Category Archives: Media

Thinking About All the Parents Out There…

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With the holidays approaching we all know that gift giving will soon be in full swing.  This undoubtedly means that your families will be generously bestowed with electronic cause and effect toys.  These types of toys help to stimulate development as your child discovers the function of the toy and how to elicit certain responses from the object.  Children with special needs tend to have a longer relationship with these types of toys as they often serve as powerful reinforcers, meet ongoing sensory needs and continue to provide opportunities to address language and motor development.  Additionally, it may take a special needs child longer to master this type of play before moving onto more imaginative and creative play.  What I’m getting at is that these toys are going to be in your house longer and some of them are LOUD.  So when I came across the following post on Apartment Therapy the other day it jumped out at me as a piece vital information for all of you special needs parents out there.  We are always thinking about adaptations for toys and games for the kids but what about the parents?  A former sound engineer for children’s sound books shares a secret on how to turn down the volume on these toys.

Check it out and Happy Holidays!

Bringing Down the Volume on Electronic Toys

Special Screening of Harry Potter for Hearing & Sight Impaired Children

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Awhile back, we told you about AMC Entertainment offering special monthly viewings for children with autism spectrum disorders where they dim the lights and turn down the sound to make movie watching less of an overwhelming experience for children with sensory issues. Well, as the latest Harry Potter movie makes its way to theaters, a movie theater in Richmond, Virginia is offering special opening weekend screenings for individuals who are hearing and sight-impaired. We think it’s fantastic that more mainstream outlets are taking individuals with special needs into account!

YouTube!

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Here at Different Roads to Learning, we’re doing our best to keep up with the ever shifting changes in technology.  There’s a ton of wonderful stuff on the internet and on YouTube but who has the time to sift through endless videos, trying to find one that is age-appropritate and addresses the skills you’re working on with your children and students.  To take advantage of some of the great, free stuff out there, we’ve created our very own Difflearn YouTube Channel! Stacy, our fantastic and tireless Behavioral Consultant, has been assembling quality videos that you can use for Feeding & Nutrition, Reinforcement and she’s got a whole section for Play.

Please let us know what else you’d like to see up there or what you’re using for reinforcement or teaching play and social skills. We look forward to hearing from you!

Special Education Apps for Ipad

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We’ve been talking so much about using the Ipad to teach individuals with autism and other special needs and it looks like Apple has been paying attention. There is now a Special Education category in the AppStore. The section titled “Special Education” launched recently and includes 72 applications for the iPhone and 13 applications for the iPad in 10 categories ranging from communication to emotional development and life skills. Have any of you tried these apps? What do you think of them?

Have A Listen

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I am a HUGE fan of the Radiolab program on National Public Radio (NPR) and just had to share this one.  I’ll admit that the Radiolab podcasts are usually my escape from work and a time to think about something different.  However, the podcast ‘Words’ focuses on the role language plays in our thinking.  It offers several interesting perspectives on language development and non-verbal individuals that really moved me.  There is no  mention of autism but so much of what is discussed felt relevant to this population.  I hope you will listen in…

https://www.radiolab.org/2010/aug/09/.

Video Modeling by Mary Beth Palo of Watch Me Learn

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Mary Beth is a dear friend of ours. Many of you know her as the amazing mother who used video modeling to help her son learn to speak. From there came the Watch Me Learn Video Series which has received near unanimous praise. Here are her thoughts on Video Modeling and how Watch Me Learn came to be.

“I was fortunate enough to see Temple Grandin speak years ago…. before she became a star….. I went to the presentation on a whim – I guess to get out of the house (pathetic right?)  Being the mother of an autistic child leads you to do things that a “normal” person wouldn’t be caught dead doing!  At the time, I believe that she only had one book published; Thinking in Pictures.

In that book and in her presentation she referred to her thought process as going back in her mind, retrieving a video tape from her mind’s library and then playing the proper video to think/see….  This hit me like a 2×4 across the head…. 

I am mostly an auditory thinker….. so I guess it didn’t dawn on me that this could be so impactful on educating. Couple this information with 2 years of therapy for my son with no progress, and a light bulb went off in my head.  Pure desperation led me to video modeling.  After my first attempt at VM, as a result my son was speaking within 2 ½ weeks.  Well, needless to say, video became my life and my son just kept learning and learning.  Video was our main teacher and our therapy hours were used for generalizing the skills he learned on video.

Video modeling can be used in sooooo many ways – self modeling, peer modeling, etc…  and it can be used to teach sooooo many skills – from simple receptive language, imitation skills to complex social skills.  Research supports video modeling as an evidence-based teaching method and it has been recognized by the CEC(Council for Exceptional Children) as a valid means of teaching.  The research exists and more will be coming. 

