RO&Ming with Lil
40 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 2 years ago -ROaMing with Lil is for people who do their best work on street corners – orientation and mobility specialists, guide dog mobility instructors and people with low vision or blindness. It provides a forum for people to learn more about functional vision, orientation and mobility from an Australian perspective. The first season is focusing on tele-practice, and functional assessment, using the VROOM and OMO tools with clients.
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Episodes
Ep 35 What is ARIA assistive tech? - Robert
March 23, 2022 19:00 - 26 minutes - 18.5 MBRobert Yearsley is CEO of ARIA Research, which stands for Augmented Reality in Audio. ARIA is a new approach to assistive technology being developed with, and for people who are blind. ARIA uses machine learning to turn camera vision into a novel soundscape for the user to interpret during activities of daily living, including orientation and mobility. ARIA is in its early development, and the team is looking for ideas and participation from people with ultra-low vision or blindness, and fro...
34 O&M pathways to international development - Jo
June 01, 2021 11:00 - 39 minutes - 27.2 MBJo Webber is a disability inclusion advisor, currently working in Kiribati and Vanuatu. For those interested in international work, Jo challenges us become dual qualified in international development so that we can work with others to create sustainable O&M services in Pacific Island countries.
33 Inventing the Stuart Tactile Maps test - Ian
March 17, 2021 07:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBOrientation is the vital O in O&M and we might assume that everyone can learn orientation, but this is not the case. How can we assess a person’s ability to learn orientation to new places? The Stuart Tactile Maps test is a table top test of spatial cognition that only takes 10 minutes to administer. Everyone does the test wearing a blindfold whether or not they have vision and the test predicts a person’s ability to use mental mapping for orientation. So where did this test come from? In th...
32 The Australian Leadership Paradox - Liz
February 22, 2021 04:00 - 44 minutes - 30.6 MBHappy new year, in late February! In this first episode for 2021, I have a dream... and I’m talking with Liz Skelton, who also has a vision for an equitable and inclusive society where people, place, and planet thrive. In 2013, Liz and co-author Geoff Aigner published a book called The Australian Leadership Paradox. They identify four paradoxes in Australian leadership culture that we need to grapple with if we want to embrace positive change in the low vision and blindness sector.
31 Guide dogs with wheelchairs and complex needs - Lee
December 17, 2020 19:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBLee Stanway is a Guide Dog Mobility Instructor based in the UK who specialises in tricky dog matches. He works with people who have low vision or blindness and use a wheelchair, or need assistance with tasks around the home, or an epilepsy alert, or help to hear the doorbell, along with the guiding function of the dog.
30 Social navigation in the Pacific islands - Ben
December 10, 2020 20:00 - 43 minutes - 30.2 MBBen Clare is an inclusive education adviser, scholarship facilitator, and regular visitor to the Pacific Islands, having also lived in the Solomon Islands and Samoa for several years. Ben has no light perception and some spatial challenges, so he has learned to build networks and travel confidently in multiple countries using his long cane and fabulous social navigation skills. Ben is convener of the first online SPEVI conference, 18-19 January 2021.
30 Social navigation in the Pacific islands - Ben
December 10, 2020 20:00 - 43 minutes - 30.2 MBBen Clare is an inclusive education adviser, scholarship facilitator, and regular visitor to the Pacific Islands, having also lived in the Solomon Islands and Samoa for several years. Ben has no light perception and some spatial challenges, so he has learned to build networks and travel confidently in multiple countries using his long cane and fabulous social navigation skills. Ben is convener of the first online SPEVI conference, 18-19 January 2021.
29 Life skills for being-in-the-unseen-world - Errol
December 03, 2020 17:00 - 44 minutes - 30.4 MBErrol Ingram is an O&M Specialist who completed a PhD thesis in 2019 called The Lived Experience of Acquiring Life Skills with Congenital Total Blindness: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. How did Errol realise he had a PhD in him waiting to get out? And what did he discover about the life skills needed for being-in-the-never-seen-world, including orientation and mobility skills?
