AdvocateDadCO

Paraeducators · Teachers · Related service providers

The BLV layer.

Bring your expertise. Build in blindness and low-vision access.

You already bring skills to your work. The next question is how a student who is blind or has low vision can access that work, show what they know, and participate with the right support.

This is a practical starting point for collaboration, not a replacement for specialized training, individualized assessment, or the student’s education and service plans.

Back to “How can I help?”

Use this before you begin

Five access questions for any discipline

  1. What is the actual goal? Separate the skill you are teaching or assessing from the visual demands of your materials.
  2. What does the activity assume the student can see? Check pictures, gestures, demonstrations, print, screens, distance, and visual search.
  3. What access does this student use? Confirm the relevant assessment findings and agreed supports with the student, family, teacher of students with visual impairments (TVI), and other team members. Ask about communication, media, lighting, contrast, positioning, processing time, and fatigue as relevant.
  4. What will the student do? Prepare a meaningful role, usable materials, appropriate tools, and an agreed support approach. Plan time to respond before adding another prompt.
  5. What will you learn from the attempt? Record the task, conditions, access tools, assistance, and response. If access failed, do not treat that result as a clean measure of the target skill.

Bring this question to the team: “Is the barrier in the skill, the way we presented it, the environment, or a combination—and what should we try next?”

These questions are AdvocateDad’s planning framework. Use them to bring your discipline’s expertise into a shared access plan.

Daily support that builds participation

For paraeducators

  • Get the plan and coaching. Ask the supervising teacher and blindness specialists to demonstrate the student’s access tools, materials, guiding approach, and agreed prompting strategies. Request practice and feedback.
  • Make room for the student’s response. Use the team’s agreed wait time and cues. Avoid repeating instructions or physically completing a task before the student can act.
  • Support direct relationships. Help classmates communicate with the student rather than making every interaction pass through you.
  • Keep tools within reach. Prepare the student’s agreed materials and devices. Notice when a device is unavailable, uncharged, or incompatible with the activity, and tell the team.
  • Report what happened. Distinguish independent action from prompted action. Describe barriers and successful conditions so the team can adjust instruction.

Supporting independence does not mean abruptly withdrawing needed help. Adjust assistance through the student’s plan, safety needs, preferences, and team guidance.

Start learning: TSBVI training for paraeducators and educational teams. For a focused CVI introduction, read Perkins’ guide for teaching assistants and paraprofessionals.

Keep the learning goal; plan the access

For general and special education teachers

Send upcoming materials to the TVI early enough to plan usable versions. Check digital documents, diagrams, manipulatives, videos, assignments, and tests. Do not make the student wait for access while the rest of the class learns.

For example, if the goal is understanding a graph, plan how the student will examine its relationships through suitable tactile, digital, enlarged, or described information. Reading out the answer for the student does not show whether they understand the graph.

Use the student’s literacy and access plan. Large print, audio, Braille, tactile materials, and screen access answer different needs; one convenient format is not a universal solution. Plan for electives, lab roles, recess, and field trips with the same attention.

Resource: Perkins’ accessible materials and classroom strategies collection.

Apply your discipline through an access lens

For related service providers

The examples below are questions to plan with the team. They are not treatment protocols or a standard set of changes for every blind or low-vision student.

Speech-language pathologists and communication teams

Can the student access the objects, pictures, print, gestures, or device layout used in the session? When considering augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), collaborate on both communication and sensory access. Ask how choices are presented and how the student can respond. A missed visual cue alone does not establish a lack of language or understanding.

Occupational therapists

When working on daily activities, tool use, or fine-motor goals, which steps depend on locating or visually copying something? Collaborate on usable materials, workspace organization, positioning, and task access. Check whether the way the task is presented lets you observe the skill you intend to address.

Physical therapists and adapted physical education staff

How will the student locate equipment, understand a movement, anticipate a transition, and participate with peers? Coordinate motor and positioning needs with orientation and mobility (O&M) access and travel instruction. Agree on cues and safety supports across settings.

School psychologists, counselors, and behavior support staff

Before interpreting a response, ask whether instructions, social cues, materials, and the environment were accessible. Consider processing demands and opportunities to learn. Work with the TVI and other relevant specialists on assessment access, interpretation, and the limits of any adaptations.

Practical next step: Choose one recurring activity. Meet with the relevant specialist, identify its visual demands, agree on access changes, and review the student’s experience and performance. For CVI-specific collaboration, see Perkins’ introduction to CVI assessments and team roles.

Shared work, distinct expertise

Know when to bring in blindness specialists

A TVI brings specialized knowledge of educational access, literacy and learning media, and blindness-specific instruction. An orientation and mobility specialist brings expertise in orientation and travel. Paraeducators and other professionals carry agreed strategies into their work and bring back observations from their settings.

The Expanded Core Curriculum includes the disability-specific skills that support access and participation in everyday life. Ask which of those skills connect to the activity you are planning and how practice can support the student’s instruction.

Cerebral/cortical visual impairment (CVI), additional disabilities, and combined hearing and vision loss may require further expertise. Do not assume that an eye diagnosis alone tells you how a student accesses a task—or that one student’s strategies fit another.

Team resource: Council for Exceptional Children: blindness and visual impairment preparation standards. These are professional standards, not a statement of each student’s legal entitlement.

Resources you can use next

Start with a resource matched to your role and the student’s needs. CVI resources address a particular form of visual impairment; they are not interchangeable with guidance for all blindness and low vision.

Make the next session better

Pick one activity. Identify the access barrier. Agree on the adjustment and who will prepare it. Ask the student what worked, document the result, and bring it back to the team. Make the successful change part of ordinary practice.

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