Teaching pratice to promote concept formation in a toddler with blindness: Instruction of appropriate hand movements using teaching materials
KANAKO: My name is Kanako Fukuda. I'm an assistant professor at Utsunomiya University in Japan. The topic of the presentation is teaching practice to promote concept formation in a toddler with blindness instruction of appropriate hand movements using the teaching materials. First, an introduction in early childhood children formed concept through activities in which they manipulate objects through their own hands. This is also true for blind children Sighted of children naturally receive information from their surroundings through their vision. However, blind children don't receive visual information, difficult to get information about surroundings, and it's hard to be interested in things in the outside world. This causes delay in the development in exploratory behaviour and hand movement. It is important to encourage blind children to be interested in the outside world and to use their hands. For this purpose, we need materials and environments that are easy to understand through haptic perception. We carried out the teaching practice appropriate hand movement with one blind toddler using teaching materials. This presentation they post on the course of four years of instruction from intake to elementary school entry. The target child was a boy the period of instruction was about four years, from one year and 10 months to six years and one month. The diagnosis was Label congenital blindness, his vision function was light vision. Developmentally his verbal expression and understanding was age appropriate. In terms of language, there were signs of understanding only words without experience. There were delays in hand movements and activities of daily living and the exploration of both hands but not sufficiently developed the next is teaching method, educational consultation was conducted once a month for about one hour at the clinical room of a university. We gave verbal warnings while touching the materials to the target child of the hand and told him how to play by taking his hands from behind. The next is analysis method. Four years of educational consultation activities from intake to the start of elementary school. A total of 24 sessions were divided into five periods from the perspective of the following state of typical development. It is summarized in an A4 table, the vertical line in the table of the caroms for each developmental stage. In the horizontal line, there is the standard Parcel age for children with typical development. On the age of the target child. The pictures of teaching tool divided by activity and at the bottom chance in the use of both hands and tactile perception. I will explain each activity period. First sensory motor activity period. The child will notice objects in the external world and perform sensory operation such as reaching, tapping and shaking. Secondary in and out activity period. With the establishment of the means object relationship, children begin to use their hand for purposes. Thirdly, discriminative activity period. In this case, the child will be able to imagine rotating in one direction. Fourth framed block construction activity period. this is the period when comparative concept such as large and small are acquired. In this period, construction activity becomes possible. Fifth free construction activity period. Understand that two-dimensional direction of vertical and horizontal and if there is a horizontal axis, understand the diagonal direction. Next is classification of teaching materials and the tools, the teaching materials and tools used in their activities were classified and organized according to the following seven developmental perspectives. First, sensory motor activity. Activities using a teaching tool that emit the light, sound or vibration by pushing, moving, for example, light moves, music box cars secondary in and out activity, putting object in holes and taking them out of bags for example, puzzle boxes, put in the cylinder. Thirdly, put and pulled out activity. The activity is that involve inserting and removing, cylinder from a rod using both hands in cooperation, for example, disc plugging, bead threading. Fourth, discrimination activity These activities to discriminate shapes and sizes, for example, shape puzzle discriminating cylinder block. Fifth, frame block construction activity, it's a construction activity that we framed on a planar axis. for example, numerical rods, puzzle with frame. The sixth is free construction activity Among the construction activity, this is a three dimensional unframed, for example, blocks cubic constructions tasks. The seventh is tactile movement-controlled activities. these are activities unique to blind children in which they control their hand movements on the raised lines with their hands, for example. tactile figure with raised line, tactile maze. Next, I will introduce the teaching process. Table one shows the teaching material with the seven activity perspectives on the vertical axis and the teaching period on the horizontal axis. I would compare the age of typically developing child to the age of the target child. In this way. Stage in sensorimotor activity period in typical children. This stage is birth to 10 months, but our target child was from one year and 10 months to two years and four months after intake. Second is in and out activity, period. In typical children. This stage is from ten months to one year and six months. But the target child was from two years and five months to three years and five months. Thirdly is discrimination activity period in typical children, the stage is from one year and six months to two years and six months, but the target child was from three years and six months to four year and four months. Just under the age of four years and four months, there was a significant delay from the typical development. On the other hand, at the age of four years and five months, the child was able to perform various activities. And after the age of five years and six months, he actually became capable of deep-thinking activities. Next, I have the right to explain about cognition and how to use in each activity period by showing you video of an activity. First is a sensory motor activity period when the child first came for consultation at the age of one year and 10 months, he played with only one hand on the right moved in the metallophone with a Paro toy. He had trouble pushing the ball in. There was a difference in interest and hand manipulation skill. Here is a video of our intake at one year and ten months. The child hears the sound of the right movement. The teacher says, let's push together but child says, I don't. The child says I don't need. But he's smiling. And then he happens to touch a toy. Child said, I did it. He was pushing the toy himself. While playing the metallophone, the teacher introduced a toy called the Paro. When he showed interest in Paro, the teacher quickly moved him from the floor to his desk. The ball had