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When: Monday evenings starting February 7th,  5:30 – 7:00., through the end of April Where: Romney Gym at MSU, 3rd floor (if you need directions, please let me know)  Why: To teach our special needs kids a few basic dance steps in preparation for the Prom. Please let me know if your child is interested. I am hoping we will have at least 6-12 kids interested in this special program.  I have enlisted the assistance of a college friend of mine who has arranged this entire class at no charge to any of us.  She is using the dance studio where she teaches other classes and will be receiving credits for this independent learning class.  If it all goes well, we can maybe do it again next Spring.  I think dance is a great socializing event and there are opportunities to use these skills later in life. Contact: Ellen Ross at 406-539-1728

The Kid Manual (aka Welcome to Our Asperger’s) I intend on writing plagues me the most. How do I explain it? How do I say that I need his future care-takers to re-invent their thinking? How do you tell someone that when your kid says “I hate you,” he’s really saying “I lack the ability to process and handle this situation at this particular moment in time?” How do you tell another adult, a family member and person stepping in to run your household in a time of great need that they are going to have to re-learn child care-taking from the ground up?

Seven-year-old Cayden is unable to walk or talk on his own, but his nine-year-old brother Conner had an idea that would allow them to participate in sports together. A year and a half ago, they began competing in triathlons together. Conner swims while pulling Cayden in a raft, bikes with his little brother towed behind him in a trailer, and pushes that trailer when they run. Over the past 18 months, the pair from White House, Tennessee, traveled up and down the East coast to compete in races. Seeing the brothers working together has inspired onlookers, while bringing Conner and Cayden closer than ever. Their amazing determination and spirit is why the Long brothers are the 2012 Sports Illustrated Kids SportsKids of the Year.

Bookshare has announced that it is launching two new additions to its product line, the Bookshare Web Reader and Bookshelf, as part of its continuing effort to help kids with print disabilities connect with books. The company made the announcement at the 2013 Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATIA) conference this week. Bookshare Web Reader allows readers to directly open books with a browser without requiring them to download the book or utilize separate software, while Bookshelf allows readers (or their teachers) to organize selections by any system they choose.

April is known as Autism Awareness Month, but this year there's a movement to re-brand it Autism Acceptance Month. The Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN), an advocacy group for and by people with autism, is calling for April to be a "celebration of Autistic culture and community." For me, this resonates a lot more than Autism Awareness Month. I'm already very much aware of autism. Two of my four kids have Asperger's syndrome, and I've been living and breathing autism awareness for quite some time now. So have my husband, our two kids with ASDs, their siblings, our entire extended family, and our friends.

Looking back on the past three years, I wanted to document the critical factors that seemed to make a difference in my son’s experience. Some of these factors parents can influence, and some are more difficult. I can personally attest to difficulty of rolling the ball up hill so-to-speak, when it comes to implementing change in schools. But if we start identify what is working well, then, perhaps, we can start to advocate and change schools so that they work for kids with autism instead of against them.

Special educators need to look at what a child can do instead of what he/she cannot do. There needs to be more emphasis on building up and expanding the skills a child is good at. Too often people get locked into a label such as dyslexia, ADHD, or autism, and they cannot see beyond the label. Kids that get a label often have uneven skills. They may be talented in one area and have a real deficiency in another.

Read more here!What:The Yellowstone County Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Support Group will feature a special informational presentation by Bernie Hedrick from the State of Montana Youth Services Center and LeAnn Logan from Parents Let’s Unite for Kids (PLUK) at the Tuesday, Jan. 31, meeting. Hedrick and Logan will discuss how to appropriately handle some of the behavior issues that grandparents deal with in raising their grandchildren. They will also discuss how families can best access community services when help is needed.When:Tuesday, January 31, 20126:30 pmWhere:Forever Families building1411 Fourth AveBillings, MTContact:Bernie MasonPhone: 256-2828

