Raising Kellan

Mike Poole of Walk This Way Oxford is well known as The Coach for children with Cerebral Palsy. In today's episode topics covered and timeframes are:

02:00 Expectations

04:00 Mindset

07:00 Massage and Manual Therapy

09:00 Training, Therapy, and Emotional Responses.

12:00 Teaching kids how to fail

13:00 Mike's Background

20:00 St Louis Children's Hospital

25:00 Time Spent in Therapy

28:00 Accountability

32:00 Different Providers, Different Opinions 

An edited transcript is available on www.raisingkellan.org

March 25, 2023, is Cerebral Palsy Awareness Day

In today's episode, we chat with Katrina VanBuren Ed.S and Annette Graves, MEd, MACR from Arc Tennessee, Family Engagement Project. 

Timeline: 

Introduction to Annette Graves and Katrina VanBuren

03:40   What is an IEP and 504 plan and how are they similar/different?

10:14   Abbreviations commonly used in Special Education: FAPE, LRE, PLEP, accommodation vs modification.

15:49  Tests for eligibility determination of placement.

17:51   How to reach a resolution amidst disagreement.

22:00 Upcoming Events

23:40 Words of encouragement

An edited transcript is available at www.raisingkellan.org

Bio:

Annette Graves, MEd, MACR, wife, Mom, and grandmother. Former 35-year educator in regular and special education inclusion classes. Currently employed with the Arc. Tn. as a Regional Family Engagement Specialist serving in the Northwest Region in Tennessee.

Katrina VanBuren, Ed.S,  Regional Family Engagement Specialist for the Southwest region of TN.  Licensed Educator, and Licensed Administrator for the state of Tennessee and Mississippi

John Shouse and his wife Janet are parents to 3 adult children, Emma Shouse Garton, and twin boys Evan and Brendan who are now 27.    Evan is on the autism spectrum.   John has been involved at the local, state, and national levels in the disability advocacy community, including stints as presidents of both Autism TN, and The Arc TN.  He was on the national board of The Autism Society of America. He co-authored the book "The Autism Checklist - a Guide for Parents and Educators".  

John has a special interest in helping fathers of children and adults with disabilities discover how to be active and engaged parents, and how to find joy in the midst of the challenges of living a full life.

Timeline

03:29  The origins of John and his family's advocacy work in the disability community.

06:00 Evan's diagnosis.

11:50  Partners in Policymaking Program

16:40  Tennessee Day on the Hill (3/8/23)

19:00 The importance of telling your story to policymakers.

21:50 Autism Tennessee

25:17. John's advice on self-care.

28:00 Resources: TheVeryStuff.com, "You Gonna Love that Kid" by Paula Kluth, Autism Checklist Guide for Parents and Educators by Paula Kluth and John Shouse, 

32:00 Middle Tennessee Dads MeetUp.

John can be contacted at [email protected]

An edited transcript can be located at www.raisingkellan.org

In today's episode, I chat with Jeff Strand who is the Coordinator of Government and External Affairs at the Tennessee Disability Coalition. The Tennessee Disability Coalition is an alliance of organizations and individuals joined to promote the full and equal participation of people with disabilities in all aspects of life.

This year TDC will be hosting an in-person event Disability Day on the Hill on March 8, 2023, in Nashville TN. This is a chance to gather as a community and take part in the legislative process. The priority Bills on the table this year include: 

1)The ABLE Estate Recovery- "This bill would prohibit the state from seeking estate recovery (clawback) of funds in an ABLE account following the death of a beneficiary, beyond what is required by federal law."(Source TDC Newsletter)

2) Right to Repair- "This bill would prohibit insurance companies from requiring a prior authorization for the repair of power wheelchairs and some durable medical equipment"(Source TDC Newsletter)

Timeline: 

2:47  The workings of the State General Assembly

9:10  How to get an Idea to the Hill.

9:56  Priority Bills for TDC 2023

10:42 Bills of Interest: Corporal Punishment, Paid FML, Mechanical Restraints, Third Grade Retention

21:00 Tennessee Disability Day on the Hill Events:

2023 VIRTUAL EVENTS

Webinar with Legislators

1pm CT - Thursday, March 2nd, 2023

Disability Advocacy Day

Saturday, March 11th, 2023

IN-PERSON EVENTS

TDC Community Party

5-7pm CT - Tuesday, March 7th, 2023

Disability Day on the Hill

9am-2pm CT - Wednesday, March 8th, 2023

Here are some ways to participate: Hashtag #MyTennesseeLife for social media posts related to the event

You can email [email protected] to receive weekly updates on the above-mentioned Bills

You can also join the Facebook Group: Tennessee Disability Advocates Group

An edited transcript of this podcast can be found at www.raisingkellan.org

Pete Hixon of Woodstock GA has been married to his wife Hollie for 25 years. They have 2 girls - Addie, a freshman at Samford University, and Hope, in her second year at Shepherds College. By occupation, Pete is a speaker and business coach. By passion and as a parent, he is an advocate for the special needs community. Pete and his wife lead an organization to build residential communities for young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities called Beyond Communities.