28 Learning life skills at blind and mainstream schools - Joe
November 26, 2020 18:00 - 44 minutes - 30.5 MBJoe Stephen is a blind software developer from Adelaide, now living in Tasmania. He has written an article reflecting on his experience starting at a blind primary school, then moving into mainstream secondary schools, before completing a Bachelor of Science (Computer Studies) at Flinders University. Joe suggests we need both specialist and mainstream education options. But if blind schools are a thing of the past, then we need to find other ways for blind kids to build life skills so they ...
27 Doing inner work - Peter
November 19, 2020 18:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBIn Orientation and Mobility practice, it is a privilege to hear and hold another person’s story as we hatch a plan of action together. But we can crash around in other people’s lives if we don’t pause to understand how our own expectations, priorities and agendas affect our relationships. Peter Bentley, spiritual director and Enneagram teacher encourages us to notice what inhibits life and what brings joy. Peter explains many ways to do our own inner work, so we can work effectively with oth...
26 Using the Enneagram to work on health - Jane
November 12, 2020 20:00 - 40 minutes - 27.8 MBJane Bradley is a Seeing Eye Dog Instructor and a self-confessed behaviour nerd, interested in how learning works across the species. We discuss the Enneagram personality model. The Enneagram can be used to understand our own personality type and our relationship with other types at home and in the workplace. We can gain insight into the motivations, priorities, and trigger points of colleagues. By identifying the direction of integration/health of a person’s type, we can identify circumstan...
25 Doing a cultural audit in a toxic workplace - Tim
November 05, 2020 19:00 - 42 minutes - 29 MBA toxic workplace makes people sick, and when we recognise this problem we need to do something about it. Morale spirals downwards, physical symptoms increase, mental health suffers, people leave, wounded, and the workforce is depleted. Tim Dyer, organisational consultant, shows how a cultural audit can help us evaluate what and who we’re working with in our own organisation. We can celebrate the signs of health and growth. We can also bring aspects of unhealthy culture into the light of day...
24 Embracing otherness with personality models - Tim
October 29, 2020 21:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBTim Dyer is an organisational consultant based in Tasmania. Twenty years ago, Tim came to my mums’ group and said, “If you learn a personality model – it doesn’t really matter which one – it gives you a common language to understand how people are different to each other. Then you can raise your children to be themselves, not you.” This was very good advice, not just at home, but at work too. We explore how personality models can help us understand others in the workplace.
23 Creating an International O&M Online Symposium - Kassy
October 22, 2020 09:00 - 39 minutes - 26.9 MBKassandra Maloney is a Certified Orientation and Mobility Specialist (COMS), living in Austin, Texas. After working at the Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired for 11 years, she set out solo as Allied Independence. Kassy knows what it’s like to be tied to home with two babies during early mothering, while her O&M colleagues disappeared to an International Mobility Conference in Dublin. But she’s a millennial, undaunted by technology and entrepreneurship. Kassy and her team create...
22 Navigating the world of work - Bruce
October 15, 2020 18:00 - 38 minutes - 26.4 MBThe O&M profession in Australia is in the midst of a revolution and some O&M specialists are feeling the pinch. This is the first in a series of episodes looking more closely at the world of work. We’ll be discussing workplace health, toxicity and tools for developing resilience in a time of extraordinary change. Bruce Everett is an international change consultant with a background in business and commerce, and more recent experience in the not-for profit sector. He offers us a useful outsid...
21 Captivated by the CVI Range - Laura
October 08, 2020 16:00 - 44 minutes - 30.8 MBLaura Garcia is mum to Eva, now aged 8. When she was one year old, Eva contracted herpes simplex virus, which passed the blood-brain barrier and damaged Eva’s visual cortex. The result was CVI – cortical visual impairment – with no visual response. Laura was desperate for resources that would guide her in mothering Eva. She discovered the CVI Range, which became a place of obsession for a year, and she used the CVI Range to assess Eva every month. During this time Laura learned to recognise ...
