Teacher educators' views on scientific literacy of visually impaired students

Abstract

The scientific literacy requires ability to use scientific knowledge, to comprehend the world through identifying problems and making results based on evidence, and to make decisions as to the changes caused by human activities. Each person fulfilling the requirements of scientific literacy can be scientifically literate. However, there is a prejudice in the society that visually impaired person cannot not be scientifically literate due to the lack of power of vision. Therefore, a descriptive case study was conducted to identify the perceptions of academicians (teacher educators) regarding the development of scientific literacy by visually impaired people. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with teacher educators and data gathered from interviews was analyzed and presented in descriptive manner. According to the results, there is a consensus among teacher educators which visually impaired people can be scientifically literate provided that necessary training is provided.