Sensory Street Kids Melissa & Doug Band In A Box Giveaway

I introduced Lea Keating and Sensory Street Kids to you in a previous post. Lea also has a blog, called La La Language, in which she writes about sensory activities, SPD, and what is going on with Sensory Street Kids.

Lea would like to invite you over to her blog and get your input or questions. If you didn’t read my previous post, let me go over the main points of what Sensory Street Kids is. Lea founded Sensory Street Kids out of a need to provide her newly diagnosed with SPD son a quality and appropriate play group.

She needed the play group to be appropriate for his sensory needs. She needed it to encourage socialization with other children and to help him developmentally. When she couldn’t find one on her own, Lea turned to her son’s therapists and developed a curriculum for him.

This led to play groups designed around the curriculum, and eventually, to forming Sensory Street Kids. Sensory Street Kids is now provides in several states around the country. Parents and therapists can join the Sensory Street Kids team by becoming licensed providers. Once licenses through Sensory Street Kids, Lea provides them continuous support and resources within the Sensory Street Kids community. This includes and advisory board of specialized therapists, her website and the La La Language blog.



Lea, on behalf of Sensory Street Kids, is providing one Melissa and Doug Band In A Box set to one lucky reader of my blog. If you don’t win here, don’t worry, there will be opportunities on other blogs. I will list them on the Winner announcement post.



This giveaway begins now and will end July 18, 2010. You must be 18+ and a US resident to enter. When the winner is posted, you need to email me to claim your prize, tammy@learningfelt.com. If you leave your entry as Anonymous, please include your email in order for me to verify that the correct winner is claiming the prize.

Main Entry: Follow the La La Language blog, then come back here and leave a comment telling me what name you are following with. (If this rule isn’t followed, no additional entries will count).

You can get extra entries by doing any or all of the below. Each entry needs to be a separate comment.

1 Extra Entry - Follow @taless on Twitter and leave your twitter id in a separate comment
* 1 Extra Entry - Twitter this giveaway and leave your twitter name in a separate comment (You can get up to one extra entry by tweeting each day and leaving a comment here each day.)
1 Extra Entry - Follow my blog and let me know in a separate comment
1 Extra Entry - Subscribe to my RSS feed via email and let me know in a separate comment
1 Extra Entry - Write a post on your blog linking to my blog, and let me know in a separate comment

Sensory Street Kids Is A Hit

I have started doing some work for Lea Keating of Sensory Street Kids. She has hired me to help with her website and her blog, La La Language. Lea has a son that was diagnosed with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) at the age of 16 months. She founded Sensory Street Kids to fill a need that was missing in her community.

After searching for the right play groups and social environments for her son, Lea became frustrated. They weren’t meeting the needs of her son. That was when she consulted with professional therapists in designing a program that would meet her son’s needs and other special needs children.

Soon, she was offering this program in libraries and day cares. It was benefiting both special needs children and typically developed children. Sensory Street Kids was born and has been providing sensory based language/music classes for three years.

It didn’t take long before Lea was being contacted by parents and professionals around the country. They had heard about her and Sensory Street Kids on Twitter and wanted to know how they could bring Sensory Street Kids to their community.

That was when Lea put together a licensing program for Sensory Street Kids, and now parents and professionals can sign up to join her team. Parents and professionals can become Certified Sensory Street Kids Instructors. They can open their own Sensory Street Kids center in their community. Sensory Street Kids now has centers in Miami, Springfield, Washington. For more information on this, you can visit the Sensory Street Kids website.

Lea has also developed a blog to go along with her website. It’s called La La Language and provides articles on sensory activities, tips, and upcoming events for Sensory Street Kids. You can leave comments on her blog if you have questions or follow her on Twitter, http://twitter.com/sensorystkids.

Lea is also competing in the 2010 Startup Nation Leading Moms in Business. You can vote for her by visiting this link, http://www.startupnation.com/leading-moms-in-business/contestant/8852/index.php. I encourage all of my readers to go over there and show your support.

Multi Sensory Conference in Alabama

The following was posted on a forum I am a member of:

"Conference on helping individuals with special needs
On October 1-3, 2010, the best and brightest involved in multi sensory stimulation research and practice will convene in Birmingham, Alabama for the International Multi Sensory Environment (Snoezelen) Symposium (www.isna2010.org) . This 8th annual event which is being held for the first time in the USA will be hosted by the Christopher Douglas Hidden Angel Foundation (www.cdhaf.org).

