These are some books other members of this PTA have found helpful. We think you'll like them too. As an added bonus, if you buy any of these items from links on this site, Amazon donates a small portion of the cost to us. Feel free to buy these books however you like, but if you were going use Amazon anyway, then consider using these links and helping out our PTA in the process. The cost is the same as on the main Amazon site. Thanks.

To make moving around the page a little faster, we set up some catagories. If you click on one of the catagory links, you'll be taken to that part of the page.
Advocacy
IEPs
Speech and Language
Social Skills
AD/HD
Dyslexia
Sibling Support
Bipolar

To offer your own suggestions for items to be included, please visit the Forum section of this site or email the webmaster@bsnpta.org.

Advocacy
We LOVE Peter Wright's books! They provide the factual basics of the laws in an easy to understand prose and provide help in understanding how to use those laws to help your child. Hey, don't just take our word for it, read the reviews and ask around. See the Advocacy page of this site for more on Pete and Pam Wright's work.

IEPs
Writing Measurable IEP Goals and Objectives is a good book for writing an IEP. It covers why a good IEP is crucial, the role of the parents and how to make sure the IEP is written to provide maximum benefit for your child. Even better -  it's short, easy to read and to the point.

Brian Touchette from DOE recommended books by Diane Browder for learning about IEPs for kids with greater needs.

Speech and Language
Nanci Bell has been working with clinical diagnosis and remediation of reading disorders for more than 15 years and believes visualization is an essential element in language comprehension and critical thinking.

For those kids who take everything very literally, this illustrated cartoon book helps them understand many metaphors they are likely to encounter in common speech . From the link, you can look inside at book at a couple of examples. This one came highly recommended by a neurologist. One caveat is that the book was written in the UK so there are a couple of metaphors we don't usually encounter in the US.

Teaching Every Child Every Day describes a teaching environment with an eclectic combination of approaches—for example, integrating literacy skills into content areas—and a variety of techniques, from explicit instruction to discovery-oriented approaches. The goal is to create an inclusive classroom where a diverse group of kids can each get as much from the classroom as possible. This site's Forum page, has an article on writing, based on the book.

Social Skills
This Hidden Curriculum book and related DVD outline some of the social skill "rules" that people without autism seem to pick up on instinctively when growing up. Check out the reviews on Amazon for the book (the left hand link below) for details on what is covered.  

Facing Autism is one mother's account of coping with her son's autism. The book includes information on Applied Behavior Analysis, cutting-edge biomedical treatments such as secretin and immunotherapy and dietary intervention that she believes can positively impact your child's behavior. 

This book, by NPR's Voices in the Family host Dr. Dan Gottlieb, contains letters to his grandson, a child with PDD-NOS.

Parenting the Strong Willed Child provides you with a step-by-step, five-week program toward improving your child's behavior as well as the entire family's relationship. The book covers specific factors that cause or contribute to a child's disruptive behavior; ways to develop a more positive atmosphere in your family and home; actual reports by parents of difficult children; strategies for managing specific behavior problems; how to tell if your child might have ADHD; and more.

The Out-of-Sync Child broke new ground by identifying Sensory Processing Disorder, a common but frequently misdiagnosed problem in which the central nervous system misinterprets messages from the senses. This newly revised edition features additional information from recent research on vision and hearing deficits, motor skill problems, nutrition and picky eaters, ADHA, autism, and other related disorders.

Tony Attwood’s guide will assist parents and professionals with the identification, treatment and care of both children and adults with Asperger’s Syndrome. The book provides a description and analysis of the unusual characteristics of the syndrome and practical strategies to reduce those that are most conspicuous or debilitating. Covering the available literature in full, this guide brings together the most relevant and useful information on Asperger’s Syndrome.

This bestseller by Linda Hodgdon is the most comprehensive book to explain the use of visual strategies to improve communication for students with autism spectrum disorders and other students who experience moderate to severe communication impairments. It is full of easy to use techniques and strategies that will help these students participate more effectively in social interactions and life routines.
  
