Division on Visual Impairments

VIDBE-Q 64.4 Fall 2019

A quarterly newsletter from the Council for Exceptional Children's Division on Visual Impairments containing practitioner tips for Teachers of Students with Visual Impairments, Certified Orientation and Mobility Specialists, and other professionals.

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VIDBE-Q Volume 64 Issue 4 55 master the environment and learn – all in the context of family, community, and cultural expectations for young children. (pp. 1) Essentially, infant mental health focuses on the optimal social and emotional development of infants and toddlers within the context of secure, stable relationships with caregivers. (pp. 2) An IMH lens is an important and valuable way of looking at how we provide EI services and supports to children with visual impairment (VI) and their families. In school based settings, the student is the client; however in EI, the family, including the child, is the client. Additionally, in an IMH approach to EI, both the child and the family are still the client, however it is specifically the relationship between the child and the family where we essentially focus. For teachers of children with VI (TVI) providing support through an IMH lens, we would think deeply about the impact VI has on the relationships within the family. We would look at how the child and the caregiver are experiencing each other and the world around them considering one participant of the relationship is a visual learner and the other is not. Why does it matter so much? Early experiences, including early relationships, can and do influence the physical architecture of the brain, literally shaping the neural connections in the infant's developing brain (National Scientific Council on the Developing Child, 2005). When we look

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