Tag Archives: Home School

10/9/11

Funday Foto Fest I

Ariel and I have been painting, drawing and doodling a bunch. Joshua and Daniel not so much. Joshua did partake in a couple of paintings. Ariel named all of the pictures and they seem to have a common theme. Her dragon drawings have now eased their way down the hallway, on almost every wall of her room, and most importantly have surrounded her bed. She said that she had to make all of these dragons to feel safe in her room. She said that they protect her from fear of shadows. Fascinating. She also made several Halloween pictures, I have a few here. She cracks me up, David walked in on her the other day and asked what she was doing she said: “Reading Frankenstein.” She was, she then told him all about the scientist that made a monster, but she didn’t understand why people got upset with the Frankenstein monster. Hee hee She is awesome. :-)

 


 

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09/21/11

Being Creative For School

Yesterday I shared about an app called Biophilia I ended up downloading another song called “Virus” which the kids and I played around with this morning. What came out of that? A school lesson today about viruses and the immune system. The app shows red blood cells that look healthy and floating about. Later in the song green viruses come in and invade. I used it to describe blood cells and viruses and what happens when a virus attacks. I also printed out the lyrics of the song and used some of the key words as vocabulary words. Simplified definitions in some cases.

As they listened to the song I asked them questions.

We discussed the vocabulary words and what they meant. I also used it as other lessons in that the music sounded really nice and pretty, but what it was actually about was unhealthy and could cause harm. Some things look good that are not, especially in nature. Some of the prettiest, most colorful frogs for example are the most deadly! Now I did not scare them I used it as a lesson to be cautious. They are pretty young so I was not all intense as I was in my own mind, trying to get myself to understand this important lesson. :-) Some of the vocabulary words that they learned were virus, transmutate, contagious, host, and adversary. Then, I pulled up BrainpopJr and we watched some videos about health and wellness and had some more words added like, symptom, fever, immune system, and mucus.

I then read several books and they made red blood cells with invading viruses!

I like the app because it is visual and auditory along with being interactive it really got all of them interested and able to retain the information. We had a full sensory learning experience. I plan on doing this with the moon app as well because the basis behind it is the moon cycle and I will create some sort of lesson out of that. I came up with this on a whim today so I hadn’t really prepared much, but they really liked it. We had fun and finished up our school day, then headed off to Target for some new backpacks.

There were several on clearance and we each got one.

Yes, I got a pink monkey backpack! I did, I admit. It was only $4.24 who could resist a monkey backpack for that? Ariel and I both have one. Plus I had a nice encounter with a raven in the parking lot. Actually it was quite strange for a moment, he flew to the top of a tree and sat there and stared at me while I got the kids and items in the car. A few minutes later a couple of his friends showed up and they chowed down on someones littered food on the ground. I can only assume he was watching me with such caution to make sure I didn’t take his feast. Hee hee No other bird encounters though and there were a lot out today for some reason.

Another thing that I found for school that is super cool for Joshua is the Lego Master Builder Academy .

This has been a great incentive for Joshua to do school. He is not a fan of doing school most days, but when I told him that he could do “school” Lego’s after he finished his work, he was all for it. I know I bribed him in a way, but he really is not motivated to do school. He would rather build and create Lego Star Wars or other Lego adventures and I do use his Lego’s to teach him a lot. However, I get Lego’d out and I need some actual documentation of his learning and progress for learning other things. He has built every set we have received by himself. We will venture out using it in more creative ways later in the year. Right now he is enjoying following the directions and building them. (I do not get any kickbacks for sharing any links. I like them, I share them, possibly others will like them too.)

Pictures, you know it! :-)

Ariel and Joshua creations. Daniel’s handwriting is getting so good I am totally amazed. He is even able to hold his writing instrument well and “properly”. We have viruses, Joshua’s Lego Robot he built and Ariel’s current reading material. Yes, it is a comic book, she has read more than half of it and yes, she is a fan of Sheldon Cooper and loves the show The Big Bang Theory. I admit I do love Sheldon. I am not into comics that comes from David. :-)   OH! And a monkey. And yes, there is quite a bit of paint spillage all over our carpet. Accidents happen. And yes, I am trying see how many times I can write “and yes”. I am quite silly today.

