Sensory Seeking Kiddos : Crash Pad

Some children in the Autism Spectrum avoid sensory, and others crave it, and seek it out. Our son is one who seeks out sensory experiences, and we got him a crash pad; so that he can crash safely into it, and not get hurt. But it has other uses, such as the whole family can play on it, or it can be a comfortable lounger.

Germs Are Not For Sharing

We just picked this book up from our local library, and I have to say it is a very cute and informative way for kids to learn about not spreading sicknesses. The cute illustrations show the many scenarios in which to prevent the spread of germs, and it is fast paced; with short sentences to hold the attention of most kids. I rated this 4 stars on goodreads.com , and it should be a staple in elementary school libraries.  These books are a part of a bigger series called "Best Behaviours".

Book mentioned -

Inspirational Movie About Someone with Special Needs

Sometimes I may just share a film that I have found to be inspiring about people with special needs. For instance I am currently watching And Your Name is Jonah about a little boy who was born deaf, and he was misdiagnosed as being mentally challenged because of it.  Watching this film helps us to understand that sometimes when cannot fully understand just what it is like for someone else unless you fully see what it is that they are dealing with.  It takes place in the '70's, and stars Sally Struthers of the All in the Family tv series.

Film mentioned -

Lego Movie

Sometimes I will just share some of the things that my son is interested in, such as Lego, which is only one of his many interests. He loves his Lego minifigures, and we cannot wait for the movie to come out in February of this year. These are great for fine motor skills, because they have to practice and maneuver small bricks. Here are some of the sets from the new movie -

And a few more -

Speech Therapy Videos or Learning Language

One of the areas that our son was delayed in was speech. He just didn't babble like other babies. I mean he seemed to understand us, but he wasn't making any sounds. So we decided to find some aids to help him discover sound. One example were -

Baby Babble DVD's 

 

These were great because they focused on the basics of phonetic sounds. They would do a letter and show an object that a baby should be familiar with and emphasize the sound. We used to play these over and over again. I sometimes wonder if things like this are why he is kind of focused on letters, and now words. But I think they really helped with his early speech development, and are something that even a normal/typical baby could benefit from.

Another set of videos that are beneficial to babies and toddlers are -

Baby Signing Time

These can be good for children who may have difficulty in speaking or are just not ready to. Plus they can learn basic american sign language. Something for parents and baby to watch together. 

Also something that our son first used before he could fully talk was something that one of his aids suggested.

PECS ( Picture Exchange System)

These are basically small pictures that a child can either choose from a sampling of activites or items that they do not have the words to express. When our son wanted something it was easy for him to hand us the little picture of a cup of milk than pointing in a vague way and us not knowing just what he wanted.

 

I hope that all of these suggestions may help your child transition into speaking or at least making it easier for them to communicate with you. 

Introduction to me and my blog

I don't know whether it had to do with the fact that in the womb my son yanked, and pulled at his umbilical cord or the few minutes that he was blue at his birth; but my son was delayed.  We didn't notice anything major until he missed milestones that other babies were making such, as crawling, and babbling, etc.  We tried doing research online, and found something called Early Intervention . We soon set up and appointment to have them evaluate our son, and he started to get services to help him catch up a little to where he should be before starting pre-school. I do remember a couple of the aids that came to our home had mentioned that they thought he was very smart child, but they thought that he was Autistic in his behaviours.  We got a recommendation from one of these aids to get him diagnosed by a Behavioural Pediatrician in our area.  Upon going to this appointment we discovered that our child was diagnosed as having PDD-NoS( Pervasive Developmental Disorder- Not Otherwise Specified); this basically meant that he had some of the symptoms and behaviours of a child in the Autism Spectrum, but still seemed like a typical child. We found a book about this diagnosis here -   this was one of the best books that we had come across while doing research about it. I rated this book 5 stars on goodreads.com It answered a lot of questions that we had and gave us some hope for our son.

The main reason I wanted to write this blog was so that others who may be experiencing the same thing have a resource of their own; and so that I can share with others just what it is like so that maybe people can feel some compassion for children in the Autism Spectrum.