The reason it’s been very quiet on this blog is because I’ve been very busy elsewhere – I have been working on creating a networking group for parents of children with special needs at the place where I work. I am happy to report I’ve made a good start! When I posted a message on [...]
The IEP Process – Special Education Advice for Parents (Part I – The Beginning)
Learning about special education is a daunting journey. I’ve been doing it for over four years now and I’m still learning. I can barely remember the very beginning and how confusing it all was. That’s why when I read a call from Karen Nowicki (an integrative coach) for tips for parents with children on IEPs, [...]
Following the Web from "organic foods" to "hyperbilirubinemia"
What does it tell you about eating “conventionally grown” foods if your own health insurance plan includes in its newsletter a short article about eating “organic”? Harvard Pilgrim’s Winter 2009 mini-magazine includes a brief feature titled “Eating Organic on a Budget.” (see page 11) Now, if you read the “fine” print (the paragraph titled “A [...]
Yopple eepee
We’ve been subjected to high-pitched chanting of “yopple eepee yopple eepee yopple eepee” for several days now and today during the 30-minute drive coming back from the auditory processing evaluation I finally found out what it’s all about. Apparently one of my son’s classmates sounded out “people” as “pee-o-ple-ee.” That, repeated over and over again, [...]
Ethnic background and attitude toward Special Education
While I have known for a while that some parents will look the other way when a child is struggling and will not have the child tested because they’re afraid or ashamed of the “special ed kid” label, I had not realized that minority families seem to be much more wary of that, until I [...]
Antibiotics and increase in symptoms
My son got strep last week and is on antibiotics until the end of the week. Interestingly, I don’t know if it’s because of the antibiotics, lack of exercise and fresh air (it’s either snowing or too cold to go outside), boredom, or what, but we’ve seen some increase in symptoms recently — much more [...]
Connection between levels of fetal testosterone and autistic traits
I wanted to title this post “Would you want to know if your child might be autistic?” but after reading in the Guardian Prof. Simon Baron-Cohen’s response article titled “Our research was not about prenatal screening for autism,” I have decided to give my post a different, more neutral title, and closer to the title [...]
Engineers, Hips, and Autism
The headline “Men who don’t find curvy women attractive ‘could father children with autism‘” sounds just too weird to pass up. I found it through Google alert on a rather curious blog “What Sorts of People.” The entry does not comment on the title, just refers people to an article in the Daily Mail Reporter, [...]
Change.gov is closed, whitehouse.gov is up(dated)
I slightly panicked when I went to change.gov today and saw only a plain-looking box referring everyone to whitehouse.gov. I was afraid all the links I created to change.gov in my previous posts were broken. (“Citizen’s Briefing Book at change.gov” from January 13, 2009, and “Citizen’s Briefing Book update” from January 20, 2009) But I [...]
Citizen's Briefing Book update
The Citizen’s Briefing Book, which I mentioned in the post “Citizen’s Briefing Book at change.gov“ was closed on Sunday, January 18, 2009 (see “Wrapping up the Citizen’s Briefing Book“ entry on the change.gov blog). My comment “Revamp the Javits Gifted and Talented Students Education Program” got only 210 votes overall and two comments. My two other [...]