Side Note: After watching the season premiere of “The Big Bang Theory” I must say I am a bit disappointed in their lack of creativity. They could do a lot more with the show. Good thing we have a DVR I could fast forward so the kids didn’t ask a ton of questions…mainly Ariel. :-)


 

 

 

 

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09/19/11

Hodgepodge

This post is going to be filled with a hodgepodge of things. Several things that I do not feel like separating into individual posts. I tried to make it like a “Wordless Wednesday” post, but I am basically incapable of being wordless! I am a very “typative” person. :-) Here I go. I have not been able to sleep through the night in days, so many days now that I cannot even remember if it’s only been a week or longer. I can usually fall back to sleep at some point after an hour of rolling around and tossing about in bed. On Sunday morning though, I could not. I woke up with a post about moving swarming in my head. It was 2:30 am and I was wide awake and my brain would not leave me alone.

I had to get up and write that post!

So at 3am I went into the school room on the kids computer, in the dark, eyes barely focused, and wrote out that post. For some reason I had to have it finished before later in the morning or day. I still have no idea why other than I was able to sleep a bit more after 4:30am when I posted it. That was another strange thing, I posted it without really going over it. So what happened? I go back to read it later that morning and see that I called David, my mom and myself “idolators” instead of isolators. In the past I would have had a panic attack at the thought of anyone reading that, this time I laughed. I am still laughing. How funny, idolators.

I think my brain needed to process the information.

The topic of moving has been flying around for over a year now. We had not found a location that was a good fit. Again, going to another city where I do know anyone or have any family at this point would not be a good thing for me. Everything that I wrote about in Big Changes…Possibly, have been concerns for a while and there are still other issues and factors that we are dealing with that I have not written about. In the past week the idea of moving to my hometown has become a real possibility. Actually more than that, we are about 96.8% sure that we will be there this time next year.

I still am not sure how I feel about all of that.

I am not going panic, I am going to process. We will be about three hours away from my dad which is a good distance. Small doses to enjoy him. My grandma lives in my hometown as well so she can help me and go places with me and the kids if I need help. Or she can babysit for me. I am not too sure about other family members, I am not close to many of my family members. Mainly my aunt is the closest, I tend to feel awkward around my grandma too, but I do not feel like talking about my awkward disconnect to family. I am sure I will have a ton to write about when/if we move there. She was planning on moving here, but she has continued to put it off and prolong the whole thing. I could help her get her house ready to sell, that may be one of the issues for her. She has friends and family there also and it may be hard for her to leave. She is quite the social butterfly. Here she would only have my mom and other two sisters. I am just writing anything that is popping in my head so I am stopping on this topic.

Good news!

Daniel pooped on the potty yesterday for the first time!! Sorry for the poop talk, but that is a VERY big deal. He told me on his own that he wanted to and he sat and did it. He was very proud of himself. :-) Another great thing happened yesterday. We were sitting on the couch together, he has started asking me to sit next to him and then he practically sits on me so we are working on boundaries. He wants to sit next to me and talk. HUGE! He was telling me all about his clock as we sat there. He told me all of the things that he likes about it and how he likes helicopters and that the reason that he likes them is because “how they work”. He has never given me a reason like that before, it has always been because “they spin” or “they make noise”. Then, during a moment of pause, he turned to me looked me straight in the eyes and asked: “What do you like mommy?” And then he listened and asked me questions about it. He wasn’t just following a script, he really wanted to know.

It was a great moment.

I have a lot to process in my life right now and as I am processing I do/say things that seem to contradict each other. A major one is working out and baking. I love to do both. I do make some healthy treats, but to be honest I do enjoy making sweet, tasty baking delights that make people smile and get them on a sugar high. Not the kids of course, but other people. :-) I do share the treats with the kids and they get so happy and surprised that they can “have a cookie for a snack!”. I do enjoy making things with the kids. They love to help me and we learn measurements and chemistry in the process. I cannot really think of anything else to write about at the moment. I think I just needed to get some things out so I could process some more things.

I will leave with some photos of some gluten-free delights and who knows what other pictures will show up.

