sj turns 11!

Last weekend SJ had a big weekend.  He turned 11 on Sunday, but the celebration began on Friday.  I made his favorite cupcakes (yellow cake with a butter cream icing colored orange) for him to take in to his class.  He was so happy all day on Friday.  He told me that Mrs. Valentine had a Happy Birthday message for him on the board when he got into his classroom.  He had shared his cupcakes and only had a few left. 

The next day was his party.  He had invited all 16 boys from his class, my nephews and my niece and a few other friends.  Not all of his classmates were able to come, but he did have quite a few that came (15 guests plus Bob and SJ).  He decided on a Lego themed party.  I decorated the gift bags to look like Lego bricks.  SJ picked out mini-figs, gum, glow necklaces, Skittles candy and some white chocolate Lego bricks that I made for each of the gift bags.  I made him a Lego cake with a over sized mini-fig man on top. 

It had been unseasonably cold where we live for weeks.  Fortunately, we were having a slightly warmer day on SJ's party day.  Since we had so many kids coming, we decided to have the kids participate in a scavenger hunt.  We split the kids into teams of 4.  They had to search our yard for bags that had their Lego pieces in them.  After they found all their Lego pieces and their instruction manual, they had to return to our house.  We had them taking turns building their creations.  They could only build for two pages and then a teammate would have to continue.  The first team to finish was the winning team.  Their prize was one of the completed Lego sets (airplanes and helicopters).  It took the kids quite sometime to finish this activity (almost 45 minutes).  They all seemed to enjoy this activity!

After they were done with the scavenger hunt, we had them take a guess at how many Legos were in the glass jar.  We had guesses from 78 to 1000.  I told the kids to make their guess.  The winning guess would be the person who was the closest without going over (Price is Right style).  There was 631 Legos in the jar.  The closest guess was my niece, who guessed 576.  She won a gift card to Subway.

We also had one last Lego themed activity.  I had my husband build this ramp.  SJ and he painted it and he added molding to the boards to make racing lanes.  We had out a box of loose Legos and wheels for the kids to create their vehicles.  I was going to make a game out of it, but we ended up letting the kids just use it for fun.  It was very interesting to see the different vehicles that they came up with.  Not all the kids used the raceway, but the ones who did were have a great time racing.

After we played the games, the kids had pizza, cake and ice cream.  We then opened all of SJ's presents.  He got a lot of nice things and he was very happy.  When we were done with all the official birthday party activities, the kids went outside to play Nerf guns, basketball and with the Lego raceway. 

The boys all left and just my nephews and niece were still at our house.  My oldest nephew, Gabe, got hurt while playing basketball, so my sister and brother-in-law took him to an urgent care center.  He had broken a bone in his foot.  I felt terrible.  He was doing something typical of a 12 year old boy.  They had put three bike ramps on top of each other and were attempting to do slam dunks.  I was sort of anticipating an injury.  Call me psychic, but I would have rather been wrong this time.  He and my other nephew, Cedar, were supposed to both have a sleepover.  Obviously, Gabe wasn't going to be able to stay.  We did still have Cedar stay over. 

SJ spent the evening building his new Lego sets, while Cedar and Bob played video games.  Towards the end of the night, my husband put on a movie for all of us to watch together.  It was really nice to have Cedar for the night.  The next day, we drove Cedar back to my house and visited with my sister's family until lunch time. 

After lunch, we left my mom's house and stopped at Target.  SJ had gotten some gift cards and cash and was browsing.  He is a big browser.  We were in there for over an hour.  After an hour, he settled on a tennis headband, a sleeve of tennis balls, a new Lego set and two Lego boards.  (He still has more birthday money to spend, but he likes to spread out his purchases.)  SJ had a great birthday weekend!

 

after school speech part 51

SJ had his weekly speech therapy session on Tuesday.  We had planned on doing his speech homework right after school.  Unfortunately, there was a bridge accident in our school district, so the buses were running behind 15 minutes.  SJ was not in the mood to complete the work when we got home, but we did manage to finish it. 



When we got to the therapy office, I told her how he handled completing the homework.  He did very well with identifying key elements in sentences worksheet.  He had a little trouble with the following directions worksheet.  I had to prompt him a few times while he completed it.  The last worksheet was on identifying associated objects.  He had some trouble with this worksheet as well.  Some of the answers were not the correct ones, but they did make sense somewhat.  For example:  horse and ________.  He should have said buggy, but he said cowboy.  Some I had to prompt him on, because he had no idea.  One of the ones that he had difficulty with was cork and __________.  He didn't know what a cork was, so I had to explain that they are in wine bottles.



