Walking Club at The Belfry in Lexington |
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Sharing best practices and promoting inclusive opportunities for students with special needs
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Executive Director's
Message
Dear LABBB Colleagues and Families,
Happy Spring! Spring is a time of reawakening and finds us enjoying warmer days and plants blooming; a favorite time of year! As the landscape around us reawakens, so do we. It is a time to refocus on how we can best supporting our learners as we start planning for summer. You can find our summer schedules on the LABBB website.
Spring also brings many special events; our Transition Speaker Series will occur on Thursday, April 27, 2023 at the Scottish Rite Museum in Lexington. Doors open at 6:00 and the event will begin promptly at 6:45 pm. Special Olympics will be held on Friday, May 12, 2023 at the Lexington Athletic Fields. Students will parade onto the track at the Lexington High School Athletic Field at 9:00 a.m. Finally, our high school graduation ceremony will occur at the Scottish Rite Museum in Lexington on Thursday, June 8, 2023. More detailed information for these events will be forthcoming.
The last parent meeting date for this school year is scheduled for May 18, 2023 from 7:00 to 8:15 pm at the Lexington Community Center. Stay tuned for more information.
Respectfully,
Pam
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The Model of Child Engagement
By: Lisa Poirier, MS, OTR
These days, we have been hearing a lot about “neurodiversity.” Looking at ourselves and our students through this lens allows us to understand that each person has a distinctive brain which manifests with us living in the world with our own personal behaviors, perceptions and sensations.
When examining participation, our initial desire is that after giving a directive, our students will do exactly what we instruct them to do in the manner that we want them to do it. Professionals as well as parents often have our own values that we unconsciously impose on others. For example, we may want students to stop flapping their hands, to use consistent eye contact, or to just stop shutting down. We may also expect them to complete a task within a specific time frame, like starting an academic project or transitioning to the cafeteria. But there are often one or two students who are just not ready despite using all of the tools and encouragement that we have in our toolbox. We want them to engage and when they challenge us, we label them as resistive. We may even feel ourselves becoming angry, frustrated, and impatient and that is when a power struggle can happen. But if we are “off”, we cannot expect our students to regulate.
There is a clear difference between compliance and participation. As Greg Santucci, OTR says, “One gets a student to obey and the other one teaches self regulation skills.” The Model of Child Engagement by Greg Santucci, OTR, highlights that without a feeling of security and trust, our students will not be able to regulate and therefore will not participate. This process requires empathy and acceptance, and some days there just isn’t enough in our tank. Of course, this all sounds like common sense; however, when we demand engagement without listening to our students with empathy, participation is unlikely to happen at this point because now we are all stressed out. Furthermore, the stress response in our bodies can ultimately lead to a fight (ex. yelling), flight (ex. slamming doors) or freeze (ex. shutting down).
As seasoned professionals, we know that our students communicate in a multitude of different ways. Most likely, when students are having an issue, it is not always because they are oppositional, but rather their immediate needs may not be met. Is it too loud? Are they cold or hungry? Did they have a bad morning at home? Whatever the case, can we take a few extra minutes of our day to really listen and help our students feel safe and secure? If we can support them with this, we can then ultimately challenge them.
How can we help support our students? Some options:
- Providing empathy even when WE are frustrated. Ex.”I’m noticing that you are having a hard time,” NOT yelling back, “You are being disrespectful!”
- Investigating: What are our students trying to tell us? What are the needs of the moment? Do they trust us? Sometimes they just need to talk for 2 minutes.
- Teaching students to notice body signals (interoception): helping our students communicate and advocate for themselves for what they need in the moment (ex. a quiet space, a glass of water, deep breathing, a snack, 5 minutes on their headphones, etc.)
The challenge for us is letting go of our expectations and trying to understand the fluctuating and complex emotions of human beings. Can we ultimately support them so that they can engage, access and participate in their education, while teaching them self regulation skills? I am confident that we can.
**The picture is a graphic of The Model of Student Engagement by Greg Santucci, OTR. The idea is that Trust and Safety is our starting point and one cannot go through the “gate” unless they master that step first. The ultimate goal is participation.
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March: In like a lion, out like a lamb
By: Lori Parent
March is a month when we can experience a lot of different types of weather and often follows the saying “In like a lion and out like a lamb.” Students in Mrs. Collins's classroom at Wellington Elementary School used their fine motor skills, visual perceptual skills, and motor planning skills to make a lion and lamb puppet craft. They used picture directions and a finished model to make each part of the craft. Making crafts is a great way to work on fine motor skills, matching to a model, spatial organization, and following visual directions. The students had to check the model and the picture directions to make sure they put each part in the correct place. When they finished, they showed off their lion and lamb puppets.
