How Vision Therapy Can Improve Your Child's Learning Abilities

When young children have trouble speaking, learning, and developing their fine motor skills, it is often due to a problem with the communication between their eyes and brain. The eyes and brain work together more than most people think, and interferences between these two organs can lead to learning difficulties. Here are several things you should understand about this if you have a young child that is having problems learning.

How The Eyes And Brain Communicate

For your child's brain to process information properly, it must receive accurate information, and this information is transferred from the child's eyes to his or her brain. This occurs naturally when the child's eyes see something. When a child views an object, light enters the eyes and hits nerves found in the retinas. This begins the process of deciphering and interpreting information. After this occurs, chemical changes occur in the retinas, and this causes electrical impulses to be sent to the brain.

When the brain receives these impulses, it completes the process of interpreting the information by encoding it and storing it. This is done to separate details of information from other information that has already been encoded and stored. The brain then maintains the information, which helps store it for long-term purposes. If the eyes are not receiving the information clearly and sending it to the brain accurately, the brain will not be able to process it like it should.

The Causes Of Interference

If anything interferes with this process, the child may have problems learning, and there are a number of things that can interfere. In most cases, the interference is found somewhere in the way the eyes reflect and receive light. If one part of the child's eyes is not working properly, it can cause miscommunications or failure in the transferring of information somewhere between the eyes and the brain. For example, if the child's eyes are not focusing equally on an object or activity, it can lead to a problem somewhere in this process. In addition, if the child's vision is causing him or her to see blurry images, it can also interrupt this process.

The Role Of Glasses

In some situations, eyeglasses may help with this issue. With the proper eyeglasses, a child will be able to see more clearly, which can help if a child is nearsighted or farsighted. Without the ability to actually see the things the child is looking at, he or she is likely to experience problems processing the information. This is why visiting an eye doctor is a good idea if you suspect that your young child may have problems seeing or learning. Unfortunately, getting eyeglasses is not always enough to solve the problem and help your child have an easier time learning things.

How Vision Therapy Helps

When eyeglasses are not enough, you may want to look into vision therapy. Vision therapy is a unique type of therapy offered primarily by optometrists. It can be helpful for people with lazy eyes, poor vision, and learning problems. Through vision therapy, a child will perform a variety of different exercises that strengthen the eyes and help them work efficiently. The goal is to help the child's eyes communicate more efficiently and properly with the brain. If this occurs, your child will not only see an improvement in the way he or she sees, but the child will also have an easier time learning things.

There are a variety of techniques used in vision therapy, and a doctor will choose the activities based on your child's needs. One technique used involves prisms and lenses. The doctor may have the child look through a variety of lenses and prisms as a way of strengthening the eyes. Doctors also use computer programs and equipment to help train the eyes.

Each of these steps can improve the visual process and perception of the eyes and brain, and this will be something that helps your child succeed in learning and in school. This occurs by training the eyes to view things properly. If this can be accomplished, the child's brain will receive accurate information and will be able to successfully complete the process of interrupting and storing information. This will help the child in almost any activity he or she may do.

If you suspect that your child might have a problem with his or her eyesight or eye-brain communications, you may want to look into this by taking the child to an eye doctor. If the eye doctor recommends vision therapy, you may want to follow through with this to help your child's eyes communicate more properly with his or her brain. 

For more information on vision therapy, check out websites like http://www.absolutevisioncare.com.