There are some Lego Dragons, school shots, raspberry oatmeal muffins, peanut butter/banana/oatmeal bread (I will not eat! Two things I dislike very much peanut butter and banana.), lemon cookies, granola bars and bread…I think those are the only pictures I put on of food. I tend to bake a lot and not eat any of it. I will freeze them for a later date for when I have a sweet tooth. It’s the process of baking that helps me not the eating it. Besides sweet things are good…in moderation. The same goes for working out. Moderation, right? :-)


 

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09/3/11

Kids Planet Stories

Colden Planet

by Ariel

I think there is another secret planet, that is far away and so cold from the other planets. I think it looks so dark blue. It’s called Colden Planet because of its cold weather. Too freezing to live, even with an astronaut suit. It’s always dark there and always blizzards. Never stopping.

The only thing that can live there is dragons. There are really dark clouds and storms so no one can find it because it is way out in space. It has no sun and no moon. It has a solid snow ground. It’s so dark that no one can ever find it. My head told me that it was out there, probably. You can’t find with a telescope.

Only dragons can live there. No people or animals. It has a huge cave, only one. My planet is kind of like Jupiter only colder.

 

Alien Glass Planet

by Joshua

My planet is a circle shape. You can see it with a flashlight. My planet is white and has snow. And the face is a circle of the alien face. Aliens live there. There are dragons on the planet, they are snow dragons. There are snow mountains. The aliens wear masks because they are actually people. And they have a space ship. It always has sun, a special sun that can change into the moon. If you hit it with a rock it changes into the moon and it’s 9 o’clock. If you hit it with a big rock it will just turn into the sun and get bigger and bigger and be nothing but the sun. You can see stars shining. It’s called Alien Glass Planet because its white and the sun shines on it and makes it look like glass.

 

Green Planet

by Daniel

My planet is a green planet. It’s cold on my planet. It has 100 hundred moons, no 20. It has a lot of clouds made out of gas. It has a whole bunch of gas. I live on the planet. I live on the green planet. And just toys live on my planet. There is an ocean on my planet and toys and animals and plants and birds and bugs. I like dragon flies. I like mosquitoes on my planet at night, but not in my house. It has grass and sidewalks.

 

I am not going to share my story but my planet is called Purple Hoom. It has ligards which are a cross of lizards and rats. There are huge plants that have ginormous leaves that swoop down to the ground in grand curves. That is all.  :-)

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08/6/11

Art Therapy Gallery

Here are some things that the kids and I have been doing with painting, drawing and doodling. I didn’t put them all on here, I tried to limit myself. I know, I know! It’s still a lot. :-)


 

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06/15/11

What’s Up Here

The kids and I have just been painting away together. We have done a ton of squiggly, swirly, twirly kinds of fantastic fun. Today Daniel actually decided that he would join me. I made some sort of design and then he would try it. When I suggested the number 8, he said “Oh, yes the number 8, that is a good idea.” He then proceeded to start making numbers on his own and wanted me to join him.

So I did.

His color of choice today was yellow. Interestingly, because he “owns” green but I was green today. Later he decided that straight lines were the way to go. Ariel has been painting with me for two days and has made her own pictures along with swirly like paintings. Today she went on a dragon kick. Yea! Dragons! Joshua wanted to paint a Star Wars Lego scene and of course create something out of wood. He loves building and creating things like that. I cannot really paint any Star Wars scenes so I made what I saw, explosions. :-)   He made this whole scene with Jango Fett and Obi Wan.

I am just going to keep going with this painting thing and see where we all go.

There are a lot of pictures, this is kind of a big deal since the only one who has ever really painted was Ariel. She is super excited to have us all join in her special interest. You can scroll over them to see their title and click on them to get the full fabulousness! :-)

Here is our gallery of fun!

 


 

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05/27/11

Blogging Lite

I don’t feel like writing much today. Well the truth is I have written a lot this week and today, but I need to go over them, you know. :-) I felt like sharing some of what the kids have been up to.

“Photo Friday!”

Joshua’s Lego fixation has seriously turned into an obsession. Unfortunately, I cannot remember all of the names he gave his ships. He has a name and task for each one. He then shares what they are with everyone, even when they are not listening. He doesn’t care, he just keeps going.

It’s pretty funny.