Timeline:

04:00  Pete Hixson's background

06:00  Impetus for Beyond Communities

09:20  Vision for the Beyond Communities

14:00  Mixed-Use Development

19:00 Pathways to access housing options at Beyond Communities

22:00 Assessment process for application to rent in the Beyond Community Model

23:41. Words of Encouragement

27:00 Pete can be reached at [email protected] 

Pete's Call to Action: I want to educate listeners on the fact that we will see far more potential when we create more environments designed specifically for each “ability” category within this community. My call to action is to get involved with someone doing this or start your own and invite others to join you.

Link to an edited transcript of this podcast.

In this episode, we chat with Lia Stoll of DisabilityWriter.com. Lia is a mom, wife, writer, co-founder of Lara Guide Dog in Greece and founder of Disability Writer, a boutique writing studio voicing accessibility and inclusion for disabled people.

Timeline: 

00:14  Introduction

04:16  What is the origin story of DisabilityWriter.com

06:57 Lia's connection with Lara Guide Dog School

12:58  How long has the Guide Dog School been in operation?

13:14  What is your responsibility at the Guide?

14:11  How does the process of training a guide dog work?

17:05 Tell us about DisabilityWriter.com.

19:33 How do we and why do we need to move towards digital accessibility?

21:09  Your top two blog posts?

23:06 You can contact Lia at [email protected]

A transcript of this podcast episode is available at www.raisingkellan.org 

Ange Anderson M.Ed opened and led an innovative specialist school in North Wales for 10 years, introducing over 25 different therapeutic/technological interventions to support pupils with learning differences. She’s written a number of books focused on SEN (Special Educational Needs) on therapeutic and technological interventions including VR, AR & AI in SEN; Trampolining for Children & Young People with SEN; Music, Sound and Vibration in SEN; and Learning through Play for SEN, all published by Routledge. Ange also presents internationally on topics related to special education.

Timeline:

02:30  What is Neurodiversity? 

03:54 What is Virtual versus Augmented Reality?

05:32. What led you to use VR to support your students with learning differences?

10:30. What are some of the benefits of VR?

13:30 How does VR help develop social skills?

16:17. Ange goes on to explain that VR does not mean headsets but rather transmitters /receivers that are used to give a room a 360-degree immersive experience

20:53. What would you say to those who believe that VR is an expensive gimmick in its educational application?

22:15 Best way to contact Ange Anderson? https://angeandersontherapeutic.co.uk/

An edited transcript is available at www.raisingkellan.org

Disclaimer: The use of VR/AR described in this podcast includes rooms designed with transmitters and receivers and does not include the use of headsets. Please consult a trained healthcare provider in your location before the use of technology as a rehabilitation tool.

The Spirit of Volunteerism is an indelible part of being part of community and belonging.

In todays episode 2 friends with similars hearts but different missions meet up on the podcast to tell about the organizations and events were they volunteer.

Rachel Talks about Paws to Care and the Dyersburg Dyer County Humane Society

Ms Sara talks about Addi's Haunted Trail which happens next Saturday, October 22, 2022. 

Transcript 

In today's episode, I chat with David Hirsh of the Special Fathers Network, a dad-to-dad mentoring program for fathers raising children with special needs as well as host of the Dad To Dad Podcast.  David was raised by his mother, a Chicago Public School Teacher after his parents divorced. He is grateful to both his mother and maternal grandfather Sam Solomon for positively impacting his and his brother's lives. 

David married his high school sweetheart Peggy and after the birth of their fifth child, he began to feel pressure at work but mostly on the home front as he sought to become a good role model to his kids and not replicate his early life experience. Concurrently during this time, David committed to a three-year Kellogg Fellow Program and he came across some astonishing statistics. There are 24 million kids growing up in America in father-absent homes, which accounts for 4 in 10 households(Source).  This began David's journey to break the cycle of father absence and to advocate for dads to be present: physically, emotionally, and spiritually, while also meeting our financial obligations.

Resources:

https://www.4dads.org/

https://21stcenturydads.org/

Transcript to this episode

In this episode, we chat with Waverly Ann Harris who has worked with individuals with developmental disabilities and their families for over 15 years. She has been the CEO of Friends Life Community since 2016 where she has developed programs that provide opportunities to adults with IDD to grow personally, develop socially, and be actively involved in the community.  She is a sociologist with a Masters in Applied Behavior Analysis and enjoys solving systemic issues and collaborating with others to create meaningful change.

00:00-2:10 Intro

02:10-4:15 What is Friends Life Community?

04:15-4:45 What role does Waverly play?

04:45-6:57 FLC Community Events

06:57-10-10:12 The creative process.

10:13-11:36 Orignal Works of Art

11:37-14:17 Treat truck

14:17-15:15 Contacting FLC

15:15-16:30 Volunteers

16:30-17:42 November 10th FLC will be at TPAC

17:42-19:22 Outro

Link to transcript