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Event Registration
Webinar: The Sensory System - Impacts & Solutions Sept. 25 at 12:00 pm ET
Admission
- Free
Summary
Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD) is often misunderstood, minimized, or folded into other diagnoses like autism or ADHD. Yet for many nonspeaking individuals, sensory differences profoundly shape daily experience, regulation, and access to communication. In this session, you’ll hear the personal and professional journey of a practitioner-parent navigating the “trifecta” of diagnoses with her son, Elijah: ASD, ADHD, and SPD. Through research, lived experience, and practical examples, this talk explores how vestibular, proprioceptive, and interoceptive systems affect our spellers’ bodies—and why understanding them is essential to effective support.
Drawing from insights of self-advocates, including Dr. Elizabeth Torres’s research and the words of spellers themselves, we’ll examine how sensory disruptions can cause chaos in the body, and how collaboration with OTs, families, and the speller community creates stronger, more informed practice.
This talk will also tackle a difficult but necessary topic: the impact of unprocessed trauma in clinical and educational settings. From restraint and compliance-based practices to subtle disregards of autonomy, many nonspeaking individuals carry traumatic experiences that directly affect their sensory systems and regulation. Practitioners will be encouraged to reflect on their own training, assumptions, and vulnerabilities, while embracing partnership and humility.
Participants will leave with:
- A deeper understanding of sensory systems beyond the five senses.
- Practical strategies for movement, heavy work, and purposeful accommodations.
- Awareness of how trauma interacts with sensory processing and regulation.
- The importance of leaning into speller wisdom, self-advocacy, and community collaboration.
This session is about more than strategies—it’s about shifting perspective, honoring lived experience, and supporting tricky bodies with compassion and competence.
Event Registration is closed.
Drawing from insights of self-advocates, including Dr. Elizabeth Torres’s research and the words of spellers themselves, we’ll examine how sensory disruptions can cause chaos in the body, and how collaboration with OTs, families, and the speller community creates stronger, more informed practice.
This talk will also tackle a difficult but necessary topic: the impact of unprocessed trauma in clinical and educational settings. From restraint and compliance-based practices to subtle disregards of autonomy, many nonspeaking individuals carry traumatic experiences that directly affect their sensory systems and regulation. Practitioners will be encouraged to reflect on their own training, assumptions, and vulnerabilities, while embracing partnership and humility.
Participants will leave with:
- A deeper understanding of sensory systems beyond the five senses.
- Practical strategies for movement, heavy work, and purposeful accommodations.
- Awareness of how trauma interacts with sensory processing and regulation.
- The importance of leaning into speller wisdom, self-advocacy, and community collaboration.
This session is about more than strategies—it’s about shifting perspective, honoring lived experience, and supporting tricky bodies with compassion and competence.