Lolly Maloney said she knew her son was bright, but he was having problems in school.
“He couldn’t copy what his teacher wrote on the board,” Maloney said.
But her son never indicated anything was wrong, until his teacher advised he get his eyes checked.
Maloney immediately took him to behavioral optometrists Sharon Luckhardt and David Maze of Westmont, who say they see more and more students who have trouble reading.
| Why vision therapy? - Prevent vision and eye problems from developing - Develop visual skills needed to achieve more effectively at school, work or play - Enhance functioning tasks demanding sustained visual effort Source: Optometrists Sharon Luckhardt and David Maze |
With a new school year underway, optometrists stress the importance of getting students screened for visual problems. Even if students have 20/20 eyesight, they could still have visual impairments to prohibit learning skills.
If left undiagnosed, it could be dangerous especially during the years students develop crucial skills for reading.
Vision therapy is learning to adjust the eyes, which is more about control than strengthening, according to Maze.
“A lot of people think they’re just born with vision, but it really is something that’s learned,” Maze said.
Like a person acquires a taste for a certain type of wine, they can teach the eyes to work together as a team.
In addition to prescribing glasses and contacts, behavioral optometrists provide therapy through vision games, which help stimulate development in the brain.
Therapy helps children who often have problems reading the board or a book in front of them because they see double. Oftentimes their vision gets overlooked, and is classified with learning disabilities.
During his 45-minute weekly session, K.J. Maloney, a fifth-grader at Notre Dame School in Clarendon Hills, practices following a bead on a string with his eyes. Then Maze asks him to picture a bug on top of the string.
“What kind of bug is it?” Maze asks K.J.
“A fly,” K.J. replies as he intently follows his imaginary bug with his eyes, crawling up the rope.
He said his favorite vision game is the coin activity, where at first, he could only see two coins on the note card. Now, after practicing everyday at him, he is able to see three.
Though he has only been coming to the vision center for a couple months, his mother said she has seen a dramatic improvement this summer.
“If he could hit the ball in baseball, I can only imagine how it will be able to help him in school,” she said.
