VISUAL PROCESSING EXPLAINED: VISUAL DISCRIMINATION

When children struggle with visual processing issues, it can profoundly affect the way they learn.
While most parents and teacher naturally think of vision problems as being related to the eyes
themselves, brain function is also a critical part of understanding what is seen. Visual
discrimination is just one aspect of visual processing, but it can have a big impact on your child’s
development.

What Is Visual Discrimination?

Visual discrimination is the ability to discern differences between two different things. This skill
comes up more than you may think in daily life. For example, it’s an important part of reading,
as letter recognition can be hindered when a child has trouble seeing the difference between a
"K" and an "H" or words like "was" and "saw." It’s likewise important for using numbers and for
succeeding in a whole host of social interactions, including game play and making good choices.

How to Detect Visual Discrimination Problems

You’ll need professional testing to sort out the exact causes of child’s learning troubles, but
visual processing problems in general and visual discrimination problems in particular often
have some tell-tale symptoms to look out for:

 Your child confuses letters and numbers

 Your child has trouble enjoying highly visual activities like puzzles or reading
  Your child loses his or her place while reading aloud
 Your child has trouble finding information during open book quizzes
 Your child has trouble telling picking out details and differences

These symptoms can signify other problems as well, so it’s a good idea to ask for help at school
to get to the bottom of the cause of these issues.

Activities to Remediate Visual Discrimination Weaknesses

Your child may need extra practice to build visual discrimination skills. Fortunately, these
activities can be fun. For example, play Highlights Magazine’s Hidden Pictures to encourage your
child to take in subtle variations in artwork to improve visual discrimination. Sorting and
matching games also provide hands-on ways to practice these skills. For example, have your
child help sort game pieces and small toys by color or shape or have them help you pair socks
while folding laundry.

Increase Your Child’s Visual Discrimination Skills (Object Matching)

Montessori object-to-object matching for visual discrimination
“This is a penny, this is a quarter, this is a dime, and this is a nickel.”

Being able to tell the difference between these coins just by looking at them is an
example of visual discrimination.

My three-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Annie, recently has expressed interest in

exploring with her pretend cash register and pretend coins from Learning Resources.

At first, the coins were all over the place and all mixed up. But after repeatedly
matching them, sorting them, and counting them
together, she can tell the coins apart and name
them.

matching coins

The penny is the easiest to distinguish because it’s

the only one that’s copper-colored. But you really
have to look at the size and detailed texture to tell
the difference between the nickel, dime, and quarter, because all three are silver-
colored.
Since Annie expressed interest in learning about different coins, their names, and
how to tell them apart, I thought it would be an awesome idea to try the Montessori
language activity, object-to-object matching. We matched North American
Animals for this lesson.

I’ll share with you the object discrimination (matching) lesson from my teacher
training, what we did in the classroom, and how it went with Annie, at home!

 Montessori object-to-object matching for visual

discrimination
 Why is visual discrimination important for young
children?
o Vocabulary development
 Why start with objects?
 How to do the object-to-object matching activity
o What you will need
o Step by step: object-to-object matching
lesson
o Play the distance game
 More ideas for matching objects
 Concluding thoughts about object-to-object matching
 More Montessori Language Resources
 Montessori object-to-object matching for visual discrimination

Why is visual discrimination important for young

children?
According to Study.com:

"Visual discrimination involves being able to see subtle differences in objects,

including letters and numbers, to distinguish them from others. For example, when
sorting coins one notices that nickels and dimes are the same color, but dimes are
always smaller. Our visual discrimination skills allow us to see the differences in size
and texture."
April Gwen Ellsworth, Study.com

Visual Discrimination activities such as object-to-object matching help preschoolers

with:

 concentration and focus

 order
 problem-solving
 making sense of the world around them
 reading facial expressions and body language
 noticing subtle differences and similarities in objects and pictures
 seeing the differences between similar letters (b, d) and words (cat, cot)
 preparation for writing and reading
Of course, there are many more types of activities you can do to help boost your
child’s visual discrimination skills. For example, there are all types of matching cards,
pictures and activity worksheets to choose from. But we’ll start with matching
objects.

Vocabulary development
This matching objects lesson also helps to boost your child’s vocabulary. Just like in
the previous activity in the sequence, classified objects, you’re gathering objects for
the lesson that are in the same category, for example, North American Animals.

With this matching activity, your child will learn the detailed and unique names for all
of the North American Animals. The ideas for topics are endless so your child can
learn new vocabulary words with each new lesson!

two sets of North American Animals for matching

Why start with objects?

“The hand is the instrument of intelligence. The child needs
to manipulate objects and to gain experience by touching
and handling. ”

—Maria Montessori, The 1946 London Lectures

Before moving forward with matching pictures or cards, it’s

best to start out with the hands-on concrete objects first with very young children.
Anytime you can use real or 3-D hands-on objects for your child to explore, the better.
Exploring with concrete objects first will help your child to get a good grasp of what
she’s learning about.

I talked about the concrete to the abstract in this in a previous blog post, Montessori
3-Part Cards and Language Development: First, Get Your Hands Dirty!

After trying this lesson a few times with your child with different types of 3-D objects,
you can move on to using matching cards.

Note: see below for “more ideas for matching objects” with stuff you have
around the house.

The oral language lesson that comes right before matching objects is classified
objects.

Then, the lessons that come after object matching include:

 Object-to-picture matching
 Picture-to-picture matching
 Go-togethers (lock and key, sock and shoe, etc.)
 Vocabulary Enrichment (3-part cards)
You can see the progression from concrete to the more abstract in the sequence of
lessons.

How to do the object-to-object matching activity

What you will need
You’ll need a basket of pairs of objects that are in the same classified family. For
instance:

 transportation vehicles
 animals (ocean animals, farm animals)
  flowers
 musical instruments
Safari Ltd. Toobs are excellent for matching object-to-object. There are several toob
categories to choose from and the objects are of excellent quality. The little figures
are very detailed and perfect for object discrimination or science activities.

Note: for matching objects, you would need to get two of the same toob to get
identical pairs.

I already had two North American Animal toobs that I purchased last year. We were
excited to finally take them out of the closet to try matching objects!

North American Animals from Safari Ltd. Toobs

The toob includes 12 North American

animals:

 mountain lion
 raccoon
 river otter
 beaver
 moose
 bison
 wolf
 grizzly bear
 pronghorn buck
 elk
 bighorn ram
 mountain goat
Tip: You could also use these North American animals for Geography and Maps
lessons. In the Montessori classroom, we match animals that go with the continents.
Animals really call to young children!

Step by step: object-to-object matching lesson

Mix up the objects

Take all of the objects out of the basket onto your mat or
table and mix them up.
Ask your child to pick an object. Look at it carefully.

Ask your child to see if she can find the other one that is matching or “the same.”

match the objects

Your child holds the pair of objects, one in

each hand, and carefully analyzes them.

If they’re a match, place the matching pair

of objects in the top left corner.

continue to match all of the objects

Continue in this way, matching all of the object

pairs, placing them in a long vertical line on the
left side.

Go back and name all of the object pairs, moving your hand from left to right for each
pair.

name all of the objects again

Annie’s favorite North American animals are the

mountain lion and the raccoon. She was also
excited to see the river otter because we just
saw an otter recently at the aquarium!

For very young children choose only about 8

matching pairs to keep their attention, and so
that it’s not too challenging.

For older preschoolers, you could use about 10-12 objects.

In the classroom on the language shelf, we always had a set of matching objects. We
changed up the objects seasonally or based on what we were studying that month.

Also, you can use the Montessori Three-Period Lesson to help your child learn the
names of objects she doesn’t know.

Tip: choose topics for objects that your child loves or can relate to. This will help the
lesson become more meaningful and fun. Also, since I observed that Annie really
loves the mountain lion, I will look into creating a
future lesson (matching cards) about wild cats.

Play the distance game

To make this lesson more challenging and fun
you can play the distance game with the objects. I
played this game with the kids in the classroom
with some of the kids.

It’s like a memory game.

Place one object on the table. Look at the object and remember what it is.

Go to the mat with all the objects and see if you can remember which object was on
the table.

Pick up the matching object that’s on the mat and bring it to the table to see if you
matched the correct object.

Continue this game for as long as your child wishes to play.

More ideas for matching objects

Especially for little ones, ages two and up:

 matching pairs of socks

 matching pairs of shoes
 matching kitchen or eating utensils
 matching pairs of fruits or vegetables from the kitchen
 matching figures, toys, or stuffed animals you that you have duplicates
Match objects from nature:

 pine cones, acorns, seeds, leaves, pebbles, sticks

 herbs from the garden
 flowers from the garden
 seashells
 rocks, minerals, and crystals
Match other objects you have around the house:

 art supplies (markers, crayons, paintbrushes)

 coins
 earrings
 buttons
 beads
 pasta
 beans

Concluding thoughts about object-to-object

matching
Annie had so much fun with matching objects. I found that for her age, it’s good to
have a set of objects that have some challenging names with a few objects that look
very similar.

For example, when she matched the North American animals, I noticed that she
would confuse and mismatch the pronghorn buck and bighorn ram. Those two
objects are the same color and size and the only difference is the shape of their
horns.