20 Accessible adventures with Cocky Guides - Buck
October 01, 2020 18:00 - 38 minutes - 26.6 MBCocky Guides is a small group tour company, based in Sydney, specialising in accessible adventures for people with low vision or blindness. Why wait for people who are sight-seeing when you can try hang-gliding, go sailing or tour the wineries with other keen travellers? Buck McFarlane guides us through some accessible Australian adventures, while planning future tours to New Zealand and Tonga, with spare long canes in hand. He has inspired a possible parallel career for O&M specialists as a...
19 Independent O&M in Kiribati - Jess
September 24, 2020 20:00 - 43 minutes - 29.7 MBJess Timmons is an independent Orientation and Mobility (O&M) Specialist who also works as a disability support worker and access consultant in Melbourne. In 2019 she volunteered to accompany an independent consultant with low vision to Kiribati in the Pacific Ocean. Kiribati (population 110,000) is a nation of coral islands straddling the equator and the international dateline. Jess describes daily life, disability, access and the challenges involved in sustainable community development thr...
19 Independent O&M in Kiribati - Jess
September 24, 2020 20:00 - 43 minutes - 29.7 MBJess Timmons is an independent Orientation and Mobility (O&M) Specialist who also works as a disability support worker and access consultant in Melbourne. In 2019 she volunteered to accompany an independent consultant with low vision to Kiribati in the Pacific Ocean. Kiribati (population 110,000) is a nation of coral islands straddling the equator and the international dateline. Jess describes daily life, disability, access and the challenges involved in sustainable community development thr...
18 VROOM and OMO with an international jetsetter - Meredith
September 17, 2020 15:00 - 44 minutes - 30.4 MBDr Meredith Prain is a speech pathologist who works with people who have deafblindness and she travels internationally on her own. She has low vision from Leber’s so was curious to discover her own VROOM and OMO scores. Merry rated 32/50 for functional vision and 41/50 for orientation and mobility, and she wanted to explore what she could do to push that OMO score up to 50.
17 Accessing street corners with 3D printing - Leona
September 10, 2020 19:00 - 39 minutes - 27.4 MBThis week we meet Leona Holloway from Monash University. Leona entered the world of braille transcription straight after uni and is now a passionate advocate of inclusive technologies and accessible graphics for people with low vision or blindness. She is currently developing guidelines for 3D printing so that 3D models are accessible to touch readers. She is also working with O&M specialists to create 3D printed intersections we can use to teach street crossings.
16 CVI through the eyes of an orthoptist - Natalia
September 03, 2020 23:00 - 42 minutes - 29.4 MBNatalia Kelly is an orthoptist from Melbourne who was captivated by cortical visual impairment (CVI) from the start of her career 17 years ago. Since then, the scope of practice for orthoptists has expanded in Australia. In her private practice, Vision Matters, Natalia does specialised work using biofeedback to reinforce eccentric viewing for reading, reducing the font size for some patients from n80 to n10! Meanwhile, her fascination with CVI continues. She delights in working with children...
15 Bears, snow and earthquakes - Alana
August 27, 2020 19:00 - 33 minutes - 23 MBAlana Bogart is an O&M specialist from Canada who now works for Blind Low Vision New Zealand. Alana takes us on a journey into the snow-bound villages and islands of British Columbia at minus 25 degrees, where she worked with First Nations people. She learned to call a cane a stick, fall down safely in the snow, and look out for bears. In Christchurch, she found some clients were more interested in learning long cane skills after the earthquakes – it seems that independent travel skills are ...
14 Fostering professional development - Darren
August 20, 2020 20:00 - 34 minutes - 23.8 MBThis episode, we’re talking with Darren Moyle, an O&M Specialist who works for Vision Australia in Melbourne. Darren has a passion for integrating sport and technology into O&M programs. He loves working with kids and he has just become a dad himself. Darren describes some of his Aha! moments in training as an O&M specialist 9 years ago, the things he finds life-giving about the job, and his own use of technology in navigating public transport and travel while working in Melbourne suburbia a...
