Spelling Chequer

Re-reading one of my other blogs, and came across this "poem" that I found some years ago. re-posting it here, because I really like it! :) How do you know if spell-check is always correct? :)

Spelling Chequer

Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.
Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.

As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore two long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.
Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My chequer tolled me sew.

~ Sauce Unknown

(Extracted from Sattler, Jerome M. (2001) Assessment of Children: Cognitive Applications. 4th Edition. Pg 717. California, USA)

Countdown timer

I suddenly remembered this product that my colleague shared about when we were discussing about how to teach some of our students the notion of "how much time left". We have students who do not have the notion of time. They can't tell time from the analogue clock (which I find to be more and more common in the digitised world), they also have no idea what is yesterday, tomorrow, or 15 more minutes. And so, in her previous work place, they used a product like the countdown timer shown here (image obtained from here)to help her students know how much more time is left for them.

I guess the benefit of having this countdown timer is that it gives a spatial view of the remaining time, because the red indicator moves as time passes. The beep that sounds when time is up also gives them an auditory indication. I think it might be quite helpful to teach children the passing of time as well as the concepts of "15 minutes more", or "5 minutes left". :)

Changes

Made another change to the template to make it look sunnier! That matches the title of my blog more aptly doesn't it? :p Or perhaps I just can't stay committed to one look! :p I've been wanting to post some blogs on some new concepts I've learnt recently, but have not found the time to! weekends are gonna be even busier now with renovations round the corner!

Autism

This season is the season for understanding Autism and the disorders in its spectrum. My job for the week is to look at the assessment and diagnosis of autism, and I found a book that I really enjoyed reading. I've just gotten past the first chapter or so of this book, Autism and Asperger Syndrome, by Simon Baron-Cohen, and found it helpful in understanding more about the learning difficulty.

In particular, I liked that the book started off with two case studies describing classic autism and Asperger syndrome, which brought to life the difficulties that children with these two different (yet similar) conditions had. Towards the end, it also identified the two similarities and differences of the two difficulties that summed up the details succiently. This I'm going to put here for better understanding

Two similar key features between classic autism and Asperger syndrome
1. Social communication difficulties
2. Narrow interests and repetitive actions

Two key differences
1. In Asperger syndrome, IQ is at least average and there was no language delay
2. In classic autism, IQ can be anywhere on the scale, and there was language delay

Can't wait to read and find out more! :)

New Template

Blogger has got some new templates for me to choose from, and I decided to give this blog a new look. Browsed through some of their choices, and decided on this look. It felt like the rain pitter-pattering on the window pane. I love to look at the rain from inside the house. I love to hear the pitter-pattering of rain on the window pane. I love dreaming about snuggling on a cosy couch with a cup of hot chocolate and a lovely book when it rains. What do you dream of when it rains? :)

been away

Been away from this blog for sometime. Been away for a really relaxed and recharging retreat, where I (for once) was not involved in any form of service. It really helped me to be refreshed in God and to be recharged physically.

Coming back meant having to catch up with work undone and I am still struggling with that now. Been wanting to go back to my very interesting book on reading, but had been hardly able to do that.

Of course, World Cup matches kept me up some nights! :)

Semantic-Pragmatic Disorder

My supervisor spoke to me about the possibility of my case having some semantic-pragmatic difficulties. He had difficulties understanding my instructions and questions, and was not able to follow instructions despite explanations and demonstrations. Furthermore, despite being almost 13yo, he had difficulties using simple words such as "cage" and "tank" to add on to his story of his pets. His verbal ability was definitely very low, and at the same time, he seemed to not be able to respond appropriately to the situation (such as instructing him to do something quickly).

Anyway, I checked it up, and found some sites that described semantic-pragmatic disorder. It is closely linked to autism, often described as high-functioning autism, but I think, not to be mistaken for asperger's syndrome.
What is Semantic-pragmatic Disorder?
- my child performed significantly better on the non-verbal reasoning as opposed to verbal

Semantic Pragmatic Disorder
This was written by the mother of a child with semantic pragmatic disorder. I liked how she put the description of how a child with this disorder takes language literally by asking the reader how this child might respond to the idiom "raining cats and dogs"! :)