South Milwaukee Avenue,Suite 606

Libertyville, IL 60048

Local Telephone: (847) 680-0100

5527 North Maplewood

Chicago, IL 60625

Local Telephone: (773) 989-9800
Hadley School for the Blind
700 Elm Street

Winnetka, IL 60093

Local Telephone: (847) 446-8111

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 323-4238

TDD/TTY Telephone: (847) 441-8111

485 Avenue of the Cities,Suite 5

East Moline, IL 61244-4040

Local Telephone: (309) 755-0018

TDD/TTY Telephone: (309) 755-0018

Email: laura.thomas@hknc.org

15 East Hazel Dell Lane

Springfield, IL 62712

Local Telephone: (217) 585-5437

TDD/TTY Telephone: (217) 529-5766

Email: jbrown@thehopeinstitute.us

Two North Williams Street

Crystal Lake, IL 60014

Local Telephone: (815) 444-8800

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 318-2000

1020 S Spring St.

Springfield, IL 62704

Local Telephone: (217) 522-7985

TDD/TTY Telephone: (217) 522-9966

Metro Square One ,Suite 120

10 West Phillip Road

Vernon Hills, IL 60061-1730

Local Telephone: (847) 680-1666

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 838-3627
Email: richardpaul@dls.net
222 South College, 2nd floor

Springfield, IL 62704

Local Telephone: (217) 782-1981

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 323-4769
Email: dhs.webits@illinois.gov
TDD/TTY Telephone: (217) 558-6482

1151 South Wood Street

Chicago, IL 60612

Local Telephone: (312) 633-3532

TDD/TTY Telephone: (312) 633-4088

421 East Capitol Avenue, #100

Springfield, IL 62701-1789

Local Telephone: (217) 785-2870

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 252-8966

Email: aging.ilsenior@illinois.gov

3241 South Michigan Avenue

Chicago, IL 60616
Illinois Radio Reader
Local Telephone: (312) 225-6200

Toll Free Telephone: (877) 949-3937

300 North Goodwin
Illinois School for the Visually Impaired
Urbana, IL 61801

Local Telephone: (217) 333-6503

658 East State Street

Jacksonville, IL 62650
Illinois Society for the Prevention of Blindness
Local Telephone: (217) 479-4400

TDD/TTY Telephone: (217) 479-4415

211 West Walker Drive,Suite 1700

Chicago, IL 60605-1117
Email: Illinois State Board of Education: Department of Special Education visionary@eyehealthillinois.org
Local Telephone: (312) 922-8710

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 433-4772

100 North First Street
Illinois State Board of Education: Early Childhood Division
Springfield, IL 62777-0001

Local Telephone: (217) 782-4321

TDD/TTY Telephone: (217) 782-1900
Illinois State Library Talking Book and Braille Service
100 North First Street

Springfield, IL 62777

Local Telephone: (217) 524-4321

300 S Second St.

Springfield, IL 62701

Local Telephone: (217) 785-0022
Illinois State University
Toll Free Telephone: (800) 665-5576 x1

TDD/TTY Telephone: (888) 261-7863

Email: ISLTBBS@ilsos.net

Campus Box 5910

Normal, IL 61790-5910
International Association of Lions Clubs (Lions Clubs International)
Local Telephone: (309) 438-8982