I thought this was excellent practice for really focusing and problem-solving. By the
time she got to the second “match”, she realized something wasn’t right and she went
back to take a closer look. She figured it out!

Have you tried matching objects with your kids? What are their favorite topics or
types of animals? Leave a comment below!
What are Visual Perceptual Skills?
“Visual Perceptual skills involve the ability to organize and
interpret the information that is seen and give it meaning.” Our
eyes send large amounts of information to our brains to process
every single second. If our eyes are sending us the proper
information in a way that makes sense, the brain can then process
it, thus allowing us to form thoughts, make decisions, and create
action. In our office we both test for and treat the seven core
visual perceptual skills. Below are the seven core visual
perceptual skills, and a brief explanation of each:

1. Visual Memory – the visual skill that allows us to record, store

and retrieve information. It allows us to learn and later recall what
is learned. Look at the top picture below for 5 seconds, then cover
it with your hand and see if you can find the match below:

2. Visual Sequential Memory – similar to visual memory in that it allows us to store and retrieve information
when necessary or useful. However sequential memory helps us remember and recognize people, places we
have been, and series of events, equations, and procedures. Can you remember the order of the planets without
looking?

3. Visual Form Constancy – the visual skill that allows us to distinguish one object from another similar
object. Being able to tell the difference between the letter “b” and “d” or “3” and “8”. Though the forms are
similar in shape, they are very different in meaning. The ability to see and distinguish these differences is form
constancy. Look at the top left card, and find the one item that is the same on the card to its right. See how
many matches you can find:

4. Visual Figure Ground – the visual skill that allows us to

distinguish, segregate, isolate or find an object or stimuli in
varying environments. This can include faces, figures,
objects, landscapes, and letters or numbers. Properly
processing our visual figure ground helps to organize the
information we see in our environment. Find the following
items to the left and bottom of the picture hiding inside:
 5. Visual Spatial Relations – the visual skill that allows us to process the
visual environment around us and the location of objects in respect to
ourselves. Which building is closer?!

6. Visual Closure – the visual skill that

allows us to detect, differentiate, select,
draw conclusions and understand
information when we are only given
certain pieces of information, rather
than the entire account, story or
explanation. Can you tell what this is a
picture of?!

7. Visual Discrimination – each of the above six skills require some degree of visual discrimination. Visual
Discrimination is the ability to identify detail, seeing items likes and differences in shape, color, position and
orientation. How many differences can you find in these two similar pictures?!
Why is Visual Perception Important?
Children primarily learn and make sense of their world through their senses, such
as hearing and seeing. A baby starts learning by making sense of what is seen
before the other senses are integrated.
Visual perception is important for a child to learn if they are to be able to
interpret and understand their environment. With enough stimulation, children
develop this skill by about the age of 7.

School Readiness

In order for children to achieve school readiness for formal schooling, the
development of their visual perceptual skills is crucial.
Children must have well-developed visual skills in order to learn to:
 read
 write
 do maths
Teaching a child to read and write is not just about looking at letters and
memorizing them, but rather depends heavily on how well their visual perceptual
ability has been built.
Visual perceptual activities such as memory games and puzzles are excellent pre-
reading activities that are far more important during the preschool years than
trying to rush the learning of letters and numbers.
What are the Types of Visual Perceptual Skills?
These are the types of visual perception skills, as laid out by Marike de Witt,
author of “The Young Child in Context: A psycho-social perspective“, and their
importance for learning:
 Visual Discrimination – the brain’s ability to see similarities and differences
(noticing differences in letters and numbers, especially those that look similar
e.g. b and d, bad and dad, S and 5 etc.)
 Visual Memory –the brain’s ability to remember what the eyes have seen
(to recognise letters and numbers, remember sight words, and copy from the
board in class.)
 Sequential Memory – the brain’s ability to remember what it sees in
sequence e.g. the sequence of letters in a word (spelling), copying the correct
numbers in multiple-digit calculations (e.g. add 2 sets of 3-digit numbers),
and remembering the order when working out calculations involving multiple
digits.

 Visual Comprehension – the brain’s ability to understand what has been

seen and conceptualize it (to be able to solve problems and draw conclusions)
 Perception of Shapes – the brain’s ability to distinguish between shapes of
objects, regardless of the size and position (e.g. something far looks smaller
than it is.)
 Depth Perception – the brain’s ability to judge how far something is
(important for all movement).
 Figure-Ground Perception – the ability to focus on something and block out
the background/irrelevant images (e.g. copying from the board). This also
helps children keep their place when reading.
 Visual Analysis and Synthesis – the brain’s ability to see a pattern as a unit,
break it up into parts and put it back together again (children do this
constantly while reading e.g. sounding out words.)
 Visual Closure – the ability to recognize things by shape from seeing a part
of them (e.g. common sight words). This prevents needing to decode the sight
word each time a child sees it and increases overall fluency.
As you can see, so much more than just learning letters and numbers goes into
learning to read, write and do maths.
Concentrating on developing your child’s visual perception will go a long way to
school readiness and success in reading, writing, etc. (here’s a video explaining
visual perception).
How to Develop Your Child’s Visual Perceptual Skills
You may be wondering which activities are important for visual perception.
The best way to develop these skills is through play.
Young children don’t need worksheets or any formal activities but rather tons of
play activities and games.
Here is a quick list of examples of activities to develop visual and motor
perception:
 Building puzzles
 Playing with construction toys
 Playing memory games
 Drawing, painting, cutting, pasting, folding
 Making patterns (with beads, pegs, etc.)
 Playing with and tracing shapes
 Sorting objects
 Matching colours
 Fine motor activities
 Gross motor activities

In the next section, I’ve given examples of simple but effective visual perceptual
games that can be played.

12 Visual Perception Activities and Games for Children

The good news is that although the skills listed above sound complicated to
teach, they are actually very easy to develop with simple games and activities.
Here are 12 games you can play at home with your child. Some focus on one of
the skills listed above, others build more than one skill (e.g. visual memory,
discrimination or closure).
Play a variety of these games to set your child up for learning success.

1. Matching Card Game

Matching card games have pairs of matching pictures.
Lay one set out in front of your child. Keep the other set. Show one card at a time
and ask your child to find the matching picture.
Variation: Place both sets of cards face up and shuffled and put on a timer to see
how long it takes your child to match all the pairs.
Get your own matching cards by downloading the FREE set of printables at the
end of the post.

2. Memory Game
Play a memory game with the cards used in the game above.
Lay all the cards face down and shuffled. Take turns turning any two cards over
on the table.
If you turn over a matching pair you keep the cards and if the pair doesn’t match,
turn the cards back over until it is your turn to try again.
This is an excellent game for developing visual memory because your child
needs to remember where the pictures are as they are turned over, in order to find
the matching pairs.
The winner is the person with the most matching pairs at the end.
Here’s an example of one of the sets in my memory game cards, available for
free download at the end of the post.
3. I Spy
Play the classic game I Spy by pointing out things by their visual aspects.
Example:
I spy something that is round, flat and rough.
4. Build Puzzles
Building jigsaw puzzles is one of the best activities your child can do. Have
puzzles available at home and make them part of regular playtime.
Ensure the puzzles are age-appropriate – the younger the child the bigger and
fewer the pieces should be. They should be slightly challenging but doable. If
they are too difficult children lose interest and feel incompetent.
The best quality educational puzzles are made of wood and have a wooden
supporting board like these.
5. Sort Dry Pasta
Give your child an ice-cream tub of mixed dry pasta and ask them to sort the
pasta by shapes (e.g. tubes, spirals etc), or even by colour if you can find
colourful pasta.
You can still wash them and cook them after!

6. Sort Buttons
Take a tub of buttons with different shapes and colours and provide containers to
sort into, such as yoghurt cups or an egg tray.
Ask your child to sort them by specific criteria and then change the criteria.
The buttons can be sorted by:
 colour
 size
 shape (if they are not all round)
 number of holes in the middle (more advanced)
 Fabric vs. plastic buttons
Here are more button activities for preschoolers.
7. Sort Shapes
Use play shapes or coloured counters and sort them as in the game above. Again,
provide different criteria each time.
Sort the shapes by:
 colour
 shape
 size
 thickness
8. Remember What You Saw
Choose any 5 household items, natural items from the garden or toys and lay
them out in front of your child. Allow your child at least half a minute to look at
the items and memorize them.
Then, cover them with a cloth and see if your child can recall all 5 items. Start
with fewer items if your child is younger and increase the number with time.
Then, place 5 items and remove only one item. Ask your child which item was
removed from the set. Then try and remove 2 items.

9. Remember the Order

A variation on the above game which teaches sequential memory is to ask your
child to watch you place 5 items down and then mix them and get your child to
place them in the same order you did.
You can also use the cards from the matching game above. Place 5 cards on the
table, cover them and get your child to find the 5 cards in their set and place them
in the correct order.
10. Where’s Waldo?
Where’s Waldo, or originally Where’s Wally from Britain, is a fun series of
books where you have to find Waldo in a maze of people in different scenes.
These books are great as a visual perceptual activity and are heaps of fun too.
This book is an age-appropriate version for young kids.
11. Straight Edge Puzzles
Straight-edge puzzles are different from regular jigsaw puzzles because the skill
is not in matching the puzzle shapes, but rather in looking at the detail in the
picture and matching colours, lines, etc.

