This paper discusses the period of transition for children with low vision as they finish preschool education and progress to the first grade of an inclusive education programme with additional professional assistance. The transition into a new programme can be a very frightening and stressful experience for a child due to the so called unknown factor. Similar feelings can arise with parents and future professional workers, which will play their part in the upbringing of a said child. The role of the teacher of visually impaired is to optimize the transition process for all parties involved – to lend support to the child and its family, to help the school, its employees and the child's peers.
This paper studies an example of a transition of a five-year-old boy with a congenital cataract from kindergarten to elementary school with help of qualitative research method. Primary goal of this paper is to help coordinate and execute a successful plan with the child, its parents and professional workers at school, thereby enabling optimal transition and reception of a child in the new environment and describe the general guidelines of planning this transition. Along with the boy, its parents, peers and professional workers who interact with the boy on a daily basis were also included in research. Data gathering took place in different time intervals from the child's integration in kindergarten to the conclusion of first semester in the first grade. The result of initial data gathering about the child is a comprehensive assessment of his functioning prior to his inclusion in elementary school. The subsequent result of data gathering focused on future educational environment and consideration of the comprehensive assessment of the child is the adaptation plan for external and internal elementary school facilities and an evaluation of these adjustments. The result of comprehensive child assessment analysis is an introduction of the child, adjustments and work methods to his teachers in the first grade and an evaluation of the student's progress by the end of first semester. The result of setting up a workshop was to make the student's peers aware of blindness and vision impairment and to evaluate the level of awareness they have. The result of child's performance in school evaluation at the end of the first semester are professional recommendations by the teacher of visually impaired on how to work with the impaired student in the future. On the basis of examined theoretical standpoints and practical application in the process of transition extracted guidelines for an effective execution of the process have been determined. A preparation for a meeting with the teacher's group is included as well as tables for school environment assessment and recommendations on school environment adjustments. A form is included as well, which a teacher of visually impaired might find helpful when organizing and gathering information on school books for the upcoming school year.
An analysis of all acquired data has shown that the transition of a student was optimal.
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