Articles

Published in Sensory Focus magazine, Winter issue

If you are seeking information about SPD’s effect on children, you are in luck. An abundance of books is available to help parents, teachers, and other non-OTs learn to recognize SPD characteristics and support “out-of-sync” kids at home and school.

Alas, should you seek information about SPD’s effect as children mature, you will find fewer choices. Reader-friendly resources that describe “what happens next” are hard to write and hard to find.

Worrying and wondering, parents and teachers have many questions about their kids’ future.

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Published in the January/February issue of Bethesda Magazine

Today, Carol travels around the country speaking about SPD. Back home, she spends time with her five grandchildren and four step-grandchildren, all of whom range in age from 3 to 11. None has SPD, but she has brought elements of her classroom into her basement via a sensory gym.

She made a crash pad by stuffing a duvet cover with pillows and got scraps from local upholsterers to fill a dress-up trunk with velvet and yards of beautiful Chinese silk. She has a therapy ball, marbles, a net swing, a platform swing and a collection of rhythm band instruments made from twigs, nuts, shells and gourds.

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Published in Bethesda Magazine, January-February

At some point during her 25 years of teaching music at St. Columba’s Nursery School in Northwest Washington, D.C., Carol Kranowitznoticed something odd: A number of the kids avoided the sandbox, finger paints and shaving cream activities. These were the same kids who didn’t respond to the piano.

When an occupational therapist came to the school, Kranowitz learned that these children had sensory processing disorder (SPD), a condition that makes it difficult to process information received through the five senses, plus movement/balance and body position.

“It explained the behavior of a lot of these kids—they were out of sync,” the Bethesda resident says.

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Published March 15, on StrollerTraffic.com

Squirmy, wiggly kids can really try a mom’s patience. Sit still. Pay attention. Be polite. Uh-huh. Good luck with that.

“Scolding a child probably won’t get him to sit quietly,” says Carol Kranowitz, author of The Out-of-Sync Child, The Out-of-Sync Child Has Fun, and co-author of In-Sync Activity Cards.  “It’s frustrating because they’re not doing what they’re supposed to do, but wiggly kids are just trying to get their bodies organized; they’re seeking sensory input. So let’s get them some input.”

With that in mind, here are Kranowitz’s tips for getting the wiggles out.

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Published May 28, on TheMomBuzz.com

I am not big on self-help books. There are books for EVERYTHING when it comes to raising your child – from dealing with the birth, to potty training to dealing with tempers and bad attitudes. So, when Growing an In-Sync Child arrived at my door I honestly stared at it, thinking it was like many of the other parenting books that I’ve seen … which honestly usually read like a college text book.

But as I started reading, I was surprised as I nodded my head in agreement with the authors, Carol Kranowitz and Joye Newman. They wrote in a conversational style and were easy to follow as they explained the importance of being In-Sync.

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