The Studt Practicum

The Studt Practicum this year will focus on the development of visual cognition; a key goal for the successful completion of a Vision Therapy program for children with learning challenges as well as for anyone with any level of brain injury. The theories reviewed, and practical methods shown are also effective for those who want to enhance their visual skills: athletes, students and anyone who want to deepen their cognitive reserves.

Some of the topics reviewed and the activities provided will be surrounding the derivation of meaning and processing known information. The significance of developing pattern recognition will be discussed and therapeutic activities will be demonstrated. Methods for developing visual imagery and embodied cognition will be shared.

Outline of Dr. Hillier’s talk:

The Enhancement of Attention and Memory by Developing Refined Experience with Space, Time, and Pattern Recognition

This lecture presents a comprehensive model of vision that extends far beyond eyesight, emphasizing vision’s role in deriving meaning, predicting future events, and guiding movement. The speaker explains how the body and environment collaborate—through gravity, movement, sensory integration, spatial confidence, and abstract thought—to support these purposes.

A major focus is visual attention, broken down into focused, selective, sustained, alternating, and simultaneous attention. Both neurological and environmental influences are explored, including the roles of the frontal lobes, sensory discrimination (JNDs), and priming. The lecture reviews tests commonly used to assess attention, such as CVAT, TOVA, and Trail Making Test.

The second key domain is memory, framed with standard psychological classifications including short-term/working memory, long-term memory (episodic and semantic), and explicit vs. implicit learning. The Ebbinghaus Forgetting Curve is used to highlight the natural decline of memory over time and the need for reinforcement.

Two detailed case studies—a six-year-old boy with significant attention and memory difficulties, and an eight-year-old girl struggling with reading—demonstrate how targeted visual training can dramatically improve functional outcomes. Both children benefited from activities such as the Multi-Matrix Game, Percon III, concept pieces, parquetry blocks, accommodative training, binocular activities, spatial transformations, and Hart chart fixations.

The lecture further highlights pattern recognition as a critical foundational skill for sequencing, spatial understanding, and prediction. Training enhances the visual system’s inherently predictive nature, enabling more efficient processing and decision-making.

The talk concludes by underscoring that one of the most important outcomes of vision therapy is the development of stronger attention and memory systems, supported by specific training strategies such as tactual–visual imagery, spatial transformation tasks, the Method of Loci, mnemonics, and levels-of-processing approaches.

Make sure you have all of the materials! Click Here to view all resources.

Bio:

SAN DIEGO COUNTY OPTOMETRIC SOCIETY – 2019 OPTOMETRIST OF THE YEAR

Dr. Carl Hillier graduated from the University of California San Diego in 1977 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology. He received a Bachelor of Science degree at Pacific University in 1980 and then graduated as a Doctor of Optometry in 1982. He received his Fellowship to COVD in 1986.

Prior to graduation, he helped establish mobile clinics in rural Honduras, and upon his graduation, he was given direct appointment as a lieutenant in the United States Navy Medical Service Corps. He was stationed at Balboa Naval Hospital, San Diego, where he directed the Vision Therapy Clinic.

Dr Carl Hillier is an adjunct clinical professor at the Southern California College of Optometry, Illinois College of Optometry, Western University School of Health Sciences: College of Optometry, and the International College of Optometry in Madrid Spain. He worked with the United States Volleyball teams for 10 years and provides sports vision training with key players on the San Diego Padres Baseball Team.

He has been honored by the American Optometric Association as Sports Optometrist Of The Year, and by the College of Optometrists in Vision Development by receiving the Getman Award, its highest award for clinical excellence.