Special Connection Homeschool

I have found that timers have been a great way for Gess to transition from one activity to another without any complaint or stress. When we have a break from school (sometimes called recess) I set an alarm. When that time is up, she has to return to her work. Gess has been great about actually doing it. When the timer goes off, she stops and gets right back to work! We also use it to keep track of the amount of time she uses media. If she is on the computer or playing a video game we set it for about 30 minutes and when the timer goes off, she immediately turns the game off. There are exceptions like when she is about to finish a race, lap, or other significant event in the game. I do let her finish that off, but usually she is just done. Well, the last few years I have found that Gess has been more difficult to wake up. I am sure this is pretty typical of teens, but Gess has started ignoring me and hiding under the covers and doing whatever she can to stay in bed. She used to wake...

This year is bringing lots of change in our lives. My daughter, who as most of you know has Down syndrome, has entered the 6th grade! This transition is exciting, but also a little frightening. I am always trying to find ways to give her more independence and responsibility when she needs it, but I also need to be on top of what tasks she is doing. Thankfully my latest review introduced me to a tool that works beautifully to meet both of those needs. My Student Logbook has come up with a simple, but thorough system of tracking your students work and activities throughout the day. This will not only help you keep them on task but it will allow you to track their progress and hours spent in each subject. This will come in handy when you have to make those transcripts that are necessary to get your child into college one day! Having all this information at your fingertips makes homeschooling record keeping a breeze! It also just helps you keep your child accountable in the day to day...

Gesserine is almost a teenager. In October she will be turning 13. She has lately started carrying around a purse that she has had since she was a little girl. She never played with the purse until now. It just sat in her toy box year after year. Then suddenly, she wanted to start carrying it. I was excited because I tried to get her to start carrying one a couple of years ago, and that too never interested her. I am glad she is finally wanting to do it! The purse is really small so it isn't very practical or comfortable. I felt she needed one she could actually use so last weekend we went purse shopping. Gess isn't really good at browsing for things. There are so many options she doesn't even know where to start. Even when its time for lunch in our home she will ask me to give her some options, so we started with that. I picked out several purses I thought she might be interested in and asked her if she liked it or not. If it was a yes, it went into the shopping cart unt...

My daughter has Down syndrome and is entering middle school so I want to begin an even stronger focus on helping her understand how to handle money. I am also trying to figure out a way for her to make some money. She recycles cans and that is fine, but I want more of a business model. It would help if I was crafty, but I am not! My goal is try to find something for her to make and sell. In the meantime I picked up this workbook and so far it looks perfect for what I want to cover. They have this for three age levels: kids, teens 11-14, and teens 15-18. This has practical, down to earth steps about money management. It appears to teach both how the system works and then how to manage your own money. It is from a Christian perspective which is very important to me. I am considering ordering the actual book Money Matters for Teens to go with it, but it looks like this can be used all by itself.  Here are a couple of quotes from the introduction that I enjoyed. "The purpose ...

While Gess has been to church camp in the past, I have had always had to go as her counselor.  There are also always some activities she can't do well, or competitions she can't compete in equally, or just some times she can't keep up and needs to rest. This year we did something different.  For the first time Gess went to camp without me.  For the first time my husband and I had an entire week to ourselves. For the first time I was able to leave Gess and not have to worry about how she would handle things or how those watching her would handle her.  For the first time Gess went to Camp Barnabas . Camp Barnabas  is a camp geared specifically for special needs children.  They have camps for ages 7 to adults for every challenge your special one might face such as intellectual, physical, developmental, chronic illness, and more.  Campers are assigned their own counselor who follows them throughout the entire camp experience. They sleep in the cabin wi...

We took Gess to the dentist the other day and she had a very good report: still no cavities!  Gess actually takes very good care of her teeth.  We go for regular check ups twice a year and I worked hard to instill good habits in her.  As I was talking with the hygienist, who also has a child with Down syndrome, I realized it might be helpful to share some of the things we have done. When Gess was younger she made quite the mess using toothpaste.  It's hard to know just how much toothpaste to squeeze out of a tube and sometimes our kids lack the motor skills to squeeze it at all.  I found that the pumps were much easier and neater for Gess to use.  You can find them in many different brands for adults as well as children. One thing Gess always got from the dentist besides a toothbrush was a sand timer.  It's a good visual way for children to see how long they should be brushing their teeth.  We don't use them anymore now that Gess is 11, b...

