An Indianapolis teacher has come under fire after it was revealed that she may have tried to harm a special needs student in order to prevent him from attending a class trip.

“Maybe he could get sick enough not to attend and we won’t have to deal with it,” the teacher told a classroom aide, according to court and state documents.

This is what teacher Trinda Barocas said when referring to one of her students, a little seven year old boy with autism. Why? All because she didn’t want him to be part of a class trip to the zoo.

In an interview with Child Protective Services (CPS) afterwards, Trinda said that she didn’t want the boy to be part of the trip because she thought he would act out.

The state report says teacher’s aides also described Barocas as dragging Young’s son and another student across the floor by their arms, pushing them, pinching Young’s son and flicking the other student on her lips.

On the day the class was heading on the field trip, the teachers aide, David Holder told investigators that Trinda said:

I wonder what would happen if (the boy) had peanuts? I could touch it, and then touch him.

Not long after, she allegedly tossed him a Mr. Goodbar that was full of just that. Peanuts.

The Mr. Goodbar allegation came to light when school officials called in state child welfare investigators after teacher’s aides alerted them about concerns that the teacher was abusive.

As you can imagine the young boy’s mother, Anita Young was shocked when the school alerted her to what had happened. She believed she was sending her son somewhere safe when he went to school everyday and has since realized that this was not the case.

The boy’s peanut allergy, which was discovered when he was small, is so severe, doctors told his parents he would asphyxiate within minutes if he were to ever come in contact with them again.

According to her, he probably didn’t eat the candy bar because he won’t eat foods that are “unfamiliar” to him, a character trait common to kids with autism.

Mrs.Young has filed a suit against the district and she wants criminal charges filed against the teacher, something that has yet to happen.

“I think she’s sadistic,” Young said. “I think there’s something wrong with her mind. She shouldn’t teach. She shouldn’t be allowed around kids.”

Barocas’ attorneys did not respond to calls seeking comment Thursday, but according to the CPS report, the teacher told the agency “she did not want (the boy) to attend the field trip to the Indianapolis Zoo because of his behavior. She stated that he did go and did many things that he was not allowed to do. Trinda compared (the boy) to an 18-month-old child several times. Trinda denied that she did anything or said anything to stop (the boy) from coming on the field trip.”

It has also been revealed that back in 2007, this teacher was placed on administrative leave after a nurse saw her force feeding, slapping and restraining a child.

Before these accusations came to light, the district was planning to fire Mrs.Barocas for poor performance. Before that could happen, she resigned.

This story just makes me want to cry. Our kids are supposed to be able to go to school to learn, to make friends and to have fun. We as parents are always confident that our children are safe in the school system. This is just scary.

As the parent of a special needs child, stories like this really make me worry about how the school system will be with my son once he is old enough to be there. I already have issues with trust and things like this are just going to make it that much more difficult.

NO child deserves to be treated in such a horrible manner. No child deserves to miss out on class trips because of a disability. I have learned over the years that some people just don’t understand kids that have special needs. They are just like everyone else, but deal with problems that are NOT their fault.

I am disgusted with this teacher. I hope that she gets what she deserves and I sure hope that they do file criminal charges against her. This was totally uncalled for and she needs to be punished.

The fact that back in 2007 she was put on leave because of mistreating another child makes me even more angry. She should have lost her license THEN as a teacher. If so this boy would not be in the position that he is in.

My heart goes out to the little boy and his family. – Shannon Strohm, Staff Writer

Related Articles:

• Shocking Report Finds Special-needs Kids Abused in Schools
  
• Is This Is How Families Of Special Needs Kids Are Treated?

SOURCE

Last month my girlfriend told me about an autistic boy who had been locked in a solitary confinement room for a whole day at his Catholic School for being disruptive during class. The story was so shocking to hear, I would never have believed that this could happen anywhere else.

A Government Accountability Office report scheduled to be released today, documents the problems with the way children with disabilities are being treated in public schools, including cases of children being held face-down on the ground.

The GAO report was prepared for the House Education and Labor Committee, which is considering new laws governing what actions teachers can take to rein in disruptive special-needs students.

The GAO, the investigative arm of Congress, found that state laws governing the treatment of the more than 6 million children classified as having “special needs” — conditions including autism and Down syndrome – are patchy at best. Teachers and school staff frequently lack training in correct restraint methods, and in some cases, where improper restraints led to injuries, teachers often kept their jobs.

