Is Kiwi Crate a Good Fit for Autistic Children?

If you’re thinking about getting a subscription box for your autistic child, I would encourage you to look into Kiwi Crate. We were given a box to try and I truly believe that kiwi crate is a good fit for autistic children.  To round out the afterschooling curriculum, I wanted to do arts and crafts. Ideally, I would like to be able to do these myself with Sweet B, but it’s also nice to have an option that’s already assembled or at least has all of the necessary parts and pieces. We will do some crafts on our own, as soon as I figure out what themes we’re doing for the upcoming months. We did try another box service, but I also wanted to try out…

How to Develop an Afterschool at Home Program

How to Develop an Afterschool at Home Program

Autistic individuals thrive with routines, as parents we know this to be true. For Sweet B, that means having as predictable of a schedule as possible both at home and at school. So when I first had the genius, or maybe not so genius, idea to start an afterschool program at home for her; I really wasn’t sure how she would take to it. Added to that, I had no set plan which was almost setting me up for failure. Though we’ve taken a break from it this year (2015/2016), I am planning ahead for next school year. One of the most important things that I’m going to do is set a budget so I know how much I have to save. Here’s our plan…

Learning About World Landmarks

With Sweet B’s week off from school, we did some of the activities that we would normally do in our afterschooling during the day. First, we reinforced her Letter A skills. And the next thing that we did was use our Early Explorers kit from last month so we could start learning about world landmarks. I wasn’t sure how Sweet B was going to do with this particular set, but then it was just a matter of tailoring it to fit her abilities. Just like everything we do with her afterschooling, I modify what I need to modify so she can accomplish it but still be challenged. Autism and Afterschooling: Learning About World Landmarks This post makes use of affiliate links at no additional cost…

Afterschooling with Sweet B- Letter A

Afterschooling with Sweet B: All About the Letter A I wanted to share with you, one of our afterschooling sessions now that we have most of the components in place. Last week, Sweet B was off from school for February break so I thought we could try some of her afterschooling stuff during the day instead. Prior to this we had only been using a simple system that wasn’t really formal or had a set routine. Now, of course, it’s a matter of integrating the afterschooling activities throughout the week in their correct time. But, the premise is the same when we did this over the course of last week. To kick things off, we’re learning all about the letter A.

One of the Pillars of our Afterschooling

  Pillars of Our Afterschooling As we’re continuing to refine our afterschooling program with Sweet B in terms of supplements and other things, I felt that it was high time that I should talk about one of the pillars of our afterschooling program. One of the reasons I wanted to start afterschooling with Sweet B was to increase her literacy and fine motor skills. Fine motor skills have always been a big area of hers as far as what to work on and literacy is close behind. It’s difficult to measure her literacy since she’s non-verbal but she has shown improvements over the past few years. She’s still nowhere near peers of her age and developmentally is around 6 or 7 years of age. This…

Yoga for Kids (and adults, too!)

I’ll have another post up soon about all of the components that we’re using for our afterschooling program, and today I wanted to share another part of it. Sweet B does receive adapted physical education time as a part of her IEP. They have a nice gym at her school with adaptive equipment available. She also goes bowling on the weekends and will soon start taking part in swimming lessons. One of the other ways we get our physical activity and gross motor play in, is by adding in a board game to our afterschooling routine. But this isn’t just your average board game- this one promotes yoga for kids (and adults, too!).