You have finished your schooling and all of your chores and now you have to run to the store to do some shopping.  You are in a hurry but you notice your child is dragging behind.  They keep stopping to look at everything!  It's so frustrating because you are tired and just want to get home so you can finally relax, or worse yet start dinner and do more work for the day.  What do you do? Typically we hurry the child along and scold them for continually stopping.  The problem is that we are missing some valuable opportunities for learning.  The hardest thing for me to do as a homeschool teacher was to stop thinking that my school had to look, act and function like a brick and mortar school.  The fact that you school at home does not mean that once the clock hits a certain time or when the lessons are complete that school is over.  Homeschooling means that the child is constantly in a state of learning. Being the parent of a child with special n...

My daughter loves listening to music and has a pretty large selection of Christian CDs.  A few years ago we got her an mp3 player so she could listen to her music on long car rides which is pretty often since we live about 2 hours from any major city.  It has been a huge blessing for her to be able to listen to her own music, especially since she hates listening to what I like to listen to, which is talk radio! As she has gotten older she has started to want to use her mp3 player outside as well as in the car. This has been awkward for her since she hates wearing jeans and doesn't have any pants with pockets to put the player in or hook it to while she is playing.  Her solution was to run around with it in her hand which has caused her to go through a few sets of headphones as she tugs the wires out while running and playing with it. So my husband came up with a solution.  He made a holder for the mp3 player that attaches to her wrist.  Now she can run and p...

Someone in one of my Facebook groups shared these neat little shoe laces that are great for kiddos who struggle with tying their shoes.  Lock Laces are elastic laces that come with a gadget that locks them permanently into place.  There is a slider which enables you to loosen and tighten them as needed.  I bought a pair just to see how they would work and we love them! Now I no longer have to look for shoes for Gess that will simply slip on or use Velcro.  Of course at a price of  $7.99 each it does increase the overall price of the shoe but to me it's worth it.  Anything that gives Gess independence is a great item.  You can buy them in packs of 3 for $19.99.  I think I may do that next time and use a pair myself.  These really were made for runners and athletes but whatever the reason I am so glad I found them! 

Want to know what is so great about this picture?  I didn't take it.  That's right, my daughter is in the yellow shirt in the upper right corner and I was not even in the room.  Our library has wonderful programs every summer and young girls get to go to the Mad Hatter's Tea Party.  However when you get older they now have an American Girl Tea Party.  Gess is finally old enough to go alone.  While I was around at the library in case they needed me I didn't stay in the room with her.  Sure, she has been left alone at classes at church, gymnastics and other things like that but this was the first one where most of the kids were strangers to her.   I am sure Gess could have done a lot of these things on her own when she was younger but I liked to be there in case communication became a problem but I also just enjoyed helping and watching her.  It was during those times that I taught Gess how she was supposed to behave and what was expe...

A couple of years ago I wrote Fostering Independence: Breakfast Cereal about one of the ways we enabled Gess to fix her own breakfast and it was by using the small boxes of cereal. Well, that worked for awhile but as Gess got older the small boxes were too small for her appetite.  They can also be expensive.  Another tool we have been using are the tupperware style containers that help you keep Cereal fresh.  These are neat because Gess is not always good at rolling the bag up.  We had a real issue with ants getting in our pantry and several times they were in our cereal because she either didn't close the bag well or so much cereal fell in the bottom of the box outside the bag that the ants still found it.  Getting these handy things not only helped with ants, it helped Gess do a better, neater job at fixing her own cereal. Now Gess makes less of a mess and more importantly we got rid of our ant problem! We are still working on milk spills....

I am just super excited to tell you about the latest product I reviewed for the Schoolhouse Review Crew - Simplified Pantry .  It is not actually a homeschooling product, but rather something that every family can benefit from.  I grew up in a home where both parents worked and we ate a lot of fast food for dinner. I never really learned many cooking skills and so I always had to cook by following recipes.  Every week I planned my shopping list by the menu I prepared for that week and I would buy only the ingredients for those meals.  That of course always had me running back to the store several times because I would either forget something or have a change of plans.  Many times it meant eating out because if one of the meals didn't work out I had nothing ready to fall back on.  To help put an end to all this needless planning and preparation, not to mention the waste for all those "special" ingredients you buy that are only used once, Mystie Winkler ca...