12. Can You See What It Is?

Place a set of 5 or 6 shapes on a table in a line. Cover half of each shape at the
same time by placing a sheet of paper or cloth over them. Ask your child to name
the shape.
Vary this game by showing half images in books, or showing an ear of an animal,
for example, and guessing what animal it belongs to.
I hope you enjoyed these ideas for developing your child’s visual perception.
There are many different games that can be played and these ideas will hopefully
inspire you to make up your own games too.

Visual Perception
What is Visual Perception?
Visual Perception refers to the brain's ability to make sense of what the eyes see. This is not the same as
visual acuity, which refers to how clearly a person sees. A person can have perfect vision and still have
problems with visual perceptual processing. Good visual perceptual skills are important for many everyday
skills such as reading, writing, completing puzzles, cutting, drawing, completing math problems, dressing
as well as many other skills. Without the ability to complete these everyday tasks, a child's self-esteem
can suffer and their academic performance is compromised.

Visual perception can be broken down into different categories

including the following:
 Visual Attention: The ability to focus on important visual information and filter out unimportant
background information.
 Visual Discrimination: The ability to determine differences or similarities in objects based on size,
colour, shape, etc.
 Visual Memory: The ability to recall visual traits of a form or object.
 Visual-Spatial Relationships: Understanding the relationships of objects within the environment.
 Visual Sequential-Memory: The ability to recall a sequence of objects in the correct order.
 Visual Figure-Ground: The ability to locate something in a busy background.
  Visual Form Constancy: The ability to know that a form or shape is the same, even if it has been
made smaller/larger or has been turned around.
 Visual Closure: The ability to recognise a form or object when part of the picture is missing

Does your child have difficulties with any of the following?

 Has trouble completing puzzles or dot to dots.
 Has difficulty with spatial concepts such as "in, out, on, under, next to, up, down, in front of."
 Has difficulty differentiating between "b, d, p, q;"
 Reverses numbers or letters when writing.
 Loses place on a page when reading or writing.
 Has difficulty remembering left and right.
 Forgets where to start reading.
 Had trouble remembering the alphabet in sequence,
 Has difficulty copying from one place to another (e.g. from the board, from the book, from one side
of the paper to the other).
 Has trouble remembering sight words.
 Has difficulty completing partially drawn pictures or stencils.
 Has difficulty attending to a word on a printed page due to his/her inability to block out other words
around it.
 Has difficulty filtering out visual distractions in order to attend to the task at hand.
 Has difficulty with hidden picture activities or finding a specific item in a cluttered desk.

What Therapies for Kids can do

Our experienced Paediatric Occupational Therapists can assist by assessing your child for visual
perceptual difficulties with the use of both standardised assessments and observation and discussion.
They can suggest practical ways to prompt and present information to your child to suit their learning
needs. Therapy may involve playing some of the following activities:

 Hidden pictures games in books such as "Where's Wally".

 Picture drawing: Practice completing partially drawn pictures.
 Dot-to-dot worksheets or puzzles.
 Review work: Encourage your child to identify mistakes in written material.
 Memory games: Playing games such as Memory.
 Sensory activities: Use bendable things such as pipe cleaners to form letters and shapes
(because feeling a shape can help them visualise the shape). The letters can then be glued onto
index cards, and later the child can touch them to "feel" the shape of the letter.
 Construction-type activities such as Duplo, Lego, or other building blocks.
 Flashcards with a correct letter on one side and an incorrectly formed letter on the other side.
Have the child try to draw the letter correctly, then turn over the card to see if it is right. (Have them
write in sand or with finger paint to make it more fun)
 Word search puzzles that require you to look for a series of letters.
 Copy 3-D block designs
 Identify objects by touch: Place plastic letters into a bag, and have the child identify the letter by
"feel"

What you can do

Encourage your child’s visual perceptual development by incorporating some of the above games and
activities into their day. It is also important to provide assistance and encouragement to ensure a positive
experience and outcome. Finally. liaise with your child’s teacher to make sure strategies suggested by
your OT are put in place in the classroom to optimise learning success.

VISUAL PERCEPTION

 29 September 2017
 Posted by: CDC
 Category: Parent Tips

What is Visual Perception?

Visual perception refers to the brain’s ability to make sense of what the eyes see. Some children have
20/20 vision but they can still have problems with visual perception processing. It has nothing to do with
their vision.

Why is it important?
Good visual perceptual skills are important for many every day skills such as reading, writing, completing
puzzles, cutting, drawing, completing math problems, dressing, finding your sock on the bedroom floor as
well as many other skills. Without the ability to complete these everyday tasks, a child’s self-esteem can
suffer and their academic and play skills can also be compromised.

If a child has difficulties with visual perception they may have problems with the following
activities:

 Completing puzzles or dot-to-dot pictures.

 Spatial concepts such as “in, out, on, under, next to, up, down and in front”
 Differentiating between “b, d, p, q”.
 Reversing numbers or letters when writing.
 Losing their place on a page when reading or writing.
 Remembering left and right.
 Remembering the alphabet in sequence.
 Coping from one place to another (e.g. from board, from a book, from one side of the paper to the
other).
 Dressing (i.e. matching shoes or socks).
 Discriminating between the size of letters and objects.
 Filtering out visual distractions such as colourful bulletin boards or movement in the room in order
to attend to the task at hand.
 Sorting and organising personal belongings (i.e. may appear disorganised or careless in work).
 Hidden picture activities or finding a specific item on a cluttered desk.
Here are some activities to help children with visual perception difficulties:

 Hidden pictures games in books such as “Where’s Wally” and “I spy”.

 Picture drawing: Practice completing partially-drawn pictures.
 Dot-to-dot
 Memory games: Playing games such as Memory.
 Sensory activities: Use bendable things such as pipe cleaners to form letters and shapes
(because feeling a shape can help them visualise the shape). The letters can then be glued onto
index cards, and later the child can touch them to “feel” the shape of the letter.
 Construction-type activities such as Duplo, Lego or other building blocks.
 Flash cards with a correct letter on one side and an incorrectly formed letter on the other side.
Have your child try to draw the letter correctly, then turn over the card to see if it is right. (Have
them write in sand or with finger paint to make it more fun).
 Word search puzzles that require your child to look for a series of letters.
 Copy 3-D block designs using building blocks, Lego or Duplo.
 Identify objects by touch: Place plastic letters into a bag, and have your child identify the letter
by “feeling it”.
 Bingo: which requires your child to look for a specific number.
If you feel your child is having difficulties with their visual perception processing, you can contact an
Occupational Therapist for an in-depth assessment.

Visual System: Lack of Visual Development Creates

Poor Visual Perception Skills
This article provides a helpful introduction to your child’s visual
system. Additional articles will be included in this series. Affiliate links
are below for your convenience. Integrated Learning Strategies (ILS) is
a learning and academic center. As a reminder, ILS is not a health care
provider and none of our materials or services provide a diagnosis or
treatment of a specific condition or learning challenge you may see in
your child or student. If you seek a diagnosis or treatment for your
child or student, please contact a trained professional who can provide
an evaluation of the child.

Most of what we learn, especially in the classroom, is through

our visual system. Educators from every field agree there is a
close connection between vision and learning. Vision is our
most powerful sense. Kids must acquire many physical and
mental abilities to perform well in school, but a good vision
system not only allows our child to see information, but
process information through their visual system, which is key
to the learning process.
It is estimated that approximately 80 percent of your child’s learning in school and at home
occurs through his or her eyes. Reading, writing, math, problem solving, using computers and
copying notes from the chalkboard are all visual tasks that children perform daily. In addition,
sequencing, visual memory, letter retention and handwriting can all be affected by your child’s
vision system. Your child’s eyes are constantly used in the classroom, as well as on the
playground, at home, and while your child is doing leisure activities.
How our Visual System Impacts Learning
Between 2 percent and 20 percent of the U.S. school population have some type of reading
disorder, which many times relates to an underdeveloped visual system. The visual system is
unique in that it is not only about the eyes; it is also about the brain. This means when your child
is learning to read their letters, retain numbers and processes words on a page, it is seen
through their eyes, but processed through their brain.

More importantly, your child’s visual system is also tied to their balance and how well their
vestibular system is developed. Your child’s vestibular system is like an internal GPS system and
works hand-in-hand with their visual system. If your child has a poor balance system or an
underdeveloped vestibular, this may be why letters or numbers appear to jump off the page, are
backward, floating or they may even see double. It is not enough for your child to have good eye
sight; they must also have a strong visual system to process visual information. For this reason,
integrating movement exercises into your child’s daily routine builds proprioception, hand-eye
coordination, gross motor and core muscle that feeds your child’s vestibular system,
strengthening their visual memory, visual motor and visual processing for retaining and recalling
information in school.

