Lesson 2 - What do people who are blind see?

Eye Model Activity

Will a magnifying glass or other handheld lens work instead of the credit card-sized lens?

You can do this activity using a magnifying glass, but it won’t work quite the same way as the credit-card-sized lens. Here are a few things to consider if you are planning to use a different lens:

• The eye model is designed to fit the credit card-sized lens. If you use a handheld magnifying glass or a different size lens, it will not fit into the eye model, so your students would only be able to experiment with moving the lens around.
• The step-by-step activity instructions will not walk your students through the activity with the adapted supplies, since they wouldn't be making the eye model (because the lens wouldn't fit.) However, as long as you're comfortable improvising, you should be good to go!
• The next lesson uses the eye model again to experiment with how the pupil works. Without making the eye model according to the activity instructions, you will have to improvise more in the next activity.

As long as you're comfortable modifying the activity, a regular magnifying glass or another hand lens will work fine. We recommend watching the step-by-step instructions ahead of time to plan how you’ll adapt the steps to use a different lens, and even test it out yourself first.

If you have any additional questions about this activity, contact us. We’ll be happy to help!