Integración de estudiantes con deficiencias visuales en el aula de enseñanza de lenguas extranjeras en la enseñanza superior

Abstract

At colleges or universities students with visual impairments have to be mainstreamed. Therefore, each year quite a lot of students with visual impairments can be found in classes scattered over the different colleges and universities in every country. However, most teachers have not been instructed how to teach students with visual impairments in a mainstream classroom. Thus, they worry about changes in the syllabus, availability of suitable textbooks, and how to teach all students together in an effective way. Obtaining necessary information about the students’ problems and sources for help are paramount for the successful integration of students with visual impairments into the mainstream classroom. This paper, therefore, aims to provide information for teachers with little or no background knowledge in special education. Several of the problems discussed in this paper are of concern for teachers of students with visual impairments in general, but some aspects are of special interest for foreign language teachers and are not normally found in guidelines provided to teachers of students with visual impairments in mainstream classes.