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Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318

7th International Conference on Intercultural Education “Education, Health and ICT for a
Transcultural World”, EDUHEM 2016, 15-17 June 2016, Almeria, Spain

ICT in teaching foreign languages to adult people with acquired

severe visual impairment
Olga Malinovská* & Libuše Ludíková
Institute of Special Education Studies, Faculty of Education, Palacký University in Olomouc, Olomouc 771 40, Czech Republic

Abstract

Introduction. Learning a foreign language is an essential part of all levels of the education system in the modern society.
Nevertheless a common language course may not be appropriate for a person with severe visual impairment. During the course of
the English language for adults with visual impairment it was possible to ask the students which way of teaching was satisfactory
for them and how it was possible to take advantage of new technologies such as email and the internet. Methods: This qualitative
research was conducted through interviews and studying clients’ documentation. The participants were persons with severe visual
impairment acquired in adult age who had previously used eyesight in all areas of life. Currently, these individuals use language
learning services provided by a local specialized center for persons with visual impairment, where the study was conducted.
Results: Participant of the study were not able to read the Braille, or they could read it very slowly and ineffectively. Not using any
text materials during the lessons and sending homework, vocabulary and writing exercises by email was considered very successful
by the students. The interviewees were completely satisfied and stated this method was the most effective. As for the online
resources (for example grammar explanation etc.) sent by email, some websites were non-blind-friendly, which can reduce the
motivation to study.
© 2017
© 2016TheTheAuthors.
Authors. Published
Published by by Elsevier
Elsevier Ltd.Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of EDUHEM 2016.
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of EDUHEM 2016.
Keywords: visual impairment; foreign languages; ESL; didactics, adults

* Corresponding author. E-mail address: olga.malinovska01@upol.cz

1877-0428 © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-review under responsibility of the organizing committee of EDUHEM 2016.
doi:10.1016/j.sbspro.2017.02.096
312 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318

1. Introduction

Teaching foreign languages is a very modern trend today. Nowadays, language skills and knowledge are
fundamental aspects that should be developed by all citizens of the European Union throughout their whole lives.
Communication in foreign languages and the ability to understand brings more opportunities to meet other people and
to find out about various cultures and nations, greater mobility across the EU member countries, but more importantly,
better chances on the European labor market, which is currently focused on knowledge and performance.
Language education of the young generation is just as important as educating adults. Adult education has been
neglected in the past, but today is gaining importance among educational disciplines. This is evidenced not only by
the emergence of separate educational fields at universities, but also by the emergence of universities of the third age,
various courses for both adults and seniors. Continuing education is not an exception today, but rather a trend and a
modern direction with increasing popularity. The UN report mentioned above clearly implies that our society is rapidly
ageing. However, the standard of living and health of this population is better compared with previous generations.
Similarly, the retirement age increases. An important aspect is employment, not only as a source of finance, but also
in terms of maintaining a certain social role and social status. All these factors point to a necessity for quality education
in all areas, both for the intact population and persons with health disability.
As evidenced by statistics (Pascolini & Mariotti, 2012), the incidence of visual impairment increases with age – the
number of visually impaired persons begins to rise in the middle age and gradually increases. Considering the above,
the number of adult persons with acquired visual impairment is likely to rise. While persons with acquired mild visual
impairment are able to compensate for this situation using technical aids, persons with acquired severe visual
impairment need to adapt to a new life situation and learn to live differently.
Adults with severe visual impairment wish to study languages just as the intact population. Knowledge of a foreign
language can help not only reduce the information deficit as a result of visual impairment, but also find a better job or
attract new customers and partners. However, these people do not often have the opportunity to participate in usual
language courses held by language agencies, because especially blind persons cannot work with printed material as
other participants, and therefore cannot develop their language competences in an appropriate manner. As a result,
there is a large niche – very few language courses adapted for adults with visual impairment, on the other hand, teachers
in mainstream language schools and agencies often do not know how to work with these clients and whether and how
they can adapt commonly used study materials. Although participants with visual impairment are usually provided
with appropriate technical aids, teachers often do not know how to use these aids and how to adapt teaching materials
for their clients.
An important part of the modern society is also the internet and related foreign language sources – blogs, videos,
podcasts, wiki, recordings, chat programs, social networks, online games and exercises. Although not all of them will
be used by persons with severe visual impairment, there are several means that can be used in teaching, especially
electronic mail and online videos and recordings. The present research study also focuses on this area of teaching
foreign languages.

