Core Knowledge Foundation
The Five Senses Tell It Again!™ Read-Aloud Anthology
Young readers explore the five senses with a read-aloud anthology. Each lesson follows the routine of introducing the reading, listening to a read-aloud, answering comprehension questions, then practicing a skill. Modification and...
Film English
Theo’s Story
Encourage your class to consider a beautiful short film about a boy named Theo who happens to be visually impaired. Over the course of the lesson, pupils work in pairs, discuss their ideas and the film as a class, view the film, take...
Perkins School for the Blind
Beginning Map Skills
Maps can be so much fun, they help you understand spatial relationships, distance between objects, and can foster direction skills. Budding cartographers with visual impairments use the Wheatley Tactile Diagramming Kit to create their...
Perkins School for the Blind
Creating a 3-D Model of a Plant Life
Instructing blind or visually impaired learners means you need to make symbolic tactile representations of various processes to provide as much input as possible. But wouldn't it be even better to have your learners make the models...
Perkins School for the Blind
Integrated Skills - Laundry
I hate doing laundry, even if it is an independent living skill that requires me to count money, follow a sequence, and sort clothing by color. Learners with multiple disabilities discuss what laundry is, why they need to do it, and how...
Perkins School for the Blind
Timeline for Anne
It is key to the learning process to make everything a child with visual impairments does as tactile as possible. After reading Anne of Green Gables, the class discusses her life events in order to make a tactile time line. They choose...
Perkins School for the Blind
Accessible Labels
When you're blind it is extremely important to be able to navigate your environment in as independent a way as possible. This idea isn't a lesson, but it is a great way to foster independent mobility and literacy skills while making the...
Perkins School for the Blind
Tactile quilts that tell a story
Learners with multiple disabilities need to engage in projects that push them to know their full potential. They need to be able to express themselves in a variety of ways, and this very thoughtful lesson plan does just that. They make a...
Perkins School for the Blind
Making Choices
Here is an excellent and well-developed lesson intended to promote choice-making skills for learners with visual impairment and intellectual disabilities. It fosters choice-making skills through a soft version of discrete trial training,...
Core Knowledge Foundation
Ray Charles
Introduce young learners to the read-aloud process with a short biographical passage about Ray Charles. After listening to the passage, class members respond to factual, inferential, and evaluative questions, and then create a timeline...
Possibilities
Disability Awareness Activity Packet
Bring awareness to disabilities with a packet consisting of a variety of activities designed to inform scholars about disabilities—autism, hearing impairments, physical disabilities, and more! Learners test their communication skills,...
Global Oneness Project
Understanding Blindness
Gaia Squarci's photo essay, Broken Screen, turns viewers attention to the challenges faced by those with visual impairments. After viewing the images, class members discuss why they believe the photographer structured the album as she did.
Museum of Disability
Taking Visual Impairment to School
What is the world like when you can't see, or when your vision is impaired? Learn about how Lisa communicates with the world around her with Taking Visual Impairment to School by Rita Whitman Steingold. Learners answer discussion...
Museum of Disability
The Right Dog for the Job
Here, dog lovers can enjoy an educational instructional activity about the ways puppies are trained to become service and guide dogs. Based on The Right Dog for the Job by Dorothy Hinshaw Patent, the instructional activity provides...
Museum of Disability
Looking Out for Sarah
Perry the dog is Sarah's best friend and her guide to the visual world. Young readers learn about guide dogs and communication with Looking Out for Sarah by Glenna Lang, through a series of discussion questions and activities.
Museum of Disability
A Picture Book of Louis Braille
Teach kids about the beginnings of the Braille writing system with a lesson about Louis Braille. A series of discussion questions guide young readers though A Picture Book of Louis Braille by David A. Adler, and once they finish the...
Museum of Disability
Buddy, The First Seeing Eye Dog
Learn about how the seeing eye dog program began with a reading lesson plan about Eva Moore's chapter book, Buddy, The First Seeing Eye Dog. With vocabulary words, discussion questions, and extension resources, the lesson plan is a...
Perkins School for the Blind
Calendar Bingo
While this activity was designed for students with special needs, it could be used with any group learning about the calendar or days of the week. Old calendar pages become the bingo board, and numbers 1 through 31 become the numbers...
Perkins School for the Blind
Language Experience Stories
Here is a great way to bring core content to your special education classroom. Included is a set of instructional ideas intended to help learners increase their verbal and written expression through storytelling. Tape recorders, story...
Perkins School for the Blind
Where Shall I Put It?
Position and positional phrases are concepts that need to be constructed for learners with low or no vision. Help them gain competence and a conceptual understanding of words like on, in, and under with a funny game. After gathering a...
Perkins School for the Blind
3-D Task List
Staying organized is a part of growing up, and it can be as easy as making a list. Here is a set of instructions for making a three-dimensional task list especially for learners with visual impairments or blindness. After making the task...
Perkins School for the Blind
Which One is the Square?
Children who are blind need to constantly be engaged in building conceptual understandings of the world around them. This activity will help them grasp the concept of shape, identify shapes, and consider shapes as they are used to...
Perkins School for the Blind
Mix and Match
Sorting and matching are skills that have all kinds of applications. Learners with low, but useable vision work to match an object to an object, an object to a picture, and a picture to a picture. This will help them identify objects...
Perkins School for the Blind
Following Directions
Turn the act of following directions into a fun and engaging game! Especially designed for young scholars with cognitive or intellectual disabilities, this instructional activity uses a game format as a natural reinforcer. Write a set of...