August 14, 2015
Issue 32, Volume 8
It's All About the Choices!     
          
Greetings and Happy Friday

Please enjoy our weekly newsletter.  For those of you back to school already, hope the new school year is a fulfilling one for you and your students!
 
News Items:
  • How Language Gives Your Brain a Break
  • Brain Structures Involved in Delayed Gratification Identified
  • Study: Kindergarten Boys Less Interested in Language Activities
  • Schools Warned On Speech Services For Kids With Autism
  • Brain Imaging Used to Predict Emotions
  • Target Stores Removing Gender Labels in Toy Department
Hot Jobs 
  • Hot Pediatric SLP Jobs! - West Lost Angeles
  • Hot Jobs - Pediatric School Based OTs in California 
  • Placement of the Week - Part Time Private School Physical Therapist
Therapy Activities, Tips and Resources
  • Social Red Rover Group Game
  • I Spy "Back to School" Literacy Activities
  • App Review of the Week: Super Stretch Yoga - FREE
  • Product Review - Gonge River Stones for Balance
Articles and Special Features 
  • Autism Corner: The Link Between Language in Perception Examined
  • School Nurse's Corner: School Start Times - Report
  • PT Corner: Positional Clubfoot
  • SLP / Career Corner: Dear CF-SLP,
  • School Psychology Corner: Guide for Supporting Transgender Students in K-12 Schools
Feel free to contact us with any questions about our openings or items in these pages. Have you discovered our RSS feed? Click on the orange button below to subscribe to all our openings and have them delivered to your Feed Reader!  Don't have an RSS Feed Reader set up? Sign up at Blogtrottr and have our blog posts delivered right to your email.

Have a great weekend and Take Care!

Heidi Kay and the PediaStaff Team





The Career Center

The links to the right are "live" and reflect the most recent SLP, OT, PT and related assistant jobs, and ALL our Bilingual and School Psychology Jobs. 
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Recent Occupational Therapist and COTA Jobs 

How Language Gives Your Brain a Break
[Source: Medical X-Press]
 
Here's a quick task: Take a look at the sentences below and decide which is the most effective. (1) "John threw out the old trash sitting in the kitchen." (2) "John threw the old trash sitting in the kitchen out."
 
Either sentence is grammatically acceptable, but you probably found the first one to be more natural. Why? Perhaps because of the placement of the word "out," which seems to fit better in the middle of this word sequence than the end.
 
In technical terms, the first sentence has a shorter "dependency length"-a shorter total distance, in words, between the crucial elements of a sentence. Now a new study of 37 languages by three MIT researchers has shown that most languages move toward "dependency length minimization" (DLM) in practice. That means language users have a global preference for more locally grouped dependent words, whenever possible.

Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
 Structures Involved in Delayed Gratification Identified
[Source:  Medical News Today]
 
Researchers at McGill have clearly identified, for the first time, the specific parts of the brain involved in decisions that call for delayed gratification. In a paper recently published in the European Journal of Neuroscience, they demonstrated that the hippocampus (associated with memory) and the nucleus accumbens (associated with pleasure) work together in making critical decisions of this type, where time plays a role. The researchers showed that when these two structures were effectively 'disconnected' in the brain, there is a disruption of decisions related to delayed gratification.

Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
Study: Kindergarten Boys Less Interested in Language Activities
[Source:  Science Daily]
 
A Norwegian study of kindergarten children reveals that girls are more interested in language activities than boys. As a result boys may receive less linguistic stimulation and become less prepared for school than girls.
 
It is well known that girls develop language skills earlier than boys. A study from the Norwegian Reading Centre at the University of Stavanger also reveals that kindergarten-age girls are more interested in reading and other activities that promote linguistic awareness.

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link our Blog
Schools Warned On Speech Services For Kids With Autism
[Source: Disability Scoop]

Federal education officials are reminding schools not to skimp on needed speech and language services for children with autism.
 
In a  letter to states, officials from the U.S. Department of Education say they've heard that an increasing number of kids on the spectrum may not be receiving services from speech-language pathologists at school. Moreover, such professionals are frequently left out of the evaluation process and are often not present at meetings to determine what services a child should receive under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the department said.

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link our Blog
Brain Imaging Used to Predict Emotions
[Source:  Psych Central]
 
Dartmouth researchers have obtained a 90 percent success rate in predicting human emotions based on brain activity.
 
The new study, which appears in the journal PLOS Biology, is unique in that researchers studied people within the general population, not just college students. As such, investigators believe the findings one day could help in diagnosing and treating a range of mental and physical health conditions across the population at large.

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link our Blog
Target Stores Removing Gender Labels in Toy Department
[Source:  Care2.com]

Tired of walking into a toy store and seeing certain toys marked for girls and boys? So is Target. The retail giant has announced that it will go gender neutral in its toy department and stop labeling and segregating toys by gender and let the kids choose which ones strike their fancy, reports Yahoo.

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link our Blog
Featured Job of the Week:  Pediatric SLP Jobs! - West LA
PediaStaff is excited to announce a new opportunity for Speech-Language Pathologists in the W. Los Angeles area.   If you are seeking an exciting setting in a pediatric clinic then we may have your match.  We are hiring SLPs for a newly opened  practice.    
 
This is a multidisciplinary practice providing services to children with moderate to severe autism as well as to children with other communication impairments from Aspergers, DD, Rhett Syndrome, Seizure Disorders, Down Syndrome, Cerebral Palsy and others.  The focus is through Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) protocols. 

Learn About / Apply for This Job on our Blog
Featured Jobs of the Week:  Pediatric School Based OTs in CA
PediaStaff is hiring School-Based Occupational Therapists throughout California.
 
These are full-time contracted positions that can be paid either on a W2 or as an independent contractor.  Positions start soon for the SY15/16 so apply now to learn more information! 
 
Requirements:  Must hold appropriate Degree in Occupational Therapy; a current state license (or eligible) if applicable. New grads with fieldwork experience and a passion for working with children will be considered.
 
Why will you choose a staffing agency and why choose PediaStaff?

Learn About / Apply for This Job on our Blog
Therapy Placement of the Week:  Part Time Private School PT
Congratulations to Linda B., on her placement at a private religious school based setting part time for the 2015-16 school year through PediaStaff!
 
She will be working part time and will travel between Skokie and Northbrook.  Kids are elementary to high school age with moderate disabilities.
 
Best to you, Linda!  Enjoy the school year!
Social Red Rover Group Game  
[Source: Your Therapy Source]
 
Purpose: Promote motor skill development, cooperation and social skills.
Materials: none

Activity: Divide the group up into two teams. Place one team on one side of the room and one team on the other side of the room. Just like Red Rover the teams call friends over - i.e. "Red Rover, Red Rover send John right over". John then walks, hops, jumps, crawls or runs over to the other team. Instead of trying to break through the other team's line create an activity that John must perform. Try Hi-5's to each player, shaking hands with each player or hugs to each player.

Learn More on Our Blog
I Spy "Back to School" Literacy Activities 
[Source: LMN Tree via Classroom Freebies]
 
Literacy activities help students become better readers and writers. Activities can target specific skills such as building vocabulary, decoding words, improving grammar and writing skill, and activities to  improve fluency. When literacy activities are used with thematic units they give students more opportunities to use the words associated with the theme and become more proficient at reading and feel successful.

Download this Freebie Through a Link on our Blog
App Review of the Week: Super Stretch Yoga - FREE
[Source: Bridging Apps]
 
Balance. Coordination. Strength. Flexibility. Posture. Focus. Concentration. Calmness. These elements make the list for some of the known improvements and benefits of yoga. And the benefits of yoga are not limited to adults. All children, even children that shy away from physical activity and children with special needs, can experience the same benefits and develop a sense of accomplishment with yoga. A wonderful app, called Super Stretch Yoga, brings that opportunity to children and a gym membership is not required.

Read More and Download Through a Link on our Blog
[Source:  Sensory Sparks]

Gonge River Stones are a playful set of triangular-shaped plastic cones designed to resemble real life river stones. Each side of every triangle varies in steepness and difficulty challenging your children to channel their vestibular senses to find and maintain their balance as they leap from stone to stone. The continuous act of leaping from stone to stone works to build your child's balance, spatial awareness and coordination, all while building their confidence and positive risk-taking behaviors (i.e. trying new things).

Read the Rest of this Review Throug a Link on our Blog
Autism Corner: The Link Between Language in Perception Examined
[Source:  Medical X Press]

How do children and young adults with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) understand idioms and other figures of speech? A 4.15 million euro EU project based out of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology is examining the links between language and perception in autistic individuals as just one of 15 cross-disciplinary projects designed to bring a better understanding to how our perception and language interact and change over time and in individuals.
 
If someone said you were "barking up the wrong tree", would you look around for a tree and wonder why that person thought you were barking? What if someone told you that you "had your head in the clouds"? Would you feel your head or look around for clouds? In all of these cases, probably not.


School Nurse Corner:  School Start Times - Report
[Source:  CDC.gov via National Association of School Nurses]

Adolescents who do not get enough sleep are more likely to be overweight (1); not engage in daily physical activity (2); suffer from depressive symptoms (2); engage in unhealthy risk behaviors such as drinking, smoking tobacco, and using illicit drugs (2); and perform poorly in school (3). However, insufficient sleep is common among high school students, with less


PT Corner:  Positional Clubfoot
by Rebecca Talmud, PT, DPT owner of Dinosaur Physical Therapy 

Positional Clubfoot or Talipes (from the Latin compound of "talus" ankle and "pes" foot) is a misunderstood, misrepresented and many times mistreated condition which affects approximately 1 in 1,000 children.  For most, the term Clubfoot brings to mind a bony deformity, a structural anomaly that requires intensive often aggressive intervention.  But Positional Clubfoot refers to a flexible "normal" foot that was held over time in an abnormal position in utero. When the child is born, due to the prolonged positioning, most 

Read the Rest of This Article on our Blog

SLP / Career Corner:   Dear CF-SLP,
by Jenna Rayburn, CCC-SLP

Dear CF-SLP,
 
Congratulations! You did it! Graduate school is mostly a Master's degree in multi-tasking. A skill you're going to need this year! You're about to be paid to do what you've been paying tuition to do for the last two years! Things are looking up!
 
On a scale of 1 to right-before-the-Praxis how nervous are you about starting your first job? There is no way around it. You're the new kid and it is going to take a bit to get 

School Psych Corner: Supporting Transgender Students in K-12
[Source:  Gender Spectrum via National Association of School Psychologists]

Schools are increasingly being called upon to include and support transgender students. Recognizing that this can seem daunting or overwhelming,  Schools in Transition: A Guide for Supporting Transgender Students in K-12 Schools offers practical guidance and field-tested tips to parents, educators, administrators, and community members on planning and supporting a transgender student through a transition at school. The guide is geared toward the needs of all students, kindergarten through twelfth grade, and incorporates recommendations that will allow schools to tailor those plans to the particular circumstances of the student and school.

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link on our Blog

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