Navigating the Special Education System Part 4: IEP vs ISP
Welcome to back to my series about navigating the special education system. Today I want to talk about the difference between IEPs and ISPs. I've previously touched on what an IEP is, so head back to that post first if you need a refresher if you need it, but I wanted to go more into depth on what an ISP is and the difference between the two.
Life Skills Download: Taking a Shower
When we lived in Argentina last year, one of the things that I started doing was a life skills to help my autistic daughter with activities of daily living. I did "taking a bath", but also made a "taking a shower" version of it as well because they require different steps. When we were in Argentina, I put it up on the wall in the bathroom so that she knew exactly what she needed to do with pictures and a checklist. In the time that we've been back she's stopped baths altogether and has struggled a little bit with the steps in the shower. So, I decided to pull the "taking a shower" download back out to help her.
Summertime Unpredictability Downloads
Today I want to talk about the things that we do in our house to help get us through the unpredictability of summer. If you're new here, I have ADHD. I thrive on just waking up in the morning and decided then what we're going to do for the day. However, my daughter is autistic, and she does so much better on a schedule. She thrives on the structure and schedule of the school year and we even do the summer school program that our county offers because she loves the structure so much. So, I have a few free downloads that help her with the unpredictability of summer that could maybe help your little too!
Organizing My Autistic Daughter’s Toys
I'm currently building wall to wall built-ins in my daughter’s room. She is autistic and one of her special interest is toys. She has SO many little figurines she collects and knows and plays with each of them. I'm building this so she has a place to keep all of them and we can still stay organized. I want to go over how exactly I'm organizing all the stuff to best fit her needs, so today we are going to sort, label and dejunk her room.
Navigating the Special Education System Part 3: How to Start Advocating
Lets get back into navigating the special education system. I've talked about my personal experience as a kid, then my experience as a parent. Now I want to start getting into the nitty gritty and give information about HOW exactly to advocate. First I want to give a couple of caveats. 1) I am not an educator or a professional, I'm a parent. There are so many other creators out there that are IEP advocates, teachers, and professionals in these fields that you should seek out, as well and do your own research. 2) I live in the United States. I have zero experience with any other country other than the United States. Along with that many things vary from sate to state and I only have experience with states that I have lived in. With that, I've done a lot of research myself so lets get started.
Things That Make Sense in Our Neurodivergent Home
Remember when there was a trend going around where people said the quirky things that “just make sense” in their home? Well, today I want to talk about things that make sense in my neurodivergent house, that might not in others.
Navigating the Special Education System Part 2: As A Parent
Last time we talked about my experience with the special education system as a student, today let's talk about my experience as a parent.
Navigating the Special Education System Part 1: As a Student
As most of you know, I have ADHD, and my daughter, who is almost eight, is autistic. I want to start a series about navigating disability within public education from a parent's perspective. So today, I'm going over my experience with disability and special education.
Home Organization Tips for ADHD
Hi! I'm Emily. If you are new here I am a 33 year old mom with ADHD. I was diagnosed when I was 16 years old so I have had more than half my life to come up with coping strategies and systems that help me to succeed. With these systems in place, I'm able to navigate my ADHD in my day to day life. I'm always trying to make our space at home more neurodivergent friendly because everyone in my family is neurodivergent and these systems help me to make that happen. I want to share how I utilize those systems to make our home function properly.
Train Trip Social Story
As the ADHD mom of an autistic child, I have made it my mission to make social stories that are neuro-affirming and focused on the viewpoint of the child that needs them, rather than how the child is impacting people around them. Currently, I'm working on transportation social stories. So far I've got airplane and ferry boat and now train! I'm gonna walk you through how I put this together, what it looks like on the inside, and how we use it.
Dental Hygiene Life Skill & Social Story
I decided the next life skill that I wanted to work on with my daughter was brushing teeth and just oral hygiene in general. My daughter seems to be struggling with that at the moment, even though she hasn't in the past so I knew it was something that I wanted to work on. I know that she's not the only autistic to have trouble with it, so I wanted to do a social story to go along with it. I already have a going to the dentist social story, but I wanted to make a dental hygiene at home specific social story.
Ferry Boat Trip Social Story
When we went to Uruguay in August, we took a ferry from Buenos Aires to Colonia de Sacramento, Uruguay. Since my seven year old autistic daughter has been on dozens of planes to this point, I thought that she would be fine with the process of getting on/off a boat and boat travel. Unfortunately, I was wrong. So, because of this experience and how difficult it was for her, I decided to create a social story about taking a ferry boat and what that entails.