Are you looking for a FANTASTIC program for families with tweens or teens who are looking to get stronger, faster, and more superhero-esque? Well, I can recommend one because we recently started a self-paced program to learn parkour at home. (Thanks, COVID19.)

But family fitness isn't even the best thing that has come from the first few weeks of working on parkour together.

The best thing that has come from leading my 2e ten-year-old son in parkour lessons at home is summed up by his statement:

“I know what my mind wants me to do, but I don’t know if my body is doing it.”

Wow. So despite seven years of occupational therapy and other therapeutic interventions, my son is STILL getting a feel for his body. AND he’s able to articulate it. AND I’m reminded that he has some serious challenges from sensory processing disorder.
Julie Schneider
People often underestimate themselves and their contribution to their local communities. Julie creates ways for them to find their everyday awesomeness and make meaningful connections, because everyone deserves to be celebrated for the unique talents that they offer to the world.

Educating her own differently wired children, Julie is deeply immersed in the homeschooling community, where she found the inspiration to tackle two big problems: parent-as-teacher math anxiety and unifying the local homeschool community. She authored the ebook Boco Math One: Your New Favorite Way to Think about Mathematics to empower parents to connect with their children through real-life everyday mathematics learning. And she creates regular events for local homeschool families: for children, she hosts three free weekly events and one free quarterly event. For parents, she hosts monthly workshops.

Julie lives in Colorado, where she is surrounded by amazing family and friends. She's an advocate for neurodiversity and an ally of the LGBTQ+ community. She reads a lot and does Kundalini yoga every day (twice on Sundays). She's also an introvert, a writer, and a teacher.

And like many of you, she is a person willing to say, "yes, I will try."
Online middle and high school courses with live weekly webinars for curious learners. Gradeless classrooms foster critical thinking and social connections.

From The Editor:

By Celi Trépanier, MEd

Sensory Issues and the Gifted

Sensory issues in gifted children are common, yet not enough research and information is available for families whose gifted children struggle with intense reactions to the sensory stimulus in their environment. What is the connection between giftedness and sensory issues? Is it normal for gifted individuals to have such intense physical and emotional reactions to sounds, tastes, smells, and touches? Or is it something that needs a diagnosis and accommodations? What we do know is that sensory issues are real and need to be addressed in a way that integrates the known traits of gifted children.


We know that our gifted children live life with intensity and seem to experience their world with heightened sensitivity, more than their same-age peers. Sounds may be louder, smells are more pronounced, and flavors taste stronger. A gifted child’s reaction to intense sensory input can seem extreme and pathological when it may be an appropriate response to the degree of the sensory stimulus he is receiving as a gifted individual—like pouring salt in a wound. An abrasion on one’s arm hurts, but a more intense pain is felt if salt were rubbed into that abrasion. 

However, gifted children do have sensory processing issues. In “Parkour and Sensory Processing Disorder,” the GHF Journey’s featured article, GHF writer Julie Schneider explains, “So despite seven years of occupational therapy and other therapeutic interventions, my son is STILL getting a feel for his body. AND he’s able to articulate it. AND I’m reminded that he has some serious challenges from sensory processing disorder.” Julie offers us a valuable program for gifted children with Sensory Processing Disorder—parkour.
 
Read the rest of Julie’s article to learn more about parkour for your gifted child with sensory processing disorder. 

As the editor for the GHF Journey, I want to acknowledge and show a heap of love for GHF’s Social Media Team, Eleen Kamas and Kathy Turner. GHF’s social media feeds are chock full of informative, fun, and relevant offerings. Follow GHF on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to see the wealth of resources we provide to our gifted community.


As always, you can depend on GHF to continue to provide resources and support for your gifted journey. Join the GHF Discussion Group on Facebook, where you will find a welcoming, supportive community ready to help. Sign up to attend one of GHF’s Expert series—live, interactive Zoom presentations featuring educators, authors, parents, and experts in education and giftedness. 

All of us here at GHF wish you and your family health, patience, and strength during this unprecedented time.
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GHF Family Members Get a Free Subscription with the coupon code
GHF Dialogue Special Article on Misophonia

The pandemic has us all home. Other than walking our puppy, our family is living, working, learning, breathing, eating, talking, moving about, at home, all day, all the time. Home confinement, intended to ensure our physical health, is testing the emotional resilience of all families, but especially those with elders, teens, those with misophonia, and atypical social and emotional intensities.

As introverts with a myriad of sensory sensitivities, we welcome cocooning; however, having no other escape from all the sounds, sights, smells, emotions, and the physical and energetic presence of all five of us twenty-four seven, even the most emotionally regulated among us is being challenged. The cacophony of sensory stimuli sets the stage for disturbing eruptions. To top it all off, there are incessant dishes with which we must contend. 

Normally, I merely bristle at my husband unloading the dishwasher, then feel guilty for doing so—after all, he is unloading it, and we have a dishwasher, for which I am grateful. This day, the visceral discomfort that courses through my whole body as glasses and plates crash, clank, and grind against one another feels excruciating. Rather than discharge my instantaneous wrath and self-righteous indignation at his audacity to unload the dishwasher in my presence, I first try to ride the wave by breathing through the repeated assaults. “Abandon ship!” my inner protectors demand of me. I sigh audibly and urgently evacuate. Perplexed by the intensity of my over-sensitivity/reactivity this particular day, my husband merely grimaces. I know he too has been thrown off kilter by living in closer quarters; he tries so hard to accommodate the idiosyncratic needs of our gifted family’s processing differences. 

We Hope You Enjoy The GHF Press Latest Release
by Kathleen Humble
Is Giftedness a myth? What is a Gifted Child? Why is Giftedness such a hot-button issue? Where does the fear and dislike of ‘gifted’ come from?

Come on an adventure about how Mrs Einstein, newspaper articles from the 1920s, and the San people of the Kalahari Desert can help us understand what gifted is – and is not.

In an easy-to-read style, Gifted Myths explores these and other stories on the history, science, and lived experience of gifted and twice-exceptional families.

Gifted Myths is a must-read for parents, educators, and professionals who work with gifted and twice-exceptional children.
Introducing the GHF Forum
a supportive community for gifted learners
Come join us in the GHF Forum, our new online community where GHF will be sharing all of our services and resources. FREE ACCESS

  • Crowdsource Resource library (join the project)
  • Discussions groups
  • Parenting
  • Professionals
  • Gifted Adults
  • You start it
  • Regular Coffee Chats to take a break and share
  • GHF Expert Series (Included in GHF Family Membership)
  • GHF Member Discounts (Included in GHF Family Membership)
THE GHF PRESIDENT'S CLUB
For those of you who can give at least $500 we have created a special recognition program where you will be listed on the GHF website and in our monthly newsletter, The GHF Journey, as valued members of the community. Donations may be kept anonymous.

  • Jaime and Ben Smith, Online G3
ABOUT GHF

GHF connects all sorts of people who love gifted learners. We offer both family and professional memberships to support and encourage adults working to create new ways of educating gifted learners. Our members homeschool gifted and twice-exceptional kids, run homeschool co-ops and microschools, write to foster understanding of gifted and twice-exceptional learners, mentor students one-on-one, teach online classes, provide services specifically designed to meet the social and emotional needs of gifted and twice-exceptional learners, and more. We'd love for you to join us.

GHF is a 501c3 organization . Please consider supporting our community with your most generous gift today. For more information on our organization, please feel free to contact us at info@ghflearners.org. Thank you!