 Asperger's, huh? is a book for children ages 6 - 12 who have Asperger's Disorder. This is a simple and insightful view into the world of a child with Asperger's Disorder.

Jed Baker, Ph.D., is director of the Social Skills Training Project, an organization serving individuals with social communication problems, and a behavioral consultant for several New Jersey School systems. He also directs social skills training programs for Millburn Public Schools. In addition, he writes, lectures, and provides training internationally on the topic of social skills training for individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorders and is on the professional advisory board of ASPEN.

Skill Streaming is a series of books teaching Social Skills and was recommended by Cindy Schneider when she gave a presentation at a BSNPTA meeting.

The Friendship Factor is a landmark book on the importance and development of children's social relationships. Based on twenty-five years of research on friendship, Dr. Kenneth H. Rubin reveals the importance of children's social development to their emotional and intellectual growth—and future success. He uses vivid case studies to differentiate normal development from potential problems and real distress. 

The Social Skills Picture Book (the title in the Amazon link incorrectly includes "Autism") demonstrates through pictures nearly 30 social skills, such as conversation, play, emotion management and empathy. Children of all ages learn more effectively when pictures are used to supplement verbal descriptions and instructions.  Most children need and usually want social skills to make friends, and, often, their level of happiness and productivity is dependent on these fundamentals. The Social Skills Picture Book attempts to teach these critical social skills by visually showing children what to do.

Temple Grandin, author of Thinking in Pictures, was born with Autism and provides insight on living with the disorder. She explains how people with autism perceive and process visual and sensory information differently and experience and express emotions differently and develop social skills differently.

Navigating the Social World describes multiple concrete, step-by-step (but flexible) programs that can be used to help Asperger Syndrome and High Function Autism students or adults become more successful in the social world. It is a hands-on manual that can be used by parents, teachers, therapists, student aides, etc. to run the comprehensive program that they envision.

At the time of this posting, Amazon did not carry Mr. Lavoie's videos and only listed one book.  For some excellent videos, follow this link: www.ricklavoie.com/videos.html or ldonline.learningstore.org/categories/lavoie.html.

Cathy Grayson is a wonderful local resource and author who has conducted seminars for Brandywine School District staff.

AD/HD
See the posting on AD/ADHD Checklist for Teachers on this site's Forum page for examples from this book.

Dyslexia
In Overcoming Dyslexia, Yale neuroscientist Shaywitz demystifies the roots of dyslexia and offers parents and educators hope that children with reading problems can be helped. She walks parents through ways to help children develop phonemic awareness, become fluent readers, and exercise the area of the brain essential for reading success. Early diagnosis and effective treatment, the author claims, are of utmost importance, although even older readers can learn to read skillfully with proper intervention. Shaywitz's groundbreaking work builds an important bridge from the laboratory to the home and classroom.

Dyslexia, Fluency and the Brain, by Maryanne Wolf

Sibling Support
This is a children's book about a boy learning to accept his younger brother, Matthew's, disabilities.
  

This children's book explains ADD by telling the story of a "jumpy, jumpy" elephant.

Looking after Loius is a childrens's book about an autistic boy in an inclusive classroom and how the other kids try to engage him.

We'll Paint the Octopus Red is a children's book about a young girl who has to learn that her her baby brother with Down's Syndrome will need a little extra time and patience but is a great little brother anyway.

Be Quiet Marina is a children's book illustrated with photographs that tells the story of how two young girls, one with Cerebral Palsy and one with Down's Syndrome become friends despite a rough start.

This book about a deaf child in the family got some mixed reviews. I did not read it but there are comments on Amazon.

Knots on a Counting Rope is about a sightless boy and his grandfather. The lessons about the boy's dealing with his disability are inspiring to most people but at least one reviewer thought that the Native American stereotypes left a bad taste in her mouth.

Bipolar
One mom of a 15 year old bipolar boy considers this "her bible".