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[David Chan]

Being incredibly frugal and fiscally challenged
always look for freebies. When you do
photofinishing at places like London Drugs,
sometime they will have these transparent
plastic photo albums. They have 4" by 6"
pockets.
perfect for an index card, picture etc.

We've use them for sequencing tasks,
rule books.
and of course if you need to pull something
out or change stuff it's a snap

the best part, if you talk really nicely to the
photofinishing clerk, these puppies are FREE

so thats another one for your list Avery

Dave
Mr. P's frugal Dad

[Barbara Rodrigues]

Hi Everyone:

I am posting this for Christina in Alberta.

Hi everyone!

Wintergreen Learning is in Canada & carries many of the same materials as Lakeshore Learning in the US. The website is:http://
http://www.wintergreenlearning.ca/ if anyone wants to check it out. Also, there is another great website for kids: http://www.dotolearn.com They have very catchy & repetitive musical cartoons about safety that are fantastic. Also, the site
has alot of other ideas that may be helpful.

Regards,
Christina Jirik

[Claire Spencer]

Love this thread! I purchased a copy/fax/scan/printer that I love, too. I found an ink cartridge refill kit at Costco for $25. I returned the two new cartridges I'd bought but thankfully not opened ($102) and have already refilled mine several times. Hooray!

I'd also vote for a laminator. They can really bring out your creative side! I took a sheet of legal sized construction paper (lengthwise), trimmed the bottom 2 1/2 inches or so off, then lined them up with just a slight gap between the two pieces before laminating them (so it would fold up nicely there). Then, using double-sided tape made narrow "pockets" in it. I made up (laminated, of course) picture cards to put in the pockets to use as a scheduler. Worked like a charm!

Claire (Trevor's Mom)

[Elna Sund]

Ok now i have chime in on a time saver.
I have recently come across google images as a means of obtaining any picture you want. For example i was able to find actions, Rols, emotions, body parts, places, money, plants –i.e. all categories possible with one click of a button.
I just copy them and paste them on microsoft word and print them.
I hope this helps for some new parents or therapists.
Here is a website for making file folders and other school related materials:
http://www.preschoolprintables.com
and here are some websites for therapy toys that Rachel Russell has mentioned to me: http://www.pfot.com
http://www.lakeshorelearning.com
they are both from the states but have bundles of toys for fine motor coordination or visual/oralmotor emphais.
I hope this helps!
Elna Sund
Lead Therapist

[Maureen St. Cyr]

This is really turning out to be a fabulous thread on tips for
creating materials. I think there's a lot of stuff here that
new parents could really use…I'm going to wait a day or
three and see how many more of us want to chime in with
hot tips, and then I'll volunteer to assemble them all into a
single PDF that can be made available to new parents…or
old parents looking for new tricks — I've picked up a few
already (Clear Mac Tac? Who knew? I thought it only came
in 'Rumpus Room Wall Paneling' :-)…

Avery

[Diane T]

Another .02 (pun intended) about cheaper alternatives:

Clear mac tac can be purchased in large rolls at department stores for about $10, and can be used to laminate cards, icons, etc. (with thanks to A.)

Ink-jet cartridges can be refilled. There is a company called Island Ink-Jet that sells printer-specific kits, and which has outlets both on Vancouver Island and in the Lower Mainland. Our printer cartridges still need to be replaced every once in a while, but refilling either the black or colour cartridges for our inkjet costs about $7 compared to the $45 replacement cost.

[Lis Louwrier]

Dear All

Wow! Thanks for all the emails about pictures, flashcards, cameras, printers, etc. This is all really valuable info for a family starting out. The digital camera sounds like a good idea especially since my husband likes to take photos and does well at it. I have wondered about the laser printer since we are spending a fair bit on print cartridges. Ryan does like to play with the materials so laminating them seems like a good idea. At first I was happy he was so interested but now I worry about accidental damage.

