What is “Vision”?
Seems a straightforward question but we tend to use that word incorrectly.
Vision is one of the areas of “seeing” that have an effect on your child’s learning.
Eyesight
Is your child short-sighted?
Is your child long-sighted?
This also includes things like lazy eyes and astigmatisms.
All of this is classified as “eyesight”.
Vision
This is to do with how your child’s eyes move. In optometric terms, it is called, “eye motilities”.
There are 4 main parts that affect reading: pursuit, tracking, saccades and accommodation of vision.
“Pursuit” is the way that your child’s eye follows a moving object. This is used when scanning a page.
“Tracking” is the way that your child’s eye moves, in a straight line, from left to right and from right to left. This is used in reading across a page and moving back to the start of a new line.
“Saccades” are the small jumps your child’s eye makes when moving across a page. This is used to read the words or groups of words across a page.
“Accommodation of vision” is when your child’s eye changes from long distance seeing to short distance seeing and back. This is used when looking from the board to a book and back again. Children who are slow in copying or very messy in copying show signs that this may be a problem.
Visual Perception
This is what your brain thinks the eye sees. It may be that the eye is perfectly round. It may be that your child’s eye motilities are correct. However, if the brain is not processing the signal correctly, there may be a problem.
The most common problem in this area is Scotopic Sensitivity Syndrome. This is where colour is separated incorrectly and causes the letters to appear blurred. Frontrunner Learning Centres test for SSS and can refer your child to an appropriate clinician for help – if it is necessary.
Dyslexia
In the past, dyslexia was considered to be a problem of visual perception because people would “see” letters incorrectly. Now, we know that it is actually a language problem and needs to be dealt with as such.
To read more information about dyslexia, click here.
If this sounds like the kind of professionalism you would like to see in your child’s tuition CALL 1300 851 062 or click here to send us a message.