Name of Website
A Piece Of The Puzzle
Address of Website
Local, National, or International?
National and International in 9 countries
Organization or Personal? Nonprofit or Profit?
Personal, currently nonprofit
Mission Statement
Create and maintain a free website that people with special needs and disabilities can access to have fun, meet others, chat, play games, and read pertinent articles.
We hope the children will use the website to make friends, chat, and elevate their self-esteem. Contribute to our creative corner where we accept pictures, short stories, or poems. Answer our question of the month, and interact with each other.
We have a parents forum where they can post questions and the community will respond. Most importantly, we let EVERYBODY know they are not alone in this world.
Resources Available
We publish two articles per month. One article is aimed toward parents and caretakers and one toward educators and organizations. All articles are archived and can be read at any time. Most of the articles are written by professionals in the special-education field as well as some heartwarming stories from parents and caretakers. We also have an area we call Life's Links, which is where we list a lot of resources for our members. We have the ability to chat either person to person or in a group, and it is all confidential. This could be used by support groups.
We are starting a new program in the fall where we will match up special-education classrooms to another special-education classroom and they will be able to communicate via our website in a group fashion. No one will be able to see what is written except for the people invited to the group, such as the teachers and children. The children will learn in a fun way, increase their communication skills, typing, geography, history, increase their self-esteem, make a forever friend, and be accepted for who they are. For the teachers it would be a great motivational and learning tool. The children will learn that they are not alone, and will also be able to communicate at home with their new friends if they have computers. A lot of special-needs and disabled children are lonely and introverted. It is impossible to gauge how this would impact their lives. We have a special-needs son and would have welcomed a project like this in his classroom while he was in school. The growth of most children stretches beyond the classroom and parenting skills, this website is invaluable where they will always have a community of friends and can discuss what they want in a safe environment.
Advice
- Firstly, become a member. Nobody buys a house from the way it looks outside. Being a member gives you the privilege to see all we have. Be proactive. When people post questions, please answer them, submit a story, get involved in our website. Make a friend in another country. Post an idea, send in something for the Creative Corner. GET INVOLVED! Everybody who is on the website is either special needs, works with special needs, or is a parent or part of the special-needs and disability family. Read our articles, view the creative corner, answer the question of the month, and browse through Life's Links.
