BOOM!
We had a massive explosion of the temper tantrum type today. It was kind of expected. I've been waiting for the "I'm not in school, I shouldn't have to do school work!" explosion. And it hit today. During math of course. That's the most difficult subject for him at the moment so I shouldn't have been surprised that it was the trigger. But we got through it. And promptly after we finished math, he proceeded to throw a longer tantrum with running and jumping. So I made him go to bed. It was only supposed to be for 15 minutes, but he actually curled up under the blanket and calmed (although he did not sleep). So I left him until he was ready to come out, which was over an hour later. That was plenty of time to get the living room cleaned up and swept.
Mark is wired energy wise which I think is spring fever. He even had problems with slowing his hand movements for working on the XOOM. So tomorrow I think I will bundle him up really good and let him go run/bounce/swing it off. A hour or so of sunshine and playing in the backyard should do a lot to calm him down.
And I ordered two visual timers today. They are not Time Timers. His classroom had two Time Timers and they were forever either not working "at the moment"/only partially working/not working at all. So I found two possible timers on Amazon. I'll post them here if they work out.
I'm planning on using one of them to let him know when "work" time is coming up. I'll set it and put the PECS card for the "work" with it. And then when it goes off, we will work on that item. I think that will settle his nerves some because he'll know that it's coming and be able to "prepare" for it. Since we are not following a rigid schedule like the school does he seems to have the occasional problem with work just "popping up". Even if I've told him beforehand that we are going to do something and do a "countdown". So this should help with that issue until he readjusts to life being random. And even after that, it will help on bad/hard/difficult days.
The second timer is for when we are working. I'll set it so that he knows how long each task will take before he is done, including rewards. And the first, then/visual schedule program is on the XOOM. So I'll be using that to show him what things we'll be doing during each work period, if needed. And it probably will be needed until we get over the hump regarding school work at home.
Despite the explosion it was actually a really good day. He helped to clean up. He didn't do so good with identifying quantities 1-5, but he did very well with calendar. Reading was ok. I still need to figure out the format for books on the XOOM. That will be cool because some of the books have interactives that he will be able to do.
Spelling is a challenge still but we may be taking some of the challenges out of that. I found a lined magnetic chalkboard. So spelling is going to be done on it, with large magnetic letters, until he finally comprehends what we are working on. Then I'll start working the small magnetics and other manipulative back into the work. One of the programs on the XOOM makes him trace the letters using his finger, which he started doing somewhat independently today. (My thumb was on the side of his wrist but otherwise there was no contact and no verbal.)
All in all, things are happening. A little slowly, and at lower levels than I anticipated, but still happening. And he's really excited about the XOOM. He doesn't like the work on it but he loves the games. And he's very quickly learning that he has to do the work to get to the games.
So Blessing all around. And I'm grateful for them. I hope your day has Blessing as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment