In education for children with visual impairments, guidance has long been provided to help students overcome and make improvements to deal with the difficulties caused by their disabilities. In the Courses of Study (national curriculum), orientation and mobility instruction, braille, visual aids, tactile perception, and information devices are presented as educational content to promote the independence of children with visual impairments. As the number of children with visual impairments studying in regular schools has increased in recent years, the number of students enrolled in schools for the blind has decreased and the percentage of students with multiple disabilities has increased. As a result of personnel changes, teachers with acquired expertise have been transferred to schools for other types of disabilities, making the maintenance of expertise an urgent issue.

Generally, activities for independent living at schools for the Deaf include various instructions in order to promote language development. Meanwhile, the needs of children with hearing impairment can be diverse. For example, some aim to actively use their hearing, whereas others desire to use sign language as their first language. Therefore, this study suggests that support must be tailored to each individual. Additionally, it is not only important for such students to acquire knowledge but also to apply it to develop their problem-solving skills. It is also necessary to provide guidance to such students on improving self-advocacy, including understanding their own hearing conditions and asking for help when aiming to achieve social independence. Based on the findings, this study indicates that teachers should understand the actual situations of children with hearing impairment, set short- and long-term goals, and collaborate with specialized institutions.

This study aims to introduce the instructional methods and content of activities for independent living (jiritsukatsudo) employed in Japanese schools for intellectual disabilities, focusing on improving related issues. In particular, the following three issues are discussed: (1) objects and contents of activities for independent living that are unclear because they are conducted through the “teaching of integrated subjects” (kaku-kyouka-to wo awaseta-shido) or “school education activities as a whole,” (2) growing needs of the teaching profession and accommodation for students with autism spectrum disorder, (3) effective cooperation with external specialists in schools for intellectual disabilities. To deal with these challenges, it is necessary to improve individualized teaching plans and more research on the relationship between those plans and activities for independent living in these schools.

This study focuses on the status of activities for independent living in education for the physically disabled/health impaired in Japan. In the case of children with a physical disability or impaired health, the teacher focuses on giving instruction in Physical Movements and Health Maintenance activities for independent living (Jiritsu katsudo). The number of children with emotional/mental health disorders has been increasing in recent years, highlighting the need for Psychological Stability; however, practical methods for addressing this have not yet been established. In the future, it will be necessary to promote research in this area because the variety of children with disabilities in the field of education for the physically disabled/health impaired may grow even more.

Previous studies report that sighted people adjust their viewing distance from one reading material or print size to another under the free-viewing condition. Is this tendency true for individuals with low vision? The study uses a reading material with traditional Chinese characters to investigate changes in the viewing distance of people with low vision under the free-viewing condition. What then is the difference between theoretical and observed values? The study recruited 60 participants with low vision and randomly used 17 reading charts with print sizes ranging from 0.3 to 1.3 logMAR. The average of change for all character sizes is 2.56±1.43 cm. From the smallest to the largest character sizes, the difference between the two values then becomes larger. Finally, 99.33% of the data is classified under the same cluster. Thus, viewing distance fluctuates over time, and the result of optimal character size in traditional Chinese needs to be adjusted during assessment. Nearly all results demonstrate that viewing distance decreases with the increase in reading time.