Reflection Blog Week 9

            I thought it was a neat experience to hear all the family projects from the others in the class. I feel that because our group had a disability that we were at least a little familiar with, we could apply previous knowledge and experience working with a common disability, the other groups had different disabilities, some that I had never even thought of. Something new that I learned from my peers was that the muscular disability they are born with, but they are not usually required to use a wheelchair until they are around 12 years old. I was surprised with the bone disease as well, I never really considered these disabilities as needing IEP’s or other things because a lot of times they are very high functioning and capable of learning and succeeding as a peer would. With the bone disease, I am glad that I was able to learn about it because we talked about how a lot of doctors and parents never assume that it is a disability, rather he is getting injured by an adult, which can be really scary- but having background knowledge in some of these disabilities it empowers us to be proactive and knowledgeable for the future.

Weekly Quote:

“ We often take for granted the very things that most deserve our gratitude” –Cynthia Ozick

I saw this quote on social media and I immediately thought of Christ and the gospel. Christ is the master teacher, and I feel that we don’t appreciate him as a teacher enough. Also while we were doing the family project where you were put in someone else’s shoes, you had to be creative and resourceful. Even though I have known families with special needs children, I had no idea how much work and stress and little things that are necessary that we take for granted not having these disabilities. When working with families, it is so important to recognize how much we truly are blessed with and be sympathetic with the families seeking resources.

HWD Paragraph:

SENORY ACTIVITIES IDEAS

http://www.sensorylifestyle.com/activities/top10-sensory-activities-toddlers-14months/

Fun with Blocks

Let’s pull out those blocks and have some fun! Bigger blocks are better, but are not necessary.

Skills developed

How to play

Eye- hand coordination; fine motor skills; and language skills. Targeted senses – as your toddler moves from lying, to sitting, to standing positions: visual; auditory; tactile; proprioceptive and vestibular.

Get down on the floor with your toddler. Start simple. Build a tower or a wall. Describe what you do. ‘I’m building a tower… let’s put the yellow block on top of the blue block… going higher and higher’. Then comes the fun part – demolition! Your toddler might start on the demolition part before you get to your third block. No problem. Start the process again. As much as your toddler will love destroying your creation encourage him to also stack the blocks with you.