In addition, your child’s visual system also incorporates their tactile system, which is important
for processing information they learn in school. Think about your learning process. Learning
about certain topics requires more than just seeing objects. It means using your tactile system to
touch objects, feel their shape and hold it in your hands. This process helps us retain that
information through our visual and tactile systems so we can recall those details later when we
need them for a test, project or when we need to solve a problem. Using our tactile system in
combination with our vestibular system strengthens our visual input and integrates all our other
systems together to unlock the power of our vision.

In Developing Ocular Motor and Visual Perceptual Skills, Kenneth A. Lane, says, “We think with our
whole brain and read and solve complex problems with our whole brain. This is why it is
important for us to do activities that involve the whole brain.”
What is Visual Perception?
Your child’s visual perception is when the eyes interpret and make sense of information they
see. When your child has difficulty reading, it is often perceived by parents and teachers as a
vision issue; however, a child can have 20/20 vision while they struggle with visual processing.
Because your child uses visual perception on a daily basis for reading, writing, drawing, math,
retention and critical thinking, it can affect their attention, focus and self-confidence in the
classroom if they have a weakened visual system.

Here are some of the building blocks that make up your child’s visual perception:

 Visual Memory: Your child’s ability to recall visual details of an object, picture or form
(comprehension, letter recognition).
 Visual Sequential Memory: How your child recalls a sequence of information in the right order
(numbers and letters).
 Visual Attention: Your child’s ability to focus on important information and filter out unimportant
background information.
 Figure Ground: Your child’s ability to find an object when it is hidden in a busy background (shapes,
objects).
 Visual Discrimination: How your child understands differences in objects based on size, color and
shape (confuses words with similar beginnings and endings).
 Visual Spatial Relations: Knowing and understanding objects within your child’s environment (poor
balance, coordination, vestibular and rhythm).
 Visual Closure: Your child’s ability to know when an object is missing from a picture or puzzle.
 Form Constancy: How your child knows two objects are the same even if they are different in size,
shape and color.
Functions of the Visual System
When the human eye is functioning correctly, it performs the same as a camera does when we
take a picture. Light passes through the lens of your eye and is “recorded” on the back of your
eye onto the retina. The image is upside down when it hits the retina. The retina is like a movie
screen which shows the picture that you are seeing upside down. The retina has two different
types of cells – rods and cones. Rods see in black and white and cones see in colors. The rods
and cones turn images into electrical messages for the brain. The electrical messages are sent
along the optic nerve to the brain. The optic nerve is a bit like a T.V. cable that transfers all those
pictures and images into something we can view easily. The optic nerve connects to the brain
through the occipital lobe, which is the posterior part of the brain. This is where the visual cortex
lies. The visual cortex interprets the electrical signals produced by the light stimulation of the
retina, where the rods and cones pick out black and white and color information.

Just think, with all of this action is going on in the background while your child is learning, it’s no
wonder signals can be crossed or messages can get mixed up in the brain as we process
information through our visual system.

As a child progresses in school, they face increased demands on their visual system. The print
size of letters and words in textbooks becomes smaller, they must retain large quantities of
information, and the amount of time expected to read and study increases significantly, many
times before your child’s visual system is fully developed and ready for this type of learning. The
increased amount of time for focus on the teacher, copying notes from a whiteboard to a paper
and a surge of homework all creates demands on a student’s eyes. Many children adapt and
excel because their visual system performs adequately, but others struggle with these demands
when their visual system experiences certain deficiencies.
Vision and Learning
The links with vision and learning are endless. As your child grows up, they utilize their vision
system constantly. The cooperation between your child’s vision, auditory,
vestibular, proprioception and touch sensory systems make up your child’s visual perception
and how it is developed. Without each system performing adequately, a child may lose some
ability and function, or they may struggle with performance in another area. Your child’s vision
system is no exception. It allows growth and learning in many of the far-reaching skills that
children attain while in the classroom.
Reading
When children first learn to read, visual perception problems can impede the development of
basic reading skills. Specific eye movements help a child track words and sometimes, if these eye
movements are not functioning properly, it can halt basic reading fluency. When a child is
grasping the skill of reading to learn, blurry or double vision can impact their ability to read for
long periods of time. Reading comprehension can be significantly reduced if this occurs. In
one study, researchers showed that uncorrected vision problems in children could be linked to
early deficiency in literacy, which can be related to other visual perception skills, not only their
vision acuity or how they see information with their eyes.
Writing and Handwriting
When a student has poor visual skills, it may impact their ability to organize their writing and it
may impair their capacity to form letters and line up letters and words. When children have poor
visual abilities, handwriting also suffers. Your child’s vision system leads the hand when writing,
which means a poorly functioning ocular system can cause trouble with directionality, writing in
a stationary line, neatness, and organization. Laterality and directionality play into your child’s
visual-spatial writing skills. Laterality is the internal self-awareness of your two body sides and
knowing they are different.
Directionality is the understanding of up, down, left, right, ahead or behind. Efficient eye
movement skills are essential in developing solid laterality and directionality skills. If
directionality is a problem, learning to read can be very confusing, apart from writing letters. The
letters, “b,” “d,” “p,” and “q” often look like the same symbol if your child does not have a good
concept of orientation. If your child also struggles with visual-spatial issues, you may notice they
don’t understand how to properly space their
letters as they write across the page. Sometimes
they may leave too much space between letters or
cram them altogether on one line.
Math

In math, visual processing, visual memory and

visual sequencing all play a key role in your child’s
ability to calculate, problem solve and process
equations. When a student lacks proper
visualization skills, they may have to resort to
counting on their fingers even at older ages, which could affect performance on timed tests.
Many times, students who struggle with visual memory and visual sequencing can’t remember
their numbers, equations or what numbers come after each other. Even if a child is skilled at
math, visual problems can manifest themselves when a child is forced to read a story problem
and process what the question is asking the child to do.

Visual Memory and Bilateral Integration

Visual memory is an important function that our optical system creates. Visual memory
preserves some characteristics of the images and pictures we see. It helps with our immediate
recall and the ability to recognize objects we have seen before. Sometimes a child will struggle
with visual recall or visual memory, which can affect your child’s spelling. Spelling seems to be a
common problem with those who have visual memory issues because they often confuse
letters, can’t remember the names or sounds of letters, and often add or remove letters from
words and phrases.

Bilateral integration is another visual spatial skill that is important for learning. It is the ability to
use both sides of the body effectively but separately. For example, when your child writes on a
piece of paper with their right hand and holds the paper with their left hand. Another example is
when your child types on a computer or rides a bicycle. They must visually follow the path or
screen in front of them while peddling or typing. With proper development, the right and left
sides of the body, particularly the hands, will begin to improve each other’s function so they can
work together to complete certain tasks
Looking into your Child’s Visual Issues
In Reflexes, Learning and Behavior, written by Sally Goddard, it describes how vision is essential for
academic learning. The skills of reading, writing, spelling and arithmetic are all dependent upon
the ability to see written symbols. When learning difficulties arise, vision is often the first area to
check. If your child passes a simple eye exam that typically only checks distance vision, further
investigation into other possible visual problems is a good idea. Your child can still have visual
processing and visual perception issues even if their vision is perfect.

In addition, if your child’s vision system is not working properly, you may notice other issues with
their balance, coordination and gross motor skills. This is also a sign to have your child tested. It
could mean your child’s vision system is not functioning properly, which could be the reason for
attention and focus issues, fidgeting and behavior problems that prevent them from reaching
their academic potential in the classroom.

Integrated Learning Strategies is a Utah-based center dedicated to helping mainstream children and children
with learning challenges achieve academic success. Our services provide kids with non-traditional tutoring
programs within the Davis County, Kaysville, Layton, Syracuse, Farmington, and Centerville areas. Areas to
find Integrated Learning Strategies include: Reading tutors in Kaysville, Math tutors in Kaysville, Common
Core Tutors in Kaysville, Tutors in Utah, Utah Tutoring Programs

Visual Perception: What It Is, Why It Matters

  Cognitive Skills and Study Methods

 Susan du Plessis
 June 25, 2022

Table of contents:
 Introduction
 What is perception?
 What is visual perception?
 Why is visual perception important?
 What are visual perception problems?
 Overcoming deficits in visual perception
 Key takeaways

Introduction

We make contact with the world around us through our five primary
senses — sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. However, psychologists distinguish
between sensation and perception.
Sensation is the pickup of information by our sensory receptors, for example, the eyes, ears, skin,
nostrils, and tongue. In hearing, sensation occurs as waves of pulsating air are collected by the outer
ear and transmitted through the bones of the middle ear to the cochlear nerve. In vision, sensation
occurs as rays of light are collected by the two eyes and focused on the retina.

What is perception?
Perception is concerned with the interpretation of what is sensed. As you
read these lines, perhaps the smell of the finished dinner is pouring out of
the oven into your nose; perhaps you are hearing a dog barking in the
neighborhood; maybe you are feeling some warming rays of sunlight on your
skin. You might be looking at the image above and interpret it as part of a
clock face, even though the hour and minute hands are missing. A
corresponding perception can cause the brain to react, if necessary, for
example, to the perception of something burning in the oven. These are all
examples of how visual perception is used in everyday life.

