In addition to being special needs educational
advisor for families with twice-exceptional children and Contributing Editor to the new publication
2e: Twice-Exceptional Newsletter, I am co-founder and co-listowner of the
GT-Special email list for
families with gifted/special needs children - founded because my co-listowner
and I needed a place where we could talk with other parents about our uniquely
gifted children. I am also founder and listowner for
GT-Spec-Home, for
families homeschooling gifted/special needs children.
Please note: Being listed here is not per se an endorsement of
any particular site or email list. I have included annotations for those sites
or lists that I am familiar with and strongly recommend.
Gifted children with special needs can look like they are lazy, oppositional,
or having motivation problems. If this describes a child you know, read
Motivation Problem or Hidden Disability?
It can be difficult for siblings of special needs children to understand that
parents are not favoring the special needs child, that he or she truly has
severe learning issues, yet at the same time to know that we empathize with
their frustrations. In Siblings of
Twice-Exceptional Children, I make some suggestions for dealing with these
issues.
The ERIC Clearinghouse on Disabilities and Gifted Education has a page of
links to information on gifted education/dual exceptionalities, including an
excellent FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions list)
http://ericec.org/gifted/gt-menu.html
Differential diagnosis is a difficult issue in gifted kids. Two articles
addressing the issue are: Diagnosis Questions by Betty Maxwell
and ADHD
and Children Who Are Gifted by James T Webb and Diane Latimer
It's important to realize that there are great individual differences among
gifted children, and that those who are most highly gifted may not "look" gifted
in school. The article
Exceptionally and Profoundly Gifted Students: An Underserved Population is
an excellent introduction to this topic by Miraca Gross, a psychologist and
researcher specializing in exceptionally gifted children.
The video, "How
Difficult Can This Be?: The F.A.T. City Workshop" by Rick Lavoie.
The description from the website says it all: "For kids with learning
disabilities, the classroom can be an intimidating place. In this workshop,
Richard Lavoie shows why. He leads a group of parents, educators, psychologists,
and children through a series of exercises that cause Frustration, Anxiety, and
Tension...feelings all too familiar to children with learning disabilities. By
dramatizing the classroom experience so vividly, Lavoie lets us see the world
through the eyes of a child. At the end of the workshop, participants discuss
strategies for working more effectively with learning disabled children."
Click here to see a video clip.
The Building is the Web site of New Horizons for Learning, an international
education network focused on identifying, communicating, and helping to
implement effective teaching and learning strategies. The information provided
is especially useful to teachers, parents, and others interested in helping all
students to learn more effectively. http://www.newhorizons.org/
Resource Room - The Resource Room is a website with tools for learning,
especially for people who learn differently or who have "learning difficulties"
or specific "learning disabilities."
http://www.resourceroom.net/index.asp
SERI- Special Education Resources on the Internet (SERI) is a collection of
Internet accessible information resources of interest to those involved in the
fields related to Special Education. This collection exists in order to make
on-line Special Education resources more easily and readily available in one
location. http://www.seriweb.com/
Fernette Eide, M.D. is a wonderful neurologist who specializes in gifted/special
needs children. Her website has interesting articles with some great fMRI
pictures! http://www.neurolearning.com
Council for Exceptional Children - The Council for Exceptional Children (CEC)
is an international professional organization dedicated to improving educational
outcomes for individuals with exceptionalities, students with disabilities,
and/or the gifted. CEC advocates for appropriate governmental policies, sets
professional standards, provides professional development, advocates for
individuals with exceptionalities, and helps professionals obtain conditions and
resources necessary for effective professional practice. http://www.cec.sped.org/
All Kinds of Minds: a non-profit institute for the understanding of
differences in learning
Dr. Mel Levine�s site - a different take on things http://www.allkindsofminds.org/
Schwab Foundation for Learning offers a wide range of services for parents
and educators to provide information, support and resources to improve the lives
of students with learning differences. http://www.schwablearning.org
