When interacting with children born with profound vision problems including blindness, the aim should be to help the children master their ability to comprehend experiences fully, even those experiences that would ordinarily be taken in through sight, as well as mastering each stage of emotional development.
If you move to the left and right of the baby while talking to her in warm and inviting tones, although you know that baby cannot see, she follows and localizes the source of the sound and may move her head in that direction. In this way the baby is constructing a “visual map,” trying to sense where things are in the space around her.
If she turns towards the sound but cannot see you, you can take her hand in your hand and put it next to your mouth so that she feels your mouth moving. She can experience the source of the sound. Similar things can be done with the smell for slightly older babies. You can simply put interesting scent like lemon juice on your fingers so that the baby can take an interest in the smell and try to locate your hand in space.
With a 15-16 month old baby who doesn’t have this spatial road map, you can do similar exercises matching the child’s motor skill. For example, you can coax her into little “Can you find me?” games by giving treats such as kisses and snacks when she finds you. In this way the baby is motivated to create a spatial road map as well as to take action.
At each stage the principle remains the same. With second stage, the baby needs to experience warmth and pleasure through touch, smell, rhythmic movement and sound. The child will be able to get a mental picture of a joyful parent beaming at her. The child may even smile back even though she cannot see the father talking to her rhythmically with a joyful smile. The daddy can take her hand to his face so that she can touch his mouth and get a kiss on her hands. In this way she will get a sense of where the pleasurable sound is coming from. .
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