1. National Center on Deaf-Blindness Michael Fagbemi Project Specialist

2. Who Do You Think of When You Hear the term Deaf-Blind ?

3. Is the first person that comes to mind Helen Keller ?

4. Who is a student with deaf- blindness? A three-year-old boy who is totally blind has a moderate-severe hearing loss, apparently normal motor and intellectual abilities, is just beginning to walk on his own, but has not yet learned any expressive language. A six-year-old with congenital rubella syndrome who is profoundly deaf, partially sighted, and has behavior disorders attributed to an attention deficit disorder. Intelligence estimates are that she is severely developmentally delayed. A 16-year-old girl with profound deafness, visual impairment, and severe cerebral palsy affecting all four limbs. Her intelligence cannot be accurately assessed because of lack of motoric functioning and absence of any consistent accessible language input during the course of her life. She has no apparent receptive or expressive language skills.

5. Some Deaf-Blindness Statistics 80-95% of information comes to us through our vision and hearing Up to 80% of children with hearing and vision loss also have other disabilities About 200 different conditions are associated with vision and hearing losses- over half are genetic. Estimates indicate that there are approximately 40,000 people in the United States who are Deaf-Blind. A study by the National Census has identified over 10,000 children and youth.

6. Parents discuss their child experience of deaf-Blindness Video clip : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQu3dufotPM

7. A person who is deaf-blind is challenged with: Disability of access : Information Concept development Incidental learning Limited life experiences Lower expectations Physical spaces Disability of Access : People Isolation Friendships Rapports communication Language

8. National Center on Deaf-Blindness – a consortium approach

9. The Deaf-Blind Network

10. National Center as the Hub..

11. New website! www.nationaldb.org

12. Recent products you might like www.nationaldb.org www.nationaldb.org /literacy

13. Transition Toolkit

15. Thank you !!!! Contact information : Michael Fagbemi –mike.fagbemi@hknc.org–mike.fagbemi@hknc.org www.nationaldb.org