I am no longer missing

No, I didn't vanish off the face of the earth! Baseball really did take up the month of October. St. Louis didn't win the World Series, but it was still fun to watch.

Then there was November. 

I spent lots of time getting ready for Luke's IEP meetings. It took us 5 hours over 2 days, but I think a good one was developed. After an observation type evaluation takes place, the IEP team will be meeting again to discuss some additional educational options for Luke. 

My oldest turned 15 in November. There was the high school play - See How They Run. And of course Thanksgiving.

December brought the middle school winter choir concert. My middle daughter's 12th Family Day celebrating the day we met in China! Then Christmas and her 13th birthday the day after. New Year's Eve. 

Luke's Family Day 8th Family Day was January 4. January 5th brought about 10" of snow. Followed by -11 temperature on the 6th. 

The kids finally made it back to school today and I went back to work.

One of my goals for 2014 is to do more blogging. I'm working on a 2013 in Review and Hope and Dreams for 2014.

Until next time,

Janet

Wordless Wednesday

What I Learned in September

• I re-learned how emotionally hard it is to fill out the parent evaluation form for Luke's special education re-evaluation. I filled out ABAS II (Adaptive Behavior Assessment System). It took a long time.

• Through Amazon.com you can by French versions of the Harry Potter audio books. Since she can't go to Paris and sit in a cafe reading French and taking a French lesson each day, Olivia thinks this would be a good way to improve her French.

• Strawberry Lake, Michigan is a delightful place to spend Labor Day weekend, especially with Aunt Becky.

• There is now a diagnosis of Impaired Glucose Metabolism in our family. 

What I Learned in August

What I learned in August...

• My 14-year-old won 3rd place in high school division of the library's summer bookmark design contest. The theme was "Seek the Unknown". (You can see all of the winners at teenbookmarks.)

A little after the end, quite a bit before the beginning, mostly toward the middle, is where our story starts...

• My 12-year-old auditioned for and is a member of Singing Sensations, the after-school show choir at her middle school. She has auditioned for the St. Louis Metro 8 choir and find out soon is she is a member.

• Vacation Station (the before/after school program) has been fabulous for Luke. Through funding provided by the St. Charles Country Developmental Disabilities Resource Board, he has a wonderful one-on-one para. 

• The move to high school has been wonderful for the 14-year-old. I have only seen this amount of enthusiasm one other year in her entire education. She has joined the art club and is busy helping to build the homecoming float (they almost always win best float!). She is also a part of the drama club. For the first production, See How They Run, she is a part of the paint team.

• Luke is expanding his list of acceptable foods. He loves hot dogs and bratwurst. They need to be bite sized pieces (he can't take a bite with his front teeth) and dipped in ketchup and mustard.  

Until next time...

Back to School - Part II

or to use Luke's teacher's words -- Playing the Mom Card

School has now been in session for 6 days and we are getting into a rhythm. I like the rhythm, I like the structure. So does Luke. The girls do too.

Before school started there were trips to the office store and to Target to get schools supplies for the girls. Each time we went I would always try to get Luke to choose something, a new pencil box or crayons or markers. He would always say no using sign and voice. When combined it means No! Not nasty, but definite. Anytime anyone would ask if he was ready to go back to school, they would get the same answer. 

The Tuesday night before school started was Meet the Teacher Night. He wasn't happy when we piled the supplies in the car and headed to school. He did help carry some to the building, but that was a far as he was willing to go. Once we were in the building he turned into a huge pill (to put it mildly). 

The first stop was the special ed room. As soon as we got in and the teacher tried to introduce herself, he was whining and pulling me out. The second stop was across the hall to the SLP's room. He completely ignored a friend who was leaving the room and tried to pull me past the room. He did give the SLP a two second opportunity to say hi between the whines and pulling.

The third and final stop was the 5th grade classroom. The room was full of parents and students and he wanted nothing to do with it. As a side note, the classrooms have been just as full and noisy on the other Meet the Teacher Nights, so this wasn't new. I managed to get his supplies put on a desk, sign up for school T-shirt, say hi to the teacher and leave ASAP. At this point, describing him as being a pill would be a complement.

On the way out of the building we past teachers, principals and paraprofessionals that he knew and likes. With the exception of one resource teacher who got a wave and huge smile, he was unable to even acknowledge them. 

I was becoming very concerned that the start of the school year was going to be very challenging for all involved.

Thursday morning everyone was up bright and early. The high school bus came about 6:40, I dropped the middle schooler at her stop about 7:25, then headed to the elementary school (1/2 mile away) with Luke. The whining started as soon as I turned into the parking lot. He wasn't happy when we headed into Vacation Station (before/after school program). Once we met his paraprofessional I left reminding them that they had my phone number.

