just a little sister

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Are we living in a risk-averse world?

There has recently been a resurgence of discussion around pre-natal screening for Down’s Syndrome because of Heidi Crowter’s current case at the High Court, defending the lives of people with Down’s Syndrome and their rights to equal opportunities before birth. As you know, I was shocked and appalled to learn that one of our children’s…
What If?

What if children had time to spend with their family? What if there was no one else to play with, and they had to turn to whoever lived in their house – parent, carer, uncle, aunt, brother, sister? Do you think they would learn to be nicer, more adaptable, recognise their emotions more easily, or…
The highs and lows of child planning meetings

We have had two child planning meetings now with Trudy in her new setting. In the first meeting, you asked us what we thought about special education. I explained that we were well informed as I was a specialist teacher working in a special school with children with a range of needs, and Alex was…
Inclusion, is it working or is it just me?

Our daughter, Trudy, has just started a mainstream pre-school and I went to see their ‘Scottish Celebrations’ show today. I was not expecting to see the little pre-schoolers so was caught slightly off-guard. I watched the curtains open to reveal the little darlings in all their tartan, and sounds of ‘aww’, ‘look!’. As I stood…
Do we need paperwork?

It’s not the most exciting content for a blog post but bear with me. We all fear the dreaded word, ‘paperwork’ in work and in life, but so much more when you live with a child who needs so much more ‘paperwork’ than the average person. The question is and one that I have been…
Being a parent

I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what it is like to be a parent of a child with a disability, as I am preparing a talk for the staff at my school about this. It’s a tough one, because most of the time we don’t see our child as having a disability, and it…