Helpful Hint by a Mother Who Knows How It Is

My goal for myself is to provide information to people involved in the special education community. My tip of the week idea may turn into tip of the day as I have 11 years of information to share!

I have been thinking about this for a very long time and where to start - so I chose to start at the beginning - and the first feeling I had when my son was diagnosed with autism. FEAR. Fear was the first emotion that I experienced, dealt with for years and have finally overcome. Fear of the unknown...

Music and Movement In the Home - Do Your Children Have an Advantage?

What are your memories regarding music and movement in your younger years? Do you remember the type of music your parents listened to around the house? Do certain songs or types of music trigger memories? There may be love songs that still remind you of the way your first girlfriend smelled, or you may have songs that are associated with negative memories in your mind. This shows how powerful early childhood music experiences can be for most people!

Since the experiences your children have today with music could continue to affect them much later in life, there are ways you can use music and movement to their advantage. You can give your children early childhood music experiences that bring back positive memories, relaxation and encouragement when they are much older.

Does My Child Have a Reading Disability?

Reading is an important first step on a child's path to success in life. A child that is an excellent reader is a confident child, has a high level of self -esteem and is able to easily make the transition from learning to read to reading to learn. For many of us reading is a natural process and we can read with ease and pleasure. Unfortunately, for a child with a reading disability, the reading process can become a frustrating and negative experience and is often very difficult to master.

What is a Reading Disability?

A reading disability is an inherited condition that makes it extremely difficult to read, write, and spell despite at least an average intelligence.

How Children Grow, Learn and Protect Memories Through Music and Movement

What feelings begin to erupt in your body when you hear the sound of your favorite song on the radio? Do you hear the music and movement takes over your body? For many people, this is the natural course of action. Music hits their ears and their bodies can't help but move. They want to get up and dance or tap their foot to the beat. They may experience other emotions like sadness or a feeling of regret depending on the connection that they have to the music. This connection can be in place due to early childhood music or music that had an impact on them as adults.

What effect does music have on you? Are there certain songs that just grab your heart or make your hips svay?

Our music preferences are sometimes put in place early on in our lives. Oftentimes, parents use early childhood music to calm them to sleep or to wake them up in the mornings. Music can be a call to playtime or a winding down habit just like story time. It is very common for adults who are very passionate about music to trace the roots of their passion back to earlier years in their life. They learned to take joy in music and movement because it was valued and encouraged in their childhood environment.

How to Advocate for Your Child With Asperger Syndrome

If your child was recently diagnosed with Asperger Syndrome, you will need to educate yourself about AS in order to understand how it affects him/her so that you can provide relevant information about his/her needs to the school in writing. You want to give the teacher as much information about your child as possible, in terms of how AS affects him/her, but at the same time keep the document as short as possible. That way the teacher is more likely to read ALL of it.

Here are a few points to consider including in your document:

Highlight the safety needs, both for your child and others. This will be the best way to get support for your child in the classroom (if that's what you want). Think in terms of anxiety related behaviours and meltdowns that may lead to destructive behaviour or aggressive behaviour towards others, and the potential for your son or daughter to be the target of bullies.

Help Your Gifted Child Having Math Learning Disability Triumph His Curriculums

Have you noticed your child saying that he hates math, he can't get math or he don't want to do math? Compared to other facets of learning like reading, parents are tolerant towards their child not taking interest in the subject. Not to forget, math is the most essential subject of your child's curriculum and is highly significant in your child's life and his future prospects. But, a question that might pop up in the minds of many would be that why does your special child show so much of disinterest in learning math?

The answer lies in the fact that your child is having math learning disorder or in other words Discalculia. It is scientifically known as math learning disability. It is a state where people puzzle to identify math symbols and concepts. The fundamental sign incorporates reading and language skills. The sufferers often have obscurity in basic calculation. There are many parents who might think that sending their children to elementary school teachers is the best solution for their dilemma. But they are not aware of the fact that the teachers themselves have proved to be uncomfortable with the subject. In fact, many elementary teachers suffer from math unease themselves. Therefore, most elementary teachers are not good authorities on the mathematical learning and approach of their students.