I have some of Ariel’s art work and Daniel’s entertaining toy dumps. He likes to dump toys in his room and then jump on his bed while singing songs. It’s good to hear him singing again, he had stopped for quite some time.  I have about a billion pictures. I put a lot on here because I had such a hard time deciding which ones to put on and which ones not to put on. So here you have some fascinating pictures of a few of our days over here.

Picture time!




 


 

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04/10/11

Next Round Of Books

I always have a list of books that are on my “waiting to get” list, when we are able to purchase them, I find them on sale or see a great deal on half.com, we get them. Book swaps are good too. These are the ones we were able to get in this round. I am focused on looking for new ways to teach social skills in our curriculum and addressing issues with a broader perspective. I got several books to help me be able to teach better and I got several that I am hoping will help the kids communicate better the issues that they are having with sensory, anxiety and what autism means to them.

To better help discover how sensory issues are affecting us I got this book My Sensory Book: Working Together to Explore Sensory Issues and the Big Feelings They Can cause: A Workbook for Parents, Professionals and Children (very long title) I am hoping that it will help Daniel communicate his needs better. I also hope this will help identify Ariel and Joshua’s issues and help all of them learn how to help themselves or communicate how we can help them.

To help learn to help themselves I got a more kid friendly book called Squirmy Wormy. I like this one because it gives examples of certain behaviors and the things to do to that can help them feel better.

To help the kids (and me) with anxiety I got When My Worries Get Too Big!

To help with explaining the autism spectrum and acceptance I got these two books. This is Asperger Syndrome and The Autism Acceptance Book.

These last two books I mainly got to share with the kids to understand their differences and similarities.

The Autism Acceptance book is a book that you personalize, it explains autism and what acceptance in general means and how to apply it. I personally like how it has a section on how and why to accept others and gives examples on how to “walk in others shoes”. Our family needs this anyway because we tend to think that everyone thinks like us so it allows us as a family to think of others and think about how each one of us is different. The whole thing is meant for children who do not have autism to relate to those children who do but I see it as another learning tool for us on the spectrum. It is teaching my kids to accept and understand each others differences and to apply that to others outside of our home as well. And I am not ashamed to admit that it helps me too. We have personalized it as a family not just as individuals and we are trying to apply what we are learning to all situations where we see differences. I think we can get several years out of this book because as they grow so will their awareness of different types people and situations.

I like the This is Asperger’s book to give a general feel but it is limited in its examples. It does address this at the end where it has notes on Asperger’s, I like that about the book.

For working on understanding friendships:

I got How to be a Friend. I like this book because it addresses several topics about friendships and self. There are things about arguments and shyness and how it is good to be by yourself sometimes. I think it is a very good book for little ones. However, I will be honest again I learn so much from my children’s books, I know it may sound ridiculous but it is true.

For adding to our school curriculum:

I got Teaching Asperger’s Students Social Skills Through Acting. I thought this would be a great resource throughout our schooling years. Despite my anxiety issues I am very good on stage, well not Grammy worthy but I have been known to be quite theatrical :-) and have done some lead acting roles at church and for work. I never tried at school there were too many other things going on for that. Acting comes natural to me, I assume because I have had to do it my whole life. I see this as an opportunity to use acting skills as a means of true expression and ability to share emotions in a fun way. I hope that is how it will work for us.

I got Teaching Students with Dyslexia and Dysgraphia Lessons from Teaching and Science. This book seems self-explanatory, I see Daniel progressing and I want to make sure I stay on top of it and help him to not have the frustrations and issues I had growing up with Dysgraphia (Dyspraxia). I am also recognizing some issues with Ariel and Joshua and I wanted to make sure I was adding this to our curriculum right away to make life easier for all of us.

Since I am freaky about wanting to be sure I teach the kids what they are supposed to know I got these two books What Your Kindergartener Needs to Know and What Your First Grader Needs to Know. Now just to be clear, I go through freak outs of thinking that I haven’t taught them enough and then I go through moments of being perfectly fine with where they are at but all of the time I just let them be kids and have fun.

And for my own personal interest, because I cannot seem to get enough information on the topic I got Autism Spectrum Disorders: The Complete Guide to Understanding Autism, Asperger’s Syndrome, Pervasive Developmental Disorder, and Other ASDs.