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Clinical Corner - Mental Health: What it is and how to take care of it?
By: Kerry Joachim and her Social Emotional Learning Class, Burlington High School LABBB Room 313
Co-authored by: Owen, Maggie, Brody, Sadie, Rachel, Hubert
Learning about mental health is more vital now than ever before. Direct and open class discussions about mental health gives students the opportunity to better understand what they may be experiencing. It also allows them to gain insight into what their friends and peers may be going through and how they can all support each other. Often, teenagers are more open to communicating with each other rather than an adult. This is one of the many reasons why it is vital to provide them with the education and safe forums to have these conversations and gain the necessary information. Mental health education can empower them to know themselves better, know the ways they can take care of themselves, know the signs of potential concerns, and most importantly, know where they can get support they may need. It also can allow them to feel confident about what to do if a friend reaches out to them and is struggling. Understanding their own mental health is a key component to fostering increased emotional intelligence and
self-awareness, better equipping them to regulate their own emotional experiences. There is ongoing work to be done to reduce stigma and to normalize mental health struggles in order to ensure people, including children and teenagers, feel comfortable taking care of themselves and asking for help when needed.
Hear from the students of Burlington LABBB themselves below:
What does mental health mean to you?
“Mental health is basically how you manage emotions and stress/anxiety. It is about problem solving and coping strategies. It is how your brain processes the world and it’s problems ” -Owen
“Personal things going on in your life that you struggle with such as anxiety, depression, and other hard things”. -Maggie
“Mental health is how you handle your emotions.” -Rachel
“For me, mental health is something that you don’t have to deal with alone. There are always people willing to help you if you need it.” -Brody
“Your habits and your hobbies can support your mental health.” -Sadie
“Mental health means how you are doing overall and how your brain feels.” -Hubert
What can you do to take care of your mental health?
Mental health is a tricky subject, but not impossible to manage. There are a lot of strategies people can use to help their mental health; however, these strategies won’t work for everybody. An example of a strategy that might work for someone but not for others is listening to music. Music can be a very calming, focusing tool for people, but not everybody can just sit down and listen to music when they’re feeling upset. Another thing that might be helpful for some people but not for others is physical activity. While plenty of people might get gratification from taking a walk or hitting the gym, some people might actually have physical conditions that don’t allow them to do this; which would make physical activity not be a possible mental health strategy for them.
It’s best to know your support system and who you can go to. If someone doesn’t feel safe, makes an unsafe comment, if they are in danger, or if you are worried about them it’s important to tell an adult to keep them safe.
It's important to learn and talk about mental health in school. Teens need to be more aware of mental health. Left unchecked, mental health challenges can worsen which can also affect your physical health and emotional health.
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Massachusetts Multiculturalism in 1850s?
By: David Dooks
At Burlington High School, the younger cohort has been looking at multiculturalism in American History. In the 1850’s, the city of New Bedford was not only known for whaling, but was also a hotbed of Abolition, and was a peaceful multicultural city thanks in part to the Quaker population. To study this period of time, students read the novel Chasing the Nightbird, by Krista Russell, (2011, Peachtree Publishers).
The story’s main characters are a 14-year-old Cape Verdean boy who grew up aboard whaling ships, an escaped former enslaved young boy who worked in a New Bedford Cotton Mill as a Mulespinner, and a young Quaker girl who was very active in the abolitionist movement. The topics that students were introduced to include the life of a whaler, the Underground Railroad, the life of a 19th Century Mill worker, the 1851 Fugitive Slave Law, and the Abolitionist Movement, along with life in New Bedford in the 1850’s.
Because of the Abolitionist Movement in New Bedford, the city had a very large population of formerly enslaved people. They were fostered and protected by both free people of color, and other people in town. Frederick and Anna Douglass settled in New Bedford because of the abolitionists in town. Even after the 1851 Fugitive Slave Law was passed, New Bedford remained a safe haven for formerly enslaved people. Due to the 1851 Fugitive Slave Law, over 300 people of color were kidnapped and shipped back south in New York City, three people of color in Boston were kidnapped and sent south, however in New Bedford, none of the formerly enslaved people of color were kidnapped and brought back south despite the attempts of slave catchers.
Prior to the reading of this story, we took a virtual tour of New Bedford to see the area where our characters lived and worked. Thanks to Google Earth and a treasure trove of pictures of New Bedford from times gone by, students could see what the docks of New Bedford once looked like with barrels of whale oil as far as the eye could see. We looked at Boarding Houses, a home for people who worked in the mills and for sailors when they weren’t shipboard. We looked at the pictures of people and places in New Bedford before jumping into the book’s 1850 world.