2. Didactics of foreign languages

The term didactics comes from the Greek didaskein, which means “I learn” or “I teach”, another possible translation
is “educating oneself”. Podlahová (2012) defines didactics as one of the disciplines in the system of educational
sciences. The umbrella concept is general didactics, which is further divided into vocational didactics, extracurricular
didactics and school didactics. Skalková (2007) further adds that “field didactics form a separate discipline in addition
to general didactics. At the moment field didactics is rapidly developing. ... Field didactics relates to all subjects in
general or specific subject areas (... writing, basic humanities and natural science, foreign languages). ... Cultivating
field didactics assumes good knowledge of educational sciences and psychology, as well as sound knowledge of the
relevant disciplines, to which field didactics is related. At the same time, didactics and field didactics are closely
correlated.” (p. 18)
At present, a new term of linguodidactics emerged in the Czech scientific environment; this term is sometimes
wrongly interpreted as foreign language didactics. Choděra (2006) states that the term linguodidactics includes foreign
 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318 313

language didactics, mother tongue didactics, artificial and dead language didactics. According to the author, the term
foreign language didactics is narrower and pertains to field didactics.
The didactics of teaching foreign languages has become the subject of long-standing discussions. Its emergence
and development was promoted for example by: Qintilianus, M. Luther, J. A. Comenius, J. J. Jacotot, J. J. Rousseau,
W. Ratke, W. Viëtor, J. H. Pestalozzi, etc. Modern research studies have shown that the issue of language teaching
reaches far beyond the area of linguistics. Besides linguistics, teaching foreign languages is addressed by educational
sciences, psychology, sociology, general didactics, anthropology, philosophy, and literary science. Interdisciplinary
scientific disciplines include the following: applied linguistics, pragmalinguistics, psycholinguistics, neurolinguistics
and sociolinguistics.

2.1. Methods of teaching foreign languages

Teaching foreign languages has a long history and in the course of its development has often followed a
philosophical or psychological direction. The oldest method, which was already used in teaching Latin, was the
grammar-translation method. This method uses the mother tongue and emphasizes the accuracy of translation and the
grammatical system of the language. Despite strong criticism, this method remained effective until the 20 th century,
some of its practices are still used today. In opposition to this method, new approaches aimed at spoken language
began to appear in 1960s – for example the audiolingual or audiooral method. Ten years later, teaching foreign
languages was affected by the communication-pragmatic approach, that is departure from the system language concept
to the practical language concept, understanding a foreign language and its functioning. To the forefront comes the
communicative competence, teaching grammar in the context of socio-cultural rules – the so-called communicative
method, which is largely used today (Decoo, 2001; Zelinková, 2012; Richards & Rodgers, 2014).
Teaching foreign languages expanded at the end of the 20 th century with the advent of new aids and technologies.
In the contemporary society an important part of teaching is the integration of advanced technologies and computer
programs or mobile applications – e.g. CALL (computer assisted language learning) or MALL (mobile assisted
language learning). Levy (1997, p.1) defines CALL as “searching for and studying computer applications in teaching
and learning foreign languages”.
The latest method of language teaching uses the principle of virtual reality learning. In a virtual world, in a
simulation of an environment, the students move by means of their avatar and learn about certain environments. Using
a single platform, virtual classrooms are developed where the students meet the teacher and where various
environments are simulated – for example of a technical (buildings, laboratories, hospitals), commercial (business
meetings, conferences, presentations) or general (airports, public transport, shops, etc.) nature (Davies, 2005;
Delcloque, 2000; Davies et al., 2011).
A frequent approach in teaching is b-learning, that is blended learning. This is a combination of e-learning and
traditional (face-to-face) teaching. This method is used to increase the study potential of a student, and is more frequent
than the CALL. Combined teaching is also often used for training of a certain profession or specific work (Pegrum,
2009).