Now, when I teach my son, I always have visuals.  Of course, he was most successful with video, but after years of strictly video, we have been able to branch out into other visual inputs. The learning is always faster with visual inputs ….. even in 6th grade when we are using cookie dough and chocolate chips to make a visual model of the atom nucleus – who would have thought?

Why does it work?  Well, I don’t have the scientific answer to that – as I have yet to find a study researching the brain activity while watching VM.  Watching children for years and knowing how and what they react to, it is easy to see the reason why VM works.  Children love tv, children love other children, children have an inherent desire to be social and VM provides not only repetition but also removes outside distractions enabling a child to concentrate on one thing.

Today, there are many VM products on the market.  These products allow you an easy way to experiment with VM and a great learning opportunity for your children.  VM can also be done in the home, school, therapy and out in public.  You need to decide what is best for you and the child.

I am the proud mother of Brett Palo – a 12 year old boy who is now mainstreamed in 6th grade.  Without VM, he would not be there.  As a result of his success with VM and a zillion phone calls from other desperate mothers, Watch Me Learn Videos were created.  Watch Me Learn’s goal is to teach children in their natural environment – at home, in school and most importantly through play!  A child’s job is to play – let them do their job and learn at the same time!   They will learn without even knowing it!

Dublin Schools Using iPad As Educational Tool

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This is an interesting article about a school district in Ohio that is using Ipads with students with developmental disabilities. We were particularly struck by the way they’re using it to appeal to students by engaging all of their senses and providing reinforcement.

Night of Too Many Stars!

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We had the best Saturday night ever! Julie treated the Difflearn gals to the taping of the Night of Too Many Stars: An Overbooked Concert for Autism Education at the Beacon Theatre in NYC.

Hosted by Jon Stewart, we were treated to side-splitting appearances by Tina Fey, Chris Rock, Ricky Gervais, Steve Carrell, and many others with live performances by Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings!

We won’t spoil it for you – the show is going to air on October 21, at 9 pm EST on Comedy Central – but some highlights included how much people will actually pay to meet George Clooney and what it’s worth to have Chris Rock call someone you’re really mad at. Temple Grandin was in the audience and our good friend Dr. Bridget Taylor was featured in one of the segments.

The event was incredible, both in the hilarity of the performers and in the intense generosity of the attendees. We were particularly impressed at how tuned-in the organizers were to the real and pressing needs not just of children with autism, but of their families and their futures and how it will continue to impact them across the lifespan.

This is the third time that Jon Stewart has teamed up with Comedy Central to put on this event and to date, they have raised more than $7 million for autism education!!!!

The money raised benefits a variety of autism education and family service programs across the country. In 2008, the benefit raised over $2.8 million dollars, with money going to:

  1. Establish the Autism Training Institute at Hunter College for teachers and therapists to learn how to teach children with autism. Many of these trained teachers have now entered public school systems where appropriately trained special education teachers can be scarce.
  2. Program Expansion for more than a dozen model schools for children with autism, especially ones that were struggling financially to keep their doors open.
  3. Development of a program that teaches public school students to become peer mentors and teach individuals with autism.
  4. Expansion of an innovative afterschool program  that focuses on play and community from Illinois to several other states.
  5. Fund a program in Arizona that trains teenagers with autism for jobs at places like the zoo and library where they can work aside their typical peers.
  6. Fund a program in Seattle that helps teens develop social skills.
  7. Fund a program in Georgia that trains First Responders about autism.
  8. Support the New England Center for Children’s “Autism Curriculum Encyclopedia” which is an online manual that features lessons and programs that teachers can use to educate children with autism worldwide.

This year, one of the new initiatives is the Institute for Brain Development, an all-inclusive center positioned to undertake collaborative research into the most effective treatment of autism spectrum disorders. It will be a collaboration between New York Center for Autism, New York Presbyterian and it’s medical schools of Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and Weill Cornell Medical College.

Please tell your friends and do tune in on October 21 at 9pm. The show is fantastic and there will be more opportunities to contribute to an excellent cause.

Is That You On TV?

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No, I know.  In all seriousness, it’s Team Braverman from the NBC program “Parenthood”.  One of the show’s main storylines portrays a family whose son is diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome.  This image is from the episode where the family participates in an Autism Speaks walk.  The plot revolves around the struggle a family faces when they are deciding how they should tell their child about his or her diagnosis.

I have been hooked on this show for the last few weeks.  I find the way ‘Parenthood’ tackles difficult topics to be touching and feel that it is an realistic account of a family ‘behind the scenes’.  I spend a lot of time with families dealing with many of these same issues and can only imagine being in their shoes.  From where I stand this show seems to be a powerful and accurate portrayal of life with a child with Asperger’s.  However, I’m curious how parents, grandparents and other clinicians are reacting to the program.