To finish up our study, the classes are looking at songs that were part of all three of our main characters’ lives. We listened to and looked at the lyrics to songs written in the 1840-50’s about working in the mills of New England, then we listened to Sea Shanties, and finally we listened to a couple of Quaker Songs. Ultimately, to conclude our study, students will write their own verses to the Sea Shanty, “Haul Away, Joe.” |
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Vin and Bobby’s Excellent Adventure to Omar’s
By: Erik Annan
A few of our students at Ottoson Middle School earned a trip to “Omar’s World of Comics" in Lexington. In Mr. Annan’s Ottoson classroom students have the ability to earn various incentives based on meeting the following criteria of: academic participation, respect for themselves and others, and following directions.
Omar’s World of Comics is a favorite amongst the LABBB community! For those who might not know, the founder and president of the store, Omar, is a graduate of LABBB and opened the store front back in 2018. Our Ottoson students got to access all of the great options at Omar’s from the extensive comics/action collection, a whole floor dedicated to the use of gaming consoles, and a delicious bistro!
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Transition Dept.: Clerical Hard at Work
“Clerical is the best thing that ever happened to me”, said Eli, a student at LABBB Lexington High School. The Clerical site at Lexington High School is very valuable to LABBB, provides endless support to the classrooms and staff. One example is their hard work making notebooks for parents to use at the 5th Annual LABBB Transition Speakers Series Thursday, Apr 27, 2023. From 6:45 - 8:15 pm at the Scottish Rite Masonic Museum 33 Marrett Road, Lexington, MA 02421.
The Speaker series is tackling the following topics:
What DDS has to Offer
Housing
Guardianship
Securing a Post-22 Program in Today’s Environment
Ms. Newton and her hard working crew are in the process of making 75 notebooks for LABBB to give to parents when they arrive at the Transition Speaker Series. They have been making these notebooks for this event for the last several years, and parents have been very appreciative to have them so they can notes during the sessions they attend.
In addition, the clerical crew works together with LABBB staff to make support materials for students throughout all the LABBB Programs, which include, making copies, collating, binding, shredding, mailings, and labeling. They are a tremendous help and support and we are grateful for all they do for LABBB. Thank you to Ms. Newton and all the hard working students. We appreciate all you do for LABBB!
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Putting the Fun in Functional
By: Michelle Collins and Jenn Malenchini
Beginning this year, our students in Michelle Collins’ class at Wellington Elementary School are applying many skills they are learning by having fun in functional cooking activities in their classroom. Recently, the class read “If You Give a Mouse a Cookie” by Laura Numeroff and then followed up their lesson with a related cooking activity. Everyone was engaged as the class integrated many academic, communication, and motor skills while baking delicious chocolate chip cookies. After reading the book, students drew cookies and watched the story on the interactive white board. They read from a list of visual directions, identified and then got the needed materials to get ready for baking. While they followed directions with the ingredients such as ‘open’, ‘pour’, ‘give’, ‘take’ and ‘stir’, they were practicing their motor skills and using the core words that they have been learning. Students took turns with the different steps, practicing waiting and requesting along the way. Each student scooped some of the batter onto the cookie sheet and one student even put the cookie sheet in the portable oven with the help of their teacher. It was a fun way to bring the story to life while using the skills they’ve been working so hard on in a motivating and meaningful way. And of course… Nobody minded tasting the finished product either! Students got even more practice as they asked for “more cookies”. Yum!
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LABBB Adapted Physical Education, Recreation and Social Opportunities
The walking/games club is enjoying the warmth of the sun and finally being outside. The mini golf group will be able to get outdoors again soon. Upcoming trips include Kimball Farm in Westford, Richardson’s and Paradise Family Golf, both in Middleton. We try to go to places where students can return with their families and friends another time. Students are often excited to share their putting skills and knowledge of the courses.
May and June bring the return of our monthly mini golf trips and maybe a High School baseball/softball game. Stay tuned.
Save the Date for upcoming events:
● April 27, 2023 LABBB Spring Dance
● May 12, 2023 Special Olympics all day at Lexington High Track
● May 18, 2023 LABBB Last Dance of the School year
● June 8, 2023 LABBB Graduation, Scottish Rite Masonic Museum
Remember to follow @LABBBREC on Twitter
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LABBB Parent Resources
The DDS Central Middlesex Area Office is working with Riverside Community Care Family Support Center to celebrate Spring. They will be having a baseball themed event at the Riverside Family Support Center in Burlington on Opening Day as the Boston Red Sox start their 2023 season. Click the link to see the flyer.