TDD/TTY Telephone: (309) 438-3467

Email: specialed@ilstu.edu

300 West 22nd Street
Jesse Brown VA Medical Center, VICTORS Program
Oak Brook, IL 60523-8842

Local Telephone: (630) 571-5466

Email: districtadministration@lionsclub.org

820 South Damen

Chicago, IL 60612

Local Telephone: (312) 569-4260
Learning Ally
1000 East State Parkway, Suite I

Schaumburg, IL 60173-4592

Local Telephone: (847) 490-3838

14600 S. Ravinia Ave.

Orland Park, Illinois 60462

Local Telephone: (708) 349-9356

2160 South First Avenue

Maywood, IL 60153

Local Telephone: (708) 216-3833

2960 Stanton Street

Springfield, IL 62703

Local Telephone: (217) 529-1611

9541 Church Circle Drive

Belleville, IL 62223

Local Telephone: (618) 394-6221

3204 W. Armitage Avenue

Chicago, IL 60647

Local Telephone: (773) 276-5164

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 366-Play

TDD/TTY Telephone: (800) 573-4446

Riverfront Museum Park

711 North Main Street

Rockford, IL 61103

Local Telephone: (815) 972-2955

Department of Teaching and Learning

Programs in Vision

Northern Illinois University

DeKalb, IL 60115

Local Telephone: (815) 753-8459

675 North St. Clair, #15-150

Chicago, IL 60611

Local Telephone: (312) 695-8150

799 W. Kensington Road
Peoria Area Blind People's Center
Mount Prospect, IL 60056-1111

Local Telephone: (847) 463-8100

TDD/TTY Telephone: (847) 463-8115

2905 West Garden Street

Peoria, IL 61605

Local Telephone: (309) 637-3693

818 DuPage Boulevard

Glen Ellyn, IL 60137

Local Telephone: (630) 790-2474

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 771-1158

211 West Wacker Drive, #1700

Chicago, IL 60606

Local Telephone: (312) 363-6001

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 331-2020

Wabash Valley College

2200 College Drive

Mt. Carmel, IL 62863

Local Telephone: (618) 263-5120

1590 South Fairfield Ave.

Lombard, IL 60148

Local Telephone: (630) 629-7272

Communications Building

SIU Mailcode 6720 - SIUC

Carbondale, IL 62901-6720

Local Telephone: (618) 453-2808

Woody Hall B150

Carbondale, IL 62901-4705

Local Telephone: (618) 453-5738

TDD/TTY Telephone: (618) 453-2292

1207 North Larkin Avenue

Joliet, IL 60435

Local Telephone: (815) 741-7777

219 East Cole Avenue

Wheaton, IL 60187

Local Telephone: (630) 690-7115

TDD/TTY Telephone: (630) 690-2509

111 West Washington Street, Suite 410

East Peoria, IL 61611

Local Telephone: (309) 698-4001

504 University Services Building 1

University Circle
Truxes Company
Macomb, IL 61455

Local Telephone: (309) 298-2403

Toll Free Telephone: (800) 895-2912

16 Stone Hill Road

Oswego, IL 60543

Local Telephone: (630) 554-8448

Toll Free Telephone: (888) 554-8448

Edward Hines, Jr. VA Hospital

5th & Roosevelt Rd.

Hines, IL 60141

Local Telephone: (708) 202-2272/202-8387

1207 South Oak Street

Champaign, IL 61820

Local Telephone: (217) 333-4605

1501 West Bradley Avenue

Jobst Hall 218

Peoria, IL 61625

Local Telephone: (309) 677-3585/3690

University of Illinois at Springfield

One University Plaza

MS WUIS-130

Springfield, IL 62703-5407

Local Telephone: (217) 206-6516

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416 East Thornhill Lane Palatine, IL 60010 Local Telephone:( 312) 409-1605 820 North Orleans Street, Suite 208 Chicago, IL 60610 Local Telephone: (312) 440-0699 Toll Free Telephone: (800) 621-4002 639 38th Street Rock Island, IL 61201 Local Telephone: (309) 794-7506 Blind Service Association 17 N.

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Illinois School for the Visually Impaired

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658 East State Street Jacksonville, Illinois 62650-2130
Toll Free: 1-800-919-5617 Voice: (217) 479-4400 Fax: (217) 479-4479
The vision of the Illinois School for the Visually Impaired is to provide a quality comprehensive education and serve as a statewide resource to students in Illinois with visual impairments assisting them in becoming personally productive and self-sufficient citizens.

The Illinois School for the Visually Impaired (ISVI), established in 1849, is a residential/day school for students who are blind or visually impaired. Located in Jacksonville, ISVI provides accredited educational and related services for children from birth to twenty-two years of age through preschool, elementary and high school.

