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June 15, 2012
Issue 19, Volume 5
It's All About the Choices!     
          
Hello Again!  

Hope you are enjoying your summer.  Here is our newsletter offering for the week!  Please enjoy!   
 
News Items: 
  • Kinesthetic Perception and Handwriting Legibility and Speed
  • Freezer Failure at Autism Tissue Program: Autism Research Could Be Set Back Years
  • Treating Childhood Anxiety With Computers, Not Drugs
  • Very Last Chance for SPD in the DSM until 2025!
  • Avatars May Help Children With Social Anxiety Overcome Fears  
  • Toddler Spatial Knowledge Boosts Understanding of Numbers 
  • Specific Language Impairment in the Huffington Post  
  • Overweight Kids May Do Worse in Math: Study  
  • Research in Time for Father's Day 
  • Fall Apple Lineup To Become More Disability (and Speech Therapy) Friendly  
Therapy Activities, Tips and Resources

Articles and Special Features 

  • SLP Corner: Improving Social Skills 
  • Physical Therapy Corner:  An Intensive Model of Therapy for a Child with Spastic Diplegia Cerebral Palsy: A Case Study 
  • Pediatric Therapy Corner:  Children with Brain Injury: Recovery and School 
  • Worth Repeating: Specific Language Impairment Fact Sheet from NIDCD
  • Also Worth Repeating: When your Special Needs Daughter Gets her Period        
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Have a great weekend and Take Care!

Heidi Kay and the PediaStaff Team





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Handwriting Research in the News:  Kinesthetic Perception and Handwriting Legibility and Speed
[Source Journal of Occupational Therapy via Your Therapy Source]

The Journal of Occupational Therapy, Schools and Early Intervention published research on haptic and kinesthetic perceptions relationships to handwriting legibility and speed  in 177 first and second grade children in Taiwan.  Haptic perception is the ability to recognize objects through touch.  Kinesthetic perception is the ability to recognize how the body moves in space.  The children participated in 5

Autism Research in the News: Freezer Failure at Autism Tissue Program: Autism Research Could Be Set Back Years

[Source:  Disability Scoop]
 

In what could be a major blow to autism research efforts, scientists say that one-third of the world's largest collection of autism brain samples has been damaged.
 

Officials at McLean Hospital, a Harvard affiliate near Boston, found that a freezer where the samples were housed failed in late May, according to a report in The Boston Globe. Two alarms designed to warn of freezer problems had not gone off even as the internal temperature rose and all of the 150 brains inside thawed.


 Read the Rest of This Article on our Blog
Childhood Anxiety in the News: Treating Childhood Anxiety With Computers, Not Drugs

[Source:  Science Daily]

 

According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, one in eight children suffers from an anxiety disorder. And because many anxious children turn into severely anxious adults, early intervention can have a major impact on a patient's life trajectory. The understandable reluctance to use psychiatric medications when it comes to children means child psychologists are always searching for viable therapeutic alternatives.

 

 Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
SPD in the News: Very Last Chance for SPD in the DSM until 2025!
As someone who understands SPD and the impact it has on families worldwide, we wanted to be sure you heard this important news about the DSM-5 campaign.

Children's futures are at stake. Use your voice to turn a "NO" from the DSM-5 Scientific Review Committee into a YES for inclusion of Sensory Processing Disorder in the DSM-5. One more committee left to review the proposal to include SPD!

 

Read the Rest of This Article and Act Through a Link on our Blog
Social Anxiety in the News: Avatars May Help Children With Social Anxiety Overcome Fears
[Source:  UCF Tdoay, Virtually Better, Inc.]

A principal standing in the hallway says, "You are one of my favorite students!" In class, a smart girl says, "You are the nicest person in our class!"  Many children would smile and eagerly return those compliments, but some with social anxiety may be too terrified to respond.

 

Researchers at the University of Central Florida's Anxiety Disorders Clinic and the Atlanta-based company Virtually Better want to give more children with social anxiety the practice they need to become comfortable in social situations.

