Letter Matchup

Today we are matching letters. Our one-at-a-time lettering (here) wasn't doing much. He would know a letter for a week and then after starting the next letter he would promptly forget the first one. I was kind of thinking maybe he didn't see the connections. Maybe? Maybe he focused on the trees so much he didn't see the forest.

We don't do phonics because of his disordered speech. The sounds don't match the letters so that's all kinds of confusing. He can't sing the alphabet all the way through yet, but he can fill in a missing letter if you stop every so often. 

We tried sandpaper letters. He does like them and he sometimes will put the letters in order for his name, but he struggles with what they are. No way we could do the whole alphabet that way right now.

We tried typing words into YouTube which he LOVED (here). Playdough letters (here). Animal shaped letters. Body shaped letters. Letter songs. But all they just turned into games. I don't think he completely understands that letters make up the words. He will ask what a word says sometimes, but he isn't interested in how they're made. He wants to read but doesn't understand what reading is. And that is the kicker. Otherwise I'd just be content with showing him the letters and give him another year. But he picks up a book and wants to know what it says.

Sigh.

So we've tried all these handy ideas, and all of them above and beyond the pre-k curriculum I've bought and the idea boards I've snatched off Pinterest. Beyond what his teