Another great household object that can be used to build sensory-motor skills is a toothpick.  Toothpicks are great for building fine motor and grasping skills.  Their small size encourages the child to use and strengthen their fingertips.  Challenge your little one to hold the toothpick with their thumb, index, and middle fingers only.  You can have them hold a cotton ball or another small object with their ring and little fingers if they are having difficulty separating the two sides of their hand.  Toothpicks are also great for building visual motor skills and eye-hand coordination as you use the toothpicks to manipulate other objects.

Here are 10 fun ways to get your kid engaged in toothpick fun!

1.  Stab It:  Use the toothpicks during snack time to pick up grapes, watermelon, strawberries, cheese cubes, or melons.  

2.  Build It:  Use toothpicks along with gum drops, marshmallows, or clay/playdoh to create a fun 3-D design, like our house or train.  

by:  Sherry Artemenko, M.S., CCC-SLP  

I sat next to my husband at the kitchen table, looking at all three of my boys eating their lunch, wrapped in multicolored towels, still wet from their swimming lessons, and I began to choke up before a single word left my mouth.  

"Boys," I began, not sure if I would remember all I planned to say, even though I had my notes and a book tightly in my grasp.  When I had their attention, I just said it, plain and simple, "Dad and I are getting divorced."  

My husband and I had only been separated about two weeks at the time.  The word 'divorce' was almost as foreign to me as it was to my children.  Having to tell any child about divorce is heart-wrenching, incredibly difficult and probably one of the only times in your life where each word you say truly matters.  But, throw in special needs children, who see the world as black and white, without the grey area that divorce falls into, and who are often confused by language, relying heavily on semantics, and each word carries exponentially more weight.

Editor's Note: Check out the comment on this article submitted by PediaStaff Guest Columnist and SLP, Sherry Artemenko of Play on Words!  

[Source:  Wall Street Journal]

by Ralph Gardner

Here's how I would celebrate FAO Schwarz's 150th anniversary if it were up to me: I'd move the store back across the street, to the southeast corner of 58th Street and Fifth Avenue-as everyone knows, it's now in the GM Building-and renovate it so it looked just like it did in 1963, give or take a year, when I was in my toy heyday.

Call me old fashioned, but I felt compelled to respond to a front page article in the

Sunday NY Times about old fashioned board games and the reproduction of them digitally.  While certain strategies and dynamics of the game stay intact, I want to list here the many aspects of a PHYSICAL Board game that build skills that digital versions lack.