Tag: down syndrome

A FREE Confession Book for Children with Down Syndrome

Published on by Mary Cooney2 Comments

Here’s an adapted confession booklet I made for my son and his friends in our Special Needs Atrium. When it was time to prepare my son for First Confession, I knew he would need a lot of visual aids in order to understand what the sacrament was about and in order to communicate his sins and his contrition to the priest. So I designed this especially for children who are non-verbal or whose speech is limited and still emerging.

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Catechesis of the Good Shepherd for Children with Down Syndrome

Published on by Mary Cooney11 Comments

One of my goals this year was to prepare Junior and the boys in our Down Syndrome co-op to receive their First Holy Communion. To help with that, we were blessed to find a catechist who was trained to teach Catechesis of the Good Shepherd classes. Maria, our catechist, had never worked with children with T21, but it quickly became evident to all of us that she had a loving heart for them. And the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd was so appropriate for the four boys in our co-op. The highly visual and hands on approach, the one-on-one presentations, the boys’ freedom to choose which materials to work with, and the (mostly) peaceful environment allowed the boys to ponder and learn about our faith. It was a beautiful thing to behold.

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A FREE CVCe Practice Book

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Here’s a free resource to help your child with (or without) T21 learn the concept of silent e in long vowel words. Most phonics programs require children to practice word families by reading long, drill-like lists of words. Early on, I knew that was not going to fly with my little guy. So, to help him understand silent e, I adapted the word lists to make them colorful, interactive, and full of pictures to boost comprehension and to make reading lists of words more meaningful and interesting.

Take a look:

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A Life Worth Living: One Family Embraces Four Children with Down Syndrome

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A few months ago, my oldest son told me he has a friend who has seven siblings, four with Down Syndrome. As a mother of a large family who has one child with Down Syndrome, I was astounded. Five biological children, three adopted, four with Down Syndrome and homeschooling? “Peter,” I said to my son, “Please get me her number. I need to talk to that mom and tap into her wisdom.”

It took us a while to connect — Sonia McGarrity is, after all, a little busy. But once we did, we could have talked for hours about family life, homeschooling, and Trisomy 21. As we spoke, I realized that the story of this extraordinary family needed to be shared. So I asked Sonia if she would do an interview for Mercator. She graciously and generously agreed.

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Our Favorite Toys for Young Children with Down Syndrome

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With Christmas around the corner, I know many of you are thinking what to get your kids for Christmas. So today I’m sharing with you some of our favorite toys with a focus on building problem solving skills, fine motor skills, and independent play. Helping our children develop problem solving skills and teaching them to persist at a task is so important. Many of our kids need extra practice with fine motor skills, and doing so in the context of play is always the most fun way! And finally sometimes we just need our kids to entertain themselves. Since I don’t give Junior any screen time at all, finding the right toys that will keep him independently occupied is such a big help.

So, here are some of our favorite toys for problem solving, fine motor skills, and independent play:

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Let’s Trace Letters, Lowercase – More Handwriting Worksheets for Children with (or without) Down Syndrome

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Here’s yet another set of handwriting worksheets for children with Down Syndrome and other special needs. These are clean, uncluttered handwriting sheets with cute pictures to color and starting dots. I designed them for children who need extra large letters to trace.

My son needs variety to keep him motivated, which is why I keep making handwriting worksheets. One day, we’ll get to the point where he doesn’t need extra large letters, and then I’ll be able to buy worksheets from Teachers Pay Teachers instead of making them myself. But until then, you can expect to find more worksheets showing up on this blog.

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How to Motivate Young Children with Down Syndrome

Published on by Mary Cooney2 Comments

Once a week, three little boys with T21 and their moms come to my house for a Down Syndrome Coop. It’s so much fun, as these little guys are so funny and lovable. But keeping them engaged and motivated is a major piece of work. Sometimes one of the boys will wander off in the middle of a story or activity. Sometimes one will lie on the floor and space out. Sometimes a child will flat-out refuse to try an activity. So behavior management and motivation has become a vital aspect of our work.

I think it is important not to underestimate the amount of effort our children have to expend to complete what we perceive to be basic and simple tasks. We need to remember that children with T21 often have several health issues including poor sleep and low muscle tone, which make them tire easily. Our children are not lazy; in fact they have to work harder than most people to complete ordinary jobs.

However, it’s also important not to underestimate their potential for learning, especially if we can motivate them. 

So we work really hard to elicit cooperation and engagement through motivation.

Here are some of my most effective strategies for keeping my son and the boys in our T21 co-op engaged and motivated:

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Our Favorite Speech Therapy Resources for Young Children with Down Syndrome

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Speech therapy is one of the most important services we can give our children who have T21. However, in many states homeschoolers do not have access to publicly funded speech therapy services. Private speech therapy services are a wonderful option if you can afford them. Even then, sometimes the waiting list to get into private services are long.

Another option, which we benefitted from, is to find a university that has a graduate program for speech language pathologists. These programs need children for their graduate students to gain experience with. These services are generally much more affordable than private services and the sessions are usually supervised by highly experienced therapists.  I learned so much by watching my son’s speech therapy sessions and having weekly conversations with my son’s speech supervisor at Loyola College. Having served the Down Syndrome population for over 30 years, she had a wealth of knowledge and experience which she so generously shared. Knowing my son needed daily speech practice, I would take note of everything the therapists did during each session and find similar resources to practice the skills he was working on in therapy at home. 

When it comes to the acquisition of language skills, time is not on our side. Because plasticity of the brain is greatest when children are young, I try to prioritize speech, targeting specific skills and working on them in a structured and non-structured way every day. Generally, children with T21 have so much to work on in order to develop their speech skills, from articulation to receptive and expressive language, to grammar and semantics, and so on.

So, in the event that your child has no or not enough access to speech therapy, I’m sharing some of the speech therapy resources my son and I have found most helpful. I am not a speech language pathologist, but most of these resources have been designed by SLPs and are quite straight forward to use.

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A Kindergarten Curriculum for Children with Down Syndrome

Published on by Mary Cooney2 Comments

Let’s talk curriculum, shall we? It’s one of my favorite topics! Many children with Down Syndrome need curriculum tailored to their learning profile. So, I’ve spent a lot of time searching, adapting, and creating curriculum for my son who has T21.

Today I’m sharing with you my favorite resources to help children with Down Syndrome master kindergarten-level skills and concepts.

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Raising a Child with Down Syndrome: Life in the Last 48 Hours

Published on by Mary Cooney4 Comments

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to raise a child with Down Syndrome? A few years ago, I shared this post, written when Junior was only three. Ah, those were the days, when he was still little, and everything he did was funny or adorable. Now Junior is six, and in many ways still a toddler, but bigger, stronger, and heavier. His propensity for getting into trouble has spiked, and he keeps me on my toes all day long.

Just in the past 48 hours, Junior did the following:

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