(Ditzinger, 2021)

Interpretation of sensory phenomena can only be made based on past experiences of the same,
similar, or related phenomena. Perceptual ability, therefore, heavily depends upon the amount of
perceptual practice and experience a person has already enjoyed. For example, an illiterate person
would not be able to group the lines in the image on the right in the same way and complete the
missing lines as you who can read them. Thus, a lack of experience may cause people to misinterpret
what they have seen. In other words, perception represents our apprehension of a present situation in
terms of our past experiences, or, as stated by the philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724-1804): “We see
things not as they are but as we are.”

What is visual perception?

Visual perception and visual processing are often used interchangeably and refer to the
brain’s ability to understand what one sees. Kurtz (2006) defines visual perception as the
cognitive component of interpreting visual stimuli. It involves the ability to mentally manipulate visual
information as needed to solve problems and to take action in response to environmental demands.

Why is visual perception important?

Visual perception is a highly critical component of a child’s learning. Children with visual perception
problems have trouble recognizing, remembering, and organizing visual images as needed to
understand written and pictorial symbols, which can interfere with many aspects of daily living, most
notably learning to read, write, and do math.

Recent studies have linked visual perception to dyslexia and dyscalculia. Some studies have
reported visual perception deficits as components of dyslexia (Goswami et al., 2010; Stefanics et al.,
2011; Vidyasagar & Pammer, 2010; Zhao et al., 2014), while others have associated visual
perception deficits with dyscalculia (Sigmundsson et al., 2010; Zhou & Cheng, 2015). Szűcs and
team (2013) set out to compare various potential theories of dyscalculia in more than a thousand 9-
year-old children. The researchers found that children with dyscalculia showed poor visuospatial
memory performance. For example, they struggled to remember the locations of items in a spatial
grid.

What are visual perception problems?

There are many different types of vision problems that may occur in children. Some are caused by
physical abnormalities of the eyes or their related structures. These may be present at birth or caused
by injury or illness and are referred to as structural vision problems. Other vision difficulties are
caused by problems that affect the efficiency of the visual system. These are referred to as functional
vision problems.

Even if the visual system is physically intact and works efficiently, the brain must interpret visual
information correctly. A reduced ability to make sense of information taken in through the eyes is
called visual perception problems, visual perception deficits, or visual processing disorder.

Visual perception problems often co-exist with structural or functional vision disorders but also
commonly occur in children without these disorders. For example, children with good eyesight, with
developmental delays and learning disabilities, may demonstrate problems with visual perception
(Kurtz, 2006).

Below are examples of visual perception skills required for learning and how deficits may interfere
with learning:
 Visual figure-ground discrimination allows the child to
separate foreground from background to attend to the relevant
details. It allows the child to focus quickly on the most
important aspects of the visual image while retaining an
awareness of the relationships of parts to the whole image.

Children with problems in this area may have difficulty reading

when there are too many words or other images on a page. As
a result, they frequently lose their place while reading.

In math, figure-ground problems may cause difficulties in

keeping individual problems separate. The student may lose
their place on a worksheet, confuse problem numbers with digits in the problem itself or not finish the
problem.
 Form discrimination: Whether it be the differentiation of the shape of a circle from a square, or the
letter B from P, the ability to perceive the shapes of objects and pictures is an essential skill for the
developing child to acquire. There is hardly an academic activity that does not require the child to
engage in form discrimination.
.
The most apparent classroom activity requiring the child to discriminate forms is that of reading.
Learning the letters of the alphabet, syllables, and words will undoubtedly be impeded if there is
difficulty in perceiving the form of the letters, syllables, and words.

That the discrimination of letters is a crucial skill in the early stages of reading is evidenced by an
extensive literature review conducted by Chall. She concluded that the letter knowledge of young
children is a better predictor of early reading ability than the various tests of intelligence and language
ability.
.
 Visual-spatial perception refers to the child’s ability to recognize the orientation and position of
objects, as well as the orientation of self to the environment. It allows the child to recognize left from
right, up from down, and top from bottom. A child with a spatial problem may find it difficult to
distinguish letters like b, d, p, and q.
.
 Synthesis and analysis: Synthesis refers to the ability to perceive individual parts as a whole, while
analysis refers to perceiving the whole in its individual parts. Synthesis plays a vital role in reading,
while analysis is particularly important in spelling.
.
 Visual closure is recognizing forms or objects that are missing parts or incompletely presented. This
skill allows the child to quickly recognize an object by mentally completing the visual image or by
relating the image to previously stored information.

Difficulties in visual closure can be seen in school activities, such as when the young child is asked to
identify or complete a drawing of a human face. This difficulty can be so extreme that even a single
missing facial feature (a nose, eye, mouth) could render the face unrecognizable by the child.
.
 Visual memory is often considered a subset of visual perception rather than a separate skill. Visual
memory involves storing and retrieving previously experienced visual sensations and perceptions when
the stimuli that initially evoked them are no longer present.

There are different types of visual memory, including immediate recall of information, longer-term recall
of information, and recall of the exact order of a series of items (called visual sequential memory).

Various researchers have stated that as much as 80 percent of all learning occurs through the eye, with
visual memory being a crucial aspect of learning.
Overcoming deficits in visual perception
Edublox programs aim to improve visual perception skills such as form discrimination, spatial
relations, and visual memory. In one research study, Edublox improved visual memory by 1.3 years in
5 days. We also offer live online tutoring to students struggling with dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia,
and related problems due to a visual perception deficit. Our students are in the United States,
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and elsewhere.

The Importance of Visual Perceptual Skills on Performance

Guest Authored By Heather F, MS, OTR/L

Sight: the faculty or power of seeing. But there is more to sight than just seeing something; we also
need the ability to understand what we are seeing. This is called visual perception. With visual
perceptual skills, we are able to put faces to names, recall pictures from stories, and understand
what we are reading.

Each human has seven different visual perceptual skills:

1. Visual Discrimination – The ability to determine exact characteristics and distinctive

features among similar objects or forms; i.e., seeing the differences between two letters, like
“b” and “d” or “n” and “u.”
2. Visual Memory – The ability to immediately recall the characteristics of a given object or
form;
i. e., being able to recall a sight word you’re trying to learn.
3. Spatial Relations – The skills which assist in understanding the relationship between objects
and recognizing underlying concepts; i.e., it helps us to understand directional concepts such
as up, down, and next to.
4. Form Constancy – The ability to mentally manipulate forms and visualize the resulting
outcomes;
i. e., seeing the similarities between two objects despite them being different sizes,
orientation, or color.
5. Sequential Memory – The ability to remember forms or characters in correct order; i.e.,
remembering a telephone number.
6. Figure Ground – The ability to perceive and locate a form or object within a busy field
without getting confused by the background or surrounding images; i.e., finding a pen
amongst other objects within in a drawer.
7. Visual Closure – The ability to visualize and complete whole ideas when given incomplete
information or a partial picture; i.e., recognizing that a pen is a pen, even when you only see
half of it in the drawer.

Without these skills, navigating the world around us becomes a lot more difficult. A child may have
more difficulty with reading, writing, or math. They may have a difficult time recalling what they
read in a book or what their teacher said. A child may also struggle to learn money management,
how to sort items, and how to remain organized when completing a busy homework worksheet.
 If your child has good vision but still struggles to complete one or more of these activities, it might
be time to get their visual perceptual skills assessed. The good news is that once the assessment is
completed and you have answers, there are a lot of fun at-home activities that a child would enjoy
and that will work on each one of these skills. If you have more questions, please reach out to your
child’s occupational therapist.

Visual Perception
Cognitive Ability-Neuropsychology
 Get access to a complete battery of cognitive tests to assess visual perception
What is visual perception?
Being able to read this text seems like a simple process. We look at the letters, and are able to make sense of the
words. It seems simple, but it's actually an extremely complex process that uses a number of brain structures
specialized in visual perception and the different sub-components of vision.

Perception is being able to interpret the information that your different senses receive from your
surroundings. This ability to interpret information depends on your particular cognitive processes and prior
knowledge. Visual perception could be defined as the ability to interpret the information that our eyes receive. The
result of this information being interpreted and received by the brain is what we call visual perception, vision, or
sight. Visual perception is a process that starts in our eyes:
 Photo-reception: The light rays reach our pupils and activate the receptor cells in the retina.
 Transmission and basic processing: The signals made by these cells are transmitted through the optic nerve
toward the brain. It first goes through the optic chiasma (where the optic nerves cross, making the information
received from the right field of vision go to the left hemisphere, and information received from the left field of
vision go to the right hemisphere), and is then relayed to the lateral geniculate nucleus of the thalamus.
 Finally, the visual information that our eyes receive is sent to the visual cortex in the occipital lobe.
Characteristics that play a role in visual perception
To get an idea of the complexity of this cognitive function, try to think about your brain when you look at a soccer
ball. What are the factors that you should identify?:
 Lighting and contrast: You can see the lines that are more or less illuminated, and have a parameter that is
different than the rest of the objects around and behind it.
 Size: it's a circular object with a circumference of about 27 inches.
 Shape: it's round.
 Position It's about 10 feet from me, to my right. I could easily touch it.
 Color: It's white with black pentagons. If the light went away suddenly, we would still know that it is black and
white.
 Dimensions: It's three dimensional, which means that it's a sphere.
 Movement: it's not moving now, but is susceptible to movement.
 Units: there is one, and it's different from the ground.
 Use: it's used to play soccer. It is kicked with the foot
 Personal relationship with the object: it's like the one that you use at soccer practice.
 Name: it's a soccer ball. This last process is called naming.
If that seemed like a lot of steps, think about how your brain does that constantly and extremely fast all day.
Whenever you look at anything, your brain is taking in all of the information and making it make sense to you. On
top of that, the brain doesn't passively perceive the information that it's receiving, but it actually provides information
and to help complete whatever it's seeing (this will help you know that a ball is round even though it's flat in the
picture)/ In the occipital lobe in the brain, there are a number of areas that specialize in each of the above
processes in the adjoining lobes (temporal lobe and parietal lobe). In general, good perception will require that all of
the areas work together.
When you take a look at your desk, your brain identifies everything on it with just a glance, allowing you to quickly
respond to it. Knowing this helps you understand how important it is to have good visual perception and how it plays
a big role in your daily life.

