- Shopping for Children with
Special Needs - Toys for Children with
Special Needs - Coming Soon! Video Games: How to Encourage Sibling Play
Play is a universal language that all children speak
Regardless of ability or physical limitations, siblings and friends want to play together; cooperative play with the appropriate toys and videogames will enable siblings to see the strengths and sameness in each other. The Ability Index™ offers parents a convenient, comprehensive and trusted resource to become informed consumers of toys and video games for children with special needs.
Parents Need Guidance
Parents are understandably overwhelmed when they learn that their child has special needs. As they search for toys (including board games and puzzles), video games, and activities that attend to their child’s cognitive, motor, social and or emotional needs, the available information is often more confusing than helpful.
Yes, parents (grandparents, aunts, and uncles) want to find toys and games that are therapeutically beneficial; they also want to find toys that are fun to play with. They wander up and down the aisles – online or off - with little guidance or rationale.
The Ability Index was created so that parents, special educators, occupational therapists and other healthcare professionals have a centralized resource for reasonably priced and readily available toys and videogames rated, certified and labeled with specific skill sets for children with special needs.
A Little History
Parents’ Choice Foundation’s association with Kennedy Krieger started in 2001 when Kennedy Krieger first began evaluating toys for the Parents’ Choice Awards program.
Kennedy Krieger is an internationally recognized medical facility located in Baltimore, Maryland dedicated to improving the lives of children and adolescents with pediatric developmental disabilities through patient care, special education, research, and professional training.
Kennedy Krieger’s clinical programs offer an interdisciplinary approach in treatment tailored to the individual needs of each child. Services include over 40 outpatient clinics; neurobehavioral, rehabilitation, and pediatric feeding disorders inpatient units; plus several home and community programs providing services to assist families.
Kennedy Krieger school, is a nationally recognized “Blue Ribbon School of Excellence”, and is a leader in providing model programs of innovative education for children, adolescents and young adults with a wide range of learning, emotional, physical, neurological, and developmental disabilities.
Faculty at Kennedy Krieger are among some of the world’s leading experts in this field and are attuned to the special needs of this population. These faculty have made crucial medical discoveries leading to innovative treatments and have improved the lives of individuals with disabilities.
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