Silly Bandz

Have you or your kids joined the silly band craze? Then check out the AutismLink's store. They have puzzle-shaped, tie-dyed silly bands to help spread autism awareness. These bands are made of silicone and are fun to collect and/or trade.

http://autismlinkstore.com/-newpuzzleshapetiedyesillybandspackof10.aspx

CeDIR Citings

The March edition of CeDIR Citings is now available through the IIDC website. Through this newsletter, you can find information on disability awareness fairs in March, CeDIR's new autism blog, how to check us out of FACEBOOK and see what's new on our Delicious account.

CeDIR has dedicated this month's newsletter to education laws. Not only can you read a summary of one of the education books available at CeDIR but you can also check out some helpful resources such as books and websites.

Interested in previous editions? Click here.

Visual Thesaurus

The Visual Thesaurus, developed in 1998 by Thinkmap Inc is an excellent way to help children who have difficulties with reading comprehension. In fact, a study that took place with eighth grade students with learning disabilities discovered a significant improvement in reading comprehension.

With this thesaurus you can find over 145,00 English words and 115,00 meanings, see how each word is used differently in parts of speech, find example sentences that express the meaning of the word, discover 39,00 proper nouns such as Mozart, checks your spelling for errors, you can hear the word if you're wondering about pronunciation and much more.

The Visual Thesaurus has different benefits for several age groups, from elementary school children, through college level, and even has wonderful benefits for people who are learning English as a second language. In the online edition, you can use the thesaurus in several different languages, including French, Spanish, Dutch, Italian, or German.

Interested in checking it out? Contact us!

Autism Speaks

Autism Speaks.is an organization that is dedicated to trying to help those who have autism spectrum disorder. Autism Speaks funds several global biomedical research in the causes, prevention and treatments for autism. The organization tries to raise public awareness about the effects that autism has on people, including family members and the world around us.

Within the site people can see what is going on in the autism community and within the Autism Speaks world. There are links about what autism is, how to cope, links for donations, Autism Speaks events, family services and sources, conferences and much more.

Autism Speaks is dedicated to uniting not only the autism community but also to getting the government to take action in helping people with autism.

The Global and Regional Asperger Syndrome Partnership

The Global and Regional Asperger Syndrome Partnership known as GRASP is a site dedicated to providing assistance to people with autism spectrum disorders. Within GRASP's site, people can find information about education, support groups, advocacy, and much more.

GRASP also includes links to various websites including sites run by people with autism, chat rooms and message boards, education and service organizations, college assistance programs, science and medication information, and support groups.
The site also includes additional resources such as advocacy and support on a state-by-state basis and informati0n about housing and employment.
In the Interview and Articles section people can read about people's lives with autism spectrum. Here the articles vary from people whose family members have autism, to children, adults who discovered late in life that they had autism and much more. Even those who don't have a firm grasp on what autism is can learn about it. There are articles about the myths of autism and even gives some history about it. Whether you have autism, know someone who does or are just interested in learning, GRASP is a great site to check out.

Interested in GRASP? Click here to get to the GRASP website.