31 Days of Down Syndrome: A Handbook for Special Families By: Cheryl and Ray Patterson Having someone in your family with special needs can be a challenge for some. With this book full of tips on how to cope with these needs and how to deal with other’s reaction, this firsthand experienced family will guide you on your journey, specifically those with Down Syndrome. This experience, a sudden change in life, can be emotionally over-whelming, draining, and the most fulfilling moment a family can experience. The Patterson family provides real world experience of what is yet to come and help those realize that this is the more heart-warming event of their lives.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • This joyful rhyming book encourages children to value the “different” in all people, leading the way to a kinder world in which the differences in all of us are celebrated and embraced. Macy is a girl who’s a lot like you and me, but she's also quite different, which is a great thing to be. With kindness, grace, and bravery, Macy finds her place in the world, bringing beauty and laughter wherever she goes and leading others to find delight in the unique design of every person. Children are naturally aware of the differences they encounter at school, in their neighborhood, and in other everyday relationships. They just need to be given tools to understand and appreciate what makes us “different,” permission to ask questions about it, and eyes to see and celebrate it in themselves as well as in those around them.

This beautifully illustrated and fun-to-read storybook simplifies and normalizes a complicated childhood condition. When read aloud, other children can identify why a peer may be treated differently and begin to empathize with them. In addition, children whose conditions set them apart as being different begin to feel accepted and safe.

Mika is a nine-year-old girl that sees the world differently than anyone else. Even though she is going through what every girl may one-day face, fighting with her best friend and feeling like an outcast, she is not like every other girl. Her mother, Ava and brother, Javi stand by her side while Mika struggles endlessly to feel normal, when instead she must embrace her uniqueness. Children with Down syndrome, like Mika, are angels that help us see the world with our hearts, instead of our eyes.

For a long time, it was assumed that a genetic disposition such as trisomy 21 enables predictions to be made about overall personality development. But, who could have ever imagined that people with trisomy 21 (Down syndrome) would also be capable of earning a university degree? We studied 1,294 people with trisomy 21. The results showed that people with trisomy 21 benefit more from abstract learning than their neurotypical counterparts. Two-year-olds with the syndrome first learn to read and only then to speak and will understand algebra better than arithmetic. Ignorance of neurodiversity inevitably leads to learning difficulties when these people are forced to learn at the same pace as others. This applies to autism and trisomy 21 to the same extent. That is why this book advocates the recognition of trisomy 21 as a variant in the spectrum of human neurodiversity.

Told from a child's point of view, explains the causes of Down syndrome and describes the things people with the condition can do, and the ways in which they, just like other people, may need help.