Tag Archives: learning

Special Tours and Programs with New York City Museums for Children with Autism and Developmental Disabilities

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New York City’s Museum of Natural History and Museum of Modern Art (MOMA) are introducing special tours and experiences for children with Autism.

The Museum of Natural History’s ‘Discovery Squad’ meets on select Saturdays for children ages 5- 14, accompanied by an adult, before the museum is open to the general public. Specially trained museum guides will lead a 40 minute tour through the North American Hall of Mammals (ages 5-8) or on an adventure through the Koch Dinosaur Wing.

For more information on the Museum of Natural History’s Discovery Squad, please visit their website here.

Each month the Museum of Modern Art’s program ‘Create Ability’ follows a different theme through the galleries to explore the art work and workshops to create in the classroom. These workshops are intended for individuals with developmental or learning disabilities ages 5-18+ and are free with pre-registration!

For more information on MOMA’s Create Ability programs, visit their website here.

 

Temple Grandin and Dr. Jed Baker to Speak at Upcoming Autism Conference in White Plains, NY – April, 24

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10409199_10153276032427780_6229927242485176303_nTemple Grandin and Jed Baker are  speaking at this one day conference brought to you by Future Horizons.
Dr. Grandin describes the challenges she has faced and offers ideas on how others dealing with autism can meet these obstacles and improve the quality of their lives. Backed by her personal experience and evidence-based research, Temple shares her valuable insights on a wide variety of topics, and offers useful do’s and don’ts.

 

Dr. Baker is a behavioral consultant for several New Jersey school districts where, nearly two decades ago, he organized a group to help children with social communication problems.

This conference is intended for family members and professionals. ASHA, APA, AOTA, and NAPNAP Credits are offered and APA Continuing Education Credit = 6.

For more information, visit the Future Horizons’ Website here.

Pick of the Week: NEW Curriculum – “Teaching the Basics of Theory of Mind”

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Using principles from cognitive behavioral therapy, this evidence-based curriculum Teaching the Basics of Theory of Mind by Kirstina Ordetx, PhD, is designed to enhance social understanding in children with autism or other social challenges. With lesson plans, activity ideas, worksheets, reproducible flashcards, and reinforcement activities for use at home, this curriculum is ideal for use with children who demonstrate challenges with the prerequisite skills, leading to successful social relationships and situations.

This week only, you can save 15%* on your order of Teaching the Basics of Theory of Mind by using our promo code TOM15 when you check out online or over the phone with us!

This curriculum includes 42 unlabeled Feelings Photo Cards (Student’s set), 42 labeled Feelings Photo Cards (Instructor’s set), 28 Feelings Word Cards, 8 Follow the Eye Picture Cards, 12 Riddle Cards, 4 Picture Clue Cards, 8 “As If” Cards, 7 Point of View Prompt Cards, and 9 Me vs. We Cards.

*Offer is valid until 11:59pm EST on April 7th, 2015. Not compatible with any other offers. Be sure there are no spaces or dashes in your code at check out!

Pick of the Week: “On My Own” Activity Kits

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Teach important daily living, vocational, and social skills that pave the way to independence and success to young learners with these brand new On My Own activity kits. Early learners can follow the visual cues and step-by-step directions to complete activities and art projects related to a variety of skills in daily life, such as cooking, setting the table, and creating art projects that develop gross and fine motor skills.

This week only, use our promo code ONMYOWN to take 15%* off either the On My Own: Year-Round Art Fun or the On My Own: Art, Cooking & Life Skills learning kits.

In On My Own: Art, Cooking & Life Skills, each activity is shown completed and is followed by a checklist of materials along with the directions. Young learners will be able to complete the tasks independently as they develop important vocational and recreational skills.

In On My Own: Year-Round Art Fun, learners will get to complete various arts and crafts projects independently, pairing visual cues and text from 30 different activity cards, while gaining confidence.

Don’t forget to mention or apply our promo code ONMYOWN this week only to save 15%* on either or both of these learning kits when you check out online or over the phone with us!

Pick of the Week: NEW! Photographic Matching Cards

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One set of cards, so many different skills to work on! Photographic Matching Cards contains 260 cards – 130 unique cards with an identical match – that cover 12 basic categories: Actions, Clothes, Colors, Emotions, Everyday Objects, Farm Animals, Foods, Pets, Shapes, Toys, Transportation, and Wild Animals.

This week only, take 15% off* your set of Photographic Matching Cards by using our promo code MATCH15 at check-out!

