‘Tis the season…for lots of continuing education, especially if you’re a speech and language pathologist AND a procrastinator–like me.  Every year, I say, “This time, I’m going to complete my continuing education hours throughout the year, not crammed into the last two months of it.” And, every year, I lie.  This coming Wednesday will be my third course since the beginning of November.  And, I’m sure it will take at least ten more months before I’m even able to think about signing up for another class.  Sigh. Last week, I attended a course called, Effective Strategies, Interventions and Resources for Autism, ADHD, and Sensory Processing Disorder (Sometimes, I think they all have this title).  Most of us are fairly aware of ADHD and autism (ASD), especially since ASD has become the number one childhood developmental disorder. However, you may not be as familiar with Sensory Processing Disorder. A condition that exists when sensory signals (information from our six senses) don’t get organized into appropriate responses due to the central nervous system not working properly. When this happens, various environmental stimuli may cause a person to feel overwhelmed, stressed, or frightened. Often, this is when children with one or more of these diagnoses may shutdown or meltdown. Anyway, it was a very interesting and valuable class, and I learned lots.  Towards the end of the day, the instructor shared a number of resources to use with children to address their stress and frustration […]

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