Examples of visual peception

 Driving is one of the most complex daily tasks that many people do everyday. It requires many different complex
processes, once of which is visual perception. If one of the processes in visual perception fails, you have a
chance of dangering yourself or others around you. It is so important to quickly be able to figure out how close
two cars are to each other, how fast they are going, etc., which wouldn't be possible if your visual perception is
poor.
 A child in class will benefit greatly from developed visual perception, as it will allow the child to take notes and
better understand the material in general. An alteration or deficiency in this skills may result in poor academic
performance.
 In the visual arts, like painting or graphic design, visual perception is very important. If you want to draw a square
that seems lifelike, you will have to use your visual perception to choose every color and draw every line
perfectly.
 Visual perception is essential for any kind of activity that requires supervision or care. A security guard with poor
visual perception won't be able to see the security cameras well, thus making it difficult to do his or her job.
 Of course, we are constantly using visual perception.

Pathologies and disorders associated with visual perception

problems
Deficient visual perception may be caused by a variety of problems and difficulties of different levels.

The total or partial loss of vision due to damage to the perceptive organs would cause a significant perception
problems (blindness). This may be caused by damage to the eye itself, damage to the pathways that carry the
information from the eye to the brain (like glaucoma), or by damage to the areas of the brain responsible for
analyzing the information, like a stroke or brain injury.
Perception is not a unitary process, it requires the use of many other processes and mechanisms, which means that
other specific damages can alter any of the previously mentioned processes.These deficits are known as visual
agnosia. Visual agnosia is the inability to recognize learned objects, even though your sight is still in tact. Agnosia is
typically divided into two types: Perceptive agnosia, which allows the person to see the parts of an object, but is
unable to understand the object as a while, and Associative agnosia, which allows the person to understand the
whole object, but doesn't know what it is. It is difficult to understand the perceptive experience of people with this
disorder, because while they "see" the object, they have the sensation of being blind. There are also other, more
specific fisorders, like Akinetopsia, which is the inability to see movement, Achromatopsia, the inability to see colors,
Prosopagnosia, the inability to recognize familiar faces, and Alexia, the inability to learn to read, along with others.
Aside from the difficulties that impair, either partially or entirely, the ability of visual perception, there are other
disorders that alter the visual information received, either distorting the visual information, or eliminating it
completely. Such is the case of schizophrenic hallucinations or other syndromes. There are also other types of
visual illusions that cause people to lose their vision, like with Charles-Bonnet Syndrome. With this syndrome, the
person will have lost their vision, and after a long period of the brain not receiving any visual stimulation or activity, it
starts to work incorrectly. The brain causes hallucinations and visual illusions where they see geometric figures or
people. However, unlike schizophrenic hallucinations, those who suffer from this disorder know that the
hallucinations are not real.

How can you measure and assess visual perception?

Visual perception makes it possible to do an incredible amount of activities. The ability to interact with the
environment and your surroundings depends directly on the quality of your visual perception. This is why assessing
and knowing how developed your visual perception can be helpful in a number of areas of your life, like academics,
medicine, or professional areas. In the academic field, it is important to know which children may have trouble
seeing the board or writing notes. In the medical area, knowing one's visual perception level will be important to
know if the patient may misread instructions regarding their medication, or if they are unable to live and thrive
independently. Finally, visual perception in a professional environment will help when reading or working in a
potentially dangerous situation. Knowing which workers should not be handling heavy equipment, or which may
need assistance in a specific meeting may make a difference for an employer.

With the complete neuropsychological assessment, you can help to accurately measure a number of cognitive skills,
including visual perception. This assessment evaluates visual assessment using a task-based of the classic NEPSY
test from Korkman, Kirk, and Kemp (1998). This task makes it possible to understand how well the user is able to
decode and decipher the different elements in the exercise, as well as measure the cognitive resources that the
user has to understand and perform the task as efficiently as possible. Aside from visual perception, the test also
measures naming, response time, and processing speed.
 Decoding Test VIPER-NAM: Images of various objects will appear on the screen for a short period of time and
then disappear. Next, four letters will appear, only one of which will correspond to the name of the object. The
user must choose the correct answer as quickly as possible.

How can you rehabilitate or improve visual perception?

Like all of our cognitive abilities, visual perception can be trained and improved, and CogniFit may help train this
ability.

Visual perception rehabilitation is based on the science of neuroplasticity. CogniFit has a professional battery of
tasks and tests that was designed to help professionals and individuals rehabilitate and improve deficits in visual
perception and other cognitive functions. The brain and neural connections, like a muscle, and be strengthened and
improved through practice and training. This is why it's possible to actually improve one's visual perception by
frequently training and exercising the correct neural connections. As visual perception improves, you'll have the
possibility of sending information from the eyes to the brain quicker and more efficiently than before.
CogniFit was created by a team of professionals specialized in the area of neurogenesis and synaptic plasticity,
which is how we were able to create a personalized cognitive stimulation program that would be tailored to the
needs of each user. This program starts with an evaluation to assess visual perception, auditory perception, and a
number of other fundamental cognitive domains, and based on the results, creates a personalized brain training
program for each user. The program automatically collects the data from this initial cognitive assessment, and, with
the use of sophisticated algorithms, creates a program that works on improving the user's cognitive weaknesses
and training their cognitive strengths.
The key to successful brain training is consistently practicing with challenging exercises. CogniFit has evaluation
tools, as well as a rehabilitation program to help optimize this cognitive function. The program only requires 15
minutes, two to three times a week.
 CogniFit's assessments and stimulation programs are available online and can be practiced on most computers and
mobile devices. The program is made up of fun, interactive brain games, and at the end of each training session,
the user automatically receives a detailed graph highlighting the user's cognitive progress.

What Is Visual Processing And How Does It Impact Learning?

Vision is a complicated process - it is much more than just how well we see. Vision
is a combination of visual acuity (eyesight), how our eyes function (tracking, eye
teaming), and visual processing. This article will focus on the components of - and
importance of - visual processing (visual perception) in learning.
Visual Processing is a term used to refer to the brains ability to perceive, interpret and process
information that is seen through out eyes. Visual processing skills are what our brain uses to
understand the world around us. It is also known as visual perception.

Visual processing is different than visual acuity (how well your eyes can see). In fact, children who
have difficulties with visual processing typically do not have impaired vision.

Visual processing plays an important role in learning for our kids. If a child has difficulty with visual
processing skills, children may have difficulties with reading, writing, and/or math, or just a more
difficult time understnading the world around them and how to navigate through it safely.