DRC_057_Photographic_Matching_Cards

These cards are ideal for developing expressive and receptive language skills, as well as sorting and classifying skills. Students who are ready can use the cards to stimulate discussion and conversation. The cards portray children in a variety of settings, full of real life and childhood enchantment. Each of the 260 cards measures 5½” x 8½”.

Don’t forget to apply or mention promo code MATCH15 to save 15%* when you purchase your set of Photographic Matching Cards this week online or over the phone with us!

*Offer is valid until 11:59pm EST on March 3rd, 2015. Not compatible with any other offers. Be sure there are no spaces or dashes in your code at check out!

Pick of the Week: NEW! Inferencing Card Sets

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Help students improve their inferencing skills with these brand new inferencing cards we’ve just added to our catalog! This week, you can save 15%* on the Inferencing Quick Take Along! Mini Book or the WH Inference Question Cards by applying our promo code INFER15 at check-out!

The pocket-sized Inferencing Quick Take Along! Mini Book is perfect for the busy speech-language pathologist, special educator, teacher, or parent. Help students practice their inferencing skills by responding to 520 prompts in 13 different categories covering: Actions, Categories, Cloze Sentences, Context Clues, Descriptive Clues, Emotions, Locations, Naming Tools & Devices, Occupations & Jobs, Problems & Solutions, Pronoun Antecedents, and Time & Seasons.

This small 5″ x 3″ book is spiral-bound, so you can easily flip pages and keep it open to the page you’re working on. The sturdy, laminated pages are tear-resistant and easy-to-read. Includes an Answer Key.

WH Inference Question Cards is a robust set of five card decks ideal for helping students reach the next stage of Wh-development, once they have mastered the basics. Each deck contains 56 double-sided cards that provide clues and hints to answer various Wh- questions. Side A has a colorful picture and a Wh-question (“Why is Karla waving?”). This picture provides clues that the children must use to infer the correct answer. Side B has a second, related picture and the answer (“She is going on a trip”).

The durable tin comes with 5 decks for Who?, What?, When?, Where?, and Why? Questions, each on a long-lasting metal ring for convenient use and storage. Leave the cards on the color-coded rings as you teach, or easily remove them as needed. Each of the 56 cards in the five decks measures 2½” x 3½”.

Don’t forget – you can take 15% off* either or both of these inferencing card sets by using our promo code INFER15 at check-out this week!

*Offer is valid until 11:59pm EST on February 24th, 2015. Not compatible with any other offers. Be sure there are no spaces or dashes in your code at check out!

Valentine’s Day Craft Ideas for Kids

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Valentine’s Day is coming up, so we thought we’d share with you a few craft ideas we came across online to help you add a little lovable learning into your weekend with your child. These crafts and activities are great for practicing skills in fine motor development, matching and sorting, sequencing, identifying emotions, and more!

Valentine’s Day Bingo

These Valentine’s Day-themed Bingo cards, created by Kristy over at Libbie Grove Design, are a great way to get kids excited about learning about numbers. Download and print them out for free on regular A4 paper to get started.

 

Valentine’s Day Same or Different

This packet, designed by speech & language pathologist Jen, contains eight different worksheets that target identifying items that are the same and items that are different.  There are two color worksheets and two black and white worksheets that target identifying items that are the same in a row.

Hearts-Themed Missing Letters and Matching Numbers Activity

Sherine at Trial & Error Mama came up with these adorable hearts-themed activities to practice spelling, counting, and matching with her daughters. For some inspiration, check out the different ways she got crafty on Valentine’s Day with her girls.

Valentine’s Day Feelings Book

Valentine’s Day is the day to show your love to those you care about. This Feelings Book idea by Ruth is a great way to help kids identify and talk about feelings. Download the Feelings Book template for free here!

 

Let us know how you’re getting crafty this Valentine’s Day with your student or child!

 

Tip of the Week: Stop Behavior Early in the Behavior Chain

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Recently I was working with a family to toilet train their son Jonathan, a six-year-old with autism. (Names and identifying characteristics have been changed to protect confidentiality.) When he eliminated in the toilet, part of his reinforcement was getting to watch the water go down the toilet after flushing. At some point, he developed the behavior of putting his hands into the toilet water as it was flushing.

