Is your child “good” at school and for everyone else but fills your life and home with meltdowns, misbehavior, ugly moods, disrespect, etc.? We hear this often from parents who have children with lots of different kinds of challenges. Our guess is that these children give everything they’ve got outside the home to be “good”. Then, they are exhausted and are at the end of themselves when home. Here are some ideas that you can implement that could make a difference: These tried and true ideas work for many. Could they need a snack? Sometimes the blood sugar gets low...
Jacob comes to church activities with aspergers-like symptoms. We love Jacob and are eager to serve him well. He is brilliant and also very rigid in his thinking. If it is not logical to him, it is not to be done. If a teacher or leader or another child is doing something that does not make sense in his black or white only perspective, he really has a hard time. The behavior he sometimes displays is impatience, and/orrudeness, and/ormeltdowns. He cannot work his way out of an “It HAS TO BE DONE like this” way of thinking. We suggest that...
Sometimes when you are leading a class, and particularly when you have a child or multiple children who are especially active, disruptive, prone to be sad or upset, or who have various challenges or special needs, things can get a little chaotic. Maybe you have a child who is reluctant to enter your group or for some reason gets upset or sad in the middle of your time together. Here are some ideas that you can do with typically developing children and special needs children as well. Remember, as you get to know the children in your group, you will...
Sometimes as people who serve in children’s ministry we might encounter this: Children who are very sensitive to their world. Lights are often too bright. Sounds are often too loud. Even the slightest hints of perfumes or cleaning chemicals or scented candles or even, children’s markers are too smelly. Wall art and floor displays and simple touches are too much. These are children whose world is overwhelming. They have sensory overload 24/7. This makes it hard to focus. Hard to concentrate. You know when an annoying noise like a car alarm is beeping loudly for a while, or when you are in a...
