Any family is healthier when parents have family and friends to help out when things are difficult. Caring for children with disabilities can require a higher level of support. In Canada, many provinces offer funding for respite care for families of children with developmental disabilities. Respite care is when someone else cares for your child, allowing you to take a […]
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One of the difficult things about learning your child has autism is deciding what kind of services are best for them. For example, early childhood intervention can be offered in many different formats, each based on different philosophies of child development. From time to time, parents of children with autism talk about combining therapies – they hope to be working […]
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Credit for this topic goes to Marlaine Willborn, a retired speech therapist in Winnipeg, who demonstrated the use of ideas from Giggle Time: Establishing a Social Connection by Susan Aud Somers. Overview Play is how children learn. Most adults want to play with their children. Sometimes we can feel that our children don’t want to play with us. Many of […]
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The following story was written by a mother learning to communicate and problem-solve with her child through play.through play. My son has begun his Autism Outreach therapy. For those of you unfamiliar with it – it’s a developmental therapy offered for children with autism. And it’s basically using play to help kids hit those developmental milestones. Our therapist is amazing. […]
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Service dogs are fast becoming an accepted and recognized support for children and adults with autism. In addition to helping with safety concerns such as wandering, service dogs also provide social-emotional and sensory support that can help children cope with a sometimes chaotic world, give them opportunities to interact and play, and even help them sleep well. Here is one […]
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Originally published on RDI Connect. Those of us raising children in Canada are keenly aware of and attuned to the seasons and their impact on the flow of our daily lives. There is nothing like living through a harsh, bitterly cold winter, then being able to throw off our winter boots and mitts on the first warm, sweet spring day. […]
Read moreHow can we help our children flourish? And what is required for them to reach their full potential as human beings? On May 29 in Winnipeg, Gordon Neufeld spoke about how we can help all children grow to be the best people they can be. Much of what he had to say speaks to addressing the needs of children with […]
Read moreEvery child grows. Every child is unique. Every child thrives when an adult loves and interacts with them. These are the principles that guide DIR/Floortime. DIR/Floortime is an approach to helping parents support the learning of children with autism. It’s based on the idea that even when children seem to be delayed in social and emotional development compared with other […]
Read moreHere’s a big question: if all children learn best through play, why would our children with autism be any different? At the World Conference of Early Childhood and Education held in Moscow, Russian in 2010, the Council of Ministers of Education Canada (CMEC) published a statement (available here) on play-based learning. They underscored the enormous importance of purposeful play based […]
Read moreBooks and reading are important in our house. My husband and I are both readers, and we believe reading is an important foundation of learning at any age. When our children were born, we filled our bottom bookshelves with books for babies and toddlers, and got ready…but there was a glitch. Both of our children were very averse to letting […]
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