Check out Rachel’s books and
free white-paper, below
Super Power Baby Project
Super Power Baby Project is an internationally celebrated book featuring striking photographic portraits of children with chromosomal and genetic conditions, taken by award-winning photographer Rachel Callander. Rachel's insights and images challenge the deficit language so often reached for when describing disability.
“The Super Power Baby Project is a life affirming work. It does not shy from the notion that genetic syndromes bring with them their share of challenges, grief and difficulty. The strong message is that there is much that lies beyond that. The pages demonstrate that these children have much to teach us about themselves and ourselves that is to be celebrated as truly exceptional. This book celebrates that simple reality.”
- Stephen Robertson, Curekids Professor of Paediatric Genetics, University of Otago, New Zealand
Super Power Kids
Super Power Kids is the follow on initiative of the Super Power Baby Project. It raises the profile of children with disabilities, showcasing their unique talents, strengths and indomitable spirit. It directly challenges the deficit language often used around disability and instead focuses on the gifts and abilities of Super Power Kids.
Super Power Kids is a collaboration between Kalparrin and renowned photographers Rachel Callander and Nathan Maddigan. It captures exquisite photographic images of children living with a disability, telling their stories in a stunningly produced 200-page hardcover book which was launched at the 2019 Awesome International Arts Festival for Bright Young Things.
Using powerful imagery and storytelling, and partnering with respected and high profile organisations, Super Power Kids is an 18-month campaign, using traditional and social media with the aim of educating children and adults that there is much that lies beyond initial and often negative impressions of children with disability.
The Super Power Kids book demonstrates that children with a disability have so much to teach us about themselves and ourselves, and will reveal the value, potential, abilities and beauty in all children. Together we can change the focus, change the language and we can adopt an attitude that celebrates all of humanity.
Effective Communication in Healthcare: Disability
This white paper is aimed at healthcare professionals and educators working with people (and parents of children) who have a disability. It unpacks the Health Language Matrix developed by Rachel Callander, showing how the way that healthcare professionals communicate can get patients and parents off-side from the start. This often creates a challenging environment for patients, parents and healthcare professionals to work together in, and leads to suboptimal patient outcomes. Through exploring an alternative approach - the HEALTH model - Rachel outlines the core tenets required to develop an effective communication style that gets the best out of patients, parents and healthcare professionals.
If you’d like to download the white paper, then pop in your details below, and you’ll be redirected to a page where you can do just that.
How to Make an Awesomeness Form
When Rachel was asked to complete a Needs Assessment Form for her daughter Evie, she realised that she couldn’t answer YES to a single question. The form asked for specific abilities, and Evie couldn’t do any of them. It felt hopeless - all the negativity, judgement, fear and uncertainty boiled over into heartache and overwhelm.
In frustration, Rachel made her own form to attach to the official form. She called it Evie’s Awesomeness, and filled it with questions she could answer yes to.
“As I answered all my own questions about Evie, I noticed an easing of the helplessness and sadness weighing so heavily on me. It was replaced by excitement and joy - because, in my answers, I could see that Evie was growing and developing. Although her development couldn’t be measured on an official chart, this Awesomeness Form proved that she was developing in her own way and in her own time. Instead of measuring Evie against ‘normal’, I measured her only against herself, and she was doing brilliantly.”
This booklet, How to make an Awesomeness Form, helps parents and providers create their own Awesomeness Forms, with step-by-step instructions and loads of examples.
To access your free download, just complete the details below.
Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health article
The Patient’s Voice- Evie
The Art of Healthcare Podcast
Listen to Episode One of Chris Desmond’s The Art of Healthcare Podcast; Our Language Shapes Our Landscape
Most people don't speak medicine
This is a problem for us Health professionals because we've been trained to only speak medicine. This can unwittingly lead to a disconnect between us and our patients making healthy progress so much more difficult.
We're joined by Rachel Callander to help us bridge this divide - and #hottip it's up to us to do it, NOT our patients.
Rachel is a sought after healthcare communication trainer and speaker who comes from a place of lived experience
We cover off
- Why it's difficult for us to explain health concepts simply
- Untraining our learnings
- Identifying our fear in communication
- Communicating for understanding (our own and our patients)
- Communicating for progress
- How to shift from jargon to empowering communication