Read more here!What:The Yellowstone County Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Support Group will feature a special informational presentation by Bernie Hedrick from the State of Montana Youth Services Center and LeAnn Logan from Parents Let’s Unite for Kids (PLUK) at the Tuesday, Jan. 31, meeting. Hedrick and Logan will discuss how to appropriately handle some of the behavior issues that grandparents deal with in raising their grandchildren. They will also discuss how families can best access community services when help is needed.When:Tuesday, January 31, 20126:30 pmWhere:Forever Families building1411 Fourth AveBillings, MTContact:Bernie MasonPhone: 256-2828

Read more here!What:The Yellowstone County Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Support Group will feature a special informational presentation by Bernie Hedrick from the State of Montana Youth Services Center and LeAnn Logan from Parents Let’s Unite for Kids (PLUK) at the Tuesday, Jan. 31, meeting. Hedrick and Logan will discuss how to appropriately handle some of the behavior issues that grandparents deal with in raising their grandchildren. They will also discuss how families can best access community services when help is needed.When:Tuesday, January 31, 20126:30 pmWhere:Forever Families building1411 Fourth AveBillings, MTContact:Bernie MasonPhone: 256-2828

Click here to download PDF What:If your child has epilepsy, you know it can affect every aspect of your and your child’s life. This educational series is offered to you or anyone interested as a time to learn about epilepsy, ask questions, and share your experience with others in the same situation. Please join us. When:Nov. 29, 2011Jan. 24, 2012Mar. 27, 2012May 22, 2012All sessions are at 7:00 PM on TuesdaysWhere:St. Vincent HealthcareMansfield Health Education Center1145 North 30th, Located in the Lower Level of theYellowstone Medical Building WestContact:St. Vincent University at 406-237-ED4U (406-237-3348) or svhu@svh-mt.org

“Treating children at home whenever possible,” said Patrick Gardner, an attorney with Young Minds Advocacy Project, “is more humane, less costly, and more effective than institutionalization.” Under the agreement the state will establish a new program and approach for delivering mental health services called Wraparound with Intensive Services or “WISe.” The program will help prevent adverse outcomes for youth with serious mental illness such as hospitalization, long-­term institutionalization in psychiatric facilities, and placements in the foster care and juvenile justice systems. These are all experiences Smith has known personally and doesn’t want repeated for other kids. “This case,” says Smith, “was about doing something to make a difference so kids with illnesses like mine won’t have to go through the things I did.” Leecia Welch, Senior Attorney at the National Center for Youth Law, agrees. “Approval of this settlement has set the stage for increasing access to appropriate mental health services for Washington’s most vulnerable youth. Better access to care means better outcomes for kids like Phillip.”

Monthly home visits to teach parents how to best work with their children with autism can go a long way toward improving kids’ interactions, researchers say. Over the course of a year, children whose families received monthly three-hour visits from a specialist showed greater gains in attention and initiation skills as compared to other kids on the spectrum, according to findings published this month in the Journal of Developmental & Behavioral Pediatrics.

For decades, frustrated parents and teachers have barked at fidgety children with ADHD to “Sit still and concentrate!” But new research conducted at UCF shows that if you want ADHD kids to learn, you have to let them squirm. The foot-tapping, leg-swinging and chair-scooting movements of children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder are actually vital to how they remember information and work out complex cognitive tasks, according to a study published in an early online release of the Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology. The findings show the longtime prevailing methods for helping children with ADHD may be misguided. “The typical interventions target reducing hyperactivity. It’s exactly the opposite of what we should be doing for a majority of children with ADHD,” said one of the study’s authors, Mark Rapport, head of the Children’s Learning Clinic at the University of Central Florida. “The message isn’t ‘Let them run around the room,’ but you need to be able to facilitate their movement so they can maintain the level of alertness necessary for cognitive activities.”

To help engage and create our next generation of park visitors, supporters and advocates, we are kicking off the Every Kid in a Park initiative. The immediate goal is to provide an opportunity for each and every 4th grade student across the country to experience their public lands and waters in person throughout the 2015-2016 school year. 

The 2010 KIDS COUNT Data Book According to data in the 21st annual KIDS COUNT Data Book, overall improvements in child well-being that began in the late 1990s stalled in the years just before the current economic downturn. Find national data and state-by-state data and rankings on 10 key indicators of child well-being.