fun at school and after school speech part 42

The Tuesday before Christmas Eve, SJ and Bob had a fun day at school. In the afternoon, all of the students participated in a charity activity. The kids sell treats, drinks, toys, etc. or play games. All of the proceeds go to charity. Mrs. Valentine told me that her class alone raised over $500!

SJ joined up with three of his boy classmates. They sold root beer floats and 2 minute knee hockey games. SJ was super excited for this event. Bob and a friend were having short soccer matches in the gym. Bob asked that I buy water bottles for the kids to have after they were done with their matches. I gave each boy $15, so they could buy something. SJ came home with $3. Bob came home with nothing. I asked him what he got with his money. He said he bought a drink and then put the rest in the donation bucket. That was so sweet! I am crying a little thinking about how selfless that was!

After school, they told me all about their afternoon event. They were bubbling with excitement. Well, at least until I told SJ he had speech. "What?" he asked. "I thought you cancelled it," he said. "No, I cancelled next week's and the week after," I told him. "But I don't want to go to speech," he said. "I know, but you are going. You will get two weeks off after that," I reminded him. That bit of good news fell on deaf ears.

He was complaining about speech all the way to therapy. I did my best to plan ignore his behavior. When we got inside the waiting area, SJ transformed from a complaining child to a well behaved little man. I told his therapist that I had not been able to complete any homework. (Too busy with baking and crafts. Not a good excuse, but a truthful one.) She said that was fine and took him back.

When he was done 30 minutes later, he came out with a present from her and I told him his dinner was in the car. She said he did very well. He told her all about school and reminded her that he would not be there for the next two weeks. She assigned him homework. I promised her that we would complete it and the homework from the week before over the break. I guess I better go that now while I am thinking of it.

at home reading tutoring part 8

Last Monday, SJ had his weekly after school reading tutoring.  This was the first of two sessions that he had last week.  He was mentally already on Christmas vacation, so he was extremely resistant to begin the session.  After a few threats of losing his electronics, he finally came down to work with Mrs. Banks.  She said they had a rough start, but he did settle down after a few minutes. 

They began the session with a reader's theater.  They read a play called "Redheaded Robbie's Christmas Story" by Bill Luttrell.  SJ chose his four characters, which were Narrator 1, Narrator 4, Big Eddie and Munching Max.  The story is about a kid who gets tongue tied when he gets nervous.  He gets assigned to write a Christmas story, but he thinks he can't do it.  He visits a few a children for help and then has trouble telling his story to an assembly.  The children he visited then help him get through the story.  It was a very nice little play.  Mrs. Banks said he read very well. 

Next, they worked on a Look and Find activity sheet.  SJ did very well with that activity. 

Then, they moved on to a worksheet where SJ had to fill in past tense verbs, adjectives and plural nouns in the blanks.  He didn't want to write in the answers, so Mrs. Banks scribed for him.  She said he some difficulty with this activity and I wasn't too surprised to hear that.  See the activity sheet below. 

She moved on to a preferred activity next.  They did a Christmas themed crossword puzzle.  He did very well with this activity and enjoyed it very much.  She finished the session with a Christmas Tree Glyph.  Mrs. Banks said he did much better with this glyph than he has done with the previous glyphs.  His choices decided how the page was colored.  The tree's ribbon is red, because we put up our tree after Thanksgiving.  The tree's trunk is dark brown, since we decorate a real tree.  His star is purple, because he likes colored lights that do not blink.  The tree is dark green due to the fact that he is a boy.  The tree was to only to have ornaments if he had pets.  We have no pets, so there are not any ornaments.  There are four presents, because there are four people in our family.  (I am having trouble scanning in color, so you will have to trust me on the colors.)  Considering the very rough start, SJ did a good job.

at home tutoring part 7

Last Wednesday, SJ had a second tutoring session. His specialist had recommended that we go with twice a week tutoring. Mrs. Banks isn't free most weeks to do two sessions with SJ. Fortunately for us, the kid she was scheduled to tutor that night cancelled. (This was unfortunate for SJ. He did not want to have a second session. Oh well!)

She started out the session by reading a play with SJ called "The Baker's Dozen A Saint Nicholas Tale". He didn't really understand the concept of what a baker's dozen is, so Mrs. Banks explained that to him. He chose his characters and they read the play. She said SJ seemed to understand the concept of a baker's dozen much clearer after they completed the play.

