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We know this sounds crazy but sometimes we get to meet rock stars. Not traditional rock stars, but people who rock our world. One of our rock stars is Mary Cushing. Mary is from the Speech Pathology Associates the inventor of the original Chewy Tubes, our most highly recommended oral motor product.

Chewy Tubes were originally created by Mary for a Jaw Rehabilitation program to help build biting and chewing muscles for people who had strokes or low muscle tone. Since that time they have been used by all kinds of people, including children on the autism spectrum.

We always recommend Chewy Tubes when a parent or therapist has a child that’s chewing or sucking on their clothes. The design is terrific. The handle has ridges making it easy to hold and the tube itself is not too long. The length of the chewy tube insures that the person will not gag themselves. If you have ever seen a kid gag on a mouthing product then you know why this is important- especially right after lunch! This is a major reason why we prefer Chewy Tubes over several other oral motor products.

Another great feature of the Chewy Tube is that it is a tube. The tube design really gives the muscles in the jaw good proprioceptive feedback. Proprio what? The muscles and tendons in the jaw get a good chewy work out! This is the only product that does this. We also often recommend the Grabber XT especially for VERY aggressive chewers, but the XT is harder and doesn’t offer the same chewy satisfaction that the Chewy Tubes do.

Anyhow back to Mary’s rock star status. Mary rocks because she saw a need and invented an awesome product to meet that need and we love that about her. It’s not easy to come up with something really good. Mary put a lot of time, effort and thought into what she created – and it shows.  Chewy tubes continue to help a wide variety of populations including children on the autism spectrum. So yay for Mary – you rock!

For more on Chewy Tubes watch the Chewy Tubes instructional Video.

Since many children with autism spectrum have a difficult time understanding emotions we offer several varieties of emotion flashcards sets. We often get questions about these items, so here is a little information about each of our emotion flash cards sets.

Stages Language Builder Emotion Cards: In terms of emotion flashcards sets, this set is the cream of the crop. This card set features 80 3.5” x 5” photo cards that depict various facial expressions and emotions. The nice thing about this set is each emotion is featured eight times by different people. These emotions are: happy, sad, angry, surprised and disgusted. This is very helpful for generalizing recognition of emotions. The set also features 40 more images depicting real-life situations and activities that elicit a wide range of emotions. On the back of these cards are suggested conversation starters that are specific to each scenario. This card set is very popular for intensive behavioral programs, home use with parents and early intervention classrooms.

People and Emotion Photographic Learning Cards: This emotion card set offers a variety of ways to explore people and emotions. This set features 22 photographs of emotions that moves beyond basic emotions and looks at more subtle emotions such as shy, grouchy, or worried. This set also includes 23 photographs of families from a variety of ethnic and cultural backgrounds. 23 photographs of children engaged in common school and social activities. 22 photographs of people engaged in common careers that children see in their community. This set also includes a resource guide with additional teaching suggestions, activity ideas and word lists.  This set is very popular in preschool and early intervention classrooms.

Emotions Flash Cards: This set features 22 high quality photographic cards that represent a wide range of emotions. Each 8” x 5” card features a close-up of a young child’s face. The common emotions happy, sad, worried and angry are each featured three times, which helps with generalization. Several other emotions are also pictured including surprised, scared, serious, bored and disgusted. The size of these cards also make them a nice choice for circle time, bulletin boards or other small group settings.

More Emotions Flash Cards: The More Emotions Flash Card set is a continuation of the Emotions flash cards. This set continues to show pictures of happy, sad, and angry as well as lots more emotions such as lonely, surprised, sick and nervous. Use this with the Emotions Flash Cards to create an extensive high quality set of flashcards that examine emotions.

Facial Expressions Flash Cards: This flash card set features 45 4″ x  5″ photographs of children displaying a wide variety of emotions and facial expressions. Close shots of children’s faces ensure that learners will focus on the facial expressions. Emotions include happy, sad, angry, surprised, as well as more subtle emotions such as worried, upset or bored. The discussion and story starters include guided questions that develop expressive language skills while teaching children how to recognize emotions in others, describe their own feelings and demonstrate empathy.

By: Kimberly L. Gallo

“He’s acting weird,” words of concern from me to my husband. “Maybe he has autism,” I blurted out of nowhere. Autism… What is autism? Why did I just say that word out loud to my husband? Especially since I have no idea what autism is?

This was the start of our journey; the word came flying out of my mouth and I knew it must have come out for a reason. It was then that I looked up the word “autism” online. The year was 2003. After finding a list of signs of autism on my computer screen, and seeing that our son had all five signs, I was convinced.

The same week of his diagnosis, our younger son was born. It didn’t take long to see that our new baby was more interested in the letters on my shirt than looking into my eyes. Here we go again.

I craved eye contact and smiles from my sons. It didn’t seem fair that I had to work so hard for what other parents got naturally from their children. So I set out to make joint attention my goal. I had my face in my children’s faces as much as I possibly could. I remember one time singing “Row, row, row your boat” to my 4 month old son. I was smiling and singing while he cried and tried to get away from me. I had the advantage though, he was not mobile yet.