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Illinois School for the Visually Impaired (ISVI)

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658 East State Street Jacksonville, Illinois 62650-2130 Toll Free: 1-800-919-5617 Voice: (217) 479-4400 Fax: (217) 479-4479 The vision of the Illinois School for the Visually Impaired is to provide a quality comprehensive education and serve as a statewide resource to students in Illinois with visual impairments assisting them in becoming personally productive and self-sufficient citizens.

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Central Illinois Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired

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If you are interested in applying for the position as Executive Director of the CICBVI, please visit our Facebook page by clicking here.
UPCOMING EVENTS & FUNDRAISERS: 9th Annual Community Banquet - March 1st
This is an after-work, business casual event that serves as one of the Center's most important sources of funding. In keeping with the Center's mission, we strive to provide a meaningful social experience for our patrons who are blind or visually impaired while offering an interesting and entertaining one for our guests. Last but not least, we take time to publicly recognize the volunteers whose time and talents keep the Center open. For information about speakers and other event specifics, please visit our Facebook Events page by clicking here. For tickets or sponsor information, call (309) 243-3883 or email aclark@illinoiseyecenter.com. When you reach out, please specify your choice of steak or salmon main course or describe any dietary restrictions you may have.

When: Friday, March 1, 2019
Where: Mt. Hawley Country Club, 7724 N. Knoxville Ave. Peoria, IL 61614
Time: 6:00 p.m. - 8:00 p.m.
Cost: $100/per ticket; Patrons are free

For our monthly calendar of events, please visit the Calendar of Events page.

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If you are interested in applying for the position as Executive Director of the CICBVI, please visit our Facebook page by clicking here. UPCOMING EVENTS & FUNDRAISERS: 9th Annual Community Banquet - March 1st This is an after-work, business casual event that serves as one of the Center's most important sources of funding.

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A visual impairment includes both partial sight and total blindness that even with correction adversely affect a child’s educational performance.

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Birth injuries

Genetic

Hereditary

Illness with fever and muscle problems

Some causes of visual impairments are more common than others. Some of the main causes are cataracts, infection/trauma, and glaucoma.

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Disorders That May be Included in This Category

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Disorders That May be Included in This Category

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Retinal degeneration - deterioration of the retina

Ocular Albinism - genetic condition that reduces the pigmentation (coloring) of the eye

Cataracts - clouding of the eye's natural lens

Glaucoma - when there is an increased pressure in the eye that causes gradual vision loss

Diabetic retinopathy - occurs with people who have diabetes, overtime there can be damage to the blood vessels in the retina

Hyperopia - when a person can see faraway objects better than nearby objects

Myopia - when a person can see objects nearby, but have difficulty seeing objects faraway

Strabismus - eyes are not straight; each eye sends a different message to the brain

Astigmatism - blurred or distorted images

Partially sighted - there is some sort of vision problem with sight ranging from 20/70 to 20/200 after correction with glasses

Low vision -  severe visual impairment

Legally blind - less than 20/200 vision in better eye or limited vision

Totally blind - complete darkness

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Specific and detailed verbal instruction

Provide and utilize manipulatives (puzzles, blocks)

Enlarge print on activities and worksheets

Use computers with talking text

Magnification pages

Audiobooks

Braille books/worksheets

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From a galaxy far, far away to blood-stained Westeros in "Game of Thrones" to the star-studded Grammy Awards, blindness played a surprisingly high-profile role in pop culture over the last year.

In fact, characters with visual impairments appeared almost everywhere in 2016 - from blockbuster movies to hit streaming series. They were superheroes and villains, animated fish and confused teens, vigilantes and martial arts masters. They found a welcome in nearly every genre - fantasy, horror, comedy and drama.

And while blind characters are frequently portrayed as either victims or inspirational lessons for sighted people, that wasn't the case last year. Some high-profile characters with blindness were morally ambiguous and at least one was flat-out obnoxious. Looking back, 2016 might be remembered as the year that many blind characters were simply...characters who were blind.

