Vision can affect learning in many ways. By Year 2 about 85% of learning information is visual, and a problem in using vision to take in teaching, or in understanding visual information, can seriously reduce a child’s ability to achieve to his or her potential.

There are two major types of vision problems which can affect learning. If a child has difficulties focusing or aiming their eyes for near visual tasks such as reading or writing, often the ability to maintain visual attention and accuracy is reduced.

This can show up as poor concentration for reading or writing; reduced reading fluency and accuracy especially with extended reading; symptoms of eyestrain such as complaints of sore or tired eyes or headaches, rubbing eyes and squinting or blinking, or holding the book very close. When a child (or adult) has to unconsciously exert more focusing effort to maintain clear vision, the ability to process the information is markedly reduced, often resulting in wandering concentration or poor comprehension and having to read over and over to make it sink in.

These focusing and eye aiming problems tend to occur more in later grades due to the increasing visual workload, so that many children may seem to learn to read and progress well in Year 1, 2 or 3 but seem to lose interest in reading in higher grades, or show reduced achievement compared to their ability. Many children unconsciously avoid such visual effort by reducing their amount of reading.

Visual abilities such as eye movements for reading, and understanding shapes or remembering visual information such as letters or words, are all learned with increasing age and experience. Sometimes a child may not develop the visual processing or eye hand skills necessary to understand the concepts of letters and words, or learn to make letter and number shapes, and they may have problems learning to read as a result.

These weaknesses in development in Visual Information Processing may affect visual spatial  skills, which involves a child’s understanding of the spatial world around them, and may show as problems in knowing left and right, leading to letter and number reversals; visual analysis dysfunction, which affects a child’s ability to recognise and remember differences in letters; visual motor skills, which affect writing, drawing and spacing; and visual-auditory integration problems, which interfere with learning to match the sounds and symbols of letters and words.

All children should be assessed prior to commencing pre-school to ensure their eyes are healthy; that there is no significant long sightedness or lazy eye or eye turn which will impede learning; and to ensure their eye movement skills and visual information processing abilities are developing as expected at normal levels for their age.

Any child who is not progressing as well as expected when learning to read in Grade 1, or reading to learn in later grades, should have a comprehensive assessment of their visual function and visual information processing by a developmental optometrist. In this way it is possible to manage any visual impediments to learning, or even to simply rule out the possibility that vision is a factor contributing to learning difficulties.

(Visual Information Processing)

This is a specialised assessment to determine how well a child’s brain understands information his or her eyes receive in everyday situations, such as in the classroom and playing sport. A number of visual abilities will be assessed to determine the developmental level (developmental age) the child has reached in each of the vital visual skills for learning to read and write, as well as being able to perform proficiently in higher grades of school.

The visual abilities to be tested include:

• Visual spatial development
• Visual analysis (discrimination)
• Visual memory
• Visual sequencing
• Visual-motor integration and tracking
• Visual-auditory integration

The assessment usually takes about one hour and is performed by our certified vision therapist Annmarie Bishop. It is essential that any close spectacles prescribed, must be worn for this assessment. It is preferable for the assessment to be performed in the morning, and for no other children to be present for the assessment.

The results are usually discussed by an optometrist with parents at a separate visit, and treatment options considered and planned. A report of test results and recommendations is provided as soon as possible as part of the overall assessment fee.

The total cost for the assessment, optometrist conference and reports is not covered by Medicare or private health insurance, since it is very specialised testing not available from most optometrists.