Vision Support Team

The Vision Support Team are very aware that during the life of a child/young person with a vision impairment, their needs will change in relation to:

  • Their visual condition age
  • Stage of educational development
  • The demands of the curriculum
  • Their learning
  • Social environment

The Vision Support Team aims to respond accordingly to meet the needs of the Children and Young People at all stages.

Early Years

The Vision Support Team is a team of specialist teachers and teaching assistants who are involved with supporting the needs of babies and children with a diagnosed vision impairment from birth onwards. The team work with children, their families, nurseries and playgroups and provide specialist interventions, teaching and support to minimise the impact of a child’s vision impairment on their development and progress in their pre-school years.

The VST team provide a range of specialist interventions and support to children in their pre-school years including:-

  • Delivery of specialist programmes of visual assessment and development.
  • Monitoring progress of vision skills and development using VI Development Journal and Early Support Plans.
  • Advice to families and settings on strategies to use to support a child’s vision development skills.
  • Delivering training to nursery and other pre-school settings to raise awareness and understanding of a child’s vision impairment and ways to support them.
  • Multi-agency and key-working to support the holistic development of a child
  • Provision of statutory reports and documentation.
  • Signposting families to other agencies who can support the child and family such as Early Support Team, Royal Society for Blind Children (RSBC) and Habilitation (Mobility) Team
  • Support through the Education, Health and Care Plan assessment process, should the child require one.
  • Advice and support with transition to nursery and/or school.

Click here for more information: Specialist Teaching and Support provided by Vision Support Team

There are many eye conditions that can affect the child/young persons eyes, optic nerve (carries visual information) or brain (processing visual information).

The Vision Support Team Qualified Teachers of Vision Impairment have developed a selection of information leaflets around the most common visual conditions that thousands and in some cases even millions of people in the UK experience every day.

For those children/young people that do have a vision impairment and are supported by a Qualified Teacher of Vision Impairment from the Vision Support Team, advice and guidance on the child/young persons visual condition will be given in a bespoke Vision Management Plan.

Primary School

The Vision Support Team (VST) are a team of specialist teachers and teaching assistants who work city-wide to support the needs of children with an identified vision impairment who have been referred to the service. The team work collaboratively with SENCo’s, teachers and parents to remove barriers and minimise the impact of a child’s vision impairment on their access to learning, social and emotional development and developing independence in order that pupils achieve to their potential.

Vision Support Team provide a range of support services to primary age pupils including:

  • Assessment of a child’s visual functioning
  • Provision of Vision Management Plans
  • Statutory reports and documentation and involvement at statutory review meetings
  • Delivering specialist teaching programmes to develop pupil’s independent access to curriculum learning, social interaction and learning and social environments
  • Teaching of specialist skills in use of low vision aids and assistive technologies
  • INSET training and raising awareness workshops
  • Environmental Audits

Secondary School

The Vision Support Team (VST) are a team of specialist teachers and teaching assistants working city-wide to support the needs of pupils with an identified vision impairment in secondary settings. The team work collaboratively with SENCo’s, teachers and parents to minimise the impact of a young person’s vision impairment on their access to learning, social interaction and developing independence.

VST provide a range of specialist teaching support services to secondary age pupils including:

  • assessment of a pupil’s visual functioning
  • provision of Vision Management Plans
  • statutory reports and documentation and support at review meetings
  • working with pupils to develop understanding of their visual functioning, ongoing needs and developing self-advocacy
  • delivering specialist teaching packages to develop pupil’s independent access to curriculum learning, social interaction and communication skills
  • teaching of specialist skills in use of low vision aids and assistive technologies
  • INSET training and raising awareness workshops.
  • environmental audits
  • advice and support with exam access arrangements, ordering and arranging modified and adapted exam papers
  • support for work experience opportunities – scaffolding additional support pupils may need to request from their placement to maximise the benefits of the experience
  • developing pupil’s understanding of the learning which can be achieved on placement as well as the benefits to their CV
  • supporting use of assistive technology to support their visual access to daily lessons, homework and exam revision. Advising on the availability of funding options to enable the student to purchase equipment, such as DLA or School Funds
  • arranging events where the student will experience new activities, such as sporting events or holidays, as well as meeting others within the world of Vision Impairment. There are also similar events organised for parents to attend where they can meet professionals who share vision impairment
  • arranging the introduction of other professionals and specialists who can work with the pupil to support them in developing their independent living skills and knowledge of how to independently travel to school and later on to college or sixth form
  • Transition planning and support

