Kindergarten graduation

Liam has had a wonderful year at Frazer Memorial Kindergarten.  I had a lot of angst about putting him in private school and losing his IEP, but given the school situation here in Alabama, it was the best choice for him.

Mrs. Struthers reports he is ready for 1st grade and has done wonderfully.  She said his fine motor skills and writing have developed and improved.  Despite being the youngest in the class, by quite a bit, he is academically near the top of his class.  She said in the beginning of the year, he was more of an observer but now he socially engages with all his classmates.  He does become tearful easily but is working on controlling his tears with deep breathing and counting.  She said that one day she became tearful thinking how much she'd miss her class, and all of the kids started yelling "Do the breathing Liam does; it helps him!"  So he is clearly accepted as part of his class.

I am proud of him and his hard work this school year.  I will miss Frazer and his wonderful teacher.

Social Breakthroughs

Liam continues to develop by leaps and bounds and amaze everyone who meets him.  We have had two social breakthroughs recently.

First, Liam has a female friend from school....one he made on his own without my help.  It is reported she saves seats for him at lunch and she has gotten him to play Barbies.  I took them to the ballet and to say they were adorable to watch is an understatement.

 

 

Second, Liam initiated a conversation about something that interested me.  He tends to talk "at" you and not much wait for you to respond.  He also has tendency to ask repetitive questions and to focus on only things that interest him.  I was shocked Friday morning when we had the following conversation:

 

Liam: "How was your beer tasting last night, Mommy?"

 

Me: "It was a wine tasting, not beer.  I had a wonderful time.  Thank you for asking."

 

Liam: "How many wines did you try? 5?"

 

Me: "No, I tried 7 wines."

 

Liam: "Oh, 7 wines!  Which one was your favorite?"

 

Me: "My favorite was the Pouilly-Fuissé."

Liam: "Oh, the Pouilly-Fuissé (I giggled inside as he said that like he knew what I was talking about).  Was it the number 5 wine?"

Me: "No, it was the 2nd wine."

Liam: "Well, we should buy some if it was your favorite."

Me: "That is a wonderful idea and I did bring some home so Daddy could try it."



Ben's "graduation" and IEP progress report/ OT re-evaluation

On Tuesday, Ben had his last day of both speech and of his special education play group.  Ben's teacher had a little graduation ceremony and nothing is cuter than a just turned 3 year old wearing a construction paper graduation cap.

Ben's IEP quarterly progress report shows he MET every single social goal.  I was floored.  I am used to Liam's progress inching along with regressions.  Socially, Ben is just exploding.  We also had our last day of his Early Intervention social skills group today, and one of the more aggressive children was in Ben's personal space.  Ben kept cowering and hiding behind me.  After class he told me, "my necklace" (the little girl had grabbed his necklace) followed by "Ben sad."  He can even identify emotions.  Things like this just seem unbelievable to me.  It helps me let go of my worries about Ben, and let's me know that the kind of developmental delays he faces are much easier addressed than Liam.

On his IEP progress report, he still has alot of work to do on his speech goals.  His articulation still needs alot of work, and his senetence length is not what you'd expect of a 3 year old.  He can answer questions (almost better than Liam) except for "why" questions, he was at 0% for those.  Overall, since he started school based speech therapy, he has made amazing progress.  I worry about him having a break in therapy this summer, and I know he'll need private speech therapy as soon as we arrive in Montgomery. 

Ben had his OT re-evaluation a couple weeks ago.  His private OT noted that his muscle tone and strength were low average.  He was given the Peabody Developmental Motor Scales, and his "greasping" score is that of a 20 month old (tested at 37 months). Out of curiosity, I looked at Liam's OT evaluation done at nearly the same age (Liam was 38 months and Ben was 37 months....both were evaluated at the same therapy center here in Alaska, but by different OTs).  Liam's fine motor quaotient was tested as in normal limits at that point.  Interesting, since he is quite delayed now.  In any case, Ben's "grasping" score was low but it was evened out by his high score in visual motor integration.  In self-care skills, Ben tests as delayed.  He cannot remove a single item of clothing, not even socks or shoes.  This is a huge OT concern at the moment, as he needs to learn how to undress before he can learn how to dress.

As always with OT stuff, the sensory profile is where Ben really showed his OT needs.  His auditory system showed a definite difference and his OT noted "Ben has difficulty functioning in a crowded, noisy room often requiring to be touched before he will respond to his name or follow a direction."  Ben shows a definite difference in vesitibular processing and his OT notes that while he recently has begun to explore the swings, he "frequently demonstrates fear and takes a rigid posture when his feet leave the ground."