Only five states keep track of incidents where special-needs students are separated or restrained. Parents contacted by CNN commonly said they were not told their child was being disciplined until he or she began to behave badly at home — a sign of trouble at school.

Some of the most disturbing reports concerned the use of seclusion rooms. Experts have long recommended that children should only be isolated when they posed an immediate threat to themselves or others. But CNN found that isolation was often used as a punishment by teachers to compel the students to follow instructions.

State investigators in Utah found a teacher left 7-year-old Garrett Peck in an isolation cubicle for at least two and a half hours after the teacher said he told her to “shut up.”

While the boy was in the cubicle, the teacher taunted him by playing his favorite video and telling him what he was missing. His parents, Joshua and Becca Peck, said the child has an attention span of about 10 minutes, and they believe that after the first few minutes, he had no idea why he was in the cubicle.

“It was so sad. We felt it was a form of torture for him but he, being autistic, he had no way to express it,” Joshua Peck said. “He couldn’t tell.”

And Becca Peck said her son had been left in the cubicle with nothing but a magic marker — which he used to scrawl all over himself. When she came to school to pick him up, “He was covered in marker — on his eyelids, on his hair, face, clothes, arms, eyelids — everywhere.”

“I started thinking, ‘What was he thinking?’ Was he thinking, ‘Why is my mom letting this person do this to me? Why am I here? I trust no one now.’ ”

In one case, a New York school confined a 9-year-old with learning disabilities to a “small, dirty room” 75 times in six months for whistling, slouching and hand-waving. In another, a Florida teacher’s aide gagged and duct-taped five misbehaving children to their desks; and police say a 14-year-old boy died when a special-education teacher in Texas lay on top of the student when he would not stay seated. Police ruled it a homicide, but a grand jury rejected criminal charges.

The findings from the GAO stop short of attaching a hard number to how many children are subjected to the practices, but investigators say they found “hundreds of allegations” of abuse involving restraint or seclusion at schools from 1990 to 2009; in Texas and California, they say, public schools recorded a combined 33,095 instances in the past school year alone.

The report goes on to detail 10 children’s cases, four of which ended in death. Unlike in hospitals or residential treatment centers, there’s no federal system to regulate such practices in schools — and teachers are often inadequately trained.

I am saddened and horrified by these reports. It is hard to think that a child who already has so many confusing things happening in their head has to add this abuse to their confusion.

My son currently receives treatment from a facility that has needed to cutback on a lot of their support staff because the government did not increase their funding this last year.

At the end of my post, I appealed to some of the companies that our website has relationships with to donate new developmental toys to his facility.

The very next day I was contacted by Kushies, who generously offered to donate some of their toys from their Zolo line.

This line of toys was created with many purposes in mind. Kids will only see the bright colours and exciting characters, but parents will love some of the developmental benefits.

Kushies toys encourage many developmental skills including dexterity, flexible thinking, explorative play and independent play.

Some of the toys the facility received were:

Stacrobats – Magnetic Stacking Acrobats($52) – Build your imagination, balance, and dexterity while you play! The magnetic figures, balls, and base are easy to attach. Connect them in zillions of ways!

Pupa Musical Caterpillar($60)- Stick balls together to create & build! Squeeze to hear musical notes! Full 8-tone scale lets you play tunes, including color coded songs.

Play Garden Magnetic Activity Garden($74) – Magnetic creatures stick to the garden and the magnetic plant pieces stack and build! This unique garden window box doubles as a zippered carrying case for toddlers on the go!

Growing Your Baby thanks this amazing company for their generosity and we encourage our readers to support companies, like Kushies who give back to the community.

I guess I have never seen their issues as anything more that a consequence from being born at 24 weeks and I appreciate every milestone that they reach.

With that being said, there are many people in this world that do not understand why a child needs to be in a wheelchair or on oxygen to survive and they paint all children with special need with the same brush.

Last night I was SHOCKED to hear what happened to my girlfriend and her 3 year-old son (pictured right) while out for their first walk in his new wheelchair.

Here is the e-mail she sent me:(not edited)

Okay as you all know we just got Ashton’s trial wheelchair YESTERDAY.

Well I always take him for a walk at night. I usually go the same route so people in certain houses know us and say hi.

I walk past this one house and their son is in the yard with their dog. The mom is out there on the porch. As I walked by I heard the kid say “mom, that kid is retarded”.

WHAT?!?!?!?! ?!? I was just saying how one day I am going to snap. I felt my face go red and I just wanted to scream at him!

I stopped and turned to him and said, “What did you say?”

