Even if school has started, there is still time to set the tone to help you and your child have the best year and relationship with school personnel. I brought this week’s guest back after seeing her last episode is in the top 7 downloads. This tells me that listeners like what she is saying, and I know you are going to love her back to school tips!
Jeff Noble
Danna is the Director of the Foothills Fetal Alcohol Society and an FASD Instructional Coach with the Wrap2FASD program. She has a Bachelor of Arts Degree and attended Mount Royal University for Recreation. Her career includes working with moms, serving as a teaching assistant, and managing an agency that supported adults with developmental disabilities. Danna has a deep belief that empathy can encourage us to be creative effective responders to “all things FASD: and that with compassion, all things are possible!
We think we need to have all the paperwork lined up, but I’m going to encourage people to think again. I was at fault of this myself as a mom and grandma. I just feel like we get really caught up in the stuff that needs to change the behaviour or change the learning and we forget about the stuff that makes this little human being still a human being – that is interesting, curious, and developing.
We know the transition of back-to-school season is tough on everyone. You are thinking about last year and wondering how this year is going to go. So we are going to give you an easy to remember analogy: T.I.P.S.:
T is for together and teams.
I is for information.
P is for practice.
S is for simplicity.
I’m terrible for the “what ifs” but I invite caregivers to take a deep breath – this doesn’t need to be complicated YET. For now, what is the simplest step I need to take. Do I need to call someone. Breathe? Go into the School? Talk to my MLA? Make it as simple as you can in that moment.
In addition to explaining the T.I.P.S. Danna reflects on start in the early days of the growth of the Autism Community and offers her thoughts on how to get rid of our own “stinking thinking.” She leaves us with an invitation to get in touch with the person we are underneath the advocate. Let me know if you use any of these T.I.P.S. and how they worked. I would love to hear from the teachers as well.
Contact Danna: dormstrup@gmail.com
Podcast: #091 Danna Ormstrup: Helping Schools Understand Your Kids And FASD