Overall, I am finding myself awed by the progress Ben has made.  I worry about him less and less.  It has helped as I forsee him losing his IEP after the move, but I think he will do fine with a good preschool setting and private OT and speech.

Leaps and Bounds

Exciting things are happening in Ben's world.  He started school based speech therapy a little over a month ago.  The progress he has made in that month is astounding.  I have become gun shy of using the term "language explosion" as I have seen regression/stalled progress following big gains, but it seems to fit. 

Ben is speaking in sentences finally!  In addition to that, he asks questions!!!!!!  Something I hear everyday while we drive, usually on the way home from wherever we were. "Where going, Mommy?"  "Ben, we are going back home." "Cause, why, Mommy?"  Oh, and mama is a word seldom heard, and the way he says Mommy is so cute.  In situations where he is comfortable, he'll talk a bit, but he still refuses to talk in many social situations.  His fluency is slow; he sounds like someone learning a foreign language.  He talks slowly, halts alot, and makes many grammatical errors.  But he is finally trying!

His articulation is improving, and he is so cooperative about practicing his speech homework.  He has been exclusively working on s-blends.  His first instinct is to drop the s, and his SLP has several cues for him to use it.  He cannot manage sp or sl, even with the cues, but he tries.  We work on word pairs, and initially he couldn't hear the difference between words off by only one letter, but now he totally gets it.

He is toe walking so much less!  His physical therapist said that the progress he makes from week to week is what she usually sees over a month or several months.  I am feeling confident that after we move this summer, we will be done with PT for good.

He had no problems adjusting to the little class he attends.  He waves bye-bye to me, and seems to have fun.  He has made his first ever friend with a little girl from the social skills class we have been in since September.  The little girl is shy and reserved and the two of them seem to understand each other.  Ben still isn't interested in socializing with most children.  Liam has always wanted to be part of the group but misses alot of social cues and is awkward in his interactions.  Ben, by contrast, seems to look at most kids with a sense of disgust and disinterest.  He likes people he interacts with reguarly, but much prefers adults to kids his age.

He has finally gotten over his dislike of Dave and happily goes to him.  It is more than that....when he hears the garage door open, he stops whatever he is doing and runs into the garage to get hugs from Dave.  Liam is happy to see Dave but often doesn't notice him until he has been home for awhile as he is too engrossed in what he is doing.

Ben seems to be making cognitive leaps.  He gets days of the week now and remembers the order things happen in with our crazy schedule.  He has finally figured out the pattern of counting and can count higher than 20.  Because of this, he spends alot of time counting.  Liam was like that for a very long time, and numbers have begun to signal, happy boys for me, so I sometimes don't take notice of the counting.

The only area with no progress is eating.  Ben still refuses most foods that need to be chewed, except for a limited number of safe foods.  He has recently added cheeseburger as a safe food, so that is something.  He will NOT touch food at all and would rather eat nothing that touch food with his hands.

His OT did a re-evaluation on him this week and said that he lacked many simple skills she'd expect in an 18 month old, but then had other skills that you don't expect to see until age 4.  We have had this problem with Liam, so it isn't new, but it means we have another child that testing is not completely accurate for, and who refuses to fit in the mold.

Overheard in these parts

Some things we have heard lately.

"Liam is the social leader in the classroom." from Liam's special education teacher....about Liam who refused to play with other children.  WOW.  I don't have words.

"I wish I had video of Liam last year to show how far he has come." from Liam's BCBA, his ABA therapist.

Liam's teacher assistant at his Montessori preschool also told me again that Liam is brilliant and told me to have him tell me what he did with her yesterday, but with Liam's pragmatic language delay, he cannot tell me anything more than that he did alot of words and some were hard.  I don't know if he read them or spelled them or wrote them.  I am guessing he was reading them, but Liam cannot seem to tell me exactly what he did that was so impressive.

Things heard from Liam:

On the night of November 30th as Dave tucked him into bed, "Goodnight Daddy; I'll see you in December."

This morning on learning that Christmas is on December 25th, "That means there are only 24 days until Christmas!"  However, when asked directly to subtract are how many days until a date, he claims not to know the answer.

When seeing a photo of the Elf on the Shelf in a Target circular, he asked "Is Christopher Pop-in-kins going to become a toy after Christmas?" At the moment, he thinks our elf, Christopher, moves by magic, but he seems confused about elves being pictured for sale and has an idea they might not be real. He is 4 years old!

Ben has started private speech and OT and is doing great and is even able to do his therapy without me present.  His tantrums are increasing in intensity however, and I am remembering how difficult they are to manage, especially as Liam gets upset  and says Ben is too loud and covers his ears and then begs me to make Ben stop.