The Tree Didn't Make It; Pediatrician Visit

Things went from bad to worse with our tree. By Monday night 3 more large branch sections had broken off the tree. We'll have to cut the whole thing down. One of the sections fell towards the side of the house and pushed the pine tree away from the house a bit. I haven't looked at it too closely yet, but it won't surprise me if there are problems with that too. It also tore a bit of the rain gutter away. We have 5 Bradford Pear trees and this is the only one that was impacted. I suppose that is because it was in such bad shape to begin with. An avenue near where I lived in Virginia Beach years ago was lined with these trees and every year there seemed to be at least one that broke apart. That is about the worst that we have seen from the storm. We did not get the massive quantities of rain and flooding that states north and east of us received. Sorry for the bad quality of the pictures I posted, they are much too dark.

Our visit to the pediatrician went well. I used to think that these visits would bring startling revelations as to the path we should take with Samuel. Now I know better. The doctor I saw let me do a lot of talking. She took copious notes and didn't say very much. That made me feel like talking more, which I did. Finally, she turned to Samuel and tried talking to him. His behavior was the most "autistic" that I have seen it in a while. He would not answer her, but he had a humorous look in his eye. Of course he tried to play on her computer and he lunged at the keyboard several times. He picked up a container of crayons and played with them on the floor during much of the visit. At one point he told me "Tell her about how I do not like 'Cyberchase' and I get upset." Maybe in the future I should not discuss him in the third person in front of him like that.

I greatly appreciated that she did not bring up the subject of medication (I did tell her while it was my turn to talk that I was not considering it at this time and that the only reason I will would be if he develops a lot of anxiety). She said it sounded like things are going pretty well for Samuel (which I think they are too). We just need to watch his scripting, his access to television, computers and other things electronic. She also recommended an increase in the amount of speech therapy he is getting (he only receives 40 min/week at school).

We'll return for another visit in 6 months and she see what she thinks of his IEP. I told her that one of my current concerns for him is his educational setting and his academics. She told me rather than worry so much about his academics, getting his communication more up to speed should be what we focus on. Makes sense to me. I should get more interactive activities going with him here at home. I spend so much time on homework and worry about his academic progress. Both will be much easier if he is able to communicate better.

Aahhh..Saturday Morning!

It's 7am and it's quiet in the house. The boys were up pretty late last night, well past 10:00, so I'm almost guaranteed they'll be asleep until 9:00. Baby girl woke up at dawn and I fed her so she should sleep in even later than the boys. I could conceivably have 2 more hours of peace and quiet!

In a moment here I'll be typing up some lessons for Samuel. I received some information from Samuel's teachers about what he is working on in Math and Science. I got some library books yesterday that cover what he is learning in Social Studies (Ancient China and Egypt). I need to get back on track with his Religion lessons. It's good to sit down and feel like I have something to work with! My oldest son has a Science exam to take today. My youngest son is learning to write the upper case letters of the alphabet. I've been printing out pictures from Writing With Symbols that correspond to the particular letter he is working on. It's time to print out more pictures, we've worked up to the letter "O".

Later today we'll be going to the library, something Samuel is eagerly anticipating. Tomorrow we are going to visit some friends who live an hour away. They have 5 children, so with our 4 plus the 4 grownups our visits are quite lively. I expect it could get downright chaotic tomorrow because we will most likely have to stay indoors, rain and snow are forecasted. I am going to type up a social story for our visit to remind Samuel that he should not invade their collection of videos and that he should play where the other children play. The daughter of our friends has a dollhouse that Samuel likes to play with. It's fragile and delicate and my friends have made attempts to hide it and one time he found it. The children of our friends, without them knowing it, are helpful in giving me the hint about what I need to watch for with Samuel. The daughter complained about him getting into it and I wouldn't have known about it if she hadn't said anything.

Time to get to work!

School Work Update

Samuel came home with some low Science Test scores. He took the tests late last week. I'm still trying to work out a good system of communicating with his teachers about what to study. I don't see all that much of his work come home in some of his subjects, science being one of them. I rely on study sheets, and this past time one came home at the beginning of the quarter, but it didn't cover everything. I got a second one 2 days before the test and that wasn't enough time to go over everything. I am able to look up on-line the general topics covered in each class for the quarter, but it does not give details about what he is being taught. We're still trying to figure out exactly what Samuel can and cannot comprehend, and how he communicates this to us.

