General Materials Used to Adapt Books for Children with CVI

Collage of CVI Materials By Diane Sheline, TVI, CLVT

Please begin by reading:

The following items are general materials that can be used when adapting books for children with cortical visual impairment (CVI):

11 X 17 inch flat, black heavy weight paper (I use Neenah, 80 lb. Astrobrights Cover Eclipse Black)
8.5 X 11 inch flat, black heavy weight paper (I use Neenah, 80 lb. Astrobrights Cover Eclipse Black)
Tru Bind Small Office Binding Machine (TB-S20A)
Tru Bind Black Coil Bindings 3/8”
Tru Bind Black Coil Bindings 9/16”
Coil Cutting and Crimping Tool (Watch the YouTube Video for how to use the Crimping Tool: How to Use Coil Crimping Pliers for Spiral Coil Binding)
Pro-Click Covers (rather than the Neenah paper noted above, I have also used these covers as pages, using the flat, black side of the cover, not the shiny side)
Pro-Click Spines (these spines go along with the Covers above, and can be clicked open and closed, again and again, for easy removal of just one page or two pages to present)
Clear, round, self-adhesive rubber pad bumpers, to use as “Page Fluffers”
Variety of adhesives, including (but not limited to); glue stick, glue gun, 3M Scotch-Weld Instant Adhesive, Velcro, Contact Strips and Stick-it Dots
Medium Binder Clips
Black clothespins with Velcro on one edge for attaching to an Invisiboard or All-In-One Board to hang individual pages from. Use a flat, black spray paint on natural wood colored clothes pins. When the clothes pins are spray painted black, they “disappear” into the black background and do not cause additional “visual clutter”
All-in-One-Board and/or Invisiboard (available through APH)

Materials to Create Specific Books

In addition to the above General Materials, you will need the following specific materials to create the books below:

Red Mylar Gift Bags (I use 4” X 6” size); these often come in a set of 3 at The Dollar Store
Red chenille stems or pipe cleaners OR strip of yellow paper

Disposable 3” Aluminum Foil Tart/Pie Pans Mold; these can be ordered on Amazon and come in a package of 250 pieces
Red Puff Balls, use 1” or 2” size; these are often called “Pom Poms” at the craft stores, but should not be confused with the mylar cheerleader-like pom poms used in another book and noted below

Red inexpensive mylar pom poms that can be taken apart and modified in size; you can often find these at the Dollar Store or you can cut apart and modify a metallic red foil fringe curtain/doorway to create mini pom poms (find at Amazon)
Scrunchy pony tail holders, to bind and create the mini pom poms (2 per pom pom)

Yellow Slinky Jr., by Poof; cut one Slinky apart into smaller sections (I made mine into 7 smaller sections)

Leorx LED Party Lights; these are small, LED lights which are designed to go in paper lanterns, can be ordered from Amazon and come in a package of 30. Note: I often place one or more of these inside of a balloon to light it up! ALTERNATELY, you can use LED Finger Lights. The advantage of using the Finger Lights is the color; they come in either red, green, blue or white. They can be ordered from Amazon as well and often come in a package of 10 to 40.

Five to ten, 5” X 7” matte finish, color photographs of your student’s favorite toys or objects. This might include favorite toys such as an O’Ball, or an Elmo doll, or it might include objects he/she encounters during familiar routines such as a favorite cup or lighted spoon

Clifford’s Family, by Norman Bridwell, paperback version available on Amazon (Note: you will need 3 copies of the same book to make the modified, progressive version I show in the sample)
Red, mylar-like ribbon and glittery craft tape, to highlight Clifford’s collar; it will be used both as a salient feature and to draw visual attention

Black, round elastic
Black retractable badge holder
1/4th inch thick pegboard
2” X 2” hardwood board
1” X 2” hardwood board
½” doweling, 3 feet
Active Learning materials to put on the pages
A very complete Tutorial on how to make and assemble this book can be found in the DIY section of my website at strategytosee.com.

For additional suggestions, see also Materials for Literacy.