During the session, she went over the ones that he had trouble with.  She said with practice he was getting it.  She said they also continued to work on identifying words from definitions.  She said he didn't always know what the answer should be.  Out of the ten they did together, he was only able to define 5 correctly.  After she explained some unfamiliar vocabulary to him, he was able to get 4 out of the 5 wrong answers correct.  She assigned the remainder as homework. 



They also worked on forming compound nouns.  He needed to select a word from column one and put it with a word from column two.  Then, he needed to write a definition.  They completed one together.  His words were tugboat, beehive and notebook.  These were his definitions.

tugboat-a kind of boat

beehive-a place where bees live

notebook-something you write in





I asked her if he told her that his birthday was coming up.  She said he did.  He told her that I was going to be making cupcakes to take in for his class on Friday.  He also told her that he was having a Lego themed party. 



She assigned him another following directions worksheet and we were to complete the compound noun worksheet.  SJ did fine with the following directions worksheet.  (He was complaining, but it was fairly simple for him.)  He needed some prompts with the remainder of the compound nouns.  His words were streetlight, dishtowel, roommate, skateboard, supermarket and campfire.  These were his definitions.

streetlight-a light to light up the street

dishtowel-a towel to wash dishes

roommate-a person to share your room

skateboard-a board with wheels

supermarket-a big market

campfire-a fire when you camp

After speech, we went to Target.  We had to get some things for SJ's birthday party.  We needed to get the plates, napkins, drinks, chips and prizes.  After we left Target, SJ was chatting away to me.  He was talking about his party and the friends who were coming.  Some of the kids hadn't officially RSVP'd yet, but they had told SJ that they were coming.  I hoped for his sake they were truly coming.  I wouldn't want him disappointed.

 

At home reading tutoring part 20

Last Monday, SJ had his weekly reading tutoring session. He was already in a bad mood from school. They have a Science Olympiad for 5th and 6th grade students. They are randomly paired up with other students. He was paired with a few older girls that he didn't know. (If you are a reader of this blog, you know how SJ feels about girls.)

When Mrs. Banks arrived at our house, he was still fairly crabby about that.  Mrs. Banks spent a few minutes talking to him about it. She was able to calm him down. Thank you Mrs. Banks!

They started the session with a Reader's Theater called "WorryWarts" by Pamela Duncan Edwards.  It was an alliteration play with a lot of "w" words. It had 15 characters. SJ chose Narrators 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6, Wombat, Woodpecker, Wolf and Owl. The characters are talking about all the worrisome things that can happen in the world.

Next, she had SJ do a Look and Find worksheet. He had to find 10 coins in a leprechaun scene.

Then, she had SJ work on an analogy worksheet. He had a word bank to fill in the first 7.  For example: race: finish line: rainbow: _______________. He needed to fill in "pot of gold". She said he did very well with this activity.

Next, she had SJ choose the words to fill in the blanks. These words would be inserted into a Mad Lib style story. These were his words and the story with his words inserted. 

 

noun-a plant  sunflower

adjective shiny

color green

noun clover

noun-a country United States

noun-plural caps

adjective bored

adverb happily

verb walk

adjective despicable

verb run

adjective light

noun-body part head

verb-past tense played

adjective burned

verb-past tense tricked

adjective dirty

noun leprechauns

Lewis the Leprechaun

Look under a four-leaf sunflower, and you might find Lewis. Lewis is a shiny man.  He wears green and carries magic in his clover.  He is a leprechaun!

Lewis comes from a green isle known as United States.  He collects cups in bored pots.  Then he works happily to walk his pots.  After a rainstorm, despicable rainbows run out to show the way to the pots!

Once a light boy caught Lewis by the head.  Lewis played to grant the boy a wish.  The boy let go of Lewis.  Then that burnt leprechaun tricked!  The dirty boy should have made his wishfirst.  Never ever let go of a leprechaun until he gives you your leprechaun!