Being a constant cheerleader was the hardest thing I have ever done and the most rewarding thing at the same time. When I got a shared moment of happiness, I felt like I was on top of the world.

Knowing how hard it is to create that bond between parent and child with autism, and knowing how vitally important the bond is, I was spurred into action to create a product that would make interacting with ASD kids something to look forward to. I wanted to make products for parents and educators that could bring out the laughter and the eye contact in a way that was fun for everyone. My husband and I created “Playtime with Zeebu” for this purpose.

First and foremost, Zeebu games, DVD, books, and puppets are tools that help parents and educators connect with their ASD children. The DVD and all of the activity books come with user guides and games that help parents facilitate joint attention. The Zebu puppet acts as a bridge from the video to the real world enticing children with ASD to want to play along with their parents and care givers. In the back of each of our activity books there is a section called “Playing Together Games”. This section has my favorite face to face games; games that my children still ask to play today.

My journey is not over; my boys are now 8 and 9 years old. Like most parents of children with autism, I am constantly looking for a new key that will unlock the part of their brain that autism has closed off. I take it as a challenge; I enjoy the hunt for the key because when I find the key that fits, when that door is opened, it will give me more energy and a purpose to tackle the next locked door.

Birthdays can be a challenge for a child with autism. A birthday party is outside of their routine. There can be lots of extra stimulation. The excitement and enjoyment of the party can quickly escalate to a place where the child feels overwhelmed.  Fortunately, there are a few tried-and-true things you can do to prepare your child for their birthday party.

Work with the child to come up with a birthday party schedule. This schedule can be a series of pictures, or words that explains the order of events for the party. Post this in a centralized location so that the child can place a check next to each party activity or line through at the end of the activity. Knowing what will happen ahead of time will lessen anxiety and give the child a sense of control. It’s important to allow your child to participate in creating the schedule. By helping to create the schedule the child buys into the schedule.

Try to limit extra stimulation. Consider limiting the number of people you invite to the party. Think about decorations in this situation less may be more.  If a balloon pops will that hurt your child’s ears? If so don’t have balloons, or securely place them high enough so that nobody can touch them.  Think about sensory stimulation your child enjoys, will soft music playing in the background provide extra stimulation or would it be calming?

Prepare for a meltdown or overstimulation ahead of time.  Have a plan set up ahead of time so that your child can go to a quiet place if they feel overstimulated. Oftentimes a short 15 min. break can allow a child to regroup and rejoin a party. If your child needs a break, what can the rest of the guests do? Can they have a coloring contest that your child can judge when they are done with the break? Can they play an outside rowdy game that your child would not enjoy? Talk with your child about the plan so that they feel comfortable with the solution ahead of time.

Practice social skills ahead of time. Create simple social stories that will help your child prepare for situations they will face at the party. For example:

Receiving a Gift

Sometimes people give me a gift. When people give me a gift, I will try to say, “thank you.”

Saying “thank you” is polite.

People like to hear “thank you” after they give someone a gift.  (The New Social Story Book by Carol Gray)

All of us are smarter than one of us, if you have a great birthday party tip please share!

On December 18, 2007, the United Nations declared April 2 as World Autism Awareness Day (WAAD).  Autism is now affecting tens of millions of people all across the world. The United Nations created world autism awareness day to encourage early diagnosis and early intervention and to express their deep concern for the high rate of autism in children in all regions of the world.

 Please join us in our effort to inspire compassion and inclusion and hope for those with autism. Start a conversation today with somebody you come into contact with. This can be as simple as saying “happy world autism awareness day” to friends or coworkers that you come into contact with today.

As an Occupational Therapist and co-owner of Sommerfly™, a therapeutic products company, I am very aware of the common misconception on the internet and elsewhere regarding what the appropriate weight is for a weighted blanket.  For a very long time there was no research done on weighted blankets.  In order to have some frame of reference, the research that was done on weighted vests and backpacks was misapplied to weighted blankets.  This is incorrect and unfortunate as weighted blankets are used in an entirely different way than weighted vests and backpacks are used.

The biggest difference is that an individual is not bearing the weight of the blanket while standing.  That is what the research on weighted vests and backpacks tested – weight bearing while standing. The useful weight for a Weighted Blanket is most commonly more than 10% of the person’s body weight. The Sommerfly Sleep Tight™ weighted blankets  follow the current, research-based recommendations of being heavy enough to be effective but light enough for the user to remove the blanket at will.

There is now finally some research on weighted blankets.  This research was conducted by Tina Champagne, an Occupational Therapist based in Massachusetts.  She also concluded that using the results of the weighted vest and backpack research to determine appropriate weights for weighted blankets was incorrect.  In fact, she found that people consistently sought out, and were comfortable with, weighted blankets that weighed well over 10% of their body weight.

I have determined Sommerfly’s™ weight recommendations for our Sleep Tight™ weighted blankets based on the many years of experience I have had trying different weights for the children I have worked with in my Occupational Therapy practice. The weights that I recommend are based on what we have found to be most commonly effective as reported by parents, the blanket users and my observations.  Some people crave more pressure and some people like less pressure but the guidelines that I have come up with work for most people, both children and adults.

Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) makes it difficult for a person to understand information they receive from their senses. If you take a minute to think about it, everything you know about the world comes through your senses. SPD causes a person’s body to misinterpret this sensory information causing them to respond inappropriately to ordinary sensory experiences.

When our senses are integrated properly they protect us and allow us to enjoy our surroundings.  Who doesn’t enjoy smelling fresh baked cookies or leave a building when they smell smoke?   The five senses most of us are familiar with are:

• Vision -visual perception
• Hearing – auditory perception
• Touch – tactile perception
• Smell – olfactory perception
• Taste – oral perception

Two senses we may not be familiar with are:

• Vestibular – our sense of balance
• Proprioceptive – our muscles movement

When coordinated properly our senses work together to help us understand and maneuver within our environment. For example to open a door:

• We look at it- visual perception.
• We place our hand on the doorknob- visual and tactile, and proprioceptive perception.
• We squeeze the doorknob (not to hard or to soft) and turn it- tactile, proprioceptive perception.
• We pull open the door (not to hard or to soft) – vestibular, proprioceptive, visual, and tactile perception. (If the door has a squeaky hinge we hear that as we are opening it – auditory perception.)
• We walk through the doorway, stepping over the door jam- visual, vestibular, and proprioceptive perception.

A person with SPD may:

• Bump into the door.
• Slam the door.
• Hit their self with the door.
• Trip or bang into the doorway as they walk through.
• Be unable to open the door.

If you believe your child may have SPD have them evaluated by an Occupational Therapist trained in Sensory Processing Disorder.

With summer coming around the corner we thought you might be interested in a new company:

Bridges to Adventure

Having a child with Autism presents many challenges, including planning and managing appropriate vacations for the WHOLE family. A new company, Bridges to Adventure is going to try to make this easier.  Their mission is to provide families that have a child with Autism necessary preparation, tools and support to have an enjoyable and memorable vacation for each and every family member.  Beginning in the summer of 2011, they will host trips to Alaska and Costa Rica.  Trips will include lodging, meals and therapeutic opportunities. 

Director and founder, Melissa Bridges (BA-Therapeutic Recreation, MaEd-Special Education) and her support staff of teachers, occupational therapists and speech/language pathologists have spent decades specializing in the care and treatment of children with Autism. A passion for teaching children with Autism and love of the great outdoors, have finally come together to create one of the most unique travel companies available to families that have children with autism. Her focus is on the WHOLE family; making sure each member has an incredible vacation they will never forget!

I had an epiphany while drinking my coffee this morning, I realized that as professionals work on developing “appropriate” social skills they come at it with a bias from their own life experience.

Let me expand and lets just say these are highly recognized reputable people:
A behaviorist with a PhD said, “teach kids to play chess so they can get involved in a chess club and make friends.” As I looked at him, I just knew he played chess, I knew it!

An SLP said, “you need to have kids around typical kids try to get them invited to parties and maybe teach them some jokes. She then went on to share a joke, that was not one I can repeat here.  I’m sure this woman was and may still be a party animal!

I myself am thinking I just want both of my kids to have a few good friends that they enjoying getting together with hanging out and watching a movie… (OK I was a little boring in HS.)

So appropriate social skills for the teenager, what are they? I guess it depends on the individual.

I love the season of Christmas. I love to anticipate the cards and decorations. I love the fact that this is my FREE time. Yep, you heard it right.  I am FREE to daily declare my appreciation to God, and to the world,  for HIS gift to me. Somehow like the game Monopoly, I feel like I have a ‘get out of my rut’ free card.  I get to appreciate many people who I have pretty much ignored throughout the year. Having a child with special needs puts my life in a category all of its own. 

I get letters from others catching me up on the growth of their children and their achievements.  How do I tell them I am still working with my child to want to say good-night to me with a hug?  

Do I think they will remember I started working on that goal 14 years ago? 

Do they save my Christmas notes???

I was so energized and encouraged when I read from the Bible about Mary, Jesus’s mom in the book of Luke. When Jesus was born shepherds came; a bright star led them to the place of his birth.  After Jesus was born she ‘pondered these things in her heart’.   I looked up that word, ponder, and it meant ‘to weigh’.  She was weighing all she had come to know about her son since his inception.   

This made me realize how I  love to ponder. I love to be free from worry or fret. I love to focus on what God will do next.  Thinking on what has come and gone in my life and what will arrive with the next ‘ wave.’ 

My life has been a series of ‘waves’. There are times when I feel sorry for myself, knowing my old age will come with a companion known as my son. There are times when I am so proud of who he is and who he has become, despite the cruelty of others. There are times when I am so tired of saying the same things, morning and night to accomplish the simplest of tasks.

Will Friday ever be anything else other than Pizza night?

Yet today I realize I am in the greatest of company when I ponder. I am thankful to God for a life of pondering. There are many times I am amazed at what I could have never thought to ponder.  I am weighing my reality and it is weightless when I ask God to hold it! 

Thnks for listening, Sharon.