I spoke with Samuel's teacher for a while yesterday afternoon about this. It was time for us to touch base about how he is doing anyways. He is doing much better now, 2 months after we relaxed his curriculum requirements, on Spelling and Reading tests. I think Samuel does much better when I take the time to go over his work at home with him.

I'm a little nervous because he will have alternate assessments done next year (instead of taking the same standardized tests that other 3rd graders take), and I'm wondering to what standards he will be held. After talking with his teacher I'm left with a vague understanding, like there might not be a lot of accountability. Add all this to the list of things for me to keep up with and research a bit!

Reflections of a Rookie Blogger and Follow Up to Situation with Academics at School

I have been blogging now for about 6 weeks and am enjoying it immensely. Since finding out my son was autistic I have always been frustrated by the "doom and gloom" approach to autism. It has been such a relief to find such positive (yet realistic and honest) viewpoints towards autism in the many many blogs I have come across. I wish I had looked into this much sooner than I did!

I love all the different kinds of blogs that are out there... the creative, the plain, the well-written and not-so-well-written, the artsy, the dramatic, the popular and not-so-popular. I have had lots of fun getting started and fine-tuning the features of my blog. I absolutely love the freedom we are given to make our own forums by blogging!

Six weeks ago I was just about at my wits end over my son's situation at school . I started looking up some things about neurodiversity and ended up coming across numerous blogs composed by people who do respect their autistic children by accepting them for who they are. I initially had no intention of setting up my own blog, but after a few days of wanting to comment and feeling inspired to tell my own family's story, I did just that! I shared the fact that I had a blog with a very few friends and family members after I had it for a month. It's kind of scary for me to share some of these thoughts with people that I know.

In these six weeks I have become much more settled regarding Samuel. I have met with his special education teacher two times. His learning requirements have been relaxed in his subjects. His teacher is also using a token board to provide small reinforcements for Samuel as he does his work at school. The incidence of behavioral outbursts has dropped since these changes were made. I think his overall stress level has gone down too. He seems more eager to get to school in the morning. His test scores have improved. The exercise I have put myself through in making up homework assignments has been exhausting, but it's nice to know that it is paying off. I better understand what Samuel is capable of and not capable of. Samuel's teacher has been attentive to my questions and requests, and our regular meetings, e-mails, and phone calls to each other are helping me to feel better about Samuel being at school. This has been a tough year of adjustment for both me and Samuel, but now, almost 3/4 of the way through the school year, we're both quite settled.

On the lighter side of things, we had another weather surprise today, about 5 inches of snow! It started as rain Thursday night, which continued Friday morning and started mixing with sleet. School was closed at noon and shortly after we got home it changed to snow. Samuel was happy to have the afternoon free. The only work I gave him the rest of the day was some tidying up in his bedroom. Friday is cleaning day around here!

Whatever it Takes!

I have been pleasantly surprised over the past few months with Samuel's responsiveness to incentives (ie.. "reinforcers"). This has been demonstrated to me for almost 2 years in how he follows the visual schedule when our in-home helpers are here, but it really wasn't until last fall that I made it my own tool to work with Samuel.

As Samuel started second grade and I saw how much his academic expectations were being raised, I realized that I was going to have to take action to get Samuel to do his homework. (This has been an ongoing process, see "The Evolution of Samuel's homework) I wanted Samuel to do the work ON HIS OWN, meaning that I would not sit there and verbalize over and over "time to do your work." The incentive: I used a token board with him and after he earned 4 tokens I gave him a small piece of candy. I also scheduled "Your Choice" after he finished his work, meaning that he could decide what he wanted to do (usually play on the computer, or Playstation).I had to spend a lot of time waiting him out. For weeks and weeks he dawdled at the start of each homework session, now he gets to work almost immediately. I'm also finding I don't have to reward tokens as frequently. In fact, tonight I didn't even take the token board or candy with me when we sat down to read a book together. He's getting more interested in finishing up the work and getting on to his fun activity!