13 Toddling with CVI - Luka, Heidi and Bronwen
August 13, 2020 18:00 - 43 minutes - 30.2 MBToday we meet Bronwen Scott and Heidi Zec. Bronwen is an independent Orientation and Mobility Specialist and Heidi is the mother of Luka, a delightful two year old with cortical visual impairment. They have worked together with Luka for the past 18 months to help develop his functional vision in the context of daily routines. This year Bronwen and Heidi have joined forces to create the CVI Community Australia. This online group connects and supports parents and professionals who are navigati...
12 Co-rating COVID isolation - Ross and Josh
August 06, 2020 20:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBFour years ago, traveling independently in inner city Melbourne, Ross de Vent scored VROOM 14/50 for his functional vision (Fragments), and OMO 33/50 for his functional mobility (Capable). Ross now lives on the fringe of metropolitan Melbourne and has been in COVID isolation with his household and guide dog for the past 4 months. Today, we found that Ross’ vision and mobility scores have both dropped to VROOM 6/50 (Fifty shades of grey) and OMO 28/50 (Cautious), despite his clinical vision r...
11 Co-rating wee bairns with VROOM and OMO - Lisa
July 30, 2020 18:00 - 43 minutes - 30.2 MBLisa Petrie is an Habilitation Specialist with Guide Dogs UK, based in Scotland. Lisa enjoys working with children who have complex needs, and she also manages O&M services for adults, children and young people (CYP). Lisa and her teams have been piloting the VROOM and OMO functional assessment tools with all ages. In 2018, we tested out the VROOM and OMO tools assessing the functional vision and mobility skills of two year old boys, Theo and Luke. They both have CVI – cerebral visual impair...
10 Aha! moments with VROOM and OMO - Diana
July 23, 2020 15:00 - 43 minutes - 29.6 MBDiana Grobler works in northern New South Wales, serving orientation and mobility clients across a large region. She has many older clients with macular degeneration who love to chat. Diana is a relative newbie in the O&M field, but she has done 12 or 13 VROOM and OMO assessments this year, both face to face and via tele-practice. Diana shares with us some of her Aha! moments, and questions that have arisen while using the VROOM and OMO tools during COVID restrictions.
9 Comparisons and Precision with VROOM and OMO
July 16, 2020 15:00 - 37 minutes - 25.6 MBIn Episode 5 we did a did a VROOM and OMO assessment with Erica Tandori, who scored 29/50 for her functional vision and 39/50 for her functional mobility. Erica chooses not to use a mobility aid most of the time, relying on her peripheral vision and fabulous mental mapping skills to maintain her orientation and her safety on familiar routes like the public transport trip to work. But Erica likes to take an arm when walking in less familiar places. This frees up her vision to look around and ...
8 Choosing environmental complexity in VROOM and OMO assessments
July 09, 2020 20:00 - 42 minutes - 29.1 MBOrientation and Mobility (O&M) textbooks talk about indoor and outdoor travel skills. Outdoor places are usually classified according to their purpose or zoning – residential, semi-business and business environments, petrol stations and shopping centres. However, environmental purpose doesn’t necessarily tell us about complexity. It can be easier to cross at the traffic lights in the city than an uncontrolled residential road. The O&M Environmental Complexity Scale provides a way to think ab...
7 Measuring Mel's ups and downs with VROOM and OMO
July 02, 2020 15:00 - 43 minutes - 29.8 MBMel Stephens is an independent 26 year old, horse-loving train tragic with no light perception and an addiction to cruises. Mel was a research participant in the Bionic Vision Australia project in 2013, so she was there at the inception and birth of the VROOM and OMO functional assessment tools. We have now done four VROOM and OMO ratings with Mel over a seven year period. The VROOM tool captured her decline from low vision to blindness from Leber’s Congenital Amaurosis. The OMO tool capture...
6 What do the VROOM and OMO numbers mean?
June 25, 2020 15:00 - 33 minutes - 22.9 MBIn this episode, Jo Anson-Smith, an orientation and mobility specialist from Newcastle, reports the VROOM and OMO scores for the client she assessed through tele-practice a few weeks ago. Let’s call him Ken. We also revisit Erica Tandori’s VROOM and OMO results from last episode. I explain how we can interpret these results in 10 point categories, with F words for VROOM categories and C words for OMO categories. Jo explains some of her decision-making challenges in using these assessment too...
