All Dogs Have ADHD..!

Oh my goodness... I was shown an AMAZING book yesterday by one of my collegues! Have you heard of this one??

It is a book  by Kathy Hoopmann, and she has some amazing books for kids all about ADHD and Asperger's Syndrome. This book, All Dogs Have ADHD, uses extremely cute photographs of all sorts of dogs to help explain what it is like to have ADHD, and helps kids relate to certain behaviours and understand that it is OK to have ADHD. I think it is a great book not only for kids diagnosed with ADHD, but also for kids who are around kids that struggle with attention (classmates, siblings, etc). Kids can instantly recognize the traits that are exemplified by these canines.  THEN I did some looking into it, and she has another book that looks great:

 All Cats have Asperger Syndrome. Incredible. I haven't had a chance to look at this one, but I bet it is great too - can't you picture some feline tendencies relating to the non-verbal/sensory/literal traits of a child with Asperger Syndrome?

Kathy Hoopman also has an adventure series where the characters illustrate what it is like to live with Aspergers; think: A kids version of "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" By Mark Haddon (which is a MUST READ if you haven't checked it out yet!).

And, while we are on the topic of fabulous books, have you read House Rules by Jodi Picoult? She is one of my absolute favourite authors, and in House Rules, she delivers an amazing, can't-put-it-down, brilliant novel demonstrating the struggles, triumphs, and challenges between members of society, families, and individuals with Asperger Syndrome (and all based around a murder mystery, too! Can't get much better than that.) Also a must-read if you have not picked it up yet!

I hope everyone is staying warm out there (us northern-ers anyway.... it is -45 degrees Celsius in Alberta today...brrrrrr. Snow day today!)

I would love for you to leave me a comment to let me know what you think of these books! Also, if you have any other great resources (or just darn good novels) that you have come across that relate to ADHD, Asperger Syndrome, LD, Social Skills, etc.I would love to hear about them too!

:) Christine

Social Media (sort-of) and..... Full Sentences!

Happy New Year! I hope 2012 is treating everyone well so far. Well, we are back into the swing of things, and it barely feels like we had a break - with teaching we seem to just dive right back in, wouldn't you say?!

I wanted to share my super successful writing lesson I had with my Gr. 4 students this week. I teach Gr. 4, but keep in mind that the kiddos are all diagnosed with learning disabilities, and they all seem to have an especially tricky time with written output. I have been trying ALL year to get the kids to successfully write full sentences on their own, but it sure has been a battle - editing their work tends to bring on negative reactions because it means *more* writing....

I tried out a website that I had heard about a while back called TodaysMeet. This is a site that is extremely easy to use, and is similar to twitter because there is a live feed that you can view as people submit a message. I like this site because you can set it up for a certain time frame - and then it is deleted. So, for the purpose of this assignment I set the site up for one day, then it would disappear along with all the written messages from my students at the end of the day.

 The lesson....