Mealtimes are another opportunity to use incentives. In the last few months Samuel has become a very picky eater. His food repertoire has never been that great, but now he is starting to turn up his nose at some old standards like hot dogs and fish sticks. One night last week as Samuel came to the table he started "I'm not eating that." He was saying this about hot dogs, something we never used to have a problem with. I said "Samuel, if you eat your hot dogs I will let you have 3 videos." He ate the hot dogs. Tonight I served him "popcorn fish." He started complaining. I told him "Samuel, if you eat a piece of fish I will let you have a sip of soda." He tried eating one bite and demanded the soda. "No, you have eat the whole piece before you get the soda." He did so and got the soda. Then I had to ask for it back. He gave it back and I told him he could have more if he ate more fish. We went back and forth like this until his fish was gone!

Now I'll have to try this method to get him to sample new foods! I bought a can of spinach with a picture of Popeye on it not long ago, in the hopes that seeing the picture would inspire him to be like him (and eat the spinach!). It worked with my oldest son but not with Samuel!

This reminds me that Samuel is very capable in many things, my challenge in getting him to do things is a matter of making the performance of some activity worthwhile to him. He has an extreme version of the "What's in it for me?" line of thinking. It's something I face with each of my children (making them think something is worth doing), just to a greater degree with Samuel.

Samples of Homework

Here are some samples of homework that I have come up with for Samuel. I've talked about this in various postings over the past month. I have found that worksheets that come home for him aren't formatted for him to work with easily. He works much better with bigger type. Though I do get a listing of the things they cover each quarter for his classes, Samuel only gets homework sent home for spelling and a reading program he participates in. I try to make up homework for Math, Science, Reading class, and Social Studies. I do this both to reinforce what he is learning at school, and for me to get an idea of his abilities. I think it is good for Samuel to be able to work in a variety of environments and with various people. I strongly believe that he should be able to do school work with his parents! I send in the homework to his teachers even though they don't expect it. We have been discussing how to make his work at school more meaningful so this is my contribution. Samuel's teacher is also trying different things.

This is a worksheet I made up for Science. Handwriting isn't one of Samuel's favorite things, so I only give him small amounts to do at a time.

This is a worksheet I made up for Samuel for Social Studies. I use "Writing With Symbols." Samuel doesn't need to see a picture with each word, so it takes a little bit of work to remove/add/adjust the symbols that come up. I probably don't work with it as efficiently as it is possible to either. Anyways, the work it takes is worth the effort! Sorry if this is hard to read. I sometimes pencil in notes describing Samuel's ability and/or cooperation during the assignment.

This is a worksheet that I made up for Samuel's science class. When there are numerous answers to be given, I usually do the writing for Samuel. Anything to get through the work for right now!

Snow Day? Eventually it was!

Our weather forecast for last night called for several inches of snow. I woke up at 5:30am to find no snow. "Oh, Samuel will be so disappointed," I thought. I turned on the local news and was surprised to see surrounding counties and cities had closed their schools. Our county was not in the listing. I then tuned into The Weather Channel to see what the radar was showing, no precipitation in our area, it was all southeast or north of us. Darn, that would have been an excuse for keeping Samuel home, knowing snow was on the way. I proceeded to shuffle through making coffee, empty the dishwasher and then sat down about 15 minutes later in front of the TV again, our county's schools were now closed! Hurray, everyone can sleep in!

Samuel enjoyed staying home, as always! We read out of his textbook, did a worksheet on that, then we looked up Helen Keller on-line. We talked about her childhood. This is the second time we've talked about her and every time Samuel says, "She can't talk?" Then he wrote down her name. Later in the day we did a worksheet on contractions.

We didn't have any snow until about 1:30pm and we ended up getting about 2 inches. The snow days have added up enough for the school board to justify adding another week onto the end of the school year. This might have been a waste of a snow day, but it sure was nice to not have to leave home!

Late Night Again!

The timing of dinner and getting Samuel's homework done was about the same last night as it was Tuesday night! My excuse for last night was that we had our in-home services person here until 6:30, and I didn't get a good start on making dinner (I had to finish up a math lesson with my oldest son). Good things about running late are:

• I'm able to get the baby to sleep for the night soon after dinner and then it's easier to focus on Samuel's homework. When baby is awake it's just a matter of getting either my husband or oldest son to watch her, but by that time of the evening she is usually fussy and she makes it her mission to find me, which means husband and big brother either have to chase her or confine her in the playpen!
• Samuel's internal clock just seems to run later into the evening than a neurotypical child, so a late bed-time isn't all bad for him.
  

