Thoughtful special needs blogs, top tips and news you can use

It's been a busy week for lots of special needs mum bloggers - as you'll see there are some fabulous, thought-provoking posts from Claire at A Boy With Aspergers and Deb and Aspie in the family, as well as a couple from Lynsey at MummaDuck. I love reading their posts, they're always interesting, sometimes moving and are a reminder that resilience and strength can be found even at the darkest and most difficult times.

I've changed the format this week to give a little taster of what you can find if you click the link and I hope you do, because these articles and blogs are all well worth taking the time to read.

There will be no round up next week as I will be in Sweden talking social media at a meeting of Europe-wide limb difference organisations. It'll be a chance to meet lots of new people who will all have their own perspective of what it's like to live with physical disability in different parts of the world.

So make these stories last, if you can! You can also subscribe to this blog via email or on your kindle. Even better now they have new types of Kindle just out or if you have the Kindle app for smart phone or tablet. Enjoy!

• Special Needs Jungle: Special Needs top tip: Elastic laces  
  

Lots of our children have difficulty with laces, especially if they are dyspraxic, and Youngest , for one, has developed his own, somewhat unique, style of doing his shoes up. These days it’s easier with velcro straps, but sometimes, such as with trainers or football boots, it’s just not possible. Plus, as they get older, velcro isn’t very cool...

• MedPage Today: Unloved Kids May Be at Risk for Stroke Later 

Children who suffer emotional neglect may have a higher risk of chronic cerebral infarction as adults, an observational study found...

• Lynsey The Mother Duck: Disability requires exact planning for the Holiday of a Lifetime

I have indicated in previous posts that things have been getting tough with J1 in ways other than his physical disabilities.  I do not mean for J1, but for me...

• The Autism File : Epilepsy and Autism: Our Experience
  

Epilepsy occurs at a much higher rate in children with the diagnosis of autism. I have a 7-year-old son with the diagnosis of PDD-NOS. After hearing Michael Chez, MD, speak about the high rate (about 66%) of abnormal EEGs in children on the spectrum, I got my son tested...

• The Autism File: Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and Autism: Speculation a Go-Go 
  

I don’t think anyone would argue with the fact that our present understanding of autism, with all its heterogeneity, elevated risk of comorbidity and slightly more fluidic expression than perhaps originally thought [1], still remains quite limited...

• Enable: Travel industry failing disabled travellers

Despite the success of the London Paralympics, new research has revealed that 86 percent of disabled people who responded to a recent survey think the UK travel industry is still not providing sufficient information about disabled access and facilities...

• Special Needs Jungle: Conference on Pathological Demand Avoidance

A few months ago, Special Needs jungle ran an article about Pathological Demand Avoidance by Deborah Rourke There was an incredible amount of interest in this article, written from Deborah’s experience. In November, the National Autistic Society is to hold another conference on PDA...

• A boy with Asperger's: Compulsory Mediation – Good Idea?

So the draft legislation has been out a few weeks now and one of the biggest changes that has stood out most to me is that of Compulsory Mediation. As things stand at the moment, A parent can lodge an appeal to the first tier tribunal as soon as the local education authority (LEA) has written to the parent setting out a child’s proposed provision in the form of a draft statement...

• Aspie in the Family: So what’s been happening to us 

My son is continuing to receive home tuition provided by the local authority.  For 4 days a week he receives about an hour of tuition a day covered by two tutors.  It doesn’t sound a lot but this is all he can cope with at the moment...

• BritMums special needs round-up: The highs and the whys

I begin with my own high point of the month over at Downs Side Up which sent me dashing to my Mac with tears in my eyes, the kind of blog post that is written in 20 minutes because the emotion is so crystal clear...

• Special Needs Jungle: The SEN bill’s future is in the hands of.. well, what a welcome surprise!

Rather than David Laws, who took over Sarah Teather’s ministerial job, and much to the relief of many I expect, the SEN portfolio will be managed by Edward Timpson MP who is Parliamentary Under Secretary of State (children and families). Mr Timpson has sat on the Children, Schools and Families Select Committee and the Joint Committee on Human Rights. Until his ministerial appointment he was also chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Groups on Adoption & Fostering and Looked After Children & Care Leavers, vice chairman for the Runaway & Missing Children group...

• Contact A Family: Consultation on Blue Badge scheme in England - closes Oct 2nd

The Department for Transport (DfT) has launched a consultation on who is eligible for the Blue Badge Scheme when Disability Living Allowance (DLA) is replaced by the Personal Independence Payment (PIP). This is due to happen for people aged between 16 and 64 from April 2013. They are seeking views on three different options...

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Tania Tirraoro

Founder, Co-Director at Special Needs Jungle

Founder of Special Needs Jungle. (She/Her) Parent of two young adults with autism. New grandma. Tania, who is autistic, is a leading SEND advisor, working with the Special Education Consortium, Ofsted, and Whole School SEND. She is also an Advisory Board member of the Royal Holloway, University of London Centre of Gene and Cell Therapy and an Editorial Board member of Springer Nature Gene Therapy journal.
Tania is an experienced broadcast and print journalist & author. She also runs a PR, web & social media consultancy, SocialOro Media.
Tania is a rare disease & chronic pain patient advocate with Ehlers Danlos syndrome.

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Latest posts by Tania Tirraoro (see all)

• WEBINAR RECORDING: Will the SEND Improvement Plan fix provision for disabled children and young people? - March 16, 2023
• Can you legislate for love? The Government’s plans for children’s social care aims to - February 3, 2023
• Don’t make it harder to get EHCPs warns Equality and Human Rights Commission as DfE considers “raising the bar” - January 26, 2023