He said, “I just said he was a retard”.

I said, “He is not a retard. Why do you say that?”

He said, “Cause he is in that chair.”

I said “That doesn’t make him a retard. You are a little brat.”

It was THEN that the mom said to me, “Just keep walking”. She didn’t say ANYTHING before this!!!!!!!! !!!!!

I said “Ya, I will keep walking but you should teach your kid some manners”.

“He has manners” she said….

I just wanted to punch her. I kinda did a little laugh and said “Well if those are manners he has a lot to learn”.

She stood up and seemed to be getting as angry as I was and said to me “He has nothing to learn, you just can’t handle the truth”.

WTF!??!?!?!? ?! I had to start walking. It was gonna be nasty if I didn’t. I started to walk….about ten feet later the tears came. I was sobbing by the time I got home. I cannot believe this. I have seen this lady and her kids MANY nights and it wasn’t until tonight that he said that. I was having a hard enough time with the whole wheelchair thing but now I just feel like crap. Ashton is NOT a retard. I am just so emotional about this whole milestone of getting a wheelchair.. ..it sucks.

Why can’t people see these kids how we do!??!?!

This mother should have marched her little monster down to the sidewalk and made him apologize to Ashton for referring to him as anything but an adorable little boy who has a flashy new chair, but instead she justified his crummy comment by sticking up for him. Now he will always think that it is okay to talk about kids like this because his crappy mother didn’t correct him the first time he did it.

This family know nothing about what my girlfriend has been through with her son and the lengths that she has gone through to make sure that he is here with us today.

The part that saddens me the most about this story is that this is the mom that slept in a ‘toy room’ at the hospital for 4 MONTHS because she couldn’t bare to leave her sons side while he was recently hospitalized.

She has pushed for every specialist and every doctor to see her son because she desperately wants him to lead a normal life and hopefully walk on his own someday.

After what she goes through daily, she doesn’t deserve to have her son ridiculed when all she wants to do is get him out for some fresh air.

When I see someone with a child who has special needs, I have nothing but respect for them because I know that they are probably on-call 16-18 hours a day looking after their child’s basic needs.

Whether we like it or not, this is how some kids are treated when they are in a wheelchair. I hope that this story will help parents realize that education and awareness goes a long way.

Would you pay a premium to know that if your baby arrives with a congenital defect, your family will receive money, which could help offset medical expenses?

The insurance company ING has devised a baby policy for women aged 16 to 40 which will deliver payouts of up to 50,000 dollars (46,640 US) for babies born with Down’s syndrome, spina bifida or a cleft palate, the Sun-Herald said.

A stillborn baby could get a 10,000-dollar payout while women who suffered complications during pregnancy or birth could also be awarded a pay-out, it said.

ING spokesman Mark Vilo said the new policy allowed the company to match up with “social trends and advances in medical technology,” the paper said.

“Every woman in the process of having a child knows the risks,” he said.

“We don’t make people undergo genetic testing to find out things they don’t want to.”

“With the median age of new mums now nearly 31, (up from 27 in 1985), the risk of pregnancy complications and birth defects increases dramatically,” ING said on its website.

“For a women aged 35 or more the risk of stillborn is 1 in 440, as opposed to 1 in 1,000 for younger women.”

If this became available to North America women I would do it. Knowing that there could be a fund that would help contribute to the needs of my baby if he/she was born with issues is reassuring.

One of the biggest stress factors that parents of special needs kids have is trying to finance all of the gear their child needs.

The New South Wales Midwives Association, believes that this policy plays on the fears of pregnant women.

“It is marketing fear and uncertainty when women are vulnerable during pregnancy.”

I disagree with this association because I think that this insurance company is just being practical. Babies are born with special issues everyday.

At some point the parents will be out of pocket for a lot of extra expenses (special food, nursing, strollers, seats, equipment and alternative forms of travel). Having this would ease that stress.

Researchers at the University of Delaware are providing safe mobility to children with special needs who are unable to fully explore the world on their own through the development of kid-sized robots that infants can drive using joysticks.

The work is important because much of infant development, both of the brain and behavior, emerges from the thousands of experiences each day that arise as babies independently move and explore their world.

The robot, UD1, is designed with smart technology to address safety issues so infants can be a part of the real world environment, and in this way uses technology to meet human need.

While it looks like something that my dad could of made in the garage, I am very excited that this robot could be responsible for children seeing the world the same way that other kids do. PHOTOCREDIT:

Kathy Atkinson/University of Delaware
SOURCE

These babies may not meet their milestones at the same time as their peers or follow the same schedule as other kids their age.