The last thing they did together was a St. Patrick's Day Glyph.  SJ had to choose the following options to finish the glyph.  He decided the color of the leprechaun's outfit (light green-he owns a green shirt), color of the leprechaun's eyes (brown-he has brown eyes),color of his hair (red-he is a boy), color of the pot (gray-he can find Ireland on a map, but it may take him some time) and the color of the coins (yellow-he knows someone who is Irish).  He also had to draw and color his favorite green veggie (peas) to the right of the leprechaun and his favorite green fruit (green apple) to the left of the leprechaun.  This is the finished glyph.

 

no tutoring monday, after school speech part 50 and redecorating

On Monday, SJ was supposed to have after school tutoring.  Bob had mentioned to me that Mrs. Banks had left school early and said she may be a few minutes late for SJ's session.  I told him that was fine, since we didn't have any other plans that night.  SJ was whining as usual about having tutoring, but I reminded him (once again) that it wasn't his decision. 

Around 4:00, the phone rang.  I didn't recognize the number, but it was local.  It was Mrs. Banks.  She had a doctor's appointment earlier in the day.  She wasn't feeling 100% and wanted to know if it was okay if we cancelled the session.  Of course if it was up to SJ, it would be a no brainer.  However, it is up to me.  I told her that was fine and gave her well wishes. 

I told SJ the news (good news if you ask him) and we continued on with our normal evening routine.  We had dinner, they played video games, they had a snack and then got ready for bed.  Pretty boring, I know. 

The next day, SJ had his after school speech session.  He was complaining about going, but I reminded him that he already had reading tutoring cancelled this week.  His speech therapist said he did a nice job with her.  They worked on vocabulary.  She said there were still quite a few words that he had trouble with.  She had given me "tame" as an example.  I thought he should have known that word, but he possibly may have never learned that. 

She said they also went over associated objects, such as bread and __________.  He would need to put in the word butter.  She assigned him a worksheet on those for homework last week.  We hadn't finished it, but she asked that we finish them for next week. 

We left speech and made our way to Target.  SJ's birthday is coming up in a couple of weeks.  I wanted SJ to pick out some new curtains and a lamp for his room.  (He still had the items in the Cars decor, which is too "little kidish" for an 11 year old.)  He also wanted to get an alarm clock for his room.  We looked at all the models that Target had.  It was a big decision, but he ended up getting a Venturer clock radio.  He can use the traditional radio or plug his IPod into it.  It also came with different "skins", so he can swap them out.  He was particularly excited over the plain white one.  He wanted to draw the characters from his comic books on that one. 

After we decided on the alarm clock, we went to look at curtains.  He quickly found an orange colored set (really they are rust colored) and then picked out a very modern looking lamp.  He did a great job picking out the new items for his room. 

When we got home, he designed the skin for the alarm clock.  It turned out well.  He loves it!  We hung the curtains and replaced the lamp.  I was a little sad to see the Cars things go into the Goodwill box, but he is just not a little guy anymore.

friday blues turns into smiles

On Friday, SJ was in a very bad mood at the end of the day.  Apparently he noticed next week's school calendar in the office and spotted something disturbing.  Our school is having their 5th grade state writing test.  He was very upset over it.  He was crying and rambling on and on about how it was going to give him nightmares.  I told him that it would only be a couple of days, but he was convinced that it was all five days.  "That is what the calendar said, Mom," he cried. 

I knew that they had probably set aside a few days for make-ups, but there was no talking to SJ.  I told him to calm down and reminded him that he would be fine.  I never put any stress on these assessment tests.  They don't affect their grades, so I just tell them to try their best.  I dropped them off at our house and went to get the kids.

When I got back with the kids, SJ had calmed down.  I noticed a note that he had written.  I thought it was very telling.  I couldn't express his feelings any better than he has.  This is the letter.

On one hand, I am glad that SJ was able to calm himself down and write down his feelings.  But on the other hand, it is so frustrating that an assessment test would make him this upset.  I am going to take this in to his school and show it to Mrs. Valentine and his aide. 

The kids stayed at our house until their normal time.  After they left, we got ready for our friends to come over.  Topher and Willie's families were coming over as well as another family that we are friends with.  They all started arriving around 7 p.m.  SJ was excited to see his friends and for the fact that we were having pizza.  The boys had a great time playing video games while Topher and Willie's sisters watched movies with our other friends' daughters.  Our guests stayed until a little after 11.  I was glad that SJ's day ended on a good note.  Hopefully, he won't be too upset when the tests come this week.

after school speech part 49

Yesterday, SJ had his weekly speech therapy session.  He wasn't too thrilled to be going to speech, but he was still going.  At least this week, the complaining only lasted until we started a drive to the speech therapy office. 

