5. Using Visual Supports

Have you ever labeled your food in a communal fridge to make sure your delicious lunch wasn’t eaten by a coworker? Or have you left a sticky note on your front door to remind you to bring something specific to work? Maybe you’ve taken a photo of your parking space at the airport or in a parking garage to remind yourself where you left your car. These are all examples of visual supports. These tools really help us remain on task, remember important things, and communicate our wants and needs. Visual supports are helpful for all of us and especially useful when supporting learners with disabilities and learners who are multilingual.

In this video, we’ll talk about how to use these in your program. We’ll see an example of how a high school advisory teacher uses visual supports to help everyone understand the expectations and be successful in advisory. We’ll also see how teachers use visuals to provide individualized support for two students that need a little more help. Let’s dive in.

As we mentioned, many of us use visual information to make sense of the world around us. Visual supports are specific images, schedules, line drawings, photographs, to-do lists, infographics, and more that give us additional information. When supporting learners, visual supports enable us to provide information in a variety of ways.

Let’s consider how one teacher, Ms. Watson, uses visual supports to help everyone in her high school advisory class. Some learners in her advisory period have identified disabilities, such as Khed, and some are multilingual, like Isabella, Zach, and Day.

Advisory starts with the sharing of schoolwide information and news to the whole group. Students are then expected to work independently using a list of predetermined options, except during Spirit Week when there are group activities. While the start of advisory period is pretty straightforward, when it comes to the independent work time, it can feel stressful and chaotic for Ms. Watson as well as for some of the students.

To help things run more smoothly and make sure all of the students have a clear understanding of the expectations and what the options are, Ms. Watson thinks about using visual supports. She wonders if providing a visual schedule using pictures of each option in choice order will help all the learners in her class be more independent with this activity. She began to brainstorm some ideas for visuals that would match each option—things like photos of each activity such as announcements and finishing homework. The group activities during Spirit Week can also be challenging because of the different routine. Ms. Watson takes time to think about how to use visual supports on these days as well.

Next, Ms. Watson will work to teach all of the students in her advisory what the visuals mean. It’s not always clear what visuals mean, especially if we aren’t able to read the text. For example, take an image for “school assembly” and an image representing “art class.” Without the accompanying text, these visuals could mean a number of different things. It’s important to explain and demonstrate in a developmentally appropriate way the meaning of each visual. Show your learners exactly what this means and celebrate when they use the visual independently.

Ms. Watson did this by showing students the visual schedule at the start of the next advisory period. She went through each image and then checked to see if each student could explain how to use the new schedule and what the visuals represented. Keep in mind that the best time to teach learners about specific visuals is before the activity, event, or time they may need to use them.

The third step involves giving learners lots of consistent opportunities to use their visual support and embed this visual into the routine. The more chances a learner has to practice using a visual support, the faster they’ll be able to use it independently. So we want to ensure that learners can practice using their visuals throughout the settings that they’ll need them.

Ms. Watson did this by routinely using the visual schedule every day, periodically reviewing how to use it, and checking in with individual students to make sure they were using it successfully. Whenever there was a change to the visual schedule, Ms. Watson was sure to start the period by announcing and teaching the change to her students.

After a few weeks, Ms. Watson realized that the independent work time during advisory was running much more smoothly. The students were more independent and on task and asked fewer questions about what they should be doing. But there were two kids who seemed like they needed a little bit more support: Khed and Isabella. So Ms. Watson took a more individualized approach.

For Khed, she made an individual visual schedule with photos of each step rather than graphics. Ms. Watson went through the schedule with him individually each advisory period. Then, Khed got to keep his copy of the schedule at his desk—something he found really helpful.

The plan for Isabella was a little different. While she consistently followed the schedule for advisory, she struggled to communicate her wants and needs with the teacher. She often needed time to get started during the independent work time and would become very frustrated if she wasn’t finished before the end of advisory. Isabella had a hard time using her words in these situations, so Ms. Watson made her some visual cards that said “I need more time” and “I’m not ready yet.” She showed Isabella how to use these symbols to communicate what she needed, and she immediately started using them independently. Ms. Watson laminated the cards and encouraged Isabella to keep them in her advisory folder that was kept in the classroom, with extra copies in her backpack and her locker. This way, they were always close by and easy for her to access.

As we saw in this example, and in the individual supports for Khed and Isabella, visuals enable us to provide information in multiple ways and help learners communicate their wants and needs. Of course, visuals are helpful for all learners, but especially useful for students with disabilities and students who are multiple language learners. Things like a visual schedule of activities, a visual checklist of things needed for a certain activity, or individual visuals to help specific learners with a certain routine are simple and easy ways to promote participation and create inclusive environments where everyone gets the support they need.

How might you use visuals in your program?