End of this School Year, Looking Forward

It's actually not the end of year for us but I won't be covering as many subject through summer.

Munchkin has done okay.  In letters, reading, and math he's still way behind. He didn't get as far as I had hoped to this year.  Even with a customized curriculum there seem to be some base issues that he's still having trouble with.  So we will just continue on step by step to get him further.  I will keep looking to see if something can help him make the connections that he needs.

In health, life skills, and communication he has exploded.  The changes in Munchkin's behaviors and skills in these areas have been astounding, although some of them only started in the last few months.

In health, he is finally getting a grasp of why certain things are an issue.  He's learning to keep his clothes clean, or if there is an accident, to change to clean clothes promptly.  He is now cleaning himself first in the shower before he then uses the bar of soap to play with.  And the frequency of wetting accidents, both daytime and nighttime, has decreased drastically.

In life skills he's learned to get his own drinks, and sometimes food.  He's figured out how to pour himself a drink, with both the cup and jug in his hands.  He's learned to get towels and clean up his own spills.  Well, try to clean them up.  He's learned to keep track of his glasses although he occasionally still loses them.  And he's still working on learning to look in the non normal places to see if he left them there.  There are so many other basic life skills that Munchkin has learned.  And we are still working on him learning to mix the ice tea in the jug.  It can be interesting sometimes.

Then we have communication.  Munchkin's communication skills have exploded at home.  He is having conversations with the words he has.  He is trying new words out.  And the true surprise occurred a week ago when he actually said a "fuzzy" sentence in front of other people.  The words weren't enunciated very well but they were clear enough that the two other people with us understood what he said.  I was ready to dance.  He had used more than his word "quiet" in front of others.  He had said a whole sentence in front of other people!!!  (BTW, the sentence was "I know that.")

We are already looking at next year's options for Munchkin.  He will continue in home school.  I'm already looking at the materials for teaching him.  But we are also going to add going to co-op classes back into our schedule.  I've found, over the last year, that even just the interaction with other "normal" peers did Munchkin a lot of good.  When he's seen the other kids throughout the year, he's been trying very hard to figure out how to break through his communication barrier with them.  He's reached a point where he wants to interact not just observe.

The co-op has a new teacher this year that is a retired special education instructor that has kept her certifications up.  Now that's important, not because of the certifications, but because she is used to working with kids that have difficulties like Munchkin does.  She already has the knowledge to adjust the materials to Munchkin's skill level while still involving him with the rest of the class.  We went to the open house and got time to speak with her about her classes.  She was very up front about which ones she thought would work for Munchkin and why/why not.  I agreed with her assessments based on the class information that she had available.  So Munchkin will be taking two of her classes.  I will most likely register him for one additional class as well.  That will allow him to take his classes and have a break in between to unwind.  There are quite a few other classes that he can participate in so I will have to debate them a bit.

All in all, Munchkin is doing good.  We are going to continue to work on the three Rs as well as the other skills.  Through the summer we will be having fewer classes but we aren't dropping them.  There's no need to have him lose skills to a long summer break.  But we will also be adding something fun.  Munchkin likes drumming on things so we are going to have drumming class.  I have a DVD to teach drumming that we will work through together.  We'll see how it goes.  Maybe next year I can work with him on basic piano skills.