When I went in to observe the behavior, one of my goals was to identify the steps in the behavior chain. Pretty much everything we do can be viewed as part of a behavior chain, in which one action is a cue for the following action. For Jonathan, each time he placed his hands in the toilet water, the behavior chain looked like this:

Pulled up pants
Stepped towards toilet
Pressed button to flush toilet
Stepped back
Watched water as it flushed
Stepped forward again
Leaned down
Put hands in water

Behavior chains can be even more detailed than the one above, depending on the needs of your learner. Identifying the steps in the behavior chain for an undesirable behavior can have a huge impact on your interventions. For Jonathan, we were able to stop the behavior of putting his hands in the toilet water by interrupting the behavior early in the behavior chain. It’s too late and unsafe to stop him once he’s leaning forward to put his hands in the water. Through prompting, which we faded as quickly as possible, we changed his behavior chain to this:

Pulled up pants
Stepped towards toilet
Pressed button to flush toilet
Stepped back
Watched water as it flushed for 3-5 seconds
Stepped towards sink
Leaned forward
Turned on water
Put hands in water

Instead of waiting for him to engage in the inappropriate behavior, we redirected him several steps earlier in the chain, providing a gestural prompt toward the sink and had him start washing his hands 3-5 seconds after he had started watching the water flush. This was ideal for two reasons: first, it was the expected step in an appropriate toileting behavior chain and second, it provided an appropriate and similar replacement behavior since Jonathan was still able to put his hands in water.

This behavior chain was relatively easy to change. While it may not be as easy in some interventions you may try, it’s essential to remember to stop the behavior early in the behavior chain. It’s much easier to give a child an activity that requires use of their hands as soon as you see them lift their hands out of their lap than it is to remove their hand from their mouth if they’re biting it. And it’s much easier to redirect a child to put their feet back under their desk than it is to get them to stop once they’re sprinting out of the classroom. Looking at the behavior chain and considering when to intervene as a part of your intervention plan is quite possibly the extra step that will make your plan successful.

WRITTEN BY SAM BLANCO, MSED, BCBA

Sam is an ABA provider for students ages 3-12 in NYC. Working in education for ten years with students with Autism Spectrum Disorders and other developmental delays, Sam has developed strategies for achieving a multitude of academic, behavior, and social goals. Sam is currently pursuing her PhD in Applied Behavior Analysis at Endicott College.

Pick of the Week: Emotion-oes – Like dominoes, but for identifying emotions!

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This newly added game will put a smile on any child’s face! With 56 domino-like cards, Emotion-oes for 2–6 players is especially useful for students who are nonreaders. Players will learn to recognize emotions and identify feelings in facial expressions. This week only, save 15%* on your set of Emotion-oes by using our promo code EMOTIONO at check-out!

To play the game, each player is dealt five Emotion-oes facedown and must match the face on one end of his/her Emotion-oe to one end of the Emotion-oe displayed in the center. An instruction sheet also includes variations on the game for even more fun!

Don’t forget to use our promo code EMOTIONO at check-out to save 15%* on your set of Emotion-oes this week!

*Offer is valid until 11:59pm EST on January 27th, 2015. Not compatible with any other offers. Be sure there are no spaces or dashes in your code at check out!

Pick of the Week: Everybody Can Cook – Enriching cooking curricula for children of diverse developmental abilities

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Brand new and hot off the press, this cookbook is not your average cookbook for children. With enriching curricula accompanied with adaptations to fit all developmental abilities, this cookbook goes beyond simply providing recipes to use in the classroom.

Everybody Can Cook was developed to allow instructors in both general and special education classrooms to bring hands-on cooking classes to children of all abilities, ages 2 and up, and to foster a positive relationship between children and food.

This week only, save 15%* on your order of our newly added Everybody Can Cook: Enriching cooking curricula with adaptations for children of diverse physical and developmental abilities by using promo code COOK15 at check-out!

Included in the cookbook are 15 recipes and lesson plans, each complete with:

  • shopping and equipment lists
  • related books and songs to enhance learning
  • pictorial recipes
  • adaptations for various physical and developmental abilities
  • ingredient substitutions for dietary restrictions and allergies
  • visual learning cards (pictured below)

DRB_441_Everybody_Can_Cook_Samples

Children strengthen their motor skills, self-esteem, socialization, teamwork, and independence through cooking and practicing basic cooking skills. In addition, they will enhance skills in other traditional disciplines such as reading, mathematics, science, social sciences, nutrition, music, art, history and geography. The Creative Kitchen offers training workshops on implementing the curriculum. Spiral bound, 124 pages, by Cricket Azima.

Don’t forget to use our promo code COOK15 at check-out to take 15% off* your order of Everybody Can Cook!

*Offer is valid until 11:59pm EST on January 20th, 2015. Not compatible with any other offers. Be sure there are no spaces or dashes in your code at check out!