Thanks again.
Lis
Ryan's mom

[Maureen St. Cyr]

This must be my me-too day :-)

Laminators are very handy, especially if your darling one
likes to handle materials as much as Ariel does. Couple of
things I've learned over the years…First make sure you get
a laminator that does full width lamination pouches —
letter size or legal size. They cost a little more, but you can
use the big pouches, which means laminating a whole sheet
of cards at a time. You can cut them up afterward and the
cost of doing 6-8 cards on a single sheet is a lot less than
buying card-size pouches and using 6-8 of them. Another
place you can sometimes save money is at school. Many
schools have industrial size laminators on site, and if your
child is already in school and needs materials there, your
aide should be able to get use of it, as well as the use of
printers and etc. If you have to, you will send materials to
school, but these are legitimate expenses for the school on
your child's behalf, so don't do it before you ask them to
foot that bill.

One last note about printers — laser printers are coming
down in price all the time. They are still much more
expensive than inkjets, but an inkjet printer is like a razor
— they'll basically give you the handle because they know
they'll be hosing you on the blades. Ink costs much more
per page than laser toner, and you can make it even
cheaper by getting your toner cartridges refilled. For black
and white materials, I strongly recommend a laser printer,
as they are not really that much more expensive than an
inkjet. If you can afford to spring for a color laserprinter,
like the HP 1500 or 2500, do — especially if your child is
just starting out. I must have gone through a thousand
dollars in ink cartridges before finally biting the bullet and
going laser.

[Deleted User]

While we are talking gadgets we can't live without… I highly recommend a printer that can colour photocopy/scan/fax.

it sounds expensive and ridiculous but it has been a lifesaver for us.

When our last printer died and untimely death, we had to buy a new one so we decided to get one that could photocopy. I strive to be organized but sometimes I forget to do things… and photocopying was one of those tasks that I was always rushing out at the last minute to do. This way our case managers can easily copy however many are needed. While we don't do super large copy runs on it, it saves us in the mean time.

When we do worksheets like sensible pencil, we like to make copies of the original. In the past we would copy lots of each sheet and if the child moved on quickly there would be wasted pages that we had no use for. Now we simply make a few copies and copy more as necessary.

We have also used it to make pec type schedules on magnet paper (pecs on your fridge instead of on a velcro strip, handy for some situations) we have used it to shrink photos down to creat PECS or to enlarge photos for presentations; I also make my overheads for my workshops on it etc etc.

its particularly handy for me as I am a nightowl and do most of my work after 10:00 at night and living in the boons (otherwise known as maple ridge) there are no 24 hour kinkos around. THere isn't even a kinkos. its alot easier for me to do my work at 10:00 in my pj's at home then to scrambling to make it to staples before they close.

our photocopier is constantly in use and I frequently wonder how on earth I survived without it! My team is positively enamored with it. My senior's practically cartwheeled across the yard when it was set up.

And in regards to making flashcards and other materials on the computer, I would highly recommend the professional version of Picture This. Picture this is great because it contains photos of many of the standards (little tykes, fisher price, popular food items such as chicken nuggets and m and m's). It also has actions, emotions, sequencing… and yes it is available from different roads to learning.

And a gadget I don't have but if I was starting over (which thankfully I am not!) I would definately invest in a laminator. I know that those who have laminators use them incessantly.

Michelle

[Maureen St. Cyr]

Just to second Nancy's suggestion, I have found my digital
camera to be marvelous for making materials. And
fortunately, digital cameras have been around long enough
that there are many good used ones you can find, so troll
the Buy and Sell. The new models have higher resolution,
but you will never notice the difference at material-type
sizes. For example, my camera takes maximum 1600×1200
pixel images = 1,920,000 = 2 Megapixels. When I bought
it, it was pretty expensive, but today you can probably find
a good deal on a used one and it will create wonderful
pictures up to 8×10 inches or more. You really don't need a
5-Megapixel camera for anything but posters ;-).

The other thing to remember is that using a digital camera
you save an enormous amount of money on developing and
printing, so eventually it will pay for itself.

Avery

[Author]

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