fallen, he was surprised. He says one more the teacher said Gyu it means press or push in Japanese. Next is in and out activity period. at the age of two years and five months. The child began to use both hands for familiar tasks, but only one hand was used to insert the cylinder. At the age of three years and one month, the child began to use both hands in the insert the cylinder, but the two hands were not separated. At the age of three and five months, there was the budding of cooperation between the two hands. Here is a video of a two year and five-month-old playing with Paro. Its cylinder put in, he put in with only the right hand. He just said, let's explore the hole. Child wants to change the toy. This was a little difficult for him. We changed the toy to ball dropping. Next is a video of the three year and one month old. playing with cylinder put in he put in the cylinder with both hands. But both hands are not sufficiently separated. Next has been of three on a five-month playing with cylinder put in he's exploring the hole with his left hand and putting the cylinder with his right hand. Next is discrimination activity period. By the time he was four, he was able to cooperate with both hands. In the discrimination of shapes, he touched the hole with his left-hand grabs, grasp the object to be inserted with his right hand. In the insert cylinder their left hand explored the hole and the right hand, put the cylinder into the hole touched by the left hand in order Here is a video of a four-year-old playing with shape discrimination. Teacher says circle, triangle, rectangles. He finds a hole with left hand and put in while discriminating with right hand. It's discrimination of cylinder thickness. He's following the hall with left hand. He put the cylinder with right hand. Next is framed block construction activity period. At the age of four years and five months. The child became interested in construction tasks. He was seen to accomplish these tasks by trial and error. By the age of four years and seven months, he started to measure the space by hand in the frame the block construction task at the age of five, he could concentrate on one task for a longer period of time. Here is a video of four years and five-month-old Playing with framed block puzzle construction task. Child said how many boards will fit next, teacher says next are also boards. He's trying to put in by trial and error, here is a video of four years and seven months old playing with framed block construction task. He can move the board to the edge. He can imagine where the board goes. Here is a video of five years old playing with framed block construction task Difficult one. He can replace the board at will. Next is free construction activity period, at the age of five years and six months, he was able to imitate the model of the blocks presented by teacher. He could touch the model, compare and refer. At the age of six, he was able to trace short lines to long curves and finally, even complex mazes. He was able to count the number of empty spaces in Braille. Here is a video of five years and six months playing with cube construction task. This is a difficult task. He concentrates on it very much. We believed he could do it. Child said, I've done it. Next is imitation construction with blocks. He touches the model and says three blocks. He touches and references the model. Here is a video of six years old playing with tactile figure with raised line. He's touching well with both hands. He said, I found the goal. Next is finding a line of the same length. He touches the border and three lines. He says the middle line is the same. Next is handmade the maze with duct tape. It was very difficult for tactile to go through the through the road without tape. We recreated the maze that follows on the tape. He follows it with both hands. Very good. Next is counting empty space in Braille. He could touch softly. He said, four spaces. Next is discussion. First, I would like to discuss overall development until the age of four years and four months, there was a significant delay from the typical development. On the other hand, after the age of five years and six months, he was able to do a variety of things rapidly. This suggests that there is a period of slow development in early childhood and the development catches up with a later stage of childhood. This is an imaginary part of the developmental process of an infant with a disability and the typical development to suggest that the effect of disability on our development is significant. If we imagine it's up to the stage of adulthood, it looks like this. Slowly growing infant if we compare this to a tree, the roots of a tree grow in the earth. Parallel growth in elementary school, the tree trunk will grow thicker. Catching up in junior high school, the trunk grows upward. From the age of 15 can be as good as the other sighted person the branches and leaves grow. Second, I would like to discuss the contents of the activities, it was not that he stopped doing similar activities after the stage, but he continued to work on them from period to period. Even with the same material, child's approaches differ from stage to stage. It is important to work on this continuously. In addition, during the in and out activity balls, cylinders and round plates, were easy to put in. However, it was difficult to put in square plates, rectangle columns and triangular columns because they needed to be oriented. It was important to consider the different levels difficulty by making small steps. Third, changes in the use of hand in the two-handed cooperation, the targets child developed from the operating with only one hand, both hands were working together and not separated. Both hands were becoming separated and both hands were separated and had a different role. In the construction activities, he was able to make movements such as bringing the plate to the edge, measuring space, replace the plate, comparing the referencing. We think that the use of these hands does not come immediately and naturally, they can only be acquired through prior learning. Fourth, is verbalization of experience. In the instruction we verbalize, his movements and the state of the teaching tools and put words to his experience so that he could acquire words with real experience. As a result, the child was able to use correct words connected to the specific situation. This suggests that by verbalizing, the target child's condition and putting words to his experience, he will develop his understanding of language, Lastly, the target child has, since he’s enrolled in the elementary school for the blind, he had learned Braille and is able to read and write well. In early childhood, he developed the pleasure of accomplishment and self-confidence through trial and error. This helped him develop a sufficient motivation to touch. We think that experiences in our childhood will become the basis for later learning activities, such as learning Braille and orientation and mobility in elementary school and beyond. Thank you very much for your attention.