The 5 Secrets Of Learning That No-One Ever Told You

Secret Number 1 - Brain Hemisphere Dominance

Everyone knows that we have two brain hemispheres - the left and the right. Logic and Gestalt.

The left hand hemisphere or the logic hemisphere handles our ability to see the bits and pieces that make up information - our ability to see the trees in the forest. It controls our ability to sequence information and put it in an orderly pattern. It helps us to see logical progressions and to recognise patterns such as number facts (multiplication tables) and rhymes.

The right hand hemisphere or Gestalt hemisphere handles our emotions, our ability to see the big picture - the reason why. It helps us to make sense of the bits and pieces in a meaningful and emotionally relevant way. The Gestalt hemisphere handles intuition and it is what allows us to make intuitive leaps - those flashes of brilliance when seemingly unconnected information comes together into something amazing. It governs our ability to relate to others with compassion and empathy. It is our creative side, our artistic and musically inclined self. Without it, the bits and pieces supplied by the logical hemisphere are meaningless pieces of information.

How Do You Know When You Need to Get Grounded?

If you've only just come across the concept of grounding and how tremendously it helps in dealing with any learning difficulties, that's the excellent first step to success! But how will you know when you are ungrounded? What will let you know when getting grounded would help you?

Here are some signs of being ungrounded:

Benefits of an Early Education

Some of the benefits of teaching a young child might not be seen immediately. Parents invest large amounts of time to make sure that their child receives all of the formal education that they are entitled to by Law and likewise, they might additionally seek out academic advantages from other sources that can prove useful to the youngster further down the road in life. The advantages might be seen in larger pay rates or from a medical marvel that the scholar achieved.

The general schooling programs ensure that young students graduate with a certain level of understanding about the basic principles related to reading, writing and performing mathematical computations. These are tools that will be extremely useful in the business world however many parents believe that these foundations can be improved on. With each year that goes by, a child should learn more as a result of the business world becoming ultra competitive.

Is Your Special Education Child Actually Being Served?

First of all, I would like to let you know that there are many special education teachers who, day in and day out advocate for special education children, and teach your child to the best of their abilities. The fact is that these teachers are not being supported, and are being made to put their license on the line, and first and foremost serve the local high-profile students first. What do I mean by high-profile students? I mean students whose parents are school administrators, lawyers, local politicians, or work for some other local high-profile organization. That's right, if you are not one of these parents, then you need to investigate whether or not your child is being served properly, according to his IEP. The excuse that the administration give the teachers for this behavior, is that they do not have enough money to hire enough special education teachers.

Let me take a moment here and educate you as to what that statement actually means. Not having enough money does not mean that the state or the city does not have enough money to hire teachers. What it means is that they did not budget enough money to hire the teachers necessary to accomplish the balanced service of special education students. They have budgeted many thousands of dollars in states such as South Carolina, for roads, highways, and research to stop flooding on city streets, and at the same time laid off teachers. Oh, of course they don't call it a layoff, they cover that by calling teachers positions slots, and just tell you the parents that there are no slots left. The parents tend to buy into what the school system says, because the school system is very good at covering their tracks.

At this point you may be asking how I know these things, and where I was able to acquire my information. I have been a special education teacher in two states and in at least three major counties. I have relatives who are teachers in other states, so my information is about as inside as it gets. In fact you can hang your hat on it. As I am writing this I am in contact with state officials and am trying to create a task force for this very purpose. I don't know if I will be able to pull this off without the backing of many parents with children having special needs, and attending public schools. Now that you understand that I am in contact with many special education teachers, I want you to know the unbelievable truth, and that is that when these teachers complain that they are serving high-profile cases, and they are not able to find the time to serve others, that do not have parents in high places, they are threatened, they are told that they will lose their jobs if they say the wrong thing, they are given extra work to do, sometimes in an attempt to have teachers quit if they rock the boat.