 

 Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
Learning Spacial Relationships in the News:  Toddler Spatial Knowledge Boosts Understanding of Numbers
[Source:  Science Daily]

Children who are skilled in understanding how shapes fit together to make recognizable objects also have an advantage when it comes to learning the number line and solving math problems, research at the University of Chicago shows.

The work is further evidence of the value of providing young children with early opportunities in spatial learning, which contributes to their ability to mentally manipulate objects and understand spatial relationships, which are important in a wide range of tasks, including reading maps and graphs and understanding diagrams showing how to put things together. Those skills also have been shown to be important in Science Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) fields.

 

 Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link on our Blog
Specific Language Impairment in the News: Article on SLI in the Huffington Post 
[Source:  Huffington Post UK]

Specific language impairment (SLI) is so common it affects up to one child in every class and is as common as dyslexia and more common than autism but is barely heard of by the general public. A group of leading Speech and Language Therapist (SLT) clinicians and academics including: Gina Conti-Ramsden, Professor of Child Language and Learning at the University of Manchester; Dorothy Bishop, Professor of Developmental Neuropsychology at Oxford University; Maggie Snowling, Professor of Psychology at the University of York; Dr. Courtenay Norbury, Head of the Literacy, Language and Communication Laboratory at Royal Holloway, University of London; along with Becky Clark, Speech and Language Therapist,

 

 Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
Physical Activity (or Lack of it) in the News: Overweight Kids May Do Worse in Math: Study
Editor's Note:  "Which came first, the chicken or the egg" connection not clear but my guess is that physical activity is promoting better attention and neurodevelopment.   Yet more evidence of the power of exercise. 

[Source:  Yahoo News/Health Day]

 

Youngsters who are persistently overweight may not perform as well academically - specifically in math - as their normal-weight peers, new research suggests.  Although the study didn't find a direct cause-and-effect relationship between being overweight or obese and school performance, the researchers did find that children who started kindergarten carrying extra weight and were still heavy when they finished fifth grade performed worse on math tests.
 

Read the Rest of This Article Through a Link on our Blog
Personality Development in the News: Research in Time for Father's Day: One Of The Greatest Influences On Personality Development Is A Father's Love

[Source:  Medical News Today]

 

A father's love contributes as much - and sometimes more - to a child's development as does a mother's love. That is one of many findings in a new large-scale analysis of research about the power of parental rejection and acceptance in shaping our personalities as children and into adulthood.

"In our half-century of international research, we've not found any other class of experience that has as strong and consistent effect on personality and personality development as does the experience of

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

Technology in the News: Fall Apple Lineup To Become More Disability (and Speech Therapy) Friendly

[Source:  Disability Scoop and ASHAsphere]

 

The iPhone and iPad will soon be even simpler to use for people with a wide range of disabilities thanks to a new software update, Apple Inc. officials said this week.

 

Changes designed to make the popular mobile devices more accessible are expected in a forthcoming update to Apple's iOS software, the operating system that powers the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

 

Read the Rest of Two Articles on our Blog

Therapist Resource of the Week: Special Ed App of the Day on Special Needs.com

Special Needs.com is a great site providing excellent information for parents and educators.   I wanted to draw special attention however to their "Special Needs App of the Day" page. 


 Visit this Site Through a Link on our Blog
SLP Resource of the Week: Caroline Bowen's Speech Language Worksheets

A special thank you and shout out to 2Gals talk about Speech Therapy for reminding me to feature this fantastic collection of worksheets by Caroline Bowen.  


 Check out These Fantastic Worksheets Through a Link on our Blog
App Review of the Week : Move Like Me
Editor's Note:  This post originated on YourTherapySource.  Thank you to Margaret Rice for sharing this information about Move Like Me: a Motor Memory and Planning App.

