Let's Get Down to the Real Knitty Gritty !

Natalie loves to knit! Her first home school teacher, Rose Gander, an educator / innovator / tutor, who was like her Ann Sullivan, gave her her first pair of needles and her first knitting lesson. Artist Denise Wey also contributed to her instruction, as well. It was one of those things that Mom, although proficient in knitting and crochet, was willing but not able to teach. No credibility. This happens and ya just gotta go with it.

The Natalie Academy Home School is firmly founded on a big sense of home. Having friends and neighbors as part of the teaching team has been an integral part of our success. Many opportunities for good cop friend and bad cop mom to leverage learning situations to fruition.

Knitting has been a wealth of access for Natalie's advancement:

Colors: Choosing colors to go together at the store has provided shopping instruction teaching moments. Asking people what their favorite color is has provided non-threatening conversation moments.

Workin' it: Knitting itself is calming and enjoyable for Natalie. It's productive. It gives her an ongoing sense of accomplishment. It's open-ended because new elements can be added, like learning to cast on and cast off on her own.

Giving them: Sharing the scarves has been a source of great joy and pleasure for Natalie, and as you can see, they are very well received.

Independence and confidence: Natalie has gotten her first commission for a scarf!

Talent Show as Senior Project

Senior students at our local high school Nevada Joint Unified School District may select Community Service as the focus of their mandatory Senior Projects. This has been a source of great assistance to the Special Needs community in our area.

This year, Arkady Unterleidner and Bailey Gonzalez organized a talent show featuring over a dozen performers who played to a standing-room-only house full of joy and satisfaction. It was covered by the Union newspaper.

Excerpts from the show are shown in two parts on YouTube:


The senior class organizers really enjoyed putting on the show and are hoping that someone will do the same thing next year, like Abilities Basketball, now a regular winter semester activity, which was started as a Senior Project in 2002 by Janell Adams.

Prepare the Child for the Path ... or Not?

There's a tile in one of my friend's dining rooms that reads: "Prepare the Child for the Path, not the Path for the Child."

On the other hand, since my daughter's Selective Mutism kicked in after some heavy teasing in her public school classroom, I'm inclined to take the opposite approach with some special needs kids.

I would love to open the conversation on this.

Teachers Come in All Shapes

The Natalie Academy is a home school with a cosmopolitan faculty. We take the best of tradition and the best of innovation for a dynamic and effective customized program, made official by our IEP - the Individual Educational Plan.

We partner with Vantage Point Charter School, which in turn is under the umbrella of the Ready Springs Unified School District, to get our Speech and Adaptive Physical Education services, and are honored to work with the great Janet Borba for effective Speech delivery and the awesome and keenly experienced David Potter on Adaptive Physical Education.

Natalie's curriculum also includes Fashion Drawing with former New York Fashion Designer Lily Nova.

She takes Earth Science with Geologist Mary Ann Westgard.

Jewel McInroy cooks with Natalie in creating alkaline-focused meals, and they have become popular locally for their own Cranberry Orange cookies.

Power Up with Saddle Pals

Saddle Pals is a United Cerebral Palsy program which offers riding and more to persons with special needs.

1. Right: Saddle Pals volunteer and retired law enforcement officer, Howard Mason, supervises Natalie as she grooms Buddy.

Obviously, it's fun, right? But there's a lot more to it than that. Anyone involved with the program -- clients, parents, volunteers, staffers -- can tell you that something really special happens when your special student gets to know and ride a horse! Something really special. Call it magic, call it empowerment, call it awesome!

It was after a Saddle Pals event, that our non-speaking, Selective Mutism-diagnosed Natalie read aloud to us, at her request, for 3 1/2 hours. We've been walking on clouds ever since, as she continues to impress us with exponential progress on being willing to speak and doing it!

Thank you, Saddle Pals! And thanks to UCP, United Cerebral Palsy, whose motto is "Life without limits for people with disabilities."

Rescue Remedy Pastilles to the Rescue !

An indispensable item in the Natalie Academy tool kit is the Rescue Pastille by Bach Flower Remedies Ltd. Alcohol-free, homeopathic, chewable, sugar-free, comes in black currant flavor or plain. rescueremedy.com

We keep a tin in her tote bag, with all her CDs, Discman, sun-blocking lip gloss and sunglasses.

They are generally available at health food stores, and I also found them on amazon.com.

Natalie chews a pastille or two prior to a stressful event, and it seems to help her relax and not panic, allowing her energies to deal with the situation instead of being sapped by panic.

We are great believers in the use of Rescue Remedy, first introduced to me as a tincture in the 1970s, when my friend Tucker Held of Toronto found that it helped him function in the midst of extreme grief and distress by the unexpected death of his mother.

As a litigation attorney in the 1980s, I found it extremely useful in calming my clients in preparation for deposition or trial testimony. I found it beneficial myself in steadying my own nerves before a trial or an appellate argument.

Since that time I have become aware of expansions to the Rescue Remedy offerings: sleep aids, children's spray, alcohol-free and the like.

Very nice stuff!

rescueremedy.com

Using Lyrics for Speech Exercises

When your student has Selective Mutism, even though Speaking is the sought-after prize, it does not work to go after it directly. That's why we sneak up on speech.

Photo: Ready Springs Schools Speech Teacher Janet Borba observes consonant exercises while Natalie sings along to a favorite song.

Natalie started Speech training by way of the Infant Stim (Infant Stimulation) program offered through Nevada County Schools beginning her first year. We began with Signing, courtesy of the Elks who provided Speech Therapists to students with Special Needs in Nevada County, California. Terry McCoan was her extraordinary first teacher, and she was soon fluent in saying Mom, Dad, Auntie and more !!! As in "more food" or "more hugs". The sign for "more" became a keynote in her vocabulary.

It wasn't long until she started verbalizing, however. Within her first year, she'd started saying the basics.

Teasing / bullying doesn't help.

Fast forward to Kindergarten and getting made fun of for reading being hard to understand. Speech started to taper off. A couple more teasing incidents in public school and it was completely submerged but for the most "select" situations.

She was then diagnosed with Selective Mutism -- an anxiety-based disorder inhibiting normal speech.

It's been challenging! Let me collapse an ensuing multiple-year period and cut to the chase of what works:

• Incentives. Offering a new CD when Natalie breaks through her anxiety to speak in a given, limited situation.
• Small, specific goals. Entering a social situation, we set a couple, achievable goals, such as responding to hellos and how-are-yous, if not with a word, at least with a smile. Each "win" in this area contributes to her foundation and creates greater strength for future challenges.
• Incidental opportunities to speak. Keeping vigilant for opportunities for her to have a limited, safe, win-win verbal exchange for more foundation building.



• Capitalizing on favorite activities. Natalie loves music, so Janet Borba, Speech Teacher for Ready Springs Unified School District, asked her to bring in the lyrics to some favorite songs. A few classes later, she asked her to bring in her boombox. She then found that Natalie was willing to sing for her, and -- voila! -- they found themselves in a dialogue in which Janet was able to start coaching Natalie on her "ch", her "s" and her "z", which had been the goal of the class to start with!

Thanks to Janet Borba, for her creativity, intuition and -- best of all -- effectiveness in employing these methods. This last has been a breakthrough year.

Natalie gave a concert to a standing room only audience, singing 6 songs, and afterward engaged in conversations with the many guests. Take a look.