The light sensory room can be used for a variety of assessment and stimulation exercises. If we have no information about the level of sight a child has, the light sensory room allows us to carry out a variety of tests to let us assess how much a child can see, and what type of stimulus they see best (such as light moving at a particular speed).

Assessment usually entails introducing the child to each separate piece of equipment in the light sensory room and observing how they react to it. For instance the bubble tubes are plastic towers of water which are lit from underneath by coloured lights, when the air is turned on they contain hundreds of rising, glowing bubbles. In a dark room this bright, very unusual display can generally be seen even if the person has very little sight, especially as the eye can be positioned less than an inch away from the bubbles.

If the child is interested by the bubble tubes, they can obviously see at least a little, this on its own can come as a great relief to parents who have been told their children cannot see at all. As the bubbles rise they stimulate the motion receptors in the eye as well as extra centers in the brain. If the child tracks the motion of the bubbles we can tell that the motion centers are working to at least some degree. If they do not track motion this may mean they either cannot tell movement is happening, that they cannot track the movement, or indeed that they do not want to, unfortunately with very young child you cannot ask whether they can see it moving or not. But we can use some of the other equipment to test this, and any tracking skills they have.

The Dark Room, which is currently under construction, will allow us to carry out more tests and exercises, giving us even more opportunities to help children with partial sight.

When we know how much the child can see, and depending on their condition how they see it, we can work out a set of stimulation exercises (or games, as they're also called). With young children as long as they have some sight they can often gain more through further stimulation with light. While children with full sight develop their visual sense without effort in day-to-day living, children with severe partial sight have to exercise their visual sense. Using the Dark Room and the Light Sensory Room we can help with this, offering a starting point from which they can improve with equipment at home. Just simple exercises using a toy torch can help development.

A section of floor in the light sensory room has reactive panels that light up and play a sound when they are stepped on. There are ninety-nine 'voices' which play according to different patterns on the floor. Using this we hope to introduce children to the concept of causal relationships between the actions of their bodies and events in the world. The simultaneous light and sound events also help reward children for actions in a way they understand easily (the sound), which can bring their attention to the other stimulus which is usually not apparent (the light). Fortunately, it's also great fun to use.

The tactile wall takes up three-quarters of one wall in the light sensory room, and we are developing large ones in the main department. It comprises of materials of various textures, lights, various tactile objects and bells for noise. The background to the wall is white, with the material being in dark or bold colours, giving a very distinct change at borders.

Children can use the tactile wall to stimulate a variety of senses at the same time. Linked stimuli such as the difference in texture following the same shaped border as the difference in what can be seen are aimed at developing a understanding that what can be felt as reality is the same as what they can see.

The light cascade, or light waterfall, is a collection of optic fibres which can be switched on and off in a variety of timed patterns. It can be waved around, or children can wrap it around themselves, and be surrounded by light.

We are currently constructing a 'dark room,' not for photography, but to give us more methods of assessing sight and stimulating any sight a person may have.

The room will allow us to cut out all exteraneous light, so any stimulus we then introduce (for example, a single bright light), has a much better chance of being seen by the child being assessed. Once we have discovered if the child can see at all, we can gradually introduce different stimuli, either together or individually, to assess how much sight the child has.