Visual Processing can be broken down into several components, all

of which play an important role in student's visual perception and
ability to learn.
VISUAL DISCRIMINATION:
 Visual Discrimination is the ability to recognize the differences and similarities between objects. It is also the
ability to classify objects, symbols or shapes into categories such as color, position, form, pattern, texture, size
and shape. Difficulties with visual discrimination will impact reading and math skills significantly, making it
difficult to discriminate between different words, letters and numbers. Poor visual discrimination skills can
also cause a child to have difficulty with directionality and laterality.
 VISUAL MEMORY:
 Visual memory is a child’s ability to see and remember what something looks like; Recalling information such
as activities, pictures or words that have been viewed in the past. If a child has difficulty with visual memory,
they may have a hard time with letter/number recognition, recalling sight words, spelling and copying from
the board.
VISUAL FORM CONSTANCY
 Visual form constancy is the ability to recognize and label object even when they are viewed from a different
environment or angle. In essence, the ability to mentally manipulate an object into different positions just by
looking at it. A child is using form constancy if they are able to recognize a triangle when the color or size
changes, when it is oriented differently, or if it is placed in a different context (within another picture). A child
who struggles with form constancy may note recognize shapes, numbers and letters or be able to generalize
 skills across environments. A child with difficulties with form constancy may also struggle with spatial
relationships in puzzles and some math activities.
VISUAL SEQUENTIAL MEMORY
 Being able to understand the order or sequence of numbers, items, pictures, and/or words after viewing
them. Children with poor sequential memory will have difficulties with their ability to read and spell correctly;
this is because every word consists ot letters in a specific sequence. If a child has a difficult time recalling the
proper sequence of letters, it can impact the overall word – and meaning – that is being perceived. Suddenly
the word name can become mean or amen. This can also impact math skills as well.
VISUAL FIGURE- GROUND
 The ability to distinguish, isolate or find an object in varying environment. This is the ability to understand
foreground from background in order to help the child understand that they see. This can include faces,
objects, landscapes, letters or numbers. Children who struggle with figure ground have a difficult time
scanning for relevant information or reading with many words on the page. They also may struggle to locate
items within a busy environment.
VISUAL CLOSURE
 Visual closure is the brain’s ability to recognize a familiar item, word or picture when only part of it is shown.
For example, if your cat was hiding under the blanket and only his tail was sticking out, would you be able to
recognize that it was a cat? Visual closure skills allow a child to quickly recognize letter and words without
having to fully decode them. Difficulties with visual closure will impact a child’s ability to read fluently and may
also impact reading comprehension. It could impact a child’s letter formation, legibility and neatness. In
addition, it may make it difficult for a child to locate items within their backpack or desk or a busy area.
Visual processing and visual perceptual skills are important for many every day
skills and are an important part of academic learning. Reading, writing, completing
puzzles, cutting, drawing, completing math problems, dressing, finding your sock
on the bedroom floor as well as many other skills could be impacted if they struggle
with visual processing skills. But by identifying where the breakdown or challenge
is and working to strengthen those skill areas, we can help our kids reach their
optimal potential. .
Importance Of Visual Perception For Kids With
Learning Disabilities
Visual Perception – Visual perception refers to, brain’s ability to make sense of what the eyes sees. Good visual
perception skills are important for many daily activities such as reading, writing, completing puzzles, cuttings,
drawing, completing math problems etc. Without the ability to complete these everyday tasks, a child’s self-esteem
can suffer & their academic and play performance can also
be compromised.

Visual perception abilities are important component of

many cognitive skills that is related to success in school,
finding one’s way in the environment & performing simple
dressing tasks.
Visual perception

Building blocks necessary to develop Visual Perception

Sensory Processing – Accurate registration, interpretation of response to sensory stimulation in the environment &
child’s own body.

Visual Attention – It is the ability to focus on important visual information & filter out unimportant background
information.

Visual Discrimination- The ability to determine differences or similarities in object based on size, colour, shape etc.

Visual Memory- The ability to recall visual traits in particular form or in objects.

Visual Spatial Relationships- Understanding the relationships of objects within the environment.

Visual Sequential Memory- The ability to recall a sequence of objects in the correct order.

Visual form constancy- The ability to know that a form/shape is the same, even if it has been made smaller/larger
has been turned around.

Visual Closure- The ability to recognize a form/ object when part of the picture is missing.

What is Visual Perception?

Visual perception is the ability to organize, interpret, and give
meaning to information that is seen.

Visual Pathways and Classroom Instruction

Early Choice Pediatric Therapy has found that once a child enters
school, about 75% of the classroom activities are directed through
visual pathways. The majority of students who have problems with their
vision system, upwards of 90%, are never diagnosed.

According to the National Vision Research Institute of Australia,

about 40% of the human brain is involved in one form or another with
visual perception. Upon visual input, visual signals leave the eye and
follow a path into the superior colliculus in the brainstem, where the
electrical impulses react and control all eye movements such as
blinking, dilating pupils, and tracking objects that are moving or tracking
a line of words. The optic nerve then forms synapses and sends neurons
to the occipital lobe of the cerebral cortex. This pathway is responsible
for experiencing and controlling visual perception. The input comes from
both eyes, the right cortex receiving impulses from the left orbit and the
left cortex receiving input from the right orbit.

Once the input reaches the cortex, it must be processed with the neural
networks. Non-verbal visual information and verbal information both
need to be processed. This includes orthographic information. Patterns
need to be distinguished.

Multiple processes of the vision system work together for visual

perception and discrimination of orthography and output (George
McClosky, Ph.D, 2007). The sound-symbol connection is extremely
important for successful reading. According to Berninger and Richards,
sound codes in speech play an important, even fundamental role in the
recoding of visual stimuli into language using the orthographic word
form representations.

Executive Function, Memory Systems, and Visual

Perception
Additionally, executive function does play a part in this process, as well
as visual, auditory, and muscle memory. Background knowledge of both
general and specific nature in both content and language goes hand-in-
hand with reading and gaining meaning from what one reads
(comprehension). The ability to decode and encode words that are
familiar, unfamiliar, or nonsense words and filter and sort them into
usable meaning brings comprehension.

It is also important to note that Rayner, in 1997, summarized 25 years of

research on eye movements. Reading obviously involves eye
movements, which are called saccades, when the eyes are moving
rapidly. The rapid eye movements and tracking are separated by
fixations when the eyes are relatively still. Saccade movements
typically travel about 6 to 9 letter spaces; they are not impacted by the
size of print. The complete perceptual span is larger, extending to 14 or
15 letter spaces to the right and 3 to 4 spaces to the left. It is the
saccade movement to the left combined with the perceptual span length
that assures that every letter of every word enters the visual field.
Understanding this visual span perception span combination leads us to
realize that efficient readers do this easily. About 10-15% of the time,
readers also shift back (known as regression) to look back at material
that has already been read. And as text becomes more difficult, saccade
length tends to decrease and regression frequency increases.

It is important to note that the space between words does facilitate

fluent reading. When spacing between words varies or is not available,
reading is slowed by as much as 50%. The research further notes that
efficient eye movement is more critical than generating predictions of
upcoming words. Readers systematically move their eyes from left to
right across the text and then fixate on most of the content words. The
processing associated with each word is very rapid, and the link
between the eyes and the mind is very tight. Rayner, K. (1997)
Scientific Studies of Reading, 1(4) pages 317-339.

How Vision Develops

Vision and visual perception develop in an ordered manner and they
improve over time. Each principle or skill has a continuum. Additionally,
each has a range of responses from very basic to complex. A child can
respond at any point on each skill continuum and can be at different
points at any given time on each continuum.

Brain Based Learning, (1997) author Eric Jensen, states that up to 87%
of students do NOT learn from hearing alone. He goes on to state that
we under-utilize our visual perception system when learning. Use of
colored handouts, charts, graphs, photographs, posters, and graphic
organizers such as those incorporated into Bonnie Terry Learning
products will increase student’s learning through boosting and
strengthening use of the visual system. Using visual and kinesthetic
methods increase student performance and decrease discipline
problems.

Reading and Vision Therapy Intervention Studies

McKane F, et al. A comparison of auditory / language therapy with

school visual support procedures in a public school setting. Journal of
Optometric Vision Development 32 (2): 83-92, 2001.
Some hold that poor reading eye movements are caused by poor
language skills and if the auditory/ language skills were improved that
reading and eye movements during reading would also improve. Twenty-
nine third grade children who had previously been identified as being
below average in some academic area were the subjects of this study.
The experimental group contained 18 subjects, equally distributed
between genders. After screening evaluations, all children were enrolled
in an auditory/language enrichment program and the experimental group
also received school-based vision techniques which were individually
programmed and administered by school personnel, in the school setting
daily for 30 minutes a day for 3.5 months. Both groups improved
significantly over pre-test scores on the reading aspect of the WRAT and
reading rate with comprehension as measured by the –Visagraph. The
experimental group also demonstrated a significant improvement in
reading eye movements as measured by the Visagraph, but the control
group did not. The authors concluded that both visual and
auditory/language intervention has a positive effect on the reading
WRAT scores as well as the reading rate with comprehension. Reading
eye movements, however, were significantly improved only with visual
intervention and not with auditory/language therapy.

Summary of Research on the Efficacy of Vision Therapy for Specific

Visual Dysfunctions
by Jeffrey Cooper, M.S., O.D.
Professor of Clinical Optometry State University of New York, State
College of Optometry

Reading Problems
37
Atzmon, et al., addressed the effectiveness of orthoptics/vision therapy
in the area of reading disabilities in an article, which appeared in
Binocular Vision and Eye Muscle Surgery Quarterly, an ophthalmological
journal. This double-blind prospective study compared the effectiveness
of orthoptics to other treatment modalities in the remediation of reading
disorders. These investigators matched three groups of children with
reading disabilities. One group received orthoptic treatment to improve
fusional amplitudes to at least 60D (prism diopters). Group two received
conventional reading tutoring. Group three received no treatment and
served as the control. Each child had 40 20-minute sessions of therapy.
Prior to therapy 100% had poor fusional convergence by the authors’
criteria, 60% had a receded near point of convergence, and many had
 asthenopic symptoms. After treatment asthenopic symptoms were
eliminated in the orthoptic group. Reading had improved significantly in
both the orthoptic/vision therapy group and
37
reading group, but not in the control group. Atzmon, et al., concluded
that orthoptics/vision therapy was as effective as reading tutoring but
had an additional benefit of eliminating asthenopia. This study also
meets the criteria of multi-subject, controlled study.

http://www.add-adhd.org/pdfs/03_sum_vt_research_Cooper.pdf

When you combine visual processing activities with intervention results

magnify.

