Title: Eyesight Affects Grades
Producer:  Emily Halevy
Feed: CWKN #379, April 2, 2008
Time: 1:29
SUGGESTED LEAD: POOR PERFORMANCE IN SCHOOL COULD MEAN A LOT OF DIFFERENT THINGS: DYSLEXIA, ILLITERACY, ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER, NOT FITTING IN … OR IT COULD JUST MEAN YOUR CHILD NEEDS A NEW PAIR OF GLASSES.  THAT STORY TONIGHT ON CONNECT WITH KIDS.
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NARR: FIVE-YEAR-OLD MADDIE SUFFERS FROM ‘AMBLYOPIA.’ (PRONOUNCED ‘AM blee OH pee ah’).

A PROBLEM IN THE VISION CENTER OF THE BRAIN THAT CAN LEAD TO LOSS OF SIGHT. (:07)
               
SUPER: Jerry Berland, M.D., Pediatric Opthamologist (:09)
“If there’s an abnormality in the eyes, so that the brain is presented with a blurred image, or an abnormal image, then the visual center in the brain doesn’t develop properly.”

NARR: ACCORDING TO A STUDY BY U-C SAN DIEGO, CHILDREN WITH UNCORRECTED VISION PROBLEMS SCORE LOWER ON MOTOR SKILL AND INTELLIGENCE TESTS THAN CHILDREN WHO CAN SEE CLEARLY.

THE STUDY ALSO FOUND THAT WHEN THE CHILDREN’S VISION WAS CORRECTED, THEIR TEST SCORES IMPROVED. (:16)

SUPER: Sharon Berger, O.D., Optometrist (:38)
“There’s so many children that have struggled and struggled and struggled only to find out at age ten or eleven that they had a vision problem that would’ve made learning a lot easier had they found out when-before the child started school.”

NARR: THAT’S WHY, EXPERTS SAY, EARLY VISION SCREENINGS ARE SO IMPORTANT ... THEY DETECT PROBLEMS THAT OFTENTIMES PARENTS AND KIDS AREN’T AWARE OF.  (:08)

SOT: Sharon Berger, O.D., Optometrist (1:00)
“They don’t know how to verbalize that print’s going in and out of focus or words are doubling or the words are jumping around on the page they don’t know how to describe that and so therefore they don’t tell their parents hey, something’s wrong with my eyes.”

NARR: NOW, WITH GLASSES, FOR MADDIE, LETTERS AND NUMBERS AND PICTURES ARE NO LONGER BLURRY. (:06)
 
SUPER: Jessica Connell, Maddie’s Mother (1:21)
“She said it’s a whole new world, I can see, and she was looking just at everything and I almost cried, it was fantastic.”

SUGGESTED TAG:  EXPERTS SAY A VISION SCREENING ONCE A YEAR IS SUFFICIENT.  BUT IF ONE SCREENING PROVES, INCONCLUSIVE, AS OFTEN HAPPENS WITH VERY YOUNG CHILDREN… PARENTS SHOULD HAVE THEM CHECKED AGAIN IN A FEW MONTHS TO SEE IF SERIOUS PROBLEMS CAN BE DETECTED.