Books that track developmental firsts like sitting up, crawling or even walking may not be appropriate for the these babies because some may never walk or say their first words.

Rhonda DeBough-Insook created a book for parents of special need children that allows parents to tell their child’s story their own way.

She writes:

My baby was born with many complicated developmental and medical needs. As I began the journey with my baby surrounded by wonder and worry, I found that baby books that are designed for the typical baby had many pages and sections that didn’t apply to my baby. I also found that big parts of my baby’s story could not be told in the spaces provided.

A Very Special Baby Book has been designed for you to tell your baby’s own unique story. It is a guided journal that allows you to record your baby’s early life in words and in pictures. The book is bound such that pages can be rearranged, or removed at your discretion to best fit your own situation.

Each book includes:

• 50 color soft water color illustrations
• beautiful acid-free archival quality watercolor paper
• hand-bound with a ribbon -allowing you to move the pages to tell your baby’s unique story in chronological order

Some of the headings include:

• Our pregnancy story
• My birth story
• My diagnosis story
• My first days home from the hospital
• My growth chart

Available at averyspecialbook.com for $25

All books are designed and printed in the U.S.A.

Parents of babies with Down syndrome were asked to help their children walk on the treadmills for eight minutes a day, five days a week. They sat on a bench which straddled the machine and held their babies as the treadmill belt encouraged them to take steps.

This exercise helped the babies learn to walk up to four or five months earlier than traditional physical therapy alone, the study found.

More intensive training helped the babies to walk even sooner, the study found.

The intensity of the training for half the babies was increased gradually after the infant could take 10, 20, and 30 steps per minute.

Children with Down syndrome generally don’t learn to walk until 24-28 months, about a year after children without developmental disabilities.Getting them walking sooner can help improve their social skills, motor skills, perception and spatial cognition, said study author Dale Ulrich of the University of Michigan’s Division of Kinesiology.

“The key is if we can get them to walk earlier and better then they can explore their environment earlier and when you start to explore, you learn about the world around you,” Ulrich said. “Walking is a critical factor in development in every other domain.”

SOURCE

The moment a child takes their first faltering steps is a special one for any parent. But for Everton and England footballer Phil Neville and his wife Julie, it was particularly poignant.

Three years ago, their daughter Isabella was born ten weeks prematurely, weighing 3lb 3oz. Doctors gave her just 24 hours to live. Isabella survived, but at 18 months she was diagnosed with cerebral palsy – a disability caused by damage to the brain before or during birth. Doctors told the couple she would probably never walk.

It is only now that Isabella is three and making good progress that 31-year-old Julie, and Phil, 30, can finally bring themselves to talk openly about their experiences.

When Julie was 28 weeks pregnant her water broke needing her to be hospitalized. After staying in the hospital for 2 weeks she suffered a placental abruption which forced the doctors to deliver the baby by emergency caesarean.

The night after she was born, Isabella was so ill that doctors thought she might not make it. Phil sat next to her incubator the entire night, but Julie was in a poor state and wasn’t deemed well enough to visit the intensive baby care unit until 30 hours after the birth.

But within just a few days Isabella’s lungs were strong enough to enable her to breathe on her own. After five weeks she was well enough to take a bottle. At six weeks, and weighing 5lb, Isabella was allowed home.

Phil and Julie thought their daughter was perfect and, putting the trauma of her premature birth behind them, tried to get on with their lives. But Isabella was always ill.

“It took more than an hour to get her to take her bottle, and then she would be sick straight afterwards,” says Julie. “At the time, I just thought Isabella’s problems were because she was so premature, and assumed things would get better.”

But as the weeks turned into months, Isabella failed to reach her developmental milestones.

“Other babies were sitting up by six months, then crawling and walking, but Isabella didn’t,’ Julie says. ‘I just knew something was wrong.”

Family, friends and health visitors all reassured Julie that Isabella would catch up. “But when she did start to crawl, it wasn’t like other babies – she seemed to be weaker on her left side. And it was always a very slow, concentrated crawl, as if she always had to think about which movement to do next.

“When we held her arms to help her walk, she seemed to drag her left foot.”

When Isabella was 18 months old, Julie and Phil took her to see a paediatrician at St Mary’s. Hip scans, leg scans and blood tests ruled out other problems and the family were finally given the news that Isabella had cerebral palsy.