His therapist said he did very well for her.  They continued to work on idioms.  She said he is getting better at them.  I told her he had used one in a sentence the day before.  He said he was "having butterflies in his stomach" over taking a writing PSSA test the next week.  She seemed pleased that he was using it appropriately.

She said they were working on identifying associated objects.  She said he had some trouble with this activity.  She said he wanted to give her synonyms instead of an associated object.  For example:  soap and _________.  His response was shampoo when it should have been water.  She assigned a sheet of these for homework.

She also started working on identifying key elements in sentences.  They did the first few together.  She said he did pretty well with this.  She said he could finish the remainder of the worksheet for homework.

The last thing she assigned him for homework was multiple direction worksheet.  She wants me to keep track of how many times I have to give him the instructions in order for him to complete it. 

After speech, we made our usual stop at Target for some household items.  SJ wanted to look at the toys, so we made our way back to that section.  SJ couldn't find anything within his budget, so he left empty handed.  We stopped at Subway and got Bob's dinner.  SJ was very quiet on the way home.  Between bites of his McDonald's and playing on his IPod, he didn't have much to say.  I would rather have that than the complaining that I was hearing earlier. 

at home reading tutoring part 19

On Monday, SJ had his weekly after school reading tutoring session with Mrs. Banks.  He had a pretty good day at school and I was hoping the good mood would continue into the tutoring session.  He grumbled a tiny bit when she first arrived, but she said he settled down quickly.  They started out the session with two Reader's Theaters.

The first one was called "At the Restaurant" by Beth Beutler.  It only had three characters, two of which were boys.  SJ chose to read both boy parts.  It was about two people on a first date.  The second play was called "Stirring the Pot" also by Beth Beutler.  It had only two characters.  It was an older sister and a little brother.  SJ chose to read the little brother part.  They were trying to make sauce and some of the sauce splattered on the sister.  Mrs. Banks said SJ did very well with both short plays.

Next, they read a short story called "Toss that Pizza Dough!" by Colleen Messina.  It was about what goes into making pizza and dough.  SJ then had to answer 8 questions about the story and complete one written response.  Mrs. Banks said he did very well with the questions.  He got them all correct.  When he got to the written response, he got a little upset.  He was concerned since there were many blank lines.  She told him he would be able to handle it and had him complete it.  The written response was to these questions:  Has he ever made dough from scratch, What did he do with the dough and Did he enjoy working with it?  This was his response.

Yes, I have made dough from scratch.  I made pizza.  Yes, I like working with it.

Then, Mrs. Banks had SJ do a Mad Lib activity.  He made up his own words to be filled into a story called "Personal Pizza".  This is his story with his words.

What should I put on my pizza?  Mom is farting pizzas, and I play one for myself. 
I think I will start with a nice happy tomato bathroom.  I know I want to put sad cheese over everything at the end.  What do I go in the middle?
I will have some cooked meat.  Perhaps some bacon, ground beef, or bored duck would be good.  We also have tired chicken and ham in the fridge.  Maybe they would be good too. 
What else can I put on it?  I found some blue peppers.  They taste good.  Look, I see some chunks of soda.  This is going to be a great pizza.  The only question is this:  can I stop all the toppings on?

She gave him an easy task next.  She had him do a I Spy type worksheet.  He needed to find all the slices of pizza that were hidden in the picture.  He did very well with this.  See the attached worksheet.

Then, she had SJ look at another I Spy picture.  He had to look at the picture and answer the questions.  He also did very well with this as well.  See the attached sheets.

Then, Mrs. Banks had SJ read the 12 Slices of Pizza.  At first, SJ complained about reading it, since the packet was quite thick.  He realized there weren't many sentences on each page.  About halfway through the packet, he finally realized it was similar to the 12 Days of Christmas.  He told her he didn't like the 12 Days of Christmas, but she had him finish it anyway.  At the end of the story, he had to answer some questions.  He did very well on them.  Then, he had to draw a slice of pizza with toppings and write a descriptive story about it.  In case you can't read his writing, this is what he wrote. 

I made the crust out of people.  The sauce is blood.  The cheese is butter.  I put a butt as the topping.  BEWARE of farting. 