There are constantly new apps coming out for the iphone and ipad. Here is a cute one that actually involves physical movement - Move Like Me.  This game is suitable for young children to practice copying movement patterns and motor memory.  Basically, the child picks a character.  That character

Learn More About Move Like Me on our Blog

Pinterest Pin of the Week : Squeezie Sidewalk Chalk
No Time for Flashcards is one of my very favorite learning/play/craft sites.    I always enjoy sharing their ideas here, especially when they support great therapy objectives like hand strengthening!   Quite a few repins on this one!

 

Learn How to Make Squeezie Sidewalk Chalk Through a Link on our Blog 

SLP Corner: Improving Social Skills

[Source:  Lets Talk SLP]

 

I'm taking some summer classes this year to help bump me up on the pay scale a little quicker. One of the classes I am taking talks about teaching and modeling social-emotional skills in students.

 

Typically if a student does not qualify for speech or language services then it is assumed that students should or already do possess the necessary social skills for their age. Some social skills may include self-awareness, empathy, communicating properly with other peers as well as adults/teachers, resolving conflicts, taking turns, etc.

 

Students who lack these social skills may struggle with forming peer relationships, may be bullied or teased, or may spend valuable classroom time trying to fit in with their peers. Oftentimes the responsibility for teaching social skills falls on the classroom teachers if the student does not qualify for speech or language services (Vitto, 2003).

 

 

Read the Rest of This Article on our Blog

Physical Therapy Corner: An Intensive Model of Therapy for a Child with Spastic Diplegia Cerebral Palsy: A Case Study

By: Neurological and Physical Abilitation Center (NAPA)

 

Background and Purpose: Intensive therapy (IT) programs for children with neurological disorders have changed pediatric rehabilitation; although, currently there is no conclusive evidence in support of appropriate protocols, outcome measures, frequency, duration, or intensity of sessions.

 

Pediatric clinicians agree that children with cerebral palsy (CP) need physical therapy (PT) in infancy and throughout childhood; however, there is often very slow progress in achieving strength, coordination, balance, ambulation with or without assistive devices, or independence in functional activities. Consequently, pediatric physical therapists have spent over fifteen years researching methods to "jump start" the neuromuscular system in children with CP. The purpose of this case study is to describe the management of a child with CP during fifteen days of an intensive model of therapy (IMOT).


 Read the Rest of This Article on our Blog

Pediatric Therapy Corner: Children with Brain Injury: Recovery and School
 

By: Marilyn Lash, M.S.W.

 

An injury to a child can be an emotionally devastating event for families. Whether it is caused by a car crash, fall, sports injury or biking collision, many parents feel that have failed to protect their child from harm.

 

"Traumatic brain injury in childhood is the most prevalent cause of death and long term disability in children and affects all socioeconomic levels" (Bond Chapman, 2006).

How do children recover?
The recovery process for children with a brain injury is complex because the child's brain is still developing. A new view of brain injury recovery in children describes two phases.

 

Read the Rest of This Article on our Blog

Worth Repeating - Specific Language Impairment Fact Sheet from NIDCD

Here is a nice fact sheet from the NIDCD (National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders) on Specific Language Impairment to use and or file in your toolkit!

 

What is specific language impairment?
Specific language impairment (SLI) is a language disorder that delays the mastery of language skills in children who have no hearing loss or other developmental delays. SLI is also called developmental language disorder, language delay, or developmental dysphasia. It is one of the most common childhood learning disabilities, affecting approximately 7 to 8 percent of children in

Read the Rest of this Article Through a Link on our Blog 
Also Worth Repeating - When your Special Needs Daughter Gets her Period

[Source:  Friendship Circle Blog]

 

From the time my daughter was born with Down syndrome thirteen years ago, my biggest concern was what would happen when she got her period.  I have learned over the years that I am not alone when it comes to parental worry on this subject.

Let me stress up front that I am not a medical professional in any capacity so what I am going to share with you should not trump your doctor's recommendations; I am simply sharing my journey and providing some helpful hints.

 

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

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