3. Typhlodidactics

As reported by Ludíková (1989, p. 20) “Typhlodidactics, that is the theory of teaching visually impaired persons,
which is one of the disciplines of typhlopaedia, examines the general principles of the teaching process of persons
with visual impairment, its objectives, content, peculiarities of the teaching process, teaching principles, methods, and
organizational forms and means used in teaching persons with visual impairment”. The author further states that the
teaching of every subject has own peculiarities and principles, suitable methods and organizational forms.
Moreover, the present research includes special adult education; as reported by Langer (Langer, 2006, p. 8, in
Krejčířová et al., 2011), this discipline “deals with the prevention and forecasting of health disability with a special
emphasis on education, re-education, diagnosis, therapeutic-formative effect, compensation, rehabilitation, inclusion
(integration), socialization or resocialization and guidance of adults, who are disadvantaged in social life as a result
of their impairment.”
314 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318

Currently in the Czech Republic there is only one available publication dedicated to teaching foreign languages to
adults with visual impairment entitled “Good practice for improving language learning for visually impaired adults”
(2010), which was the outcome of the project “Pedagogy and language learning for blind and partially sighted adults
in Europe” under the auspices of the Grundtvig Learning Partnership Programme. Although this publication reflects
on the current needs of adults with visual impairment in language education, the information published is rather of a
general nature and does not provide direct practices and techniques for working with this category of persons.
International literature in English provides more information on the topic; an important publication was written by
Sylvie Kashdan and Robby Barnes (n.d.), who established the so-called Kaizen Program for New English Learners
with Visual Limitations. However, other literature on the topic is sporadic and is rather part of various websites. It is
interesting to note that also teachers of visually impaired children lack adequate experience, which in confirmed in a
study by Topor and Rosenblum (2013) (cf. Donley, 2002; Correa-Torres & Durando, 2011, Kocyigit, N., & Artar, P.
S., 2015). A similar perspective of teaching students with visual impairment it taken by Valerie Price (in McLagan,
1994), who claims that in teaching foreign languages (English), students do not have adapted study materials and
adequate formulations and forms of homework (cf. e.g. Salisbury, 2007).

4. Methods

The study is of an exploratory-descriptive nature, which is the result of the research questions and insufficient
information on the issue in both Czech and foreign literature. The choice of a qualitative approach resulted from the
fact that the issue had not been sufficiently described in Czech or foreign literature. For data saturation it was necessary
to choose appropriate methodology in order to fulfil the objectives, answer the research questions and sufficiently
describe the research phenomena, but also to leave space for new phenomena.
Švaříček, Šeďová et al. (2007) define qualitative research as “... a process of examining phenomena and problems
in an authentic environment in order to obtain a comprehensive picture of these phenomena based on in-depth data
and a specific relationship between the researcher and the participant. In a qualitative research study, the intention
of a researcher is, using a number of procedures and methods, to reveal and represent how people understand,
perceive, and create social reality” (p. 17).
In a qualitative research study, the researcher analyses a large amount of data of a predominantly subjective nature,
which are collected by means of techniques, over which the researcher has minimum control. Qualitative data obtained
in a research study might be of a visual, auditory or text nature; this often includes a verbatim transcription of
interviews and their subsequent analysis.
The present study used two methods of data saturation:
a. Interviews with research participants
b. Audio recordings of lessons
In the research the authors used semi-structured interviews (cf. Miovský, 2006; Chráska, 2007; Gavora, 1996). An
interview “enables not only data capture, but the researcher can also get a deep insight into the respondents’ motives
and attitudes. An interview uncovers the respondent’s external reactions, according to which subsequent questions
can be promptly modified” (Gavora, 1996, p. 110). The author further states that the interview is used when the
researcher is looking for confidential and private answers of the respondents. These features of the interview were
used in the present research study. Not only the responses but also involuntary reactions and non-verbal
communication of the clients helped create a more comprehensive overview of the issue. The interviews with the
course participants were recorded using a voice recorder and transcribed in an unabridged text form.
Similarly, entire lessons were recorded using a voice recorder (subject to the clients’ informed consent). These
lessons were transcribed into a shortened text form.
The research was based on the following three principal questions:
1. What are the challenges that adults with acquired visual impairment encounter when studying a foreign language
in a usual language course?
2. What procedures can be used to eliminate or prevent these challenges?
3. Which technical aids, software or technology can be implemented in this type of language teaching?
 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318 315

The acquired data were handled by means of qualitative data sorting, comparison, data systematization, first order
reduction, and coding. The prevailing approach was a descriptive analysis (development of clusters and patterns,
comparison, searching for associations).