The Thursday report from the teachers and VS was that he had a great day. 

Friday morning he again whined and protested when we got to VS. Again I quickly left. A few minutes later I went back in to leave my check. He was happily playing the piano. Hmmm.

The Friday report from the teachers and VS was that he had a great day. Hmmm.

Each day this week the drop-off has gotten easier and easier. All the reports from school continued to be positive. He is now happy to go off with his para. 

I know change isn't always easy for him. And I know he doesn't (yet!) have the skills to tell us what he needs/wants/thinks. But I also know that a part of his behavior was a show for mom. While developmentally making-mom-feel-guilty-for-leaving-me is more of a toddler or preschooler thing, he must have thought he needed to try it one more time!

Back to School - Part I

Here is the post I promised last week.


Last Thursday was the first day of school for the 2013-2014 school year. This year is a 3-kids-3-different-schools kind of a year. 9th, 7th and 5th grade.

Last year was not the best of years for Luke. One positive is that with the many meetings I had concerning his education, I did get the opportunity to develop a working relationship with the new principal. I already have a good working relationship with the assistant principal in charge of special education (or at least from my point of view ;-) 

Since Luke has an entire new team this year, they all made time for us to meet to talk about "all things Luke". Attending the meeting was the general ed teacher, special ed teacher, SLP, principal, assistant principal over sped, assistant principal working with 5th grade, and the head Vacation Station (before/after school program) -- plus me! 

The new sped teacher is right out of college and is super excited about this coming year. She has experience working with children on the spectrum - which is a big plus.

The new SLP is also a sweet young thing who has been working now for 3 years. She also has autism experience (which last year's SLP did not!).

The gen ed teacher is experienced. While she has taught students on the spectrum, she hasn't had one with as many communication, sensory and developmental concerns . She asked lots of great questions about how she can get Luke involved in her class. It had already been decided that she will be teaching Luke social studies and science. Her structured classroom style is going to be a big plus.

Some of the things I shared about my guy are...

• He is an expert at acting incapable. He is small, non-verbal and has a killer grin, it is very easy to fall for. 
• If you let him get by with something one time, he will assume he can get by with it all the time.
• His behavior will tell you much if you pay attention. Asking him a stupid question (e.g. show me your foot), you will be ignored. Keep doing it, he will start to whine, continuing to escalate the behaviors until hitting or throwing might become involved.
• Loud vocalizing is often a way of expressing that he doesn't know what is going on. For example, if he missed the exchange that we weren't going home after grocery shopping he will let me know.
• Hitting, that appears to be out of nowhere, most often means he needs to tell you something and doesn't know how. 

The main goals for this school year are communication, communication, communication!

He has to learn how to communicate using the Proloquo2Go on his iPad. If he can't communicate then he can't learn. Or at least he won't be able to let us know what he has learned. Communication skills should help eliminate inappropriate behaviors that are being used for communication.

This year they will be using visual schedules for all parts of his day, including the before/after school program. The sped teacher already had most of Luke's put together. I now need to asked her to email me a picture so I can start to implement a visual schedule at home.

Till next time...

What I Learned in July

One of my favorite blogs is Along Came the Bird. It is mostly about a sweet little girl named Lily. It is written by Lily's mom. It is a blog full of hope, prayer, and family. Check it out if  you have a chance.

One of today's posts was titled "What I Learned in July". Lana (the mom!) got the idea from yet another blog. (Isn't that how things work in the world of bloggers and blogs?) 

What I learned in July is...

1. Luke can pick beginning sight words from fields of five. His ESY (extended school year) teacher did some fabulous things with him. I can hardly wait to see how far he can go.
2. The email address for Luke's new special education teacher. Email is my favorite way of communicating. We have already corresponded. I will be meeting with all of Luke's new team on Tuesday afternoon. I have very thankful they are all willing to take the time away from preparing for the new year. Meet the Teacher night is Tuesday night and school starts on Thursday, so this is a very busy time for them.
3. Not all people providing in-home services for autism really understand how autism effects every aspect of family life and that there isn't always time to do as much therapy as they would like. I refuse to allow someone to try to make me feel guilty for what I can or cannot do. That service provider is no longer being used.
4. I need to do a better job of identifying poison ivy when working in my front/side garden. But I am thankful for the Walgreen's TakeCare Clinic. Hopefully the steroids I got tonight will start working.
5. Luke will whine when he has to use his iPad to order his meal at McDonald's. He has learned that if doesn't order it, he won't get it. The whining and opposition is less each time we go.
6. Both of my daughters have a really good group of teachers for the upcoming school year. The 14-year-old has already checked out the high school teachers with friends who have older siblings. We know the 12-year-old's is good from our own experience.
7. Blogging is fun.