Cerebral palsy is a condition that affects movement, and around one in every 400 babies are born in Britain with it each year. There are several causes, although the most common is failure of part of the brain to develop – perhaps because of a blocked blood vessel or complications in labour.

An MRI scan showed that Isabella had probably suffered a stroke in the womb about six months into the pregnancy. The section of brain affected is responsible for sending messages to muscles to control movement and co-ordination.

However, the condition varies with the child: in some, movement problems are barely noticeable, in others, all four limbs can be badly affected. Some can also have learning difficulties, problems feeding and talking, and may suffer sight or hearing loss, and develop epilepsy.

Depending on the child, treatment may involve a combination of physical therapy, medication and surgery.

“At first we were told Isabella’s cerebral palsy was mild, but now the doctors say it is medium,” says Julie.

Not long after Isabella was diagnosed doctors gave her a less than 50% chance of walking.

Both Julie and Phil were determined not to accept the diagnosis and decided to do everything in their power to help their daughter to walk.

They erected hand rails at Isabella’s height all around their home, and converted their garage into a soft play area so she could play and climb to keep her muscles loose without hurting herself if she fell over.

When Isabella was two, physiotherapists and the paediatrician decided her best chance of walking would be to fit her with special leg splints, which she would have to wear 24 hours a day.

“Isabella hated them. The day they were fitted, she cried for eight hours, begging me to take them off.

“But I knew that if I gave in, her chances of walking would be ruined. Philip was away for two weeks on tour in America with Everton, and I remember me, Isabella and Harvey all just sitting at the top of the stairs crying.”

The splints helped support her, but because Isabella’s legs were so turned inwards – a classic cerebral palsy stance – the doctors said she would never be able to take steps independently and they suggested a ‘twister’ brace.

This would be strapped around her waist, with metal rods attached to splints on her legs. These would pull Isabella’s hips outwards so she could stand up straight and give her stability.

For months the family didn’t see any progress and just received more bad news. Just a few weeks after using the help of a walking frame, Isabella started to take her first faltering steps, but the best was still to come.

On Christmas morning the little trooper surprised her parents by letting go of her walking frame and taking her first steps unaided.

We couldn’t believe it,” says Phil. “It was the best Christmas present ever. At first we didn’t want to tell anyone in case it was a one-off. But as the days went on, she became more confident and started letting go of her walker more and more.”

Through Isabella’s traumatic premature birth and disability, Julie and Phil have become involved with several charities to help other families in similar situations. They are patrons of the New Children’s Hospital Appeal in Manchester and Julie is also an ambassador for the premature baby charity Bliss.

“We were lucky to have had Isabella at St Mary’s in Manchester, which is one of the top neonatal units in the country. The help and support we got there was fantastic” says Julie.

“But not everyone is so lucky. One in eight babies born in the UK is premature or sick, and some hospitals just don’t have the staff, resources and time to provide the kind of support we got.

The diagnosis that a doctor gives you is only one small part. The strength and drive that the child has to do more is the large part. It is amazing what can be accomplished when you don’t settle for what is bring offered.

SOURCE

Starting today Toys “R” Us will carry a catalog of toys for Differently-Abled Kids. Compiled by experts at the nonprofit National Lekotek Center, the guide will help parents find developmental toys for their children.

Each toy in the 52-page guide includes a detailed description of how it can be used, along with icons indicating whether the toy can stimulate development in such areas as creativity, self esteem, vision or hearing.

The guide can be useful to people buying toys for many of the more than 6 million children in the United States who have disabilities, said Diana Nielander, executive director of the Chicago-based National Lekotek Center.

The group, which operates 38 therapeutic play centers in eight states, evaluated some 200 toys over the past nine months to select those included in the guide, Nielander said.

Certified play specialists observe families and children with the toys, and determine which would work, for example, for a child who is blind, or for a child who can’t close their hand, she said.

“We want to see toys that are great for the most amount of children. And sometimes the smallest thing can make the biggest difference,” she said, such as knobs that allow puzzle pieces to be lifted easily from their board.

Nielander noted that the guide features photographs of disabled children playing with the toys, adding, “One mother told me that her daughter sleeps with this guide because it’s the first time she saw children who look like her.”

This is great news for parents who have spent many hours looking for the right toy for their child. This guide will help you make the right choices. It may also come in handy for relatives at christmas time when they are not sure what to buy.

National Lekotek Center: http://www.lekotek.org/

Toys R Us: http://www.toysrus.com/differentlyabled

SOURCE:AP