I have not started that one yet but I mainly got it to make sure I understand the differences and I am always looking for new information to help the kids and myself.

When to say when?

I don’t know if there will ever be a time that I will feel comfortable with all that I have read or looked into. I like having an abundance of resources to look back on and refresh my memory because some things that did not work in the past, may work now and vice versa. We are at a place where the kids are becoming more aware of themselves and they are molding their identities, so at these ages I would like to make sure that we are instilling in them acceptance of themselves and of others. I also hope to help them gain ways to express themselves and feel confident in expressing who they are, how they feel and what they need. These are things that I didn’t feel as a child so I think that I am pretty sensitive to it.

Well I am off to go do some more reading!

All of the books are linked to Amazon but they can be found cheaper at places like half.com or going through book swaps.  These may be of some interest to some. :-) If you have already used some of these I would be interested in your opinions, feel free to share about them. Or any other book suggestions as well.



 


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03/25/11

On Games: They Are Helping Us

After watching Temple Grandin and reading this particular article and a few books, this past holiday we decided to work on turn taking and game skills. Temple shared how it helped her a lot learning turn taking and with David being SO into games, we felt that we should use the knowledge that David had gained about learning and games. He LOVES games, me not so much. It depends on the game. David is all about the strategy and I am all about reading the rules.

David likes to take hours playing games, doing role-playing games and those with deep story lines or other games like Risk.

Me, I like straight forward, tell me what to do, let’s play the game and then I feel satisfied that we finished it. I don’t care who wins. I have programmed myself not to, otherwise I get obsessive about winning. There is a whole history behind games and my dad’s side of the family that I will not go in to, but it caused me to not want to play games as an adult. Let’s just say the obsessive winning thing is genetic. Ariel is like that, if she doesn’t win, it is the end of the world. She is getting better. Joshua just loves playing, he doesn’t care if he wins or looses he just loves to play much like David.

Daniel, however, has not had a lot of interest.

He has played games off and on but it has been very hard to keep his attention most of the time. In the past few months we have seen a change in this. There were several games that we focused on to help with certain skills we felt we all needed to work on. David has done a ton of research on how games are great learning tools. He can go on for hours, days, years about board games, role-playing games, internet games, chess….whatever game, he can talk about it and share how it can be used as a learning tool. His mind automatically does this, when he sees a game, he will say that it can be used for math, reason, strategy, language, storytelling, and many other things.

I look at a game and I see rules that must be followed.

I do not share that special interest but I do learn a lot and have had my mind opened to interesting ways of teaching through David’s special interest. All of that to say he talked me into using games. He will send me game information and tell me how it may be good for school and I decide which ones I could use best for school and learning skills. It sounds like it may not be too fun but actually, I have observed the kids learning faster by adding games into our curriculum.

All of the games are learning tools without anyone feeling like it is.

I need particular games to play with the kids because I do not like role-playing games. David will play games with them like Heroscape and he modifies the game or they will make up game rules together.  I do not enjoy playing The Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, (he has all three) like they do. Daniel and I sit out and do our own thing, it seems he doesn’t much get into them either. However, sometimes he does join them. We finally chose several games that we have gotten over a course of time, while they have gone on sale over throughout the past year until now. There have been several different skills that we have been working on. They are as follows:

  • Turn Taking
  • Learning Make Believe/ Descriptive Story Telling
  • Learning Rules/Following Them
  • Winning/Losing
  • Having Fun
  • Communication Skills
  • Social Skills
  • Strategy
  • Motor Skills
  • Math/Reasoning
  • Reading
  • Completing Tasks

So far we are seeing some big improvements with all of the kids.

I am pleased with my ability to be able to do the list above as well. :-)   Playing games has improved Daniel’s communication with Ariel and Joshua. He is starting to tell them clearly what he is thinking or wants a lot of the time, instead of using me as a mediator. I have seen this improve much more rapidly since we started focusing on doing games together. There are several things I have seen a lot of improvement on. I really like to watch them enjoy themselves as they learn. We not only use board games but interactive internet games as well. We have a huge lot of software from graphic drawing to ancient history. The internet as well has many free resources for games.

We are a multi-sensory learning family, since that comes naturally to me and the kids just absorb, it works well.

