Weekly Round up and IEP ESY

Weekly Round up and ESY

PARENT THERAPY =TRAMPOLINE
Rather than talk about what we did every evening suffice it to say we jumped on the trampoline.
Yes that is what we did every evening – we jump – loll around- I sing action songs and try to get him to imitate the action-( Stamp your feet slowly .. fast etc etc - From the Spectrum Connections CD and DVD )
Plus because of the safety net it forms a sort of zone with no other distraction
This has been the perfect antidote to screen time and I am really rueing the rainy day that is today and was yesterday night

PRIVATE THERAPY =MINIMAL
His speechie was on holiday and one of his therapists was off as well.
So he had minimal intervention – he seems to be doing totally fine though

IEP AND ESY( Extended School Year )

The only thing of note was our ESY meeting on Friday
We love his school and are going to miss it terribly as he moves to a new school in August ( also like his new teacher )
We had been told that we would not get ESY as R is making great progress
We were also able to add the diagnosis of Apraxia. This has been a thorn in my side as they were unwilling to add it on – R has PROFOUND Apraxia – the worst I have ever seen and I have seen plenty of kids with Apraxia
His trying to talk is literally like a stroke victim
His school speechie who made some great points in the meeting in fact reiterated many things I had said in his previous meeting – as in Harness the Hyperlexia – write things down

Our Private speechie came to the meeting and that really helped

School speechie also to my pleasant surprise recommended augmentative device- another friend of mine has been talking of augmentative device for her son and after thinking about it for a while – I really think that this will definitely help communication and will also encourage speech

School Speechie also said something that kind of bothered me but like most things its best to face upto it – she said that we can not guarantee if he will ever get functional speech – but he will definitely be able to communicate properly as he is so intelligent

Apraxia is such a beast

Anyway on ESY with the help and advice of my good friends I researched the law and took in these arguments and basically we went armed with Doughnuts and this documents Anyway the net result was 12 days over the three months of summer
Sigh !!!!

In India there is a saying I dug up a mountain and found a mouse
Basically loads of effort= Minimal results

Paradoxically his teacher who loves him did NOT want him to have ESY

Though I was surprised - her main reason came out later- she says the classroom will have severely affected kids and she does not want R with them and pick up any bad behaviors
Though I am not sure if that argument really holds as R does not pay much attention to his peers

TRANSTION MEETING MAY 15 -2009

WHY IS ESY APPROPRIATE FOR R

RRegression and Recoupment
R thrives under consistency . We are afraid the Summer break will be like pressing the reset button
Over the Christmas break – Rhad a significant loss of ability to be engaged socially – despite of our best efforts
I noted in my blog that he was sort of coming back around in Early February – slowly.
It took us a month of intensive Floortime along with a consistent routine of school to get back the critical ability of joint attention and engagement.
He spend most of January self stimulatory behavior and lost the “with-it” ness that he had in December. It was extremely difficult in the month of January to get him to learn anything
Mid February to Mid May – have been so much better
R is starting to vocalize a lot more - he will use the beginning letters for most things at home

Emerging Skills
Ris working on key skills – speech and potty training. He is also working on writing.
Again we worry that we will be going backwards on these critical skills

Degree of Impairment
Ris fully autistic – he has all the core deficits of Autism as well as Severe Apraxia

Transition needs
Rwill be facing the change of a new school. At this crucial juncture its appropriate to provide as much structure as we can

Rate of progress
Rhas made suboptimal progress in key social goals – like addressing his peers by name, taking turns with a peer. Additional time is needed for him to achieve this

Then DH brought forth the fact that R has no friends which was a real puploo