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Families with MassHealth Need to Renew Coverage:
Families with MassHealth need to renew their coverage this year in order to maintain coverage. Coverage protections put in place during the pandemic will end soon, and MassHealth will return to standard annual eligibility renewal processes. Please help inform MassHealth families that they need to take the following steps:
- Update contact information – make sure MassHealth has their most up-to-date address, phone number, and email so that they do not miss important information and notices about what else is needed.
- Report household changes to make sure MassHealth knows about any changes in their household, like a new job, address, changes to income, disability status, or pregnancy.
MassHealth Eligibility Redeterminations Information
Merrimack Valley Disability Transition Fair: Virtual Event with the Lawrence Public Schools. https://bit.ly/3Mo8Lmq
• Visual Impairment “Early Connections” Conference: w/ Perkins School for the Blind in Watertown https://bit.ly/41mrOCJ
• The Inevitable Aging Process for Special-Needs Caregivers & Their Loved Ones: Webinar with the MinuteMan Arc https://bit.ly/3KqQkvX
• Higher Education for Those with Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities in Massachusetts https://bit.ly/3KjDzCd
Special Needs Art Programs Inc.
Riverside Family Support
Extra Steps Launches Innovative Programs
Wilderness skill building can be a thrilling and empowering adventure for school age kids. A new program called Kids in the Wild is being offered through Extra Steps Pediatric Therapies. The first session will take place on December 10th in Sudbury for children ages 7-12.
Additionally, Extra Steps is offering Caregiver Workshops to help families build connections with one another and promote skill development in their loved one. An example is a workshop held on Nov. 2nd that focused on holiday stress.
For more information, contact Director Sherry Kenin.
Asperger/Autism Network (AANE) provides individuals, families and professionals with information, education. Community, support and advocacy is offering free community connection sessions .Our.Free Online Community Connection Sessions are single-session discussion groups and a great way to meet our staff and connect with the community for the first time. All times listed are in the Eastern Time Zone. Please click the date for more info and to register.
Housing Navigator Massachusetts
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Discovery Museum Announces 2023 Series of Free Events for Families of Children with Disabilities
Discovery Museum is ADA-compliant and all exhibits are accessible, designed according to Universal Design principles to be both aesthetically pleasing and useable by the widest possible range of people, without regard to age or ability.
Special resources are available to families including noise-reducing headphones, a sensory guide to the Museum, sensory-based programming, and American Sign Language (ASL) language facilitators at some events. Additionally, dinner, including a gluten-free option, is provided at all evening events.
All Especially for Me events are free to attend for all family members, but preregistration is required. Dates and registration links can be found online at http://bit.ly/EspeciallyforMe.
2023 Event Schedule
Sensory-Friendly Afternoons (open to the public, but no group visits are scheduled):
Tuesdays 1:30 to 4:30pm | May 2, June 6, August 1, October 3, November 7, December 5
Evenings for Families with Deaf, Hard of Hearing, & KODA Children (closed to the public):
Saturdays 5:00 to 8:00pm | May 6, December 2.
Autism-Friendly Evenings (closed to the public):
Saturdays 5:00 to 8:00pm | June 3, September 16, October 21, December 16
All-Access Evenings (closed to the public):
Saturdays 5:00 to 8:00pm | May 20, June 17, November 18
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A LABBB PODCAST
Patric Barbieri, Hosts a Podcast talking about special needs planning and resources related to our community
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In episode #22 we talk about our journey in building a mindful culture in LABBB. It is one of our core values that is posted throughout our collaborative. There is a significant difference between just talking about these practices and actually doing them. We made a commitment to offering mindful practices for all students in all our classrooms every single day. We also believe for us to be successful we need to offer and teach this to our staff as well. We are a community practicing together and this is the only way to get the true benefits. We have been fortunate to have many staff persons who have a myriad of unique mind-body skills to bring into our environments for both students and staff.
This initiative started organically back in the early '90s. We realized that these practices have a significant impact on managing the pervasive anxiety symptoms that people are feeling. Our mission was to bring these practices directly into our schools and for staff and students to know they have permission to practice at any time. When one individual is practicing it is benefiting their entire community!
Rayne Pratt and Lisa Poirier, LABBB Occupational therapists, join me in this podcast. They are members of our LABBB Mind/Body team and they are also the creators and facilitators of our all-day staff retreat that we offer.
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LABBB Collaborative
123 Cambridge Street, Burlington MA. 01803| LABBB.com
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