Samuel has been getting quite cranky late in the afternoon. This has been happening both on days that our in-home person is here and days that she's not here. We're trying to teach Samuel to "take a break" when he has trouble controlling his temper. The challenge is that his break area is up a flight of stairs to his bedroom and he often fights getting up the stairs. We have to try to keep his pathway up there free of things that he can push down or throw and younger siblings have to steer clear as well! We have to prompt him to take the breaks right now. While he is working with the in-home services person he often asks to take a break but sometimes he has to be prompted then as well. Samuel is going to be big and tall someday so we want to teach him as many ways to regulate his temper while he is still a cute lil' youngun!

I only bothered with a 2-question worksheet about Abraham Lincoln for homework last night since it was so late and Samuel complied very quickly!

The Evolution of Samuel's Homework Sessions

Even before we started receiving in-home services for Samuel, I have always wanted to "work" with Samuel at home. Whether it was getting him to be able to play games with the family, helping with chores, or reading together, a lot of time and energy has been invested by our family to teach these things to Samuel. Thanks to having in-home services, Samuel is well on his way to participating in "normal" family events.

My first step in teaching him to "work" was to follow the recommendation of his special education teacher during the summer break after his first year at school. We set aside an area in the playroom and did little drills and took data! We did things like laying out 3 cards and he had to "select different." After that summer I did not take data, but when I worked with Samuel I started fitting in other activities like working on a puzzle.

In-home services started for Samuel almost 2 years ago. Homework wasn't put into his schedule right away, but was added after he demonstrated that he could comply with other activities. Spelling homework has been around for him since kindergarten. Last school year I requested some math worksheets and copies of his reading stories (they wouldn't let me have a copy of the textbook). This year we have spelling, the school has allowed me to have a copy of the reading textbook (yay!), they send home some reading worksheets, and I make up homework for Social Studies and Science based on the school work I see him bring home and on the "Standards of Learning" lists I have for each school quarter.

If I put together work for 3 subjects I would say that there is about 5-10 minutes of work for Samuel to do. I use edible reinforcers during the homework session and I make sure a highly reinforcing activity follows the homework session. We do his homework in my bedroom, sitting on the floor with a lap desk. The in-home services provider does most of his homework at the kitchen table, but sometimes they will read in the living room. Other staff members might work with him in a quieter area of the house if Samuel is too distracted in the kitchen.

At the beginning of this school year it could take an hour for Samuel to comply. If he did not comply I told him he had to go take a break until he was ready. Most of the hour it would take involved him going back and forth taking breaks and returning to my room. I learned the hard way that I cannot say anything like "this is your last chance to ______..." He has a meltdown if I do that. What works better is to ask him "Are you ready to work?" or say something like "You know, the sooner you do your work the sooner you get to do what you really want to do!" Now he almost never has to leave my room. All I have to say is "If you are not ready to work then you should probably take a break." This is enough to prompt him to say "I'm ready." On a good night he gets through his work in about 10-15 minutes.

Late Night

I was a little tired and running behind this afternoon, which just snowballed all evening so that I did not get the boys to bed until 10pm!

Samuel got his hair cut this afternoon. I took all 4 children in, and a family with 3 boys was before us! I was worried about Samuel waiting patiently. It was hard for him at first, but he found some books to look at so that kept him happy. For the first time ever he agreed to wear a cape as he got his haircut. Usually he won't let it be put on and he ends up getting hair all over himself.

When we got home I took a few minutes to type some lessons for Samuel and then I decided that before I could prepare dinner I HAD TO clean up the kitchen! Of course I was interrupted by everyone numerous times, and dinner ultimately was not ready until 7:30pm. My poor husband, who isn't feeling all that well anyways, was a bit overwhelmed by all the whining hungry children, plus he was rather hungry himself!

Samuel and I started his homework, which I ended up reducing in quantity because of the late hour, at about 8:45pm. At least he finished pretty quickly! He went through his usual after-school grumpies today, but tonight he was quite jovial