Lapbooks, life skills, Montessori, and special needs

I promised Dani I would upload my links today.  In looking around I was intrigued by the success stories of Montessori kids with special needs. We have two delightful little boys visiting us this week while their parents attend a funeral out of town. While visiting when they got dropped off she was sharing about the dyslexia curricula they used for an older boy years back.  It sounded remarkably like Montessori as well. Tracing letters, visual cues, etc.  Anyway, we have been busy here this week so will just jump to the links:

Do 2 Learn life skill clip art.  These can be used a lot of ways.  You can make wall charts such as these and these  or use them for lapbook lessons like Dani plans to.

The Preschool Power tapes teach by showing rather than by telling. They are offering a special price through the end of Sept for teachers of special needs children.  Don't miss these!!!  They are awesome for all preschoolers and for their parents who want a visual presentation of Montessori lessons. Nothing like having lessons at the ready on your VCR.

I am including an article  about Montessori being used for Autistic children.  In this one Montessori Mom answers some questions about using the method for special needs.  Here is a very encouraging story written by a young lady who has Down's Syndrome.  She presented this testimony to the entire school in a speech given during Disability Awareness Week.

and finally LOTS of lapbooking links! I am very happy to be able to share several links to free templates and fold directions. Now you really can try before you buy: 

Tamy Duby has a visually appealing new site called Lapbook Ladies

At Scrapbooking to Learn you can access fold directions for the file folders and booklets.

a few more can be found here, not many but I really like her illustrations <g>

Candle in the Window is another how-to site.  (Crossover content with Scrapbook to Learn)

Mirkwood Designs has tons of templates to download and resize to your needs.  These are designed as cards so there is a great deal of potential here for all kinds of projects. There is nothing so nice as 'press and print' imo!

And should you want it just that easy you can check out Hands of a Child.  They sell lapbooking kits along with topical study guides for a host of subjects. If you click on a title you can pull up a free downloadable sample for each.

If you want more more more then ck out the yahoo lapbooking group. They have oodles of shared images in the picture files for the group.

Hope that helps, Dani!   Back to school here!  : )

Comments

[Dani]

Thank you, sweetie, for taking the time to put together this post for me...it helps a whole lot and is very much appreciated!!!! {{hugs}}

[Dani]

Wow! Just bookmarked the websites...again, thank you!!!!!!!

[Meredith]

Wow, great resources, I had forgotten about Hands of a Child, have you ever used any of the pre-packaged materials or packs?? I'd be interested to know what you think. thanks so much for all this good info!!

[Shayne]

Thank you for those links, especially the article relating to autism. My youngest son who is autistic used to visit a multi-sensory room when he was younger and it helped his development a great deal. I was interested to read about fluorescent lights especially, as it is very relevant for us. Brilliant help!

[Maura]

Thank you so much for posting this, your timing was perfect! I am gathering materials for a unit study on the solar system and wanted each of the kids to put together a lapbook as we work through the unit.

I love reading your blog, it's always a picker-upper.

take care...