Army OT guy, great article
The Grinch That Stole Blogmas….
We are officially on break…
…one of the many perks of being in the school system…not that I get paid diring it but nice to have a break.
I included a picture of an attempted glitter manicure…and a page of ginger bread accoutrements that one of my first graders was expected to cut out…yikes!!!
Also a picture of a recent sunrise I woke up to 🙂 and finally a picture from a recent late night of work at one of my schools…we ordered in some minestrone soup and one of the teachers lit a candle which made me laugh. 🙂
It was sweet how many presents I got addressed to miss awesomeness…Always makes me smile. Probably about 10 percent of my kids give me small gifts for the holidays which are of course appreciated but not expected or necessary. I think Starbucks gift cards are definitely the most common 🙂 I enjoy buying my friends drinks!
I am hoping that this next two weeks will allow me to catch up on some reviews!! I have tried out some new apps enough by the makers of dexteria to have pros and cons of each. And taught several kids how to tie their shoes using tying is a snap laces. 🙂
Well typing all of this on my phone is tough so I guess I’ll stop now. Thanks for the kind comments, emails, texts, Facebook messages, etc on my sweet black cat. I am hoping this next two weeks will be both productive and restful and healing!!
My kids..
I don't even know what to call this…
Awkward photos.
I know I’ve blogged about this before but it’s so weird I have to blog about it again because it keeps swimming in my brain, trying to figure out why.
The left is a picture of a pencil grip with a pipe cleaner threaded through it and a cocktail sword (which has been mostly broken off) on it too.
For whatever reason my kids are fascinated by it. And I have several kids who tend to fist their non-dominant hand while writing, and holding this object makes them happy. Don’t ask me why.
Cats are people too
Good news, bad news….
Bad news first…
Having a rough week!
My blog mojo and my general brain mojo have been lost this week. I’m feeling down, partially because I’m putting my 20 year old cat down this next Saturday, partially because I’m a little overwhelmed, partially because of the darkness of December, etc etc.
Hi, Teach123 Fans: Lava Paper!
“Cut a file folder into strips. The shorter the attention span, the smaller you will cut the strips. I cut this one into 3 parts. Students open 1 flap at a time and always begin at the top and work their way down. Students complete the work that they can see when a flap is open. “
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Does music help attention? Does white noise help attention?
Something I saw in I think Smithsonian magazine about using music to help your brain. I liked what they noted about people with attention deficits and how they may calm down in a paradoxical way – ie how taking the equivalent of speed calms them while it “speeds” the rest of us up. Very interesting neurologically.
Anyway, the thing about anxiety – that USED to be the case for me, that when I was frequently (severely) anxious, I listened to Enya while lying in a dark room and practicing diagraphagmatic breathing. But eventually when I thought of Enya it made me anxious because the two became so linked. So then I could no longer listen to Enya without that association of being panicked. So sometimes it turns on you! My new favorite is Native American Indian flutes, the Canyon Trilogy, by R. Carlos Nakai. Many of my kids in special ed also really enoy it.
This reminds me that I want to do a post soon about white noise. Some studies have come out showing that white noise or classical music can be very helpful for concentration for SOME PEOPLE – especially those with ADD. But for those with “regular” concentration, it can actually be harmful to our attention. When I was in 7th grade, we had a history teacher who was big on playing classical music during our tests. He had good intentions and I know there were/are studies showing classical music helps. But it was a novel stimulus and I know for me it actually made it much harder to concentrate. Try white noise apps for your OT kiddos with ADHD to use while working, and see if it seems to help them out. (In our district our 3rd graders and higher have individual iPads so it would be easy for us to implement but maybe not so easy in most districts). But be careful of using classical music/white noise with ALL children. Better to use as a case by case basis.
Oh. Guess I don’t need to write a new post about white noise, I just wrote it. 😉
hit my sensory limit…
hit my sensory limit for the week. Having a very quiet Friday night at home…..but going to write down some children book ideas before bed. Have been saving pictures and stuff to post to the blog.