Comments on: Ridable Robot for Special Needs Kids

By: Akiro

Akiro — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 23:52:18 +0000

Good points by father. I would also like to point out they seem to have invented an electric wheelchair…

By: Father of Special Needs

Father of Special Needs — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 17:33:42 +0000

This should only be used if the child has the physiological inability to move. Otherwise, tough love is needed to encourage the child to develop the skills needed to be mobile. I have a infant son with Down’s, I noticed one of their children in the program also has Down’s, a vast majority of children with that syndrome can and should be encouraged to walk. Walking and reciprocal motion are not just physical, there have been many links that find that babies that skip a crawling stage (i.e. go straight to walking) suffer with other academic and social skills later. There’s some sort of causal link between learning to locomote on your own and higher brain function. Putting a child, like a down’s child, in that machine takes away his incentive to learn this skill and will affect him adversely.

By: sw

sw — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 15:15:53 +0000

what makes this a robot? it’s neat, and doubtlessly will benefit the kids who use it, but just seems like a ride on toy . . .

By: Skipweasel

Skipweasel — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 14:13:47 +0000

I just wonder whether the spotted base-bit is actually /meant/ to look like Davros, the originator of the Daleks, or whether it’s just serendipitous.
http://www.davross.clara.co.uk/personal/jpg/davros.jpg