Sample of Activities/Resources That Address Visual Processing

1. Visually tracking objects without moving the head.

2. Catching objects in space, e.g. bean bags or balls.
3. Coloring “in the lines,” copying activities.
4. Visual tracking of letters or words with a built-in scoring (accountability) system.
5. Visual memory activities
6. Visual discrimination activities
7. Eye-aiming activities
8. Visual figure-ground activities like hidden pictures
9. Visual language activities that build vocabulary
10. Play marbles, jacks, and other eye-hand skill games
11. Awaken the Scholar Within: Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic (VAK) Therapy
Program, which addresses all 9 areas of visual processing
12. ASW Reading, Writing, Study Skills Program, which addresses 7 areas of visual
processing
13. Five Minutes to Better Reading Skills reading fluency program, which addresses 5
areas of visual processing

42 Easy Visual Perceptual Activities That

Enhance
Learning

Visual perceptual activities

are great for a child’s
developing brain! These 42
 visual perceptual activities support the components of visual
perception… part of the foundation for learning.
What is Visual Perception?
Visual perception is the brain’s ability to interpret what the eyes see.
Vision, just by itself, requires many skills and abilities:
 Focusing on objects up close
 Scanning the environment using the eye muscles
 Taking in info from all fields of vision
 Coordinating the eye muscles to work together
 Seeing and focusing on objects far away
 Adjusting to objects that are moving toward or away from the eyes
 Filtering light and adjusting to light
 Following moving objects with the eyes
 Focusing on objects while the body is moving
 Visually sustaining attention to objects and the environment
The eyes have such an important role… and so does the brain!
As the eyes constantly look, attend, and take in information, the brain
has to make sense of what it sees.
The brain processes, perceives, and interprets what the eyes see. This
is visual perception.
Visual perceptual skills rely on the brain’s cognitive abilities. A child
has to remember and organize previous visual info. Then, it can
automatically make sense of everything seen.
Many other systems play a role in supporting the visual system and
visual perception.
Various postural muscle groups and the movement / balance (vestibular)
system help support visual skills.
Sensory processing helps support the attention centers needed for the
visual system. In order to effectively take in info, the eyes need to
focus and attend well. But, at the same time, they have to ignore
unnecessary visual info.
The brain’s job of actually making sense of what the eyes see (visual
perception) is very complex! This post focuses on seven components of
visual perception.
What Are the Components of Visual Perceptual Skills and
How do They Impact Learning?
The seven components of visual perception are: visual discrimination,
visual memory, spatial relationships, form constancy, sequential
memory, visual figure-ground, and visual closure.
Each area is explained below. Additionally,
visual perception examples are given for each
area, showing how the components are part of
learning.
Visual Discrimination
Visual discrimination is the ability to tell the
difference between objects or the details of
objects. It involves recognizing what’s the
same and what’s different. This helps with
matching and categorizing.
This skill is used when recognizing the difference between b-d, p-q, p-9,
5-s, etc. It’s used when kids recognize the difference between similar
looking words.
Or, it’s used when telling the difference between leaves or shapes of
states or countries.
Visual Memory
Visual memory is remembering an object and the characteristics of an
object after it’s out of sight. Kids need to retain visual information for
immediate recall, or for later retrieval.
This skill is used for learning shapes, letters, numbers, sight words, fact
families, maps, patterns, etc.
It’s used when drawing a picture without a model. Or, when writing a
descriptive story about an object or a picture.
Visual Spatial Relationships
Visual spatial relationships is the ability to recognize and understand
the physical relationships between objects. It’s knowing the position of
an object in space.
(The development of position in space is complete between ages 7 and
9. Spatial relationships improves up to age 10.)
This is an important skill in understanding directional concepts (left,
right, between, under, down, etc)
Kids need this skill during prewriting and writing. It’s crucial when
forming shapes, letters and numbers… especially ones with angles and
curves.
Visual spatial skills are used when writing words and sentences with the
correct letter size (tall, short, or hang below the line.) Additionally, the
words have to be placed correctly on the writing lines.
Letter and word spacing is also necessary (proper space between
words, but letters within a word are close together.) Understanding of
margin sizes and space around the written work is also needed.
Kids also use spatial skills when organizing their math problems on
paper (with or without lines.) They use it when figuring out maps,
measurements, distance, patterns, and geometry.
Form Constancy
Form constancy is knowing that an object or form is the same no matter
its size or what position it’s in. This helps kids understand consistency
of objects.
(This skill improves between ages 6 and 7, and continues to develop
until age 9.)
The brain can look at an upside down A, and still understand that it’s an
A. Kids would also understand that an A is always an A, regardless of
font or writing style (printed, italicized, bolded, upper/lowercase, etc.)
Children are able to form letters or words without reversing.
Additionally, form constancy involves looking at an object from a
different angle but still knowing what the object is.
A picture of a world map on the wall is the same as a picture on paper in
front of them. They understand that it’s the same, even though the wall
map is much larger, and maybe even at a different angle.
Visual Sequential Memory
Visual sequential memory is remembering the correct order, series, or
sequence of items.
This is extremely important for spelling, reading, and copying short
text. It’s useful when remembering the sequence of a visual story. Or,
when following written directions to complete a multiple-step task.
As kids get older, they have to remember longer words or a series of
words when copying text from a book or from the board. It’s also used
when remembering the correct order of equations and formulas.
Visual Figure-Ground
Visual figure-ground is the ability to visually locate an object in a busy
background. It’s differentiating foreground from background.
This skill continues to develop in kids between ages 6 and 7.
It’s noticing an object, word, or letter with added visual input behind it.
Such as on a busy worksheet.
Another example would be a child’s ability to locate a blue pencil on a
blue marbled carpet. Or, to find a math equation, part of an animal’s life
cycle, or the outline of a state in a pile of others.
Visual Closure
Visual closure is the ability to know what an object or picture is, when
only presented with parts of it.
This would be recognizing part of a homework page when most of it is
covered up by a notebook. It’s also knowing what a picture is, if only
given parts of it (a partially completed puzzle… or a dot to dot picture
that’s only partly finished.)
It’s seeing an outline of a leaf that has been erased in many areas.
Even though all of the lines of the leaf are not complete, the brain can
fill in the rest of the parts to identify it.
This is important when kids start to learn to read faster. They don’t
have to look at every single letter of a word, or even at every single
word.
Why Are Visual Perceptual Activities Important for Kids?
Visual perceptual activities support learning and
cognition. They’re an important building block
for the brain and for many academic subjects.
The visual perception skills and examples
previously listed are essential parts of math,
reading, spelling, writing, science and social
studies!
They’re also important in staying organized and
managing school materials.
If a child is having difficulty with any of the areas
of visual perception, they can easily become
frustrated. Frustration leads to a dislike of
school, a low confidence level, potential behavior challenges, and even
anxiety.
As a school based occupational therapist, I’ve worked with many, many
kids who need support with visual perception.
I like using the Test of Visual Perceptual Skills (non-motor) to evaluate
kids’ visual perception. This test assesses the 7 components that I’ve
previously mentioned.
Checking all areas allows me to assess a child’s visual perceptual
strengths and weaknesses.
Then, I’m able to offer very specific visual perceptual activities to the
child’s educational team. The chosen activities address important
skills to support the child’s learning.
42 Easy Visual Perceptual Activities for Kids
Examples of visual perceptual activities are listed below. They’re
organized in each of the 7 areas previously mentioned.
I’ve only listed an activity once (under each category.) However, some
activities and games address more areas than the one they’re listed
under. (I chose the most relevant component area that the activity
focuses on.)
 If you want to start with the basics, there are simple ways to work on
the foundation for visual perception during daily routines (visual
tracking, visual attention, etc.) The following list gives specific
examples of games and activities that support each component of visual
perception:
Visual Discrimination Activities
 Matching complex shapes to outlines (Perfection)
 Dice games
 Sorting coins
 Dominoes
 “What’s Different?” Or “Find the Difference” Games
 Sort items by shape or size
Fun Visual Memory Activities
 Memory games
 What’s Missing? games
 Study the picture
 Word searches
 Line Up
 Concentration
Visual Spatial Relationships Activities
 Copy designs using pencils, pennies, small erasers, etc
 Geoboard patterns and designs
 Traffic Jam game
 How to Draw books
 Directionality games
 Proprioceptive activities (to improve body awareness)
Cool Visual Form Constancy Activities
 Spot It
 Jigsaw puzzles
 Tangrams
 Parquetry blocks
 Building sets
 Type spelling words using different fonts
Visual Sequential Memory Activities
 Scrabble
 Hangman
 Crossword puzzles
 Sequence game
 Copy patterns (make a pattern, cover it up and have child re-create)
 Stringing beads in a specific sequence or to spell non-sense words
Easy Visual Figure-Ground Activities
 I Spy
 Hidden Pictures
 Sensory Bins with Letters (to build words)
 Shredded paper with letters or words on other
paper scraps (to build sentences)
 Crafts with small beads
 Jigsaw puzzles (also great for visual closure)
Visual Closure Activities
 Partly cover up complex shapes before matching to
the outline
 Word shapes activities (match the word to the
outline)
 Match pictures to incomplete pictures
 Scavenger hunts (partly hidden learning items)
 Dot-to-dots (identify picture before connecting dots)
 Erase parts of pictures or words for a guessing game