5 A co-rating conversation with Erica - Interview only
June 18, 2020 07:00 - 44 minutes - 30.9 MBErica Tandori is a visual artist with two kids, a cat, a hole in the backyard, a doctorate, a university job, and Stargardt’s Disease. This juvenile form of macular degeneration means that Erica has trouble seeing what she is looking at directly, but her peripheral vision is still useful. Erica describes it as colourful, soft and blurry like “living in a Monet painting,” with the occasional visual hallucination to keep her guessing. Erica has not had orientation and mobility training, but sh...
Using VROOM and OMO for the first time - in telepractice
June 11, 2020 15:00 - 38 minutes - 26.2 MBJo Anson-Smith is a dual qualified Occupational Therapist/Orientation and Mobility (O&M) Specialist working in Newcastle, Australia. When we talked with Jo in Episode 2, she was exploring tele-practice with occupational therapy clients, but she hadn’t yet made the leap into O&M tele-practice. In this episode we talk with Jo about teaching the long cane to a man with intellectual disability, via Zoom. Then Jo describes her first VROOM and OMO functional assessment with a client, via FaceTime ...
4 Using VROOM and OMO for the first time - in telepractice
June 11, 2020 15:00 - 38 minutes - 26.2 MBJo Anson-Smith is a dual qualified Occupational Therapist/Orientation and Mobility (O&M) Specialist working in Newcastle, Australia. When we talked with Jo in Episode 2, she was exploring tele-practice with occupational therapy clients, but she hadn’t yet made the leap into O&M tele-practice. In this episode we talk with Jo about teaching the long cane to a man with intellectual disability, via Zoom. Then Jo describes her first VROOM and OMO functional assessment with a client, via FaceTime ...
3 What are the VROOM and OMO tools?
June 05, 2020 05:00 - 32 minutes - 22.3 MBThis episode introduces VROOM and OMO – two functional assessment tools created by an O&M specialist who loves ridiculous acronyms. VROOM stands for vision-related outcomes in orientation and mobility, and OMO stands for orientation and mobility outcomes. These are constructivist (not objective or subjective) assessment tools designed to co-rate a client’s functional vision and mobility, giving each a score out of 50. We meet Ewa Borkowski from Guide Dogs NSW/ACT, whose team is using the VRO...
Working from the COVID cave
May 27, 2020 16:00 - 34 minutes - 23.6 MBThis podcast is recorded in the time of Coronavirus lockdown, when Orientation and Mobility (O&M) specialists are fast needing to learn about tele-practice. We meet four O&M specialists from Guide Dogs NSW/ACT who are venturing into the brave new world of O&M tele-practice: Amy McKibbins, Zoë Gephart, Tayler McBrien, and Jo Anson-Smith
2 Working from the COVID cave
May 27, 2020 16:00 - 34 minutes - 23.6 MBThis podcast is recorded in the time of Coronavirus lockdown, when Orientation and Mobility (O&M) specialists are fast needing to learn about tele-practice. We meet four O&M specialists from Guide Dogs NSW/ACT who are venturing into the brave new world of O&M tele-practice: Amy McKibbins, Zoë Gephart, Tayler McBrien, and Jo Anson-Smith
Welcome to RO&Ming with Lil
May 27, 2020 16:00 - 4 minutes - 3.43 MBThis episode introduces ROaMing with Lil. It describes the role of an Orientation and Mobility Specialist, and a profession that does its best work on street corners! ROaMing with Lil is intended to provide a forum for people to learn more about functional vision, and orientation and mobility practice from an Australian perspective. It offers professional development for O&M specialists and guide dog mobility instructors worldwide.
1 Welcome to RO&Ming with Lil
May 27, 2020 15:00 - 4 minutes - 3.43 MBThis episode introduces ROaMing with Lil. It describes the role of an Orientation and Mobility Specialist, and a profession that does its best work on street corners! ROaMing with Lil is intended to provide a forum for people to learn more about functional vision, and orientation and mobility practice from an Australian perspective. It offers professional development for O&M specialists and guide dog mobility instructors worldwide.