Food For Thought Friday

Do you ever look back at your week and think Where the hell did the time go???

That is what I am thinking this Thursday afternoon as I finish up this post. So many things I thought I would get to, and didn’t. Oh well, there’s next week, right?

This week on Food for Thought Friday, I’m sharing some great reads all about connecting with children with special needs, the importance of how we say things, and what happened in one school district when they took away all the playground rules as well as why I am moving to Finland. 😉 Happy reading!

The view from a recent hike we went on with the kids.

Connecting through Sensory Play

Sarah from Little Bins for Little Hands, a mother of a child with special needs, shares her story on Two Daloo about how sensory play provided a way to connect with her son that she wasn’t expecting…

We had taken Liam to a farm with a huge silo filled with corn. He happily sat in it and played. We bought a bag and filled an under bed storage tub at home with it. He happily sat and played with us. We then purchased a large sandbox for the living room and put the corn in it. Again, he happily played with us in it. All of a sudden I had found a key to a lock that had remained a mystery. We were given the chance to play together.

This is a must read for parents of children with special needs, but also for SLPs and other professionals who work with children with special needs. It may make you rethink how you connect and teach your students/clients. Head over to Two Daloo to read the whole post.

Why Our Words Matter

Fellow SLP Kelly at Speech2U has an awesome series called Soapbox Saturday where she blogs about topics that get her, well, on her soapbox 😉 Recently she shared a personal story about her son, The Paper Wasting Story, that prompted her post about why our words matter. She says:

As professionals working with children, our words are powerful.  As parents to our children, our words are powerful.  As adults in the community, our words are powerful.  It’s easy to forget this as we need to share information with others.  But we can choose how we frame our thoughts-and we can choose what we want to communicate to the children and students with whom we work.

Head over to Speech2U to read the rest of her insightful thoughts on how we speak to, and about, others.

What Happens When a School Ditches All the Rules

This is by far one of the best things I read all week on the subject of education. A New Zealand school ditched playground rules, and you might be surprised what they saw:

Chaos may reign at Swanson Primary School with children climbing trees, riding skateboards and playing bullrush during playtime, but surprisingly the students don’t cause bedlam, the principal says.

The school is actually seeing a drop in bullying, serious injuries and vandalism, while concentration levels in class are increasing.

Principal Bruce McLachlan rid the school of playtime rules as part of a successful university experiment.

“We want kids to be safe and to look after them, but we end up wrapping them in cotton wool when in fact they should be able to fall over.”

Letting children test themselves on a scooter during playtime could make them more aware of the dangers when getting behind the wheel of a car in high school, he said.

“When you look at our playground it looks chaotic. From an adult’s perspective, it looks like kids might get hurt, but they don’t.”

Head over and read the whole story, and tell me what you think. What do you think would happen if the schools in the US tried this?

I’m Moving to Finland, care to join me?

I am not sure I have done a Food for Thought Friday that did not include a post from Amanda from Not Just Cute. I guess you could say I am a fan 😉 Anyway, this is an older post of hers (which is still relevant) about Finland’s educational system:

While here in America, we seem fixated on the “earlier is better” philosophy, Finland is staying at the top by honoring early childhood for what it is.  In fact, Finnish children don’t even enter formal schooling until they are seven years old.  That’s right.  Finland is getting ahead by starting later.

Before seven, however, young Finns don’t just stay home watching cartoons all day.  The period of early childhood is revered and respected in Finland, evidenced by their commitment to providing access to high quality early education to all of its citizens.

Yup, I kinda want to move to Finland. Go check out the whole post at Not Just Cute, and then tell me what do you think of Finland’s educational system?

That is about it for today’s Food for Thought. Did you happen to catch my post yesterday about letting go of the guilt? If not, I’d love you to check it out and tell me what you think!