Category Archives: Children with Special Needs

My Story, A Few Other Stories, and a Book Review

I started my career as a helper at my sister’s daycare, the Frontenac Club Day Care in Kingston Ontario. I had just graduated from Guelph University and was looking for work at the same time my sister needed help to get her daycare ready for licensing. Before I knew it, I was putting hooks on the newly installed cubbies and greeting the first children enrolled at her newly-renovated centre which opened in 1983.

Around the same time, I applied for funding to start the Integration Programme at the Frontenac Club Day Care and I became the first Resource Teacher to work there. As such, I was responsible for the integration of 4 children with special needs; 2 of the first 4 children had Down Syndrome.  

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From the CISS Equipment Library: The Benefits of Adaptive Seating

As resource consultants, one of the supports that we provide to programs is equipment for inclusion in the classroom. Some of our most commonly used items are alternative seating options for circle and group time activities. Group time can be challenging for children who may have trouble staying still, difficulties concentrating, or limited ability to wait. They may also have challenges processing sensory input such as the classroom noise level or the proximity of others.

Why use flexible seating?

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Home Child Care and the Joys of Caring for a Child with Special Needs

Pic HCC.jpgEarly Childhood Education experts agree that child care should be inclusive, but what does this look like in a home daycare?

In group care, all the educators are either Registered Early Childhood Educators (RECE) or in support roles. Most home child care providers are not trained RECE’s, and some have no formal training in the field; they do, however, have a love for children and a passion to help them develop to their full potential. Home child care providers are lifelong learners and take the training that they need to expand on their knowledge and enhance the quality of their early learning and care program. Continue reading →

ADD or ADHD

Boy_ADHDDifficult child, ill-bred child, whimsical child, problem child, lazy child… In short, you’ve probably heard them all before. These are false qualifiers that people attribute to children living with Attention Deficit Disorder with or without Hyperactivity. In our role as Consultants, we meet many of these children in community programs on a regular basis. We try to educate all involved in the face of this disorder, but mainly we try to provide winning strategies to encourage the inclusion of these children to enable them to reach achievable goals. Continue reading →

Letter to you, my perfectly imperfect daughter…

Your birth on April 18th 2015 was the happiest day of my life. You know, less than a year before your arrival, you had a big brother but he had the wings of an angel. So when I held you in my arms for the first time, it was both a relief and the culmination of a big dream; becoming a mother. You arrived 4 weeks earlier than expected after nearly 23 hours of labor.

JulieBenoit

Photo credit: Jessica Côté

When I saw you for the first time, I was ecstatic but this little voice inside my heart and my head was telling me that something wasn’t right. I guess we can call it intuition. When I changed your diaper for the first time, I noticed right away this little malformation on your skin in your lower back. I didn’t waste any time; I spoke to your doctor and from then on, a range of specialists entered your life and you have had to undergo a whole battery of tests that caused you to suffer more often than not. All the doctors seemed worried but nobody knew what was really going on so we were referred to different specialists. Continue reading →

How families walk the financial tightrope of caring for children with medical complexity

Amy recites expenses with the precision of an accountant. There was the HEPA filter to purify the air in her home: $1000. An American Sign Language (ASL) kit: $1500. A plasma car: $80.

These are all necessary to accommodate Amy’s three-year-old son, Wyatt. Wyatt was born with brainstem dysgenesis, a rare condition where blood flow to the baby’s brain is disrupted during pregnancy. Because of his condition, Wyatt has a host of respiratory, nervous and muscular problems that require special accommodation. Continue reading →

Clothing Rituals: Moving from Season to Season

Does your child have difficulty with change of clothing between seasons e.g. moving from shoes to boots, long sleeves to short, coat to just a tee shirt?  This can be a common characteristic in children with Autism and those with sensory processing difficulties. It can be the result of tactile sensitivity; the child is particular about the clothes he wears, finds tags and seams itchy or irritating, may not like having his sleeves pushed up, and likes only loose or tight clothing, socks and shoes or bare feet. Some children have difficulty tolerating touch to their skin and find that they can only tolerate certain clothing. It may also be the result of an intolerance to change in routine, transitions, or type of clothing. Some children are rigid and ritualistic because their world is confusing and overwhelming. The rituals and routines are their attempts to control their world in order to cope with it. Continue reading →