Greetings Everyone ~

If you're located in California chances are you already know about the Great Shakeout. Just in case you were not notified by school here is some information:

http://www.shakeout.org/

This is the book the aide and teacher are utilizing to help with transitions and firedrills:

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art57268.asp


Here are the latest articles from the Autism Spectrum Disorders site at BellaOnline.com.

Homeschooling the Middle School Years
An update on using the California Virtual Academy for my high functioning son on the autism spectrum.

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art59351.asp

Autism On The Radio
http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art59247.asp

Please visit http://AutismSpectrumDisorders.bellaonline.com for even more great content about Autism Spectrum Disorders.

MEDIA INFORMATION

Last week Discovery Health aired a special three times on Kay & Flo, Autistic Twin Savants. I was going to tape it but at the last minute changed my mind and took tape out because it was a Sunday morning with two kids wanting to watch TV. I searched all over the internet for more information on these women from NJ, my home state. I ended up writing about them at my blog. Google searches are bringing all those seeking information on these women to my blog.

http://autismfamiily.blogspot.com

Feel free to comment if you have ideas on how to approach national media to get a story on them and if you viewed the show share your views on it.

Thursday, Nov 13th - tomorrow starts a three part episode on Grey's Anatomy that introduces a new Dr who has Aspergers:

http://ausiellofiles.ew.com/2008/10/mary-mcdonnells.html

On Sunday, November 16th on CBS Sixty Minutes is doing a segment on autism:

http://www.autism-society.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=12340

I have been on a micro-blogging site since the summer - www.twitter.com/autismfamily

It is free to join and no referrals, basically a place to write in 140 characters or less what you are doing. This can be sharing posts to articles, things of interest, etc. People meet and tweet each other using the @ symbol. If you want to follow a specific conversation like at an event, conference, chat you would use hashtags (example # in front of the word, code, etc.) this could be #conf or whatever. I use autism daily to meet new members and find articles of interest, etc. The site for real time conversations is www.summize.com

You can see a widget at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/autism. They have it half way down the page. Events are taking place often in preparing for the holiday. I asked the other day about an autism day and many were interested. These blog party launches are done at twitter with door prizes, etc.

I want to do something where we promote autism awareness, over a period of say six hours and award prizes every half hour or 15 minutes. One organization has mentioned having ABA therapists available for questions. I thought this would be great for families before the holidays to learn more, gain insights and win a prize for their family.

If you have a product, whether it be a book, toy, CD, DVD, food item you would like to donate for the event please let me know via email at the site, by responding to this email is fine also. Lots of these giveaways on blogs include two items, one for the prize and one for a blog review. I am open to this and would like to have several people represented like grandparent, teacher, aide, therapist, sibling, person on the spectrum, etc.

For more brainstorming ideas feel free to join my group here:

http://pecsclub.ning.com/group/twitterautismday

You would first have to join the Ning group at http://pecsclub.ning.com

A prize could also be picture cards, sensory product, etc. I do plan on posting soon at Help A Reporter out (HARO) - http://helpareporter.com/

Here are some sites I have found the last week that are worth sharing:

http://www.elf-magic.com/

http://www.fundoodies.com/

http://www.parentsofinvention.com/tt-product.htm

http://iluvmojo.com/

http://www.toobeez.com/index.html

To participate in free, fun online discussions, this site has a community forum all about Autism Spectrum Disorders located here -

http://forums.bellaonline.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=postlist&Board=365

I hope to hear from you sometime soon, either in the forum or in response to this email message. I thrive on your feedback!

Have fun passing this message along to family and friends, because we all love free knowledge!

Bonnie Sayers, Autism Spectrum Disorders Editor
http://AutismSpectrumDisorders.bellaonline.com

One of hundreds of sites at BellaOnline.com