Here are 10 highlights of blindness in pop culture, 2016:

1. The blind warrior-monk in Star Wars: Rogue One

A blind character is one of the stars of the Star Wars film "Rogue One." He's Chirrut Imwe - a blind warrior-monk who helps the Rebel Alliance steal plans for the Death Star. The Force is strong with this one, so blindness is no barrier when it comes to thumping Imperial troopers with his quarterstaff. Chirrut also gets one of the movie's best lines. After he's captured, the bad guys put a bag over his head to lead him to a hidden location. "Are you kidding me?" he says. "I'm blind."

2. Short-sighted Destiny saves the day in Finding Dory

Visual impairment plays a big role in the hit animated film "Finding Dory." The movie, a sequel to "Finding Nemo," features Destiny, a whale shark who is very short-sighted. While Destiny's disability is sometimes played for laughs, she turns out to be a plucky friend who helps orchestrate an escape from a marine institute. The movie has another interesting blindness connection: Disney's iPhone app, Disney Movies Anywhere, provides an audio description of "Finding Dory" for moviegoers who are blind.

3. The blind hero (or villain?) in Don't Breathe

In the popular horror thriller "Don't Breathe," a character who is blind must defend himself against three thieves who break into his home. It turns out they really shouldn't have messed with this particular blind guy, who's a military veteran. He grabs a gun and stalks the robbers through his dark and barricaded house. Three cheers for the blind Rambo? Not so fast. A shocking plot twist late in the movie forces viewers to reconsider who the real villains and victims are.

4. Blindness empowers Ayra Stark in Game of Thrones

Nothing is ever simple in HBO's popular "Game of Thrones," including how Ayra Stark, a daughter of House Stark in Westeros, became blind in Season 5. It's like this: She disobeyed a command in the House of Black and White, so the Many-Faced God struck her blind as punishment. Got that? In last year's Season 6, she showed courage and determination (and learned to fight while blind), so her vision was restored. Later, using skills she learned while blind, she struck back at a powerful adversary and discovered that revenge is a dish best served hot. In the end, blindness made her stronger.

5. Stevie Wonder's challenge at the Grammy Awards

Stevie Wonder, one of America's best known musicians who is blind, made an unexpected pitch for accessibility at the 58th Annual Grammy Awards in February. While announcing the Song of the Year award, the R&B superstar opened an envelope with the winner's name printed in braille. He used his moment in the spotlight to declare, " We need to make every single thing accessible to every single person with a disability." The audience, full of music's biggest stars, cheered enthusiastically.

6. Blindness is one of many mysteries in The OA

Blindness is part of the mystery of "The OA," a series that debuted on Netflix in December. Quick synopsis of the Mobius-strip plot: Prairie Johnson, who is blind, turns up seven years after she disappeared - but now she can see. She won't tell her parents or the police what happened, but, instead, gathers five random people in an abandoned house at midnight to tell her story. What happens next depends on each viewer's perspective, but may involve secret experiments, near-death experiences, angels, time travel, insanity and interdimensional space-yoga.

7. Battling retinitis pigmentosa in Borealis

"Borealis," an independent Canadian film released in the U.S. in June, tackles big themes - grief, addiction and disabilities. Fifteen-year-old Aurora has retinitis pigmentosa, a degenerative condition that causes blindness. (The movie even shows some scenes from her perspective, so viewers can experience the reality of declining vision.) Every Aurora needs a borealis, so her father, a gambler on the run because of his poker debts, takes her to see the Northern Lights before her vision vanishes. Amidst the poor life decisions and family dysfunction, it's a sensitive portrayal of vision loss.

8. Hundred Eyes in Marco Polo

Hundred Eyes isn't your typical blind warrior. In Netflix's "Marco Polo" series, he's a blind Taoist monk who sports the impressive title of Khanate Minister of Martial Affairs. Hundred Eyes (so named because of his ability to sense what's around him) trains Marco Polo in the Wu Tang fighting style for Kublai Khan. He's brave and fierce, as demonstrated in terrifically choreographed fight scenes. Sadly, Hundred Eyes fights no more. "Marco Polo" was canceled by Netflix in 2016 after its second season.

