Tag: 2e

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“But They Only Want to Play Games!”

But They Only Want to Play Games, yellowreadis.com | Picture: Minecraft character in black and red on wooden platform looking directly at camera

It’s the perennial question – are they really learning? This can be particularly acute when your kids seem to spend all day playing computer games (or horror – watching other people on YouTube play games).

This is our reality at the moment. Of course, I have been knocked around with a lovely infection, so there has been a tad less guidance than usual ( and thank goodness for antibiotics!)

But despite this, there are a number of things that we have done to actually aide, encourage and help our kids learn the things we think they need to learn while immersed in their ‘everything is a game‘ world.

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A Matter of Perspective

A Matter of Perspective, yellowreadis.com. Image: Sign with words possible, impossible on clouded blue sky

I still remember the moment I realised my son was Autistic. We were walking down a leafy, tree-lined street and my son asked me,

“Mummy, how can you tell what people are feeling?”

As I explained how I knew based on how people’s faces and bodies moved, I watched my son’s expression – it was shocked surprise. The idea that most people could just tell by looking at each other came as utterly mind-bending. It was like Valentine Michael Smith from ‘Stranger in a Strange Land‘ learning about the alien customs of Earthlings that he resembled, but did not grok.

That conversation changed everything.

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Our Crazy Normal of Twice-Exceptionality

Our Crazy Normal of Twice-Exceptionality, yellowreadis.com. Image: Green peas in a pod with one orange pea

Outliers. Sometimes, I forget that may kids are way out there at the margins.

It’s so easy for me to forget what ‘normal’ looks like, or to forget the assumptions usually made about the innate range of abilities of most children.

In my friend-circles, I clap, cheer and cry when other families have their child engaging in conversation for the first time after months of therapy, or get excited when another family talk about the crazy conversation they had with their primary-schooler on infinity and prime numbers.

My crazy-normal has become very . . . skewed.
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What’s it Like to Be On ADHD Medication?

What's it Like to Be on ADHD Medication? yellowreadis.com

“What is it like to be on ADHD Medication?”, a friend asked me the day I started.

For me? It was a huge mental difference. Not a ‘high’, but a zen calm. It’s the feeling you would get after sitting down after a long hike up a mountain to visit a sub-tropical rainforest spring.But that’s only part of it. Because it’s hard to describe without also understanding what living without medication is like. Until I started, I had no idea either. I mean, I had read about the external symptoms and I’d ticked enough boxes to get myself to a specialist. But I didn’t really understand.

In fact, when I asked the specialist, in my usual worried way, “How will I know if it’s working?”, he’d smiled at me and said, “You will know.” I swear, I heard a Yoda-like cadence there, too.

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