“Together We Grow”, the program that the Monster is enrolled in at school, is a standard kindergarten for the purposes of the school system. They follow the regular curriculum, such as it is, and that includes homework.
Of course, the Monster had homework all last year, but this is different – it’s more in-depth now, longer, and tends to be something that entails more of a fight with him at certain points. Continue reading
As we’re preparing for next week’s assessment meeting, I’m still struck sometimes by the differences between the child we see at home and the one that his professionals see at the school.
Now, I think all kids are different in front of their parents as opposed to the school environment. I was probably more respectful of my teachers than I was of my parents growing up – there was, after all, a limit to what teachers were going to be willing to put up with as opposed to my parents who were kind of stuck with me. Likewise, I was certainly not as diligent about showing off what I knew at home versus at school, since I wasn’t being graded at home… Continue reading
On Thursday night, during the Autism Society of Baltimore/Chesapeake meeting, there was an interesting discussion about what a school is actually required to provide.
The conversation started with a parent discussing that her child – who is four – is showing an interest in writing, but the school system is asserting that they’re not required to provide OT to teach the child a proper tripod grip because that’s a “kindergarten” skill. The basic thrust, as the members of the panel asserted, is that the school is not required to pursue ‘advanced skills’, but to provide a ‘free and appropriate public education’ as they define it. Continue reading
It’s a rare Saturday morning post from me, while I’m at home with both kids – the wife is at her book club while I’m watching the women’s National Championship final in curling by webstream.
Now, granted, I do wish I were in Philadelphia to watch it in person, the way I was able to two years ago, shortly after R was born. Doing what we want is not always possible – something us parents with special needs kids understand very, very well – but it also lets me look back on how far we’ve come since the last time I was able to go in person. Continue reading
Last night, after all the hullabaloo about the Monster’s failed IEP meeting, and more so about how I responded to it, the wife asked if getting a facilitator for the next meeting might not be a “good idea”.
Personally, I don’t see the point, if only because I’m not quite sure what a facilitator would be doing at the meeting. Continue reading
As you can tell from my title, it was not a good meeting this morning.
So Baltimore City Public Schools were delayed by two hours this morning on account of the snow and ice left over from yesterday’s not-quite-a-storm. Expecting that this might wreak havoc with the meeting schedule – we had the IEP meeting at 9:30 today – I reached out to his teacher Ms. A, who in turn reached out to the interim IEP Chair to find out if we were actually going to meet today or if there’d be a rescheduling. Continue reading
So I came home yesterday evening after most of four days away at my bonspiel…
Now, I don’t know that the kids really missed me being gone, but it’s certainly a different vibe when I’m not here, if only because of the differences in how we handle discipline. Continue reading
I’ve mentioned in other places that I think us special needs parents need to make sure that we take care of ourselves now and again, lest we go absolutely crazy.
And so, I’m going to step away for a few days. Continue reading
So over the last few nights, the wife’s been filling out forms for when the Monster finally goes into feeding therapy.
As I’ve recounted several times, we’ve had issues on and off with the Monster’s diversity of eating. We’ve gotten used to the lack of variety in his food choices, and for the most part, we can deal with it. We’ve even had some vague broadening recently – he’s discovered he likes oranges, cucumbers and carrots. Continue reading
My dad wasn’t exactly the rough-housing type. I don’t have memories of wrestling with my dad or anything like that when I was a kid – certainly, my sibs and I did all kinds of things with/against each other, growing up, but nothing like that happened with my dad. (That’s neither bad nor good, for the record. 😉 )
On the other hand, I tend to play a lot of physical games with the Monster and R. Wrestling, tickling, tackling, things like that. Continue reading