Home        Site Map

 x

All parents recognize how vital good vision is to their children's development. As children grow and mature, over 80% of what they learn is processed through their eyes.  However, most people have a limited understanding of what good vision means.  Good vision involves much more than just seeing clearly without glasses.  

When most parents think about vision, they think about their child's clearness of sight, or visual acuity--in other words, the sharpness of vision as measured by the eye chart.  When a child has 20/20 vision, it means that each of his eyes can see what an average person sees at a distance of 20 feet.  If a child fails the eye chart test, he can get glasses or contacts to correct his blurry vision.  But the eye chart's use is limited to only checking a child's sharpness of vision, usually measured at distance.  

The eye chart cannot test many other important visual skills that children need to succeed in today's modern world, especially at school.  For example, the eye chart can't check how well children team or coordinate their eyes at the close distances required for reading, how well they can track a line of print without losing their place, how well they can adjust focus changes from near to far distances, or how well they can understand and make sense of what they see.  These are problems glasses can't correct.  Children can have good sharpness of vision (20/20) and still have serious problems in these other areas. 

The only eye test most children have is a brief screening at school which only checks their distance vision using the eye chart.   Each year thousands of children suffer from undetected vision problems that can make school and life difficult.  In addition, children with crossed eyes and lazy eyes face especially demanding challenges.  Children with poor visual skills may struggle to read, have short attentions, perform poorly in sports, develop low self-esteem, and have doors closed to many future careers because of poor visual skills. 

Is your child at risk?  A simple screening quiz can give you accurate information about tell-tale symptoms that flag potential problems.  Click here for more information. 

.

  
 

The Children's Vision Information Network was created to raise public awareness about potential vision problems in children.  This site is not intended as a substitute for a complete eye exam and professional advice from your family optometrist.  Parents, teachers, occupational therapists, psychologists, and related professionals have permission to copy and distribute information contained in the site for educational purposes only with the condition that each page is copied in its entirety with the URL included (www.ChildrensVision.com).  All publishing rights are reserved. Direct specific inquiries to Mary Barton, Director of Vision Therapy, at (316) 722-3740 or email VTDirector@ChildrensVision.com.