About this time last year, my son was really into all the Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site books. We read them over and over again. So I decided to make him Construction Vehicles Three-Part cards. I made cards for the vehicles featured in this series: Here’s a sampling of the cards: There are eight cards in total: excavator, bull dozer, dump truck, cement mixer, flatbed truck, skid steer, and crane. I include extra word cards with pacing dots for kids who need help articulating all those syllables. Three part cards are great for building matching skills and for learning to read high-i ..read more

  Is your child ready for phonics? Here’s a free and easy way to try it out! A year ago, I came across the newly published book Phonics the R-igh-t Way for Children and Adults with Down Syndrome by Judy O’Halloran and Marilee Senior. My son with T21 was already a fluent reader, but I was interested to see if there were any ideas that might help the boys in our Down Syndrome co-op. What the authors presented, among several great ideas, was a very unique and clever order of teaching the phonograms. Almost all other phonics programs teach the CVC (Consonant-vowel-consonant) words first, such ..read more

My son loves the picture book Bear Wants More by Wilson Karma and all the books in the series. We have borrowed them from the library again and again. So, I made him these Montessori-inspired three-part cards to help him read the names of the animals. Here’s what they look like: How do you use them? Almost just the way we use the See and Learn Cards. Print pictures on card stock and laminate. The control cards are the cards on the left of each page. The word is connected to the picture. The matching cards are the cards on the right of each page. Cut along the dotted line to separate the word ..read more

If you would like to help your child learn the addition facts within ten, here is a FREE resource I hope you will find helpful. I have tried several math curricula for my son with Down Syndrome, but when it came to independence, accuracy, and fluency in working out the addition facts within ten, he did not make any real progress until we introduced the rekenrek. And so I found myself making worksheets and eventually this workbook for him and the kids in our coop, and for any child who needs extra help with addition. A rekenrek (which means “counting rack”) is a 20-bead abacus with red and whi ..read more

One of my goals this year was to prepare Junior and the boys in our Down Syndrome co-op to receive their First Holy Communion. To help with that, we were blessed to find a catechist who was trained to teach Catechesis of the Good Shepherd classes. Maria, our catechist, had never worked with children with T21, but it quickly became evident to all of us that she had a loving heart for them. And the Catechesis of the Good Shepherd was so appropriate for the four boys in our co-op. The highly visual and hands on approach, the one-on-one presentations, the boys’ freedom to choose which materials to ..read more

May is the month of Our Lady, so this month I’m sharing Montessori-inspired three-part art cards depicting the Mysteries of the Rosary for FREE. I made these for the boys in our co-op to use in our Catechesis of the Good Shepherd Atrium. They are a beautiful way to teach your children about the mysteries of the rosary. Here’s what they look like: The wonderful thing about three-part cards is that there are so many ways to use them, depending on your child’s age and ability. You can help your child match picture to picture, then title to title. You can lay out all five cards of a mystery, then ..read more

Here’s a free resource to help your child with (or without) T21 learn the concept of silent e in long vowel words. Most phonics programs require children to practice word families by reading long, drill-like lists of words. Early on, I knew that was not going to fly with my little guy. So, to help him understand silent e, I adapted the word lists to make them colorful, interactive, and full of pictures to boost comprehension and to make reading lists of words more meaningful and interesting. Take a look: Having the silent e in a yellow font helps students remember that it silent. Pictures h ..read more

Spring has sprung! So I made these Spring-themed Picture Addition Cards. Take a peek: These cards provide practice and review of addition math facts within ten and focus on +1 and +2 facts as well as doubles. If your child is just starting with addition, I recommend helping your child master the +1 and +2 facts, and then the doubles before moving on to the other facts within ten. Print these on card stock and laminate, so your child can practice with these repeatedly. Download these for FREE here: Spring-themed addition cards: +1/+2/ doubles factsDownload   Happy Spring! Winter-themed N ..read more

A few months ago, my oldest son told me he has a friend who has seven siblings, four with Down Syndrome. As a mother of a large family who has one child with Down Syndrome, I was astounded. Five biological children, three adopted, four with Down Syndrome and homeschooling? “Peter,” I said to my son, “Please get me her number. I need to talk to that mom and tap into her wisdom.” It took us a while to connect — Sonia McGarrity is, after all, a little busy. But once we did, we could have talked for hours about family life, homeschooling, and Trisomy 21. As we spoke, I realized that the story of t ..read more

Here’s a set of Spring-Themed Tracing Pages I made for my son to keep him motivated with handwriting. These come in color as well as black and white. There are 16 words to trace in color and 16 in black and white. Be sure to watch that your child is using the correct order of strokes when tracing. Muscle memory is so important in writing skills, so we want to make sure they are using consistent and correct stroke patterns. Download them for free here and Happy Spring! spring-words-for-tracingDownload Winter Words for Tracing by Mary Cooney January 14, 2024 FREE Worksheets for Trac ..read more