Since we started to really focus on the story telling and trying to act out our stories, Daniel has recently asked for a doctor set. He has actually been connecting with David quite a bit. David has a tackle box with his “doctor” stuff in it and Daniel asked for his own so he could “be like Daddy”. Since this was the first time he has ever asked or connected like that we got him a set.

We also got Ariel her vet kit that she has been wanting since before Christmas.

Joshua wanted Lego’s, what else is there in the world? :-) It has proven to be a great buy, Ariel and Daniel have been playing off and on with their sets. They will lay out blankets on the floor and set up an animal hospital and people hospital. Joshua is their assistant, which means getting every stuffed animal and doll in the house, so they can be taken care of. I don’t know if this will help others but I thought I would share how games have helped us.

Here are some pictures and I will give links for people to check out if they feel like it.

Here are some reads about board game learning and a few about video game learning if you are interested.

Edutainment in School with Board Games

The Home Education

Currents in Electronic Literacy

TEEM: Computer Games in Education Summary Report

TEEM: Full Report

National Summit on Educational Games Fact Sheet

Summit on Educational Games site

And now for the game links I have pictured! I have other links of games we have that I do not have pictured as well. (I do not make any money off of these links, I just use them because they normally have good photos and descriptions.)

Star Wars Trouble

Minotarus Game

Lava Dragon

Rory’s Story Cubes

Jax Doodle Dice

Sleeping Queens This game has a very interesting story that can be read here: Sleeping Queens–Our Life in Cards

Coloretto

Think Fun Blocks All of the sets can be found on this link along with more similar games.

Pretend Play Doctor

Dalmation Vet Kit

Here are some games we have that I do not have pictured, they are either upstairs with David or in the other closet. :-)

SET

Quirkle Cubes

Uno

Upwords This game has helped Daniel and Ariel be able to create words from other words.

Jenga They use the Jenga blocks as regular blocks as well. They get pretty creative with them.

U-Build Sorry

We have a lot more, David and I actually played a lot of games before the kids were born. (I do pretty well with limited people playing, I felt comfortable with David and was able to have fun.) I have used them for a while with trying to do therapy but it didn’t actually resonate with me until I read the article that Temple wrote and connected what David had been telling me about his research. So there you have it, I guess I will say David was right maybe I should have listened to him in the first place. :- )


 






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02/5/11

I Found Them, Finally

I have been searching for several months for all of Daniel’s medical records and evaluations that I put in a “safe” place, that I would remember but I completely forgot. I have gone back and forth searching the entire house, garage, under the car, up on the roof everywhere except on top of my storage file box, hidden in my closet, with books and photo albums on top of them. Sometimes I really do not know what I am thinking when I put things in a “safe” place. I happened to find them the other day while looking for something else I put in a “safe” place.

I am so relieved to have found these papers, I also found some of the journals that I kept of Daniel.

I need these papers to go over and evaluate where he has improved and see what things we should focus on now. Daniel and Ariel are going to have their progress evaluations for school soon and I want to be prepared way ahead of time. I will need these evaluations for Daniel as we sit with the evaluating teacher for homeschool, so I was freaking out that I could not find them. Since I was now able to breathe about that and move on with my preparations, I decided to look through the journals and his first evaluation.

Here are some of the things I had written down:

9/30/07 Daniel had a rough day. He fought me all through breakfast. He got very upset at church and we had to take him outside, he was happier while outside. When we got home he began to throw things and get progressively angry. He got very angry with me during lunch. The rest of the day the same. He can’t talk so I am not sure what upset him. I believe it was some sort of sensory issue but I cannot determine what it was. Pay closer attention next time.

10/05/07 I woke Daniel up today. He sat in the same room with Ariel and Joshua all day. He seemed very happy today. He got fussy at mealtimes but he did touch my arm and legs while I fed him. He had a good day, but was unable to go to sleep, finally fell asleep around 1am. It was a nice day.

10/06/07 Daniel peed all over himself in his sleep and woke up very angry. He got upset with me, Ariel, and Joshua, I am not sure why. He had a bottle in his mouth all day, whenever I tried to take it from him he would get aggressive and scream.

