If you haven’t already ready parts 1 and 2 of this blog series, please read them first, as they provide a foundation for understanding a Growth Mindset. In this final post, we will get more concrete about how we can encourage and empower Spellers with these tools. One of the most powerful ways to employ…
The term “Growth Mindset” was coined by Stanford Psychology Professor and Researcher Carol Dweck. Her research with children illuminated astounding implications about how the mental frameworks we use affect everything we do. Now, when a person is in the process of succeeding at something, the mindset they have will not necessarily be apparent. In the…
One evening in the Fall of 2014 – years before I had any idea that life would take me in the direction of working with nonspeakers and motor-coaching them for communication – my mind was blown with a new concept: The Growth Mindset. My own three children were all in elementary school and we had…
Kia ora! For the last three months I have been lucky enough to intern at GKTC, where I have been learning so much. All the way from little old New Zealand! What an honor it has been to be welcomed so warmly and given the opportunity to communicate with the spellers in the community… what…
When I first started working at Growing Kids, I worked with students who were brand new to Spelling to Communicate, as well as some who started with Elizabeth beforehand. Over that time, skills began to build, goals were being met, and fluency was increasing. For the students and for myself, as well! Doing a regular,…
There are many reasons why I love being so involved with Tribe, but the UVa-Tribe exchanges are at the top. As a UVa alum, a friend of Vikram (who teaches the course), and as an educator at GKTC, it’s truly the case of my worlds colliding, and it’s the best thing ever. GKTC Tribe and…
Today we welcome guest blogger, Michele Kukler, one of our ACTS (Accessing Community Through Spelling) professional practitioners and teacher extraordinare of the Connections School of Atlanta. Michele and the incredibly dedicated teachers and staff at Connections are leaders in education as they include nonspeaking students along side speaking peers inside and outside the classroom through…
GKTC’s Tribe has kicked off the fall schedule with an exchange between The University of Virginia students and Tribe members. The University of Virginia students are taking the undergrad psychology course, The Science and Lived Experience of Autism along with the young adults of Growing Kids Therapy Center’s “Tribe”. Last year, the Tribe completed the…
For our final week of Summer Institute, our guest lecturers were Meenu and Sarina from the University of Maryland. Meenu and Sarina work together at the Academy of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and teach students how to think outside of the box and bring new, interesting ideas to life! After the “getting to know you” portion…
GKTC Summer Institute kicked off the summer exploring multimedia journalism: photography, videography, television, and radio. The past two weeks in Summer Institute was all about media in a different context… A R T! Liz Michaels, GKTC’s longterm intern, is also an art instructor and led us in a discussion about types of art: fine art…
Hi everyone! My name is Karen Dorula and I’m an occupational therapist at GKTC. Elizabeth has challenged us all to jump onto the blog. I’m very excited to be able to share all of the wonderful chess that has been happening here! I started teaching chess in January 2016 after one of my letterboard clients,…
Autistic individuals are the true autism experts. Matthew Lager’s TASH Talk debunking the myths of non-verbal autism is a must read for anyone who has an autistic child or works with autistic individuals. Matthew uses a letterboard and keyboard to spell to communicate. He prepared this presentation for the 2016 TASH conference with his mother…