She said she knew this was coming, since there was a farting pizza in one of previous activities.  She told him this was okay, because he was doing it at home.  She reminded him that this would not be acceptable at school.  Here is his completed pizza slice.  

The last thing they worked on was a pizza glyph.  SJ decided on the color of the plate (blue-he likes thin crust), the color of the boy's hair (black-he eats pizza once a week), the color of the boy's shirt (blue and red-he likes restaurant and homemade pizza), what to circle (hands-he likes to pick his pizza up with his hands) and the color of the sauce (red-he dips his pizza in pizza sauce).  He also had to finish the speech bubble and draw on his favorite pizza toppings.  This is his finished glyph. 

parent-teacher conference, errands and daddy's return

Last Friday was a very busy day for the three of us.  My husband was still out of town.  He would be returning later that night.  I had both of the boys’ parent-teacher conferences Friday morning.  I had Bob's first.  Everything was going well for him.  Thank goodness!

Next, I had SJ's conference with Mrs. Valentine.  She said she was very pleased with the progress he has been making.  She said he has been grumbling less and less.  She said when he does occasionally grumble, she walks over to him and whispers in his ear that he has one minute to stop.  She said most times this warning is enough to get him to pull himself together. 

She also told me that his aide has him very well trained.  He knows that she or Mrs. Valentine is not going to tolerant tantrums.  He will lose his recess, which is something he loves.  She showed me some of his work projects.  She seemed very proud of his work (I am so proud too!).

She told me is very well liked in the classroom.  He has two boys who he talks about all the time.  I asked her if it was one-sided.  She said it isn't.  Those boys enjoy SJ as much as he enjoys them.  What a wonderful thing to hear! 

After I returned home, we had a few errands to run.  We dropped off our aluminum cans at the recycling center, got the boys’ lunch and then went to my sister Sally's house.  She had surgery done, so I made her a small lasagna.  SJ didn't want to go to Aunt Sally's house.  She has a big, black lab.  SJ is a little nervous around dogs.  One of our neighbor's dogs playfully nipped him on the rear end a few years ago.  Ever since then, he gets crazy around dogs. 

When we got to Sally's house, he wouldn't even go into her house until I had her dog outside and out of SJ's reach.  SJ planted himself in the kitchen on a chair to keep away from Sally's dog.  We only stayed about 20 minutes due to SJ's fear and Bob's allergies.  We left Sally's and picked up my husband's favorite pizza.  We were surprising him with it as a welcome home gift. 

We went home and the boys were back into electronic zombie mode.  My husband returned around 6:30.  SJ told him all about his week and my husband gave them a few gifts from San Francisco.  They were so happy to have him home (I was over the moon!).  A great way to end a very long day!

SJ's completed mask

after school speech part 48

Last Tuesday, it was time for SJ's after school speech.  SJ was in a fairly good mood, but Bob was extremely crabby.  My husband was out of town, so I had to take Bob with us to the appointment.  He kept lobbying to stay at home by himself, but I don't feel that he is quite mature enough yet.  We drove out to the speech therapy office with Bob complaining the whole way. 

I walked SJ in and told Bob I had my fill of his complaints.  I told him that they had been filed and would be reviewed at a later date.  I drove to Subway (in a local Wal-Mart) and we went inside.  I got Bob's normal order (ham and cheese on flatbread) and two cookies (chocolate chip for Bob and snicker doodle for SJ). 

We then went to McDonald's to get SJ's usual dinner (two hamburgers with no pickles, medium fry and a small Hi-C orange).  I also got Bob a medium fry.  We drove back to the speech therapy office.  Bob started to complain that we were 8 minutes early, but I cut him off.  I told him to relax and eat his dinner. 

SJ came out of the office about 5 minutes later.  I asked his therapist how he did.  She said he did very well.  She said they mostly worked on the idioms.  She said he got 19/28 correct.  He had trouble with "blowing his own horn", "he's nuts about you" and "has a heart of gold".  She said they will continue to work on them. 

I asked her if she told him that my husband was out of town.  He had.  He told her he was in San Francisco and would not be back until last Friday. 

When we got home, SJ had homework to do.  I usually help him with language arts and my husband helps with math.  SJ had been worried that he would have math to do while my husband was away.  To his fruition, he had math homework that evening.  Oh no!  I am terrible with math.  Fortunately, it was two very simple problems.  Whew!  What a relief!