Personal
Self Awareness
I think there are most likely exactly zero of us who received explicit, overt, interoceptive (inner body sense) instruction growing up. Maybe there are a few of us who did actually receive good instruction, but […]
Year: 2023
At Home
Personal
Offering Grace
My friend Jessica, who runs the page Once Upon an Upset, once wrote: “So many of us are afraid of getting taken advantage of that we forget the option of offering grace.” It’s strange that […]
Autism
Communicating =/= Speaking
Communicating is not always speaking. It can be easy to write off neurodivergent people’s voices because they don’t always sound like neurotypical people’s voices. Imagine finally taking the effort and time to explain something that […]
Activities
Beanbag Bunny Rescue
Okay, it might look like a hostage situation, but I promise that my game of “rescue the beanbag animals using scissors to cut the tape and string” was more fun than it looks visually and […]
Personal
Maladaptive Coping
I had a kid recently who is not on my caseload. Their teacher asked me offhandedly about something they do, what I would call a stim. In their case, they pick at the skin on […]
Activities
Time Travel
I have this one kid I work with who is an utter delight to witness inventing things. It’s a talent, seriously. Whereas I often work with kids who don’t necessarily know how to direct play […]
Activities
Following A Child’s Interest…
Sometimes “following a child’s interest” means taking 5 minutes before the session starts to use the beanbag animals that they’re extremely passionate about and set up a diorama of bunnies participating in fine motor activities. […]
Autism
Autism & Disability
Let’s talk about euphemisms. When non-disabled people dodge around the word “disabled” because they think it’s an uncomfortable word, that’s a euphemism. When they say someone has “special needs” or is “differently-abled” or is “challenged”, […]
At School
Half Pencils
Here’s a quick little thought/frustration of mine: Please, please, let kindergarteners (and first graders) (and I’d even say second graders!) use half-pencils instead of full pencils. I say “let” because I keep having to write […]