All support interventions are developed and agreed with each pupil to develop pupils understanding of their support needs and self-advocacy skills.

Post-16

The Vision Support Team is a team of specialist teachers and teaching assistants working city-wide to support the needs of students with an identified vision impairment in post-16 settings.

Support for post-16 students is provided through Vision Support Team Traded Services.

On entering a post-16 provision an initial assessment of a student’s needs is carried out by a Qualified Teacher of the Vision Impaired (QTVI), following which a package of support for the student will be set up in liaison with the college.

Click here to find out more information on the assessment process and packages of support: Specialist Teaching and Support provided by Vision Support Team

Special Schools

The Vision Support Team (VST) is a team of specialist teachers and teaching assistants who work city-wide to support the needs of children in special schools with an identified vision impairment. The team work collaboratively with SENCo’s, teachers and parents to minimise the impact of a child’s vision impairment on their learning opportunities.

VST provide a range of specialist teaching and support interventions to pupils in Special Schools

  • Assessment of a child’s visual functioning
  • Provision of Vision Management Plans
  • Statutory reports and documentation and involvement at statutory review meetings
  • Delivering specialist teaching programmes and interventions to minimise the impact of a pupil’s vision impairment on their learning opportunities.
  • Teaching of specialist skills in use of low vision aids and assistive technologies
  • INSET training and raising awareness on the impact of low vision workshops

Deafblindness

Children and young people with multi-sensory impairments (MSI) have hearing and vision impairments, often with other disabilities, which affect their learning and communication.

When both sight and hearing are damaged, children are hugely disadvantaged in exploring, interacting with and understanding their world.

Additional disabilities often accompany MSI such as further sensory impairments (for example of touch, balance and/or smell), physical disabilities, complex medical needs, emotional difficulties and/or learning difficulties.

MSI affects development in all areas, and especially

  • communication and the development of relationships
  • mobility and interaction with the physical environment
  • the processing and integration of information from residual hearing, vision and other senses
  • the perception of time and space
  • the generalisation of skills and concepts

Pre-school pupils and those in other educational settings in Birmingham, including other special schools, are supported by the Birmingham Sensory Support Service.

Support may include specialist assessment, teaching, advice and support, staff training, social activities and the Deafblindness

Children and young people with multi-sensory impairments (MSI) have hearing and vision impairments, often with other disabilities, which affect their learning and communication.

When both sight and hearing are damaged, children are hugely disadvantaged in exploring, interacting with and understanding their world.

Additional disabilities often accompany MSI such as further sensory impairments (for example of touch, balance and/or smell), physical disabilities, complex medical needs, emotional difficulties and/or learning difficulties.

MSI affects development in all areas, and especially

  • communication and the development of relationships
  • mobility and interaction with the physical environment
  • the processing and integration of information from residual hearing, vision and other senses
  • the perception of time and space
  • the generalisation of skills and concepts

HLTA’s/ TA’s

Our Higher Level Teaching Assistants work in partnership with students, parents and schools to support the children and young people in a variety of settings from birth to 25.

We demonstrate good practice and the required support for teachers and school/nursery staff that are working with our children, providing resources or support with modified materials to ensure full access to the school curriculum.

We assist with the use of specialist equipment such as iPad’s, BrailleNote, speech software in order to prepare our children for their future. The teaching of Touch Typing is also adopted for use with some specialist equipment.

To provide opportunities for the children and young people to meet with their peers in order to develop social skills and take part in organised events.