It’s exciting to see a new innovation that helps someone. Sometimes an invention comes along and I think to myself, “Wow, why didn’t someone think of that sooner?” I remember arriving at our city park one day and seeing a swing for kids in wheelchairs. It was thrilling to see the joy on a child’s face when they got to try it out. I was recently introduced to another one of those …
nonverbal communication
Never Take “I Love You” for Granted Again
One of our missions here at the Orange Effect Foundation is to make sure every child can communicate. We often take it for granted. I have had so many emails from grateful parents--writing about how their child can participate in every day activities like saying, "Trick Or Treat!" or "I’m hungry," or they want to go outside. Such simple things. But no example has warmed my heart the way …
Kids Teach Us So Much
I really enjoy spending time with kids because they are so smart and so aware of the world around them. They generally are not judgmental (yet) and often so willing to try new things. The 5th Grade Class at Lakewood Catholic Academy (LCA) in Lakewood, Ohio is one such group. As a service project, they participated in our second annual Silence for Speech campaign to help recognize the …
Who Inspires You? We Want To Know!
I’ve run across a lot of feel good articles this week. It amazes me what people can accomplish and to be honest, I often envy their constant upbeat mood and never ending drive. I realize too, that most of these folks just don’t get enough credit. So we would love to highlight some of them here at The Orange Effect Foundation. Here’s some I ran across this week! Dylan …
That Magic Moment
Communicating with Your Nonverbal Autistic Child for the First Time Seasoned parents know that their tone can significantly affect the way a child responds. This can have profound implications for the parent of a nonverbal child. Autism specialist and HuffPost author Marci Lebowitz writes about that "magic moment," the first time one mother became aware that her autistic child was trying to …