Learning Disabilities Association of America: a national, non-profit
organization. http://www.ldanatl.org/
Hello Friend/Ennis William Cosby Foundation works to help people with
dyslexia and other language-based learning disabilities. http://www.hellofriend.org/
NICHCY: The National Information Center for Children and Youth with
Disabilities is the national information and referral center that provides
information on disability-related issues for families, educators, and other
professionals, with a special emphasis on birth to 22 years. Site includes many
papers that can be downloaded for free http://www.nichcy.org/
The Gifted Development Center serves parents, schools, and advocacy groups
with information about identification, assessment, counseling, learning styles,
programs, presentations, and resources for gifted children and adults. In
addition to their other services, the GDC now has a
speaker's bureau. http://www.gifteddevelopment.com
The Learning Disabilities Association of Massachusetts (LDAM) is a non-
profit, volunteer organization including individuals with learning disabilities,
their families, and professionals dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for
all individuals with learning disabilities and their families, and to
alleviating the restricting effects of learning disabilities. http://www.ldam.org
Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC) is a federally-funded
national information system that provides, through its 16 subject-specific
clearinghouses, associated adjunct clearinghouses, and support components, a
variety of services and products on a broad range of education-related issues.
AskERIC is a personalized Internet-based service providing education information
to teachers, librarians, counselors, administrators, parents, and anyone
interested in education throughout the United States and the world. AskERIC
encompasses the resources of the entire ERIC system and beyond, using the
subject expertise of the 16 ERIC Clearinghouses to respond to your education
requests. http://ericir.syr.edu/
To do further research on your own, the National Library of Medicine has a
free search engine for journal articles that you can use, called Pub Med.
Searching Pub Med will get you citations and abstracts (if they are available
for the article), and you can then order the full article if you wish.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed/
LD/ADD Pride Online: Inspired by Deaf Pride, this site has been developed as
an interactive community resource for adults with learning disabilities (LD) and
Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). http://www.ldpride.net
Stories/Personal
Experiences
By parents
Enabling Our Children
by Deborah Thorpe. "I hear it everyday. I belong to a parent support group for
children with learning disabilities and ADHD, one of the largest Internet
listserv groups for parent support for these disabilities. There seems to be a
constant, reoccurring topic among our group: 'The teacher says I am enabling him
to be the way he is' or 'The teacher says if we gave him more discipline he'd be
fine.' Parents of children with invisible disabilities are constantly being
blamed for their child's difficulties. We are easy targets."
Fighting Guilt by Charlotte Riggle.
"Misplaced parental guilt is a monster I know all too well. Seducing you with
what might have been, it wastes your time, erodes your confidence, devours your
energy, and distracts you from what is � which is the only thing you can do
anything about."
My Mockingbird
by Ruthie. "My son was reading Harper Lee's story To Kill a Mockingbird �
I was struck by how this wonderful story's metaphor applies to twice-exceptional
children."
Welcome to Holland
by Emily Perl Kingsley. "I am often asked to describe the experience of
raising a child with a disability - to try to help people who have not shared
that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel. It's like
this......" Although written by the parent of a child with Down's
Syndrome, it is applicable to all of us dealing with the emotional rollercoaster
of parenting special-needs children.
By kids
The Positive Side of SED Classes, by Michael
(age 13). During a discussion on GT-Special, a teenager expressed concerns
about possibly getting an ED (Emotional Disorder) placement. In response,
another
listmember posted the following note from her son, who attends an SED school
(shared with permission).
What's in a Name?
DBD Marketing used to be called DysGraphic by Design. "There is an
interesting story behind the name DysGraphic by Design, LLC. The story begins
with a young boy diagnosed with dyslexia, named Danny..."
Others
Tony - a poem
about our kids, getting into trouble for being themselves.
Why a Bee? and a story .. �Once upon a time
the animals had a school. They had four subjects: running, climbing, flying, and
swimming-and all animals took all subjects.�
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