9. The obnoxious sibling in My Blind Brother

The blind guy as a jerk - that's the premise of the offbeat independent film "My Blind Brother." In this comedy-drama, blind brother Robbie is obnoxious and egotistical, but no one notices because they only see the "saintly" disabled guy who runs marathons for charity. His sighted brother Bill is content to live in his shadow until they both start dating the same women. In its unafraid-to-be-offensive way, the movie makes the point that people with blindness are just people - sometimes they're nice and sometimes they're jerks. That's progress, right?

10. Daredevil, pop culture's truest hero

TV's most popular blind hero was back in 2016. He's Daredevil - Matt Murdock, idealistic lawyer by day, superhero crime-fighter by night. In the gritty second season of the popular Netflix series, Daredevil faced myriad new challenges. Using his superhumanly sharp senses and epic fighting skills, he battles ruthless vigilante The Punisher, down-but-not-out crime kingpin Wilson Fisk, and the Hand, a mysterious and ruthless ninja clan. Fans will next see Daredevil in 2017, when he joins forces with Luke Cage, Iron Fist and Jessica Jones in "The Defenders" on Netflix. Portrayed with moral depth and athletic grace by actor Charlie Cox, Daredevil may be pop culture's truest hero - one who just happens to be blind.
Photos and trailers courtesy of Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, Walt Disney Pictures Pixar Animation Studios, Ghost House Pictures, HBO, the Grammy Awards, Netflix, Archstone Distribution, Orion Pictures and Starz Digital.

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From a galaxy far, far away to blood-stained Westeros in "Game of Thrones" to the star-studded Grammy Awards, blindness played a surprisingly high-profile role in pop culture over the last year. In fact, characters with visual impairments appeared almost everywhere in 2016 - from blockbuster movies to hit streaming series.

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Post date:

With blind people always being portrayed as helpless, supernatural or inspirational in the media, blogger Alex Man speaks out to try dispel these misconceptions.

With the media playing such a large part in our lives, nothing says that "you" too are a part of today's society more than when you see yourself portrayed in mainstream media - right?

A heart-warming story of a blind person regaining their sight, an inspirational article of a blind person's life, or even a blind superhero - hey, that person is just like me! Right? Wrong.

It's very well to say, the more stories about us, the better. That way sighted people will learn about us, so it's a perfect way to generate awareness. Providing our stories in an entertaining medium means that people are more likely to take notice - right?

But are we here to entertain? We say we want to be like anyone else, but not a sightless wreck or a miracle worker. And today's media is doing just this.

Blindness in TV

Let's start off with TV. In 2015, Netflix added the series Marvel Daredevil, which featured a blind superhero who fights crime using martial arts. But unlike other superheroes, he relies on his extraordinarily heightened senses. He's able to hear heartbeats, read just by feeling the ink on paper and navigate the world around him with radar senses.

Ironically, the series didn't feature audio description (AD), meaning that blind viewers weren't able to get the most out of the show. This was until a petition was started on Change.org asking Netflix to add AD and eventually it was. (Now Netflix boasts over 40 audio described titles in the UK alone.)

So what about the sighted viewers? What did they take away from watching the series? The fact that this guy is a superhero sums it up: you can't be independent unless you have some kind of exceptional powers. This also encourages the myth that blind people have super senses (which is false - we simply rely on them more as we don't have vision).

It gives people an inaccurate understanding of what it means to be visually impaired and therefore does the opposite of promoting awareness.

Once when a friend and I were at a restaurant, we overheard the two women sitting at the table next to us. One of them said: "Look at that guy, he can't see. I wonder how he finds the food on the table. Oh, it must be that girl, she's probably his carer."

One last thing, we really don't need to touch your face - often we don't even care what you look like. I know a lot of media (including Daredevil) features the infamous "blind person touches their face scene", but this isn't your average blind person behaviour.

Blindness in film

Moving away from the so-called "positive portrayal of blind people", there's a movie called At First Sight which is a romantic drama about a blind protagonist who encounters issues with a sighted heroine. These issues revolve around this man's sight loss and him and his romantic partner eventually drifting apart..

