ORIENTATION & MOBILITY
Intersection Analysis
Tools for the O&M Instructor
And Program Accountability
Kevin A. Stewart, Ed.D.
April 24, 2008
Denver
Today’s Agenda
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Program Accountability
FVA O&M / Ecological Inventory
Central Skills in Street Crossings
Perceptual Learning applied
Video Analysis
LUNCH
Walkabout “Your Turn”
Data Analysis
Jeopardy: “What do you Know?”
Heart of Instruction
As teachers our goal is to ensure that
the instruction we design and the
strategies we use will provide
opportunities that will lead to positive
changes in learning on the part of the
student.
IEP Goals & Expectations
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Follow logically from assessment of
present levels of functioning
Address functional priorities of the
educational team
Provides accountability to our
instructional practice
Accountability
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Establishing goals and collecting data
helps guide our daily instruction
Provides a means to measure student
learning
Provides a means to evaluate our
instructional practises
Top-Down Approach
DESIRED GOAL
Identify
Skills
Obstacles
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Based on interviews with
student, family, team members
Ecological Assessment
– Task Analysis
– Discrepancy Analysis
Strengths
Strategies to Improve
Performance &
bypass obstacles
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Expectations and
Strategies
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Determine Adaptive Skills to
teach
Write observable, measurable
and obtainable short-term goals
Example: Desired Goal
Identified
To be able to independently travel
safely and efficiently to/from home
and the neighbourhood convenience
store (Max Milk).
Identify Skills:
Ecological Inventory
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Involve observing and identifying the
skills in a given environment. Ensures
that the skills will be:
– Functional
– Age-appropriate
– naturally occurring
(Falvey, 1989; Snell, 1992)
Ecological Inventory
Environment
Activity
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Skill Area
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Identify the environment
Identify Activities that
occur
Skill
Skill
Skill
Skill
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Identify specific skills
required to participate in
the selected activity
Ecological
Inventory
Task Analysis
Discrepancy
Analysis
Measurable
Long Term (Annual) Goal:
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WHO: Student
ACTION: will be able to independently
travel to Max Milk Convenience store,
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CONDITION: within his residential area
during daylight conditions,
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PERFORMANCE CRITERIA: 1/1 times/
session with a 100% accuracy on ten
tasks,
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LENGTH OF TIME: over 5 consecutive
opportunities.
Example: Short - Term
goal
_________, will be able to cross a standard
4-way light controlled intersection (Green
Lane & Willowbrook) during daylight
conditions, 4 out of 4 times per session with
a 100% accuracy on 10 specified
procedures , over 5 consecutive
opportunities.
Central Skills in Street
Crossings
1. Detecting the street
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(a detection task)
2. Aligning the body
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(a localization task)
3. Initiating a crossing
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(a detection task)
4. Walking a straight path across the street
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(a localization task)
Perceptual Learning
Sources of Input
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Looking
Listening
Touching
Walking
– Kinesthetic
– Vestibular
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Wind, Temperature, Odors
Looking
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Movement of the eyes, head and body
Visual Field of 180 degrees
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Form and shape
Motion
Over-all spatial layout
Adaptation to dim illumination (night vision)
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Contrast
Colour
Fine detail
Figure ground
Visual Acuity
Listening
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Assist in identifying
– Objects that emit sound
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traffic
pedestrians
– Objects that modulate sound
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scrapping sounds (surface texture)
Impact sounds (surface hardness)
Manipulating (pouring into containers)
– Type of environment
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Assist in localization – Distance Sense
– Information about sound –directional source
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Spatial position (familiar intensity)
Time-of-arrival (familiar intensity)
Maintaining line of direction
– Information through reflection - echolocation
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Presence and position of objects
Object size
Maintaining line of direction
– Information through attenuation - sound shadows
 Presence and position of objects
 Object size
 Maintaining line of direction
Touching
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Assist in identifying object properties
– Skin (neural end-organs)
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pressure vs. lateral motion
vibration
temperature
pain
Assists in detecting position / body movements
– Proprioception
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receptors in skin,
muscles and tendons
– Kinesthesis
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position of joints,
body parts
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Assist in perceiving proximal / distal stimuli
– Proximal (sensation at receptor organ)
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proprioceptive input through skin
Pattern of pressure / deformation of hand grip
– Distal (exploration of object / environment)
 mobility tools
 materials, slopes, elevations
 location and dimension of obstacles /
openings
Walking
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Perceptual input and motor action
– Coordinating input with planning movement
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Assist in keeping track of locomotion path
– Sequence of motor control commands to
muscles (efference)
– Feedback from body about movement from brain
commands (afference)
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proprioceptive
vestibular
– involves the hairs in semicircular canals
– used to determine direction and extent of turns
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Assists in skillful orientation
– “Environmental Flow”
changes in distance and directions to objects
 turning in place vs. walking straight ahead
 vertical and horizontal planes
 relies on looking and listening
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Wind, Temperature,
Odors
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Feeling wind
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Mechanical stimulation of skin
Movements of hair and clothing
Building wind flow
Wind for determining facing direction
Feeling Temperature
– Open doors of air-conditioned bus
– “Hot spot” from sun
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Smelling odors
– Fat-soluble vapors
– General directional information
Perceptual Learning
Development and education of attention
(Gibson, 1968) and filtering sensory
information for the purpose of safe and
efficient travel.
A Key ingredient within every O&M lesson.
Three Principles of
Perception
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Single vs. Multi-Task
Unskillful: requires much attention and
concentration between mobility/orientation
tasks.
Skillful: less attention, easily combined
with other tasks.
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Irrelevant vs. Relevant Features
Unskilled: notices both relevant and
irrelevant sensory features
Skilled: Narrow focus to relevant
features and understand them.
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Proximal vs. Distal Stimuli
Unskilled: attention to proximal stimulus
Skilled: attention to distal stimulus
Classification of Perceptual
input and movement
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Procedural
– Coordinated Motor sequence
– Degrees of freedom
– When to apply the motor act
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Specific
– Places and event (locations/hazards)
– Increases efficiency of travel
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Conceptual
– General patterns
– Typical intersections
– Cardinal directions
Spatial Structure
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Egocentric
– “Lateral: to my right or left.”
Topocentric
– “Between . . . Beside . . . Under etc.”
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Cartographic
– Pattern of streets, number systems
– “Max Milk is on the NE corner”
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Polarcentric
– Compass directions
Object - Object
Self - Object
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Data Analysis
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Baseline
Graphing Data
Aim Line
Trend Line
Decision Making
Remedial
Strategies
Mapping Materials
Street Models
3 – D Models
ORIENTATION &
MOBILITY:
JEOPORDY
GAME