The conference will bring together experts from over 12 countries featuring more than 30 renowned speakers who will offer thought-provoking lectures and workshops concerning the use of Multi Sensory Environments (MSE) and sensory enrichment. For the first time a large section of the program will be devoted to the brain, its development, plasticity and the impact of the environment.

Multi Sensory Environments have been used to improve learning, health, quality of life and increased human potential in people with Autism, Alzheimer, Cerebral Palsy and many other similar conditions so this is an event not to be missed."


I went to the ISNA2010.org site, and was amazed at what I saw. This conference looks like it will be great. I would love to attend, but the cost of just the conference is $325 for non-members. If you can afford to attend this conference, and decide to attend, please let me know. I would love to write about your experience at the conference.

Proud Parent of a Person With Autism

written by:
Karen Nichols, proud parent of a Person With Autism.
Her son is 10 and in the 5th grade.

Matthew was born on July 1, 1999. He had a normal delivery, and, for his first few weeks, was a delightful little guy.

As he grew, we noticed that he hated to be held, and screamed every night for at least 3 hours. It was exhausting. We figured it was Colic.

His first word was not mama or dada but "GO", and in hindsight, this meant "GET OUT OF MY FACE!" The car and grocery stores were torture for him. He screamed from the car seat, to the store, and all the way home, then continued to scream himself to sleep. My marriage collapsed. I was now a single mom. At the time, I was a Firefighter/EMT, and I knew that daycare would be out of the question for this difficult infant, so I opened my own daycare, where I could be with Matthew all the time.

Matthew's language and development faltered. I saw that my daycare children were progressing at a much more rapid rate than my own child. I dismissed this as he was the youngest, therefore the other children were speaking FOR him. He crawled everywhere, didn't take steps until 15 months of age. Few words, only words that needed to be said: "drink, treat,eat, GO"

Matthew was fascinated with his Handy Dandy Notebook, and took it everywhere he went. I bet we bought 100 Handy Dandy Notebooks in his toddler years. He hated clothing, and, even in the wintertime, preferred his diaper and nothing else. Shoes were out of the question. Still, I was oblivious. Hindsight is 20/20. The guilt that I have over this is unimaginable.

Matthew developed his own sign language, and could do simple mathematics with his fingers. His hands were his best friends, he studied his hands and counted for hours on end. He made intricate designs with his blocks and walked all around the table, studying the angles and how the shadows affected his designs. He loved trains. We lived near a train track, and when he heard the whistles blowing, we jumped in the car to watch. He would record the entire event in his notebook. He watched The Weather Channel and recorded each day's weather in a separate notebook. By the time we moved from the house, there were crayon markings on EVERY wall.

First grade was a complete disaster. Matthew hid under his desk and screamed. His teacher had 30 years under her belt, but didn't really know what to do with Matt, so she sent him to the office, where he would continue his meltdown, and return to class. Lunchtime was torture, too loud, noisy, chaotic. So, Matthew would just throw his lunch away, and sit on the playground with his notebook. At his first Parent/Teacher Conference, his teacher, Ms Doty said.."We are certain that your son is Autistic". We asked why. She said that we only had 5 minutes left of the conference. We argued that Matthew is BRILLIANT, he's not retarded. (ignorance on our part)...Conference over.

I came home to my son. He was making an intricate design, a pyramid, out of pennies, counting each one, making sure that they were all "heads up" and perfectly aligned. He is brilliant, I told myself. Autistic children sit in a corner and rock back and forth. My son is NOT Autistic. Matt cried all night, and so did I.

By the next morning, and for a solid month after, it was my duty to learn as much as I could about this thing called "Autism". I searched the internet endlessly, spoke with other moms, had Matthew tested, scaled back my daycare to just a couple of days a week, and became a First Grader. I sat next to Matthew every day in school. His teacher thought that Autism was a "fad". I went to lunch with him and opened his containers, so he could eat. I left at noon, went home, cried. Daily. By the time Matthew made it home from school, a massive meltdown would ensue, followed by a long nap. I became a warrior. NO more crying. Time to fight.