4.1. Description of the research sample

The sample included adults older than 25 years with acquired visual impairment. Neither age nor education was
decisive. An important aspect was the level of English; the applicants were in a group of A2 level – pre-intermediate.
The level of English was tested in a short interview; the interviewees were read out a test with a choice of responses
to identify their level of English. The interviewees verbally identified those responses that they thought were correct.
The selection of the research sample was conducted in cooperation with a partner organization –specialized center for
visually impaired persons. The organization announced an English language course open to any individual with visual
impairment older than 25 years. In cooperation with the employees of the center, who knew the clients, a
corresponding group of respondents was formed. One of the criteria, which was later included in the main research,
had not been part of the pilot study. This was computer and internet skills.
The study involved four adult persons with acquired visual impairment. The sample included one person with
purblindness, one person with severe purblindness (on the border of remaining vision), one person with remaining
vision and one blind person. The age of the participants ranged from 35 to 55 years. All four persons had studied
English at elementary or secondary school; however, they have not used English in their professional life. One person
had a university degree in a technical field, the other three persons graduated from secondary school – engineering,
social work and agricultural machinery. The research participants included three men and one woman. At present,
several years after the onset and stabilization of their visual impairment, two men work as massage therapists, one
man is a transcriber of audio recordings to text, and the woman works as a social worker in a senior home.

5. Results

The research was conducted in the spring of 2015 in the premises of the specialized center for visually impaired
persons. For the purposes of the research, on one day of a week a room was reserved for 2.5 hours for the lessons and
interviews. The participants always arrived about 10 minutes before the lesson in order to have time to settle in and
prepare for the lesson. Each lesson started with a brief introductory conversation, lesson plan, warm-up, followed by
the main part of the lesson (reading, writing, grammar, etc.); at the end of the lesson a relaxing activity was offered
(song, film video, joke, etc.) Each lesson was finished with a repetition and homework assignment. The following
student’s book was used during the lessons: New English File Pre-Intermediate, Oxford University Press, issued in
2011. This is one of the most common English coursebooks designed for educating young learners and adults. After
the lessons the participants were interviewed in an adjacent room.
An analysis of data obtained from the first interview with the research participants suggested that none of them
except the purblind woman, who uses a magnifying glass for occasional reading and writing, actively used the Braille
for reading or writing, or had a Picht machine. Two persons have already learned the Braille, the third person is
currently in the process of learning, and claims: “After three years I’ve decided to learn it after all. Perhaps I will use
it at home.” (Personal interview, 4 March 2015.)
For writing and reading, all respondents use a desktop computer with specialized software (ZoomText, Jaws, etc.),
and mp3 players or mobile phones for listening to books. These results confirm one of the preconditions of the research
not to use printed materials in the process of direct teaching. In the interviews the participants confirmed their
willingness to work with a digital version of homework, which is evidenced for example by the following:
“Yes, it is a huge relief for me. I could forget it on my way home, and if I took a laptop, I would need
headphones, you know, to understand what I’m writing. But then I couldn’t listen to you.” (Personal
interview, 25 March 2015.)

During the next several interviews the participants positively commented on sending new vocabulary via email.
The vocabulary was written in the form of “English word” hyphen “Czech translation” arranged in a column in a MS
316 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318

Word document. What frequently happens in language teaching is that new words emerge that the students are
unfamiliar with and that do not occur in the actual or the following unit of the student’s book. Therefore, the lecturer
writes the word on the blackboard including pronunciation and translation. In our case this was impossible; therefore,
these words were written using a computer. The participants gave the following comments:
“It’s good this way. I can get back to it during the week and repeat it. Because it is a word document I don’t
need any special software. And even my daughter can test me.” Another participant added: “It suits me
because I can read it letter by letter – when it have it in Czech, then I switch to English and I have the
translation. So I can put it together in my mind. It helps a lot because before I had a photographic memory,
so I have to imagine it now.” (Personal interview, 8 April 2015.)