Next, they read a story titled, "The First Gingerbread Men". After reading the story, SJ had to answer four questions about the story. This was great for his comprehension troubles. Mrs. Banks said he did okay with this activity.

Then, they moved onto a crossword puzzle that asked questions about gingerbread. SJ LOVES crossword puzzles. There was a word bank that went along with the crossword. SJ did very well with this activity.

She then moved onto an "I Spy" worksheet. SJ had to find the 12 decorations that were hiding in the scene. He flew through that worksheet.

Lastly, they did a glyph with a gingerbread man. Mrs. Banks said that rushed through some of the choices without fully reading them. For example: He saw the 2nd one that said color of gingerbread man's hair. Without reading all of the choices, he chose blue. Blue was for "I have never met a cookie I did not like." That is not true, since SJ does not like any cookies with chocolate in them. (I know that sounds crazy, but that is how he is!)  He should have chosen red, since that response was "I love snicker-doodle cookies". He loves that kind.

When he realized his mistake, he wanted to correct it. Mrs. Banks told him it was too late and he should slow down and read all of the choices. He was a little more careful after that. This is his completed gingerbread man glyph.

Considering how grumpy SJ was to begin the session, he managed to get through it. I am thankful for that!

 

at home reading tutoring part 6

On Monday, SJ had his reading tutoring session. He wasn't as grumpy about it as usual, so I thought that was a positive sign. Mrs. Banks started off the session by reading the play, The Grinch Who Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss. She let SJ choose the characters he wanted to read. He chose the Grinch, Who 2 and Who 4.

She said he did a very nice job with it. (Dr. Seuss has always been a favorite of SJ's.) She said SJ changed his voice for his characters. She said this was quite amusing. I was not surprised to hear that he did that. He has been doing that for years. It may be his thing, but I tended to alter my voice when I used to read the boys books nightly.

Next, she showed him an "I Spy" type picture. He had to find a variety of things in the picture (such as how many mice can you find) and write in things in the picture (such as can you thing of a line or two from a Christmas song? Write it in the bubble above the girl decorating the tree.) Mrs. Banks said he was a little frustrated with this activity, but they got through it.

Last, they worked on an analogy worksheet. SJ was given a word bank and he had to fill in the appropriate word. For example: menorah: candleholder :: dreidel : ___________. SJ had to fill in toy. He didn't understand some of the vocabulary, but with her explanation he was able to finish the worksheet.

When they were done with that worksheet, she told him that their time was up. She said he checked her phone and said, "But it is not 5:15 yet." She reminded him that she got to our house a few minutes early. "Oh, that is right," he remembered. Overall, she said he worked really hard and he had a good session.

 

after school speech part 41

Last Tuesday, SJ had his weekly after school speech session. He gave me as much difficulty going to speech as he did to have Mrs. Banks over for tutoring. Sometimes you just have to get back into your routine. (I guess mine is to listen to constant complaining!)

His therapist spent the entire session finishing the testing. She assigned us homework on Speaking Well. It had ten actions that is something you should not do as the speaker in a conversation. He needed to rewrite (or I would scribe) each statement to say what he should do. She asked that I use these skills while talking about something that happened at school.

He wasn't too happy when we did this assignment. (I did interrupt his Wii game, so it was somewhat understandable.) He did okay with it. I did have to prompt him on a few of the actions. One of the ones he had trouble with was this one. Use a monotone voice; don't show your emotion by the way you speak. I had to give him an example of the monotone voice (robot voice) while describing something that should have made me very excited.

He also had trouble with another action that was very similar. It was to keep your facial expressions blank or neutral; don't show any emotion. I began to pretend cry while I was supposed to upset. I asked SJ how I was feeling. Was I happy or sad? With the example, he knew I was sad.

The remainder of the actions he answered mostly correct. For example: Look beyond your listener to see if anything else interesting is going on. His response was to look at their eyes and mouth. He wasn’t exactly accurate, but fairly close.

After speech, he ate his dinner in the car on our way to pick up food for Bob and my husband. There was a hair cutting place next to Subway. I needed to take SJ for a haircut to correct the one he had given himself a few days earlier.

Flashback to Saturday afternoon: I was cleaning the garbage out of his can when I saw a lot of hair. "What is this hair doing in this can, SJ?" I questioned him. "I needed a haircut, so I cut the front," he replied. "Well, you are not allowed to cut your hair. If you need a haircut, just tell me or Daddy," I told him.