Being the parent of a Human Being with Special Needs is quite a charge. I realized that I could no longer be a firefighter, I mustn't put my life in jeopardy, for as long as my son is Autistic, he will always need me. I reluctantly quit the Fire Department and became a fulltime glass artist. I am 100% available to my son and to his Special Ed team.

I am now my son's Advocate. I remarried, and my husband and I understand Matthew and have nurtured him and supported him and adored him. I am pleased to say that, while Matthew continues to have speech difficulties, doesn't make eye contact, hates stores, Santa, and the Easter Bunny, he pitched for the Holt Rams baseball team this past year. He has no friends, and doesn't really want any. This past summer, he said, "MOM. For my birthday, I want some walkie-talkies". I told him, "yaknow, buddy, if you want some walkie-talkies, you're going to need to go up the street, and see if you can make some friends."

Matthew replied "Mama. You are my friend" I melted.

What Is SPD?

Think of your brain like a computer where information is entered. The computer (brain) processes the information and then yields output in the form of behavior or motor skills. This is the concept of Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD). The brain organizes sensory information to create an adaptive response. This processing directly impacts the development of motor control, behaviors and emotional responses. SPD occurs when there is a "glitch" in the system which disrupts daily routines.

When we think of senses, we all know the five senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch, but the two lesser know senses need greater attention. The vestibular sense obtained through movement and the proprioceptive sense obtained through our joints are very important senses and are precursors to the development of our visual and auditory systems.

There are three symptom clusters under SPD. Sensory Modulation Disorder may include over-responsivity, under-responsivity and sensory seeking. Sensory Based Motor Disorder includes dyspraxia and postural disorders. Sensory Discrimination Disorder affects vision, hearing, touch, taste, small, position and movement. Each category displays a specific set of symptoms & behaviors, which I would be willing to write to at another time.

My son has Sensory Modulation Disorder. Some things he is under-responsive to, like pain. Some things he is over-responsive to like noise. Most of the time he is sensory seeking, seeking input to meet his proprioceptive and vestibular needs. He also has mild hypotonia so he may fit loosely into Sensory Based Motor Disorder. He also has issues with auditory processing and may fit into Sensory Discrimination Disorder.

In the past we have seen several Occupational Therapists who claimed they worked with SPD, but issues were never adequately addressed. Now, we have a new OT and her complete focus is directed to SPD! Details here: http://www.ourjourneythruautism.com/2010/01/we-have-new-ot-with-focus-on-spd.html

We have been involved in activities that meet his sensory seeking needs. One of the most profound activities has been therapeutic horseback riding. Great info here: http://www.ourjourneythruautism.com/2008/10/eamon-coca.html We have been riding for about 18 months and it has been incredibly successful.

We had been involved in a tumbling program as well. We had stopped because the instructor had left the program but most recently found a great drop in program where he can jump on trampolines, swing on a rope into a giant foam block pit, tumble along an obstacle course, etc. and he leaves completely satisfied, all sensory needs met. This fall we added Karate to the mix which address some of his sensory needs and also works with self discipline and self control.

For further information, I recommend the SPD Foundation and The Out of Sync Child and sensory diet ideas from The Out of Sync Child Has Fun




written by:
Tiffani Lawton, RN

http://www.OURJourneyThruAutism.com

Loveable Look-a-Like Doll Review

Leaving your child with someone and walking out the door can be hard on both mommy and child. I have been introduced to a new product that can help your child with being without mommy. It’s called a Loveable Look-a-Like doll. The company sent me a Do It Yourself Doll Kit to review and keep. This one is “ A 24 inch blank face doll packaged with an iron-on heat transfer for a do it yourself doll kit. Doll is clothed with jeans, white shirt and matching socks.” It is soft and cuddly.

You print out a close up of your face on an iron-on heat transfer sheet and iron it onto the doll’s face. You can also order a recordable micro voice chip to put in the doll. On this, you can record a message for your child. This doll does come assembled, you just have to put your face on it. You can order different outfits for the doll off of their website, too.

I think this is great. With the Loveable Look-a-Like doll, your child can cuddle with a doll that has your face and your voice. This can make separating from your child easier and less traumatic for both of you. It’s also good for autistic children that like to hug and cuddle.

You can order this doll with the photo of your face on it for a little extra. Also, the micro voice chip can be recorded over multiple times. This allows you to change the message whenever you need to. For more information, please visit the Loveable look-a-Like doll website.