Spectrum SA: Developmental Educator

23/04/2026

16/04/2026

Awareness is important

The complete body safety system with word-for-word scripts for teaching children ages 3-10 the 7 rules that keep them safe.

15/04/2026

AAPi Vice President Dr Katrina Norris discussed her concerns about proposed NDIS reforms in an opinion piece which was published in both the Courier Mail and Daily Telegraph this week.

"Too often, rising participation in the NDIS is being framed as evidence of misuse," she writes. "A key example is the repeated focus on the proportion of participants with autism, now sitting at around 40 per cent. This figure is being frequently presented as proof that the scheme is being overrun by people who do not “really” need it.

"What is missing from this narrative is context. The NDIS itself reports that 73 per cent of participants with a primary diagnosis of autism experience severe or profound disability. This means they may have limited or no verbal communication and require physical support for everyday activities. These are not marginal cases. They are individuals with significant functional impairment, the very cohort the NDIS was designed to support."

"It’s clear the NDIS requires reform. Costs are rising, and the system must be sustainable. But focusing on specific groups, particularly children and people with autism, as the source of the problem, risks oversimplifying a far more complex issue.

"We have seen this pattern before across Australia’s social support systems: demand exceeds expectations, and rather than interrogating system design, funding models or broader service gaps, the response becomes one of tightening access and assigning blame.

"The critical question is this: if people are pushed out of the NDIS, where do they go?"

Read the article: https://ow.ly/Con050YFjVO

14/04/2026

Some children and teens are not “acting out” - they are overwhelmed.

Autistic meltdowns are not tantrums. They are not attention seeking. They are not a choice. They happen when a child becomes so overwhelmed by noise, change, demands or emotions that their brain goes into crisis mode. At that point, they cannot reason, explain or “just calm down”.

Many autistic children/teens spend all day trying to cope - masking, holding it together, managing sensory overload, confusion, and stress. The meltdown is often what happens when there is nothing left in the tank.

Punishment, shouting or forcing eye contact does not teach anything in that moment. It only adds more pressure to an already overwhelmed child.

What helps is calm, space, reduced demands and feeling safe.

When we stop asking “what is wrong with this child?” and start asking “what has overwhelmed them?” everything changes.

03/04/2026

Wonderful!

03/04/2026

it’s the “why”.
indeed it is.

03/04/2026

What many believe can be used to “calm” a child down to prevent a tantrum, is actually now shown to make it worse over time…
Basically, they’re not learning at a pace that is developmentally required to acquire the skills to cope and process what is happening.
everything (or almost everything) challenging is then interpreted by their sympathetic nervous system as a “threat”.
Our brains and body weren’t evolved to have devices and screens to be part of our development.

https://youtu.be/yFc4yhZKP5U

New government guidance says children in England under the age of five should be limited to one hour of screen time a day, while under-twos should not be wat...

10/01/2026

MS may not be genetic bad luck after all.
A landmark study of 10 million military personnel confirmed Epstein-Barr virus is the leading cause of Multiple Sclerosis. This shifts everything. A vaccine for this common virus could potentially eradicate MS entirely. One virus. One target. A disease erased.

Shared for informational purposes only.
Source: Science

04/01/2026

03/01/2026

Please be very discerning when it comes to reading Dr Gabor Maté’s book on ADHD “Scattered Minds”.
there are very valid points made, but his fundamental proposition is erroneous, according to empirical data.