Two Sides of the Spectrum

In this episode we explore the role of therapists in promoting positive sexual identity and reducing the risk of sexual assault for our clients. Our guest, Sarah Selvaggi Hernandez is an autistic  occupational therapist and educator working to promote an intentional identity-first approach to autism and OT. Promoting bodily autonomy starts with what we teach our youngest clients and how we treat them in our sessions. This is a must-listen episode for all therapists no matter their setting. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

Jane Farrall, speech pathologist and special educator with extensive training and experience in literacy, discusses how a comprehensive literacy framework can transform speech and OT goals around reading and writing. The episode covers supporting reading comprehension and writing development, the importance of comprehensive literacy, challenges with handwriting, shifting focus to writing tools, parallels between emergent literacy and AC use, strategies for teaching reading comprehension, using declarative language in shared reading, and teaching literacy and communication as life skills.

In this episode we dive into interoception, our ability to understand the messages we are getting from inside our bodies. Our guest, Kelly Mahler, makes the connection between interoception and truly neurodiversity-affirming therapy practices. Kelly Mahler presents internationally on interoception and has authored 12 resources, including The Interoception Curriculum. This episode covers how a deeper understanding of interoception can help us support authentic self-regulation for our autistic clients. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

In this episode, we talk about what it means to cultivate an authentic life together with our autistic clients, from early childhood through adulthood. Our guest, Maisie Soetantyo, is an openly autistic family and inclusivity consultant who founded the Autism Career Pathways. She’s worked with families for 3 decades and believes that nurturing one's autistic authenticity is a critical first foundation to meaningful self-advocacy, career path and living the best life as an autistic person. This episode covers parent coaching in touch situations, cultivating a growth mindset, creating opportunities for meaningful work for our clients, and more.  View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

In this episode with preschool director Corrie Price, we go into exactly how you can build neurodiverse, inclusive early childhood spaces from the ground up and from the top down. Corrie Price is a life-long advocate for children and families and the director of Evolve Early Learning, an inclusive preschool in Asheville, NC. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

In this episode with autistic AAC user Tiffany Joseph, we cover functioning labels, AAC access, how race intersects with disability in the autistic community, aggressive behaviors, and so much more. But the thread that runs throughout the conversation is empowering our clients to participate more authentically in their daily life. Tiffany Joseph, or TJ, is autistic and runs the Instagram and Facebook pages 'Nigh Functioning Autism', where she posts about AAC, being black and autistic, epilepsy, ADHD, OCD, and more.  View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

In this episode we deeply explore how therapists misunderstand kids who communicate using scripts, how traditional approaches just don’t work to support their language acquisition, and a totally new framework we can all use to support them in a meaningful way. Our guest, Alexandria Zachos, is a speech-language pathologist who has presented at ASHA and all over the world on delayed echolalia and gestalt language processing. She owns a private practice in Illinois called Social Butterfly Speech Therapy and runs Meaningful Speech, where she teaches an online course on gestalt language processing and shares tons of absolutely transformative content on social media. You can check out Alex’s online course at bit.ly/gestaltcourse. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

Kat Harhai is a facilitator, educator, and writer, and currently works as the Neurodiversity Collaboration Facilitator at Bridges Learning System. She is multiply disabled and was late diagnosed as autistic as a young adult. Katrina Martin is the founder of Bridges Learning System. Katrina is fully dedicated to moving beyond the deficit-based model of education for autistic students and moving into a model that focuses on strengths and teaches the benefits and values inherent in diverse ways of thinking. In this episode we talk about social and emotional learning from a neurodiversity-affirming perspective…and we don’t just talk about what NOT to do, we get really specific about a beautiful model called the Social-Emotional Acuity Bridge that Kat, Katrina, and their team have developed that everyone can use in their own work. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

Sarah Selvaggi Hernandez is an occupational therapist and educator working to promote an intentional identity-first approach to autism and OT. She’s also a mother to three neurodiverse children. In this episode, we explore Sarah’s experiences as an autistic mother, the types of supports that help her thrive in her daily routines, and her own process of self-advocacy. Then we apply this insight to the clinical work of anyone working with autistic children, children with autistic mothers, and autistic mothers themselves. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast

Greg Santucci is an occupational therapist and the founder of Power Play Pediatric Therapy. Greg provides workshops and trainings to parents and professionals all over the country on compassionate, collaborative, and neuro-developmentally informed approaches. In this episode we talk about how restraint, seclusion, and behaviorism harm kids, and why they are more prevalent than we’d like to admit. Greg shares how he fights these practices on the ground as a school-based OT and at the policy level. And finally, we explore Greg’s Model of Child Engagement as an alternative to behavioral approaches. View show notes and transcript at learnplaythrive.com/podcast