NEW YORK Dr. Grace Ambrose-Zaken kicked off California Association of Orientation and Mobility Specialist (CAOMS) first online professional development for its membership. According to Nicholas Casias, COMS organizer of the event, the CAOMS membership voted in favor of the Toddler App and Cane TAC system to be their inaugural online professional development offering.
Dr Ambrose-Zaken, spoke for an hour connecting the dots between toddlers with visual impairment, unsafe mobility, and their risk for acquiring developmental delays in motor, concepts, language and social skills. The toddler cane is not about teaching a skill like syncopated cane arc, Ambrose-Zaken said, it is about increasing the percentage of safe mobility for a child with visual impairment. When toddlers who are blind walk without tactile next step warning, their percentage of safe mobility is zero. Wearing the toddler cane increases safe mobility to above 90%.
The CAOMS membership had one question, "how do we get one?" I love that question, because it means our O&M specialists came to the meeting in search of solutions to problems they have already identified. The answer is, contact us on the website, as soon as we cane we'll mail a measurement kit and create a custom cane. There is a waiting list for testing the prototype.
We hope that we will have a commercial-ready toddler app and cane system in two years.
Image of a little girl wearing the current toddler cane prototype.
