Over the last two weeks we have been discussing the specific use of iPads with preschoolers and many of you have written in with wonderful ideas, suggestions and your own personal preferences for various apps for children ages 3-5. Thank you! In last week's post, I shared the entire process that we follow in our county when obtaining an ...

This fall at the preschool where I practice, we have had an unusually high number of children in need of full evaluations all for various reasons. For some, they were simply due for their re-evaluations which happen every 2 years at this age in our district. For others, we had decided as a team that several children were in need of a ...

Earlier this past week, one of the teachers I work with, Jamie Zarmanian, shared with our preschool classes this fabulous recipe for pumpkin spice Play-Doh. The entire classroom smelled like cinnamon cookies! The texture was perfect - soft, but not sticky and children really seemed to enjoy using a different type of Play-Doh to roll, ...

This is the last week of my Piccolini Perfecto Pasta creations. Please take a look at my previous two recipe posts for ideas on how to create a delicious rainbow of flavors and nutrients using Barilla's Piccolini vegetable pastas. The third and final recipe includes the Mini Rotelle (aka mini wagon wheels), wonderfully made with spinach ...

All through September at our school we talked about apples: red ones, yellow ones, green ones, little ones, big ones and everything in between! Now that October is upon us and Halloween is just two weeks away, it is time for our next topic of ... pumpkins! The teachers are talking all about those happy round orange friends we see every ...

Every 6 months or so, I like to recap and review popular posts and the topics that seem to be most important to our readers. In addition, I carefully comb through recent reader comments to make sure that questions are being addressed and people are able to get the answers they are seeking. Today's post will do just that, so please join me in ...

If you have been reading this blog since its inception three years ago (the first post was published October 1, 2008) then you will know that when I began writing my weekly posts, I was working in a home-based birth to 3 program. It was that experience that prompted me to contact ADVANCE with the idea to create a speech and language therapy ...

This week instead of a recipe, I would like to share a fun lesson that expands on the apple theme from last week's recipe post. This is a lesson I created and implemented with my occupational therapist colleague and is an imaginative mix of communication and sensory-enriched activities! The Story of Johnny Appleseed The lesson began with a ...

How is your school year going so far? The past 2 years have been very challenging for me with regards to organization. Early in 2010, I switched jobs after returning from maternity leave. When I moved into my current position in February, not only was it the middle of the school year, but the caseload was hefty. I inherited a group of about ...

Today is the follow-up from last week's interview with licensed clinical psychologist, Alexandra Ranieri-Deniken, PsyD, of the Behavioral & Developmental Services Department at Special People In Northeast (SPIN), Inc, in Philadelphia, PA. Below are some of the follow-up questions I sent to Dr. Ranieri-Deniken, along with ...