Help 4 Students >CASE STUDIES OF HOW WORKING WITH COMICS HELPS STUDENTS WITH BEHAVIORAL PROBLEMS
Eleven-year old Joe struggled with temper tantrums. His anxieties drove him to physical violence and numerous school suspensions in Wales, United Kingdom. A year ago his uncontrolled outbursts were tempered after James McKeon, a school psychological counselor, began working with him using MakeBeliefsComix.com, one of the world’s most popular educational comic websites.
The troubled teenager learned to channel his anxieties and fears into storytelling using the comics. Working one-on-one twice a week, they tapped into two resources offered by the free site.
Comic strips from Make Beliefs Comix. (Ricardo Kuettel)
THE POWER OF DIGITAL-COMIC THERAPY IN SCHOOLS
NEW YORK—Every day, the teenagers Jeremiah Aponte, Jasherah Nalls, and Paula Rodriguez squeeze into a small four-story building housing three schools and close to 1,700 students in the South Bronx neighborhood.
Mostly serving generations of families living in one of numerous high-rise public-housing projects or homeless shelters dotting the area, The Urban Assembly Bronx Academy of Letters, a New York City public high school, sits in the country’s poorest congressional district. Recently, The New York Times cited the city’s 40th precinct as having the highest murder rate in the city, but where there are the fewest detectives per violent crime. To get to their school, these three teens must also walk through a neighborhood that includes two methadone clinics..
FOR KIDS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS, CREATING COMICS HELPS COMMUNICATION
Brain & Life magazine article about how MakeBeliefsComix.com is used to help children with special needs.
WELLNESS AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2019 SARAH WATTS For Kids with Special Needs, Creating Comics Helps Communication Sharon Eilts, a special education teacher in Sunnyvale, CA, has given her low-functioning students, some of whom […]
HOW TO HELP CHILDREN WITH AUTISM COMMUNICATE BY USING COMICS
Brain & Life magazine article about how MakeBeliefsComix.com is used to help children with special needs.
For a useful article on how comic strip generators like MakeBeliefsComix.com are used for students with autism, please read this article in SpecialEdConnection®
And read this new article, How to Help Your Child with Autism Communicate Using Comics, written by Bill Zimmerman, creator of MakeBeliefsComix. The article appears in the August 2018 issue of Autism Parenting Magazine here.
There also is a lesson plan on using comix in teaching children with autism.
Comic strip created by one of Symonds's students
Digital Comics Boosting Skills of Students With Special Needs
By Paul Wisenthal on School Library Journal
In an increasingly social media–driven world, school library media specialist Cindy Symonds sees herself as the personal tech guide to the teachers and 560 students at Round Top Elementary School in Blythewood, SC. One media tool she’s recently introduced is interactive comic strips. Her students have been creating stories using the comic generator MakeBeliefsComix.com.
With perpetually limited funds, librarians and teachers are turning to the growing number of free make-your-own-comic websites and apps. These allow students to create their own characters, settings, dialogue, and stories. In particular, they seem to be stimulating literacy, communication, and linguistic skills among students with special needs. Often, they improve such students’ attention span and increase their class participation.
DEAR READERS
If you have a story of how creating comic stories has helped troubled students you counsel, please consider submitting your story to billz@makebeliefscomix.com . Please share what you and the students you guide have learned from this process. And please share our site with your colleagues.
Thank you.
Bill Zimmerman
Creator, MakeBeliefsComix