Map work is one of the most challenging areas of the curriculum for children with vision impairment (VI). Even with some sight, it’s often difficult (and extremely tiring) for a student with VI to understand map details, locate grid references and maintain the intensive level of concentration required. While enlargement can help, it makes it increasingly difficult for the student to grasp the bigger picture.
Difficulties in access to maps may be overcome if the map is broken down into component parts. For example, a series of overlays can be used to gradually rebuild the map – a base map may only show simple contouring and rivers, and acetate overlays may add the features relevant to the study topic.
Many children with VI are able to use original maps through magnification – if they are enlarged on a CCTV, accessed with a low vision aid, or accessed online. The Ordance Survey (OS) provide a wide range of online materials.
Students able to use magnification to access maps will need to learn systematic approaches to scanning for information, but given sufficient time and support they are able to complete map tasks.
Map work presents very significant challenges, and a different approach is needed for children:
Struggling with map work can single these students out and give them a real sense of their disability. For such students, the task of supporting them is not simply producing appropriate modified diagrams, but also developing their scanning and tactile skills, and allowing them to enjoy success in the activity and avoid failure.
Print OS maps are likely to be unsuitable in adult life. Students need to know what they are and how they are used, but they may need to accept they aren’t able to use them independently.
Instead, emphasise other methods they can use to gather information held within a map, such as their listening and memory skills, their spatial and orientation skills, and their mental mapping skills. These are skills they use all the time to negotiate and make sense of their environment. There may also be online tools, for example Google Maps or GPS mobile phone apps, that would be of greater use than struggling with an OS map.
Above all, make the activity achievable and fun.
It’s important the teacher and support staff work closely to plan how the work will be modified. Together you should identify times when the student will be able to work on a task with the rest of the group and when to set a complementary mapping exercise more suited to their needs.
Where opportunities arise, develop their ability to prepare maps for themselves, starting with mental maps, perhaps describing the route from the classroom to the dining hall. You can also use plastic embossing film (which makes a raised line when drawn on) to allow the child to draw a simple map. Alongside geography, work on co-ordinates will be continuing in maths and science, and these skills are transferable.
Don’t underestimate the task at hand. For a congenitally blind child, concepts such as distance, direction and scale are difficult enough, without trying to understand that the plan is looking down on the earth from above. Some children find it difficult to understand that a car park is "behind" the school and might insist on marking it beside the building.
Introduce cork boards and mapping pins as early as possible for children with severe VI and braillists, along with rubber mats for embossing film.
The advice given in this article is intended to encourage teachers to be creative in how they teach map reading skills to children and young people with vision impairment. For students taking qualifications such as GCSE Geography, it is important to make sure that the methods you are using fit with the way that map reading skills will be assessed in external exams.
You should contact the exam board concerned to discuss this as early as possible.
Below are some tips on how you can prepare accessible map work diagrams for learners with VI:
When there is a need to use a whole extract to test a number of skills, work as follows: