[FEAT BC Admin]

This area is for discussions in general topics.

Topic

[Maureen St. Cyr]

Well, it's rather serendipitous to see your post today,
Michelle, since you and we shared consultants way back
when we were still residing in the same province, and since
it's Ariel's birthday today…The little monster is 10 years
old, which means she's now been in program for a little
more than 6 years. Where does the time go? I'm not
generally one to talk a lot about Ariel here, but today was
just so damn fine I have to crow a little.

Ariel is in grade four now. Her aide is fantastic, and her
classmates love her to bits. Today they sang Happy
Birthday and Ariel actually blew the candles out. She came
home happy as a clam and then went off to her swimming
lessons, which she can't get enough of and is actually
learning to swim this time (third time in lessons). Earlier
this year she started learning to bicycle in earnest –
probably still not as expert as Aaron, but getting there. And
have I mentioned she's actually asking for things she wants
now? In English and everything?

You should know this is not a child who was "mild" on the
spectrum. The so-called experts told me she'd never talk
and tried to bully me into augmented communication
devices and sign language "so she'd be able to
communicate her needs."

It's been a long hard climb, and it's not over yet by a long
shot, but my little darling is talking to me, and learning,
and laughing, and getting more independent every day. It's
9:30 now, and Ariel has already opened her presents,
played with them, and just trundled off to bed for the night.
Somehow the 10th anniversary of her entry into this world
seems like a good time for reflecting how we've gotten to
here from there.

Thank you Jean, for sitting at my dining room table for two
hours that afternoon long ago, telling Maureen and I what
we needed to hear…and what no one else was saying.

Thank you Michelle, for helping us afford those early days
by splitting the cost of flying consultants from far away
Yankee cities…and for showing me how resourceful one
can be when one needs to be.

Thank you David Chan, for being the cheerleader you are,
and keeping up that incredibly positive attitude no matter
how much crap came your way.

Thank you Dave Bridges, and Nancy Walton, and Debra
Antifaev, for training Ariel's school aides so well…I owe you
all…

Thank you Barbara Rodrigues, for being the gutsiest of us
all…I still don't know how you do it…and to Robin for
blazing a trail and always keeping the faith, right up to
now.

Thank you Rachel, for that first training workshop that
trained Ariel's first team, all at once, and me to boot, and
for making me laugh at the same time…

Thank you Catherine for overseeing our greenies when we
couldn't find a senior and thank you Janet for finding the
keys to getting stubborn Ariel on side…and thank you
Claire and Denise and Tracey and Elisa and Aliya who were
there for Ariel in those earliest days, and everyone who
came afterward, up to Noel and Yanina and Brandy today.

Thank you Shannon, wherever you are, for starting the task
of programming a life for Ariel. Thank you Jennifer for
proving my little girl was indeed going to talk, and for
always being here for my family.

Thank you Chris and Birgitta, for doing more for all of our
children than anyone *without* a child with autism ever has
or will.

Thank you to all the marvelous FEAT families I have met
over the years…you have been an inspiration to me.

And last and most, thank you Sabrina and Isaac. In the
midst of doing for us all, and doing for your own, you
always find the time to do for Ariel and me. I will always be
grateful.

Avery

[Michelle Weis]

Thanks Avery for your last post! I was having that problem…I tried it today and it worked!

Take care
Michelle

[Maureen St. Cyr]

Scanner tip: Back to our materials thread for a moment, this
is a little trick for scanning one side of a sheet that's
printed on two sides — for example, a newspaper page,
magazine page, catalog, etc. If you just slap the sheet on
the scanner bed, you'll find the back side of the sheet
bleeds through on the scan. The cure is to simply place the
sheet you want to scan on the bed, then place a sheet of
black construction paper on top of it, then close the
scanner. The black sheet behind the scanned sheet keeps
the backside of the page from bleeding through.

[Deleted User]

With the FEAT therapist workshop coming up this week, we’ve been receiving some emails and calls from those who are interested in a more “intermediate” workshop. It sounds like a great idea! It would be geared to those who have attended a beginners workshop (FEAT or otherwise) and/or have worked in the field for at least 3 months. Parents are always welcome though, even if they do not meet these pre-requisites.

From the comments I’ve heard so far there seems to be a need for more detail on:
§ data collection including techniques, customizing data forms for particular programs,
§ putting terminology into practice, how it all relates (this would expand on what we cover in the beginner workshop.)
§ more hands on practice, particularly with trial by trial data while delivering effective therapy. (in the beginners workshop we work on implementing Discrete trial techniques but don’t ever have time to practicing data collection at the same time. It sounds like many of you would like further practice with this)
§ More detail on generalizing concepts
§ Organization: data collection, filing, stimuli, room in general
§ Professionalism and Confidentiality (this is an on-going topic that should be addressed in each and every workshop – so important!!)
§ The key features to an effective team and how to train up a team to these standards
§ Training new team members (that could be a workshop in itself!)
§ Team meetings: the importance of them, the goals to work towards and how to effectively run a meeting

I’d like to get a feel for how many people are interested in something along these lines and other topics you might be interested in having included. I can not guarantee that we would teach them all and as we have not even attempted to clear a weekend in our schedules and I can’t guarantee that the course will go ahead immediately but your feedback would be appreciated.

You can email me directly at mkarren@telus.net

[Louise Watson]

I just recenty purchased a plastic shelving unit at superstore it was only $35.00 and is on wheels , some of the bins are deep and some are shallow and you can always add more, we have all Liams program stuff in each drawer and even the big binder fits in and you can wheel it anywhere.

[Barbara Rodrigues]

Hi:

This is on organizing. I found these great little drawers at the dollar store – They are plastic – small about 12-16 inches tall – 4 drawer or 5 drawer. They fit into a shelve unit nicely – I can keep all his cards (sorted) emotions/rol/spelling letters/etc. in those. We also bought larger (they look like recipe holders) for other rol/sight words/word to object.

You can't go wrong with shelving. My husband made shelves for the room – we put all the toys etc. up there so the therapists/Jeremy could SEE what was out and grab stuff. We also bought a really nice cheap smaller pine shelve for storage of those little plastic shelves and other materials. Joe also put up a huge wall length shelf above the craft area – we can keep the paints/paper/larger size games etc. there and out of the way.

We use an older stereo unit with the glass doors removed for puzzles holders (this works great where the stereo should have been) and to put his games and things.

This year we bought a desk (again just a cheap pine one) for the therapists – they can keep the data books on the shelf below and folders in the drawers with the sheets, etc. We put up cheap shelving above it for further storage. The desk works great for doing work away from the table also. We bought a new table and chairs for Jeremy at a wholesale office supply and Joe just chopped a couple inches off the table legs – really cheap and great longer table table(that also folds up so if we ever need extra room).

I use large Rubbermaid containers to hold reinforcers (for us mostly books) and I also use these to rotate materials. Putting away nonreinforcing items for a few months and then bringing them back works wonders.

I also bought lots of larger type baskets for holding the books/toys/etc. again wanting to keep things easy for both Jeremy and the girls to get at and also to clean up after.

Hope this gives you some ideas – we also have been at this for 5 years so it's been a long process of organizing. Now if I could just get all my papers in order.

Barbara

[Michelle Weis]

Hello

My laminator (also from staples) is a cold laminator made by 3M. You purchase cartidges of 100feet (I believe). I just put in my material, roll it through then slice it at the end.

Michelle

[Elna Sund]

Hi

Below are some ideas of mine:

I organize materials differently for each of my teams based on what kinds of stimuli each child requires.

For instance i use a generic pocket chart and label each pocket with the appropriate program (EMOTIONS or 2d MATCHING)for programs that don't have many 2d pictures.

But for ever growing programs with 100's of 2d pictures i end up using one of those gift boxes you can buy at the dollar store or even a tupperware container and do a filing system. So in one box is all categories and ROLS (because they are mostly the same picture) and in another box i may have actions and locations or emotions or opposites.

You can also purchase a 5 or 6 drawer plastic shelving unit to stick more materials in there. For instance, i use some shelves for 3d stimuli or puzzles. On the outside of the shelves you can put the Program name.

You can also purchase those accordian looking filing books (sorry don't know the correct name) and use that for keeping more 2d stimuli.

For 3d stimuli i mainly use buckets and put labels on them with the appropriate program name. So for instance, i would use a basket for a block imitation program.

For file folders and/or extra data sheets i use a magazine rack for easy access.

I hope this helps. I am not sure if this is "new" information but after 4 years of doing ABA I have found some organization methods that work for the teams i am currently on.

Elna Sund

[Anna Aquino]

Awesome links and tips for saving on therapy materials.
Thanks!
Now anyone has some neat ideas on organization without
busting one's budget? I'd love to hear what other families
have done to sort and organize the ever growing supply of
materials…what sort of systems do you have in place? What
works and what doesn't?
I want to fix up my son's room and don't know how to
make it more efficient for therapists while still making it
look like an inviting work room for my son. Help ;-)

[Deleted User]

I've done alot of laminating over the years too but a pretty crude version compared to the high tech stuff I've been reading about the past few days.

When we were working with our son, trying to build a greater understanding of emotion and feelings, I took alot of pictures of my him with a polaroid camera in order to use his own image as a visual reference and therapy aid. If he was happy and smiling I took a picture of that and I did the same with other emotions, like sadness and anger. Digital cameras would be perfect for this. The important thing I believe was to be able to take the picture and show it to him right away. It really began to speed up his "processing" of emotion and understanding of it because there was such a short lag time between the expression and him seeing it for himself on his own face. He has been able to generalize this to other people and has gotten fairly adept at reading quite overt facial expressions and even more subtle body language. I can walk across the room and he'll be able to infer if I'm troubled or upset and say
"What's the matter Mom?"

[Author]

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