10/07/07 Daniel had a great day. I put on music and we all danced together for quite a while. He had a hard time during meals. Later in the day he sat in his room playing with his gears and a music mirror toys. He was able to go to sleep.

As I went through, there were so many days that I had written that he was in his room alone, he was angry, he was doing self harm, he threw things at me, he got angry at his food. He went through a period of time when he was doing “poo art”all over his bedroom, Ariel’s bedroom and the hallway. We had to feed him nothing but mushy food, covered in cottage cheese or something white. He would only eat white foods. We were not gluten-free at this time and pretty much year after year I have written down something about Daniel being upset during and after meal times. That has changed since we changed our diet.

I have this entry as a general observation 10/21/07:

Daniel mainly plays alone with particular toys, they usually play music or make noise. He is fixated to the point of obsession with ceiling fans and spinning toys. He will turn on every ceiling fan in the house and if we do not have them on he will become very upset.  When we have gone to people’s houses the first thing he does is turn on their ceiling fans and watch them and try to play the on/off game.

He beats on things repeatedly. He makes a game of turning the ceiling fan on/off and then beating on something as it spins from faster to slower. He also does this with turning lights on/off.

He loves music, especially heavy drums. He dances all the time, rocking back and forth.

He will not feed himself or drink from a cup.

He will not eat anything hard or crunchy.

He will not put anything in his mouth, just started to touch mouth with fingers.

11/2007

Does not hug or kiss

Avoids touching certain textures, foods, liquids on the table.

He has a toy or bottle at all times.

Stands still or moves against the traffic in group activities.

Shows little or no reaction to pain.

Shows behavior that seems difficult when its a response to tactile stimuli.

Those were for sensory issues I assume.

I did not label my entries with a title for certain list entries,  I wish I would have done that. He received a label from the OT “Motor Disturbance and Developmental Delay” on January 15, 2008. “Currently Fine Motor Skills, using the HELP, are at the developmental level of : ~24 month old. Daniel was 3 yrs old and 2 months during this evaluation.  Patient’s fine motor delays are partially due to poor attention to task and tactile sensitivities”. She also had a three paragraph description of his sensory issues. His gross motor skills were considered “fair”. After looking at the short-term goals and long-term goals for that year, I am happy that he has achieved them all and beyond.

We did not get to go back for formal progressive evaluations because of our insurance problems.

I did see his OT last year at an autism symposium and most likely will see her this year. She told me to come see her unofficially so she can see for herself how Daniel is doing. I think I will have to plan that, she is an amazing woman and I am so glad that we got her from the beginning. In my post  A Thankful Year I say that I am thankful for learning about the autism spectrum. Many people could misunderstand what I mean by that. I am not thankful for the hard things that Daniel had and does go through, the struggles that Daniel has, my personal struggles and facing my denial and confusion about all of it.

I am thankful that I have information.

I am thankful that there are so many resources and people who have already gone through life learning lessons with autism. I thankful that I can learn, grow, discover ways to help Daniel and the rest of us be able to live in this world better. I am thankful that the knowledge has given me awareness and understanding. I am thankful that I understand about how other people’s experience with autism is different and I can learn something from them or possibly help them understand it differently too.

Daniel has not miraculously stopped everything and now our life is great.

In the past two years Daniel has gotten progressively more verbal and that has changed our world. In the past 6 months his language has increased tremendously and that has made it possible for us to know what Daniel needs, wants, is happy about or angry about. When he is upset he does shut down at times but he is trying to talk when he can tell us. At times I just have to let him go and then go back and try to find a way to help. In Nov. 2009 Daniel was still drinking from a bottle and would not take it out all day except or meals. I wrote about that here The Bottle-My Nemesis!.

Getting rid of the bottle helped him find his voice.

There are just too many things to write about and at times I am too close to see the progress that Daniel has made. When I write about some of these things it helps me to step back and take a big picture look to see everything that is going on. I tend to be happy for a moment at his accomplishments but then jump right to the next thing that we should work on. Finding these papers will help me put things in perspective and actually help me see with clarity. I can’t wait for the day that Daniel can read all of this stuff and see all that he did.

I hope it gives him a sense of accomplishment and understanding that he doesn’t do things the way others do and that he doesn’t have to.

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