School is almost over until the fall. Today CJ’s teachers sent home a summer fun pack with stickers, crayons, a whiteboard with his name on it for practice writing his name, and a bunch of other goodies. I was quite shocked, actually. It is really nifty.
I didn’t know schools did things like that, especially public schools. It was a nice surprise.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
Yesterday I went in to meet with CJ’s teacher and talk about a few of the concerns and questions I had from his IEP case conference. Specifically, I wanted to know what kinds of testing they might want to do and why, and then talk about CJ’s social interaction.
I am really glad that I went in and talked with his teacher, because she was really great about meeting with me and was happy to talk about any and all of my concerns and questions. The meeting went really well and put my mind at ease about a lot of things, and also gave me things to think about.
The good news is, the teacher doesn’t see a specific need for more testing, but the option is there if we choose to do it. Most of the children at CJ’s school have what is termed a “developmental delay” and that diagnosis only goes to 5 years old. When they enter kindergarten, they need a more specific diagnosis to have the help assigned to them that they need. CJ has only been diagnosed with a speech delay not the more encompassing developmental delay. The testing they do is IQ testing, and if we choose to, we can have CJ’s IQ tested next fall, but it isn’t required. CJ’s teacher said that he shows no sign of a cognitive delay and that he is on track or ahead of what they would expect of an almost 4-year old as far as that goes. (In that he knows colors, shapes, numbers, letters, can read short words, and things like that.)
The more challenging news, for me at least, is that there’s a good possibility that CJ’s speech will not be caught up to his peers completely by kindergarten. No one can predict the future of course, but he still has a long way to go in using his language appropriately in social situations. He is developing those tools, but he still often, well, almost exclusively, reverts back to non-verbal responses and cues when dealing with his peers in things like sharing and negotiating needs. So we’ve got him enrolled in a number of group activities for the summer - t-ball, soccer, and storytime at the library. He also needs to improve his “attending” when in a group setting, and hopefully this will help with that as well.
So, some positive news, some challenges to work on. I can’t say I’m pleased completely but I am pleased with the meeting and I am glad I decided to call.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
CJ has entered a “testing limits” phase with a vengeance. Tell him not to do something, and he will *almost* do it. Ask him to do something, and he will refuse until he decides the consequence of disobeying is too steep.
This is normal, and I know that. What he doesn’t know, of course, is that it as hard for me to be the bad guy as it is for him to suffer the consequences of his actions. On Sunday we went to the zoo and the park. At the park, he hissed at a little boy (who apparently had growled at him first but I didn’t know that part). CJ learned “hissing” from our cats, and it is something he knows he is not supposed to do under any circumstances. He had previously been warned about it, and that was the last straw. Into the car we went, with him crying and wailing, and we went home. And it broke my heart to do so, but at the same time, the child seems to only remember how to behave if he knows clearly the consequence for not behaving and doesn’t want that to happen.
Sigh.
Hopefully that is the end of his hissing for a while at least. Later at home he came up to me and said he was sorry for the hissing.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
CJ is afraid of bugs. This again is my fault. A bee landed on him at the zoo when he was two and I kind of freaked out. It may have stung him. It is not clear. But ever since, he has been afraid of bugs.
Again, I am passing my neuroses on to my kids. I try, but…
There was a ladybug in our sunroom yesterday. CJ ran up to me and started telling me “Ladybug! Ladybug!”. I asked him what was wrong, and he said, quite clearly:
The ladybug is fighting the CJ!
But that didn’t make any sense. So I asked “Biting? The ladybug is biting?” and he answered “NO! Fighting! The ladybug is fighting the CJ!”
“Frightening? Are you frightened?”
“Yes I frightened but the ladybug is FIGHTING the CJ.”
Tough ladybug.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
And so it begins.
I have a lot of thoughts I need to stew over about this. CJ has been playing with his friend M from down the street a lot, and M has a lot of things CJ does not. It started with the scooter. And then the Wii. I don’t feel bad that I haven’t given CJ these things exactly, but at the same time I wonder if I am putting him at a social disadvantage. M tried to explain some Mario Kart game to CJ for like 10 minutes and CJ was totally bewildered. Well, actually, I was too. (They weren’t playing the Wii, M wanted CJ to pretend their bikes were karts or something).
Today I broke down and took CJ out to buy a scooter. His early birthday present. Now CJ thinks he should get birthday cake.
But I’m not buying a Wii. I agonized over the scooter in fact, but decided to go forward with it. I’m really struggling with this. Argh. At least the scooter was on sale so I spent $10 less than I planned to. Yay small things.
And on top of that, those school pictures that I had no way of not having taken have shown up, and they are adorable. Now I feel my own internal pressure to buy them. Ugh, marketing.
If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed!