Without going too deep into the details of the movie, which contains a lot of positive nonsense about sight not being everything, I'd like to talk about this guy's occupation.

He is, wait for it... a masseur! Until very recently I'd never considered this to be a stereotypical job for the blind, but after some research I've come to learn that this is in fact a very popular occupation - especially in Asian countries where it's one of the few avenues of employment for the visually impaired.

Movies like this give the notion of what visually impaired people can do, rather than the attitude of "I'm visually impaired. What do I want to do?"

Instead of exploring new avenues of job prospects, the blind must choose from a list something that sounds the most appealing to them.

"Are you good with music? Maybe you can tune pianos!

"Are you a computer whiz? Why not try out programming!"

Don't get me wrong, these kinds of jobs are fine - I know a lot of blind people (including myself) who are in these occupations and are content, but this isn't always the case. We just need to get this idea out of everyone's heads that these are the only types of jobs we can do.

Blindness in literature

There have also been a lot of visually impaired characters depicted in books throughout the centuries, from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sir Nigel novel, where the blind character Andreas is believed to have special abilities because he has no sight, to William Shakespeare's King Lear, where Gloucester is so completely helpless he could be tricked by the simplest of deceptions.

Even today, there are contemporary novels where the portrayal of visually impaired characters remains questionable. One in particular that comes to mind is the hugely popular young adult novel The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. For those of you who haven't heard of it, it revolves around a teenage couple who are both diagnosed with cancer and hit it off at a support group. The friend of the male protagonist, Isaac, also suffers from cancer, which affects his eyes.

Isaac eventually loses his vision and the portrayal is fairly accurate. Throughout the novel, he tries to adapt to living with his sight loss and we see him performing everyday tasks as a blind person in the real world, not a blind person in the media.

However, his role in the story is to lighten the moments of the doom and gloom of the two protagonists, which makes him the proverbial good-humoured disabled person and merely serves the function of the comic-relief within the narrative.

In conclusion...

It seems like every story has to portray a visually impaired person as helpless, supernatural or inspirational. We can't turn on the television or open a book and see that this blind person is just doing everyday tasks. And even if they are, it will be twisted into an inspirational story where this blind person is able to do X and Y, despite his or her disabilities. Because doing anything else won't meet prevalent expectations or generate interest.

Further information

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Dear Media, your portrayal of blind people is wrong

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Post date: With blind people always being portrayed as helpless, supernatural or inspirational in the media, blogger Alex Man speaks out to try dispel these misconceptions. With the media playing such a large part in our lives, nothing says that "you" too are a part of today's society more than when you see yourself portrayed in mainstream media - right?

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Since 1891, St. Joseph's School for the Blind has been providing specialized services to individuals with visual impairments across New Jersey. Founded by the Sisters of St. Joseph of Peace, the school is comprised of several programs, such as: Early Intervention, In District Support Services, School for the Blind, and Adult Services.

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AEM Center - National Center on Accessible Educational Materials at CAST

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The National Center on Accessible Educational Materials for Learning at CAST provides technical assistance, coaching, and resources to increase the availability and use of accessible educational materials and technologies for learners with disabilities across the lifespan.

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Audiobooks for Dyslexia & Learning Disabilities | Learning Ally

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Learning Ally solutions help struggling readers through audiobooks & support services for educators, parents, and students dealing with dyslexia. Reading accommodations

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The American Foundation for the Blind (AFB) removes barriers, creates solutions, and expands possibilities so people with vision loss can achieve their full potential. As a national nonprofit with offices in five US cities, AFB is a leader in expanding possibilities for the more than 20 million Americans living with vision loss.

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Braille books/worksheet: this accommodation is beneficial because it gives students a chance to learn beyond just listening.  Using braille books in your classroom will allow students to read at their own pace and allow the students to not feel excluded from what the class is doing.

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Braille books/worksheet: this accommodation is beneficial because it gives students a chance to learn beyond just listening.  Using braille books in your classroom will allow students to read at their own pace and allow the students to not feel excluded from what the class is doing.