Back to Tuesday, we went into the hair place and there was going to be a 10 minute wait. I told SJ we would get the food from Subway first and then come back. We came back and SJ was called back for the haircut. When she was done, she said she couldn't do much with the front. "Either you or he cut his hair very short in the front," she said. "Oh, that would have been him. That is why I needed you to work your magic," I told her. She did a nice job and we made our way home. Too much activity for a school night!

 

at home reading tutoring part 5

Last Monday, SJ had his after school reading tutoring. He wasn't too happy to get back into his routine after Thanksgiving break. Oh well! He kept telling me to cancel it, but there was NO WAY that was going to happen.

Mrs. Banks started out the session by telling SJ that they were going to read three different stories about foods. Then, he would need to fill in circles that pertained to the foods in the three different stories. The foods were fruitcake, gingerbread and pumpkin pie. SJ wanted to just fill in the chart without reading the stories. Mrs. Banks told him to go ahead, but he may need to change his answers after reading the stories.

He quickly filled out the chart that had 8 food traits. They then read the different stories. Sure enough, SJ had answered many of the selections incorrectly. Mrs. Banks allowed him to change his answers once he had all the correct information.

Next, she showed him a coloring page of an elf. She then presented him with a glyph. The glyph gave him directions depending on how SJ would answer the questions. For example: How do you unwrap presents? If he unwraps them carefully, he needed to color the elf's shoes light green. If he rips the wrapping paper into shreds, he needed to color the shoes dark green. This is the finished elf after SJ answered the remaining 7 questions.  They decided the elf's shirt color, pant color, where the star would be drawn, hat color, eye color and where SJ's favorite toy would be drawn.  He did a great job on the elf glyph.

Even though he was reluctant to have tutoring, Mrs. Banks said he did a very nice job. I am glad that he is working hard for her (even if it is unwillingly).

 

Thanksgiving break, blood work and back to school

The rest of our Thanksgiving break was nice. After all of our guests left, we had a few pretty low key days. My husband and I had the boys help us bring down the Christmas decorations. (And we have a lot of decorations!) We had over twenty 20 gallon buckets. They were full of holiday serving dishes and cups, ornaments, lights, trains, train accessories and general Christmas decor. The boys were a big help! I had taken down all of our Thanksgiving decor two days after Thanksgiving, so I had SJ assist me put those back in the attic.

It took me a few days to get the bulk of the decorations up and put away. The boys spent the remainder of their break either playing outside or in an electronic coma. I didn't care too much though. It was their break and they needed time to relax.

On Monday, I did have to take SJ to get his yearly blood work for his specialist. He wasn't too thrilled when I told him where we were going that day. "No. Not blood work!" he cried. "Yes, blood work," I replied. I told him that he would be fine and he could have whatever he wanted to eat for lunch after. That did not satisfy him, but we still forged ahead.

We got to the hospital around 11:00 a.m. I got SJ registered and we got a beeper to let us know when they would be ready for us. SJ was fine in the waiting room. They had a Playmobile train set and a marble course that was fascinating to him. After a good hour, the beeper went off. As soon as the beeper went off, the waterworks started again.

"I don't want them to take my blood, Mom," sobbed SJ. "You'll be fine. It will be over very soon," I reassured him. The tech was very nice and patient with SJ. She inserted the butterfly needle (that is what SJ says it looks like) and started drawing the blood. SJ cried the entire time and tried to pull out the butterfly at least three times. The tech kept asking him questions to distract him and it did work a little. However, he still continued to cry.

When it was all done (she took 9 vials of blood), she gave him an orange Band-Aid and told him how well he did. I thanked her and we walked to our car. His crying started to slow down, but he was now complaining that his arm was injured. So dramatic! On our way home, our one friend called to see if SJ and Bob would like to come over to play. SJ said he was "too injured" to go, so I took him home and dropped Bob off at his friend's house.

SJ was lying on the couch when I returned home. He said he didn't feel good, so I took him temperature to appease him. Sure enough, he had a fever! I guess he really wasn't feeling good. I felt bad that I thought he was being overly dramatic. I gave him some Motrin and told him to rest on the couch.

He was feeling better the following day. The boys played outside with a neighbor and were complaining about going back to school on Wednesday. "Well, at least it is a short week boys," I told them. That didn't seem to console them. Oh well, all good things must come to an end. I reminded them that they only had 18 days of school until Christmas break. "That is a long time," said SJ. Maybe that is when your 10.