Another area of investigation was writing; the participants were asked four times to write/translate a certain number
of sentences and send them to the lecturer via email. Then the lecturer corrected the assignment and sent it back to the
participant. In order to practice vocabulary in the lessons, the most frequent mistakes in the homework were explained.
This way of writing was positively assessed by all participants. One of them said:
“For several days I’ve been thinking about how to write it and what to write. So I put the things together in
my mind. In the evenings I usually get down to my computer and write. It’s a hard job just to check it after
myself. I could have it read in English but then it would be immediately clear where the mistake is. So I have
it read in Czech in a sort of gibberish. Although I won’t recognize many of the mistakes, I have a chance to
check it after myself – at least in this way.” A similar view was shared by the purblind woman: “Although I
mustn’t strain my eyes, the 20 or 25 minutes’ time is bearable, moreover I’ll hardly write a traditional letter
to somebody today. Especially me. The good thing is it makes me produce something, use the English a bit.
So yeah, it’s fine, if you can say that about homework.” (Personal interview, 25 March 2015.)

A bigger problem for the participants was using the student’s book. While the female participants with purblindness
completed the tasks in the student’s book using a magnifying glass (optical) with adequate breaks, for the other
participants this area represented a much more difficult challenge. The page with the assigned exercises had to be
scanned and using special programs converted into a linear form. One of the participants commented as follows:
“It’s bad that the page has two columns. Sometimes the program won’t recognize that. So you need to fold
the page in half, scan just one half and work with it. But you don’t know where the exercise is. When there
are pictures, it’s sometimes acting funny. And it would be worth a try if black and white was better.” Another
participant added: “I scanned the whole lesson to a pdf file and then had it converted into a text. ... You don’t
have it, it’s a special feature in Acrobat. But then I realized that I won’t recognize page number as it’s all in
lines. So I had to re-scan one page but it wasn’t much better. It took over two hours and my wife had to help
me. It was a nightmare.” (Personal interview, 15 April 2015.)

The above implies that the clients had difficulties using the student’s book, it was time consuming and the effort
did not match the outcome. One possible solution could be to use a digitized versions of the student’s book; however,
this is not publicly available (some universities provide these for students with health disability, they are also available
in special libraries). Therefore, the task of the main research is to find a way of using the student’s book.
The last area of research was using websites that provide materials for language learning. In this way the students
had an opportunity to revise what they had learned (mostly grammar) or acquire some new knowledge. In the
participants’ opinion, this was a suitable complement to teaching, because they could revise without lengthy searching.
However, some websites were not suitable for this purpose:
“The link you gave us on the second lesson worked well. But the last one was a disaster. Perhaps they have
bad coding or something and the reader couldn’t get to it. So as I said, I read it but I don’t know what was
there.” (Personal interview, 15 April 2015.)
A similar thing was experienced by another participant:
“It was possible to read somehow, but it was terrible. There was a crossed text, some tags, links, images, it
was difficult to go through the text. The second was better, there was basically a plain text, it was easier to
use.” (Personal interview, 8 April 2015.)
 Olga Malinovská and Libuše Ludíková / Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 237 (2017) 311 – 318 317

The participants’ experience could be summarized by means of the well-known concept of blind-friendly and non-
blind-friendly websites. Unfortunately, at present there is no means of identifying the type of website, it is only
possible to try it out using reading software.
The results of the present research suggest a high degree of satisfaction of the participants with the digital form of
homework and interaction with the lecturer. On the other hand, it was difficult for the participants to work with the
printed form of the student’s book and conversion into a digital form. The use of internet and email facilitates access
of this group of students to the learning content and study materials. However, this method of teaching places high
demands on the lecturer, oral communication skills, clear explanation and teaching time. In addition to noting down
vocabulary during lessons, this also includes internet communication with the participants, correcting homework,
searching for suitable websites with materials available for the clients, and preparing activities suitable for the group
of participants.

6. Conclusion

The results indicate that teaching foreign languages to adult persons with acquired visual impairment is one of the
topical issues that need to be further addressed. While in the past blind persons could not do without a Picht machine
or the Braille, today both are replaced by computers, mobile phones, special compensatory devices and related
software. On the one hand, these technological changes provide a greater and more stable platform for the inclusion
of persons with visual impairment, on the other hand, intact individuals, in this case lecturers and teachers of foreign
languages, often lack adequate methodology and an overview of possibilities of educating these persons. This gap in
the recently developed methodology might have far-reaching implications concerning job opportunities and
resocialization and socialization of persons with acquired visual impairment. The quality-based research provides an
insight into the wide issue of educating adult persons with visual impairment. The aspects of the research presented to
the readers will be addressed by means of further research activities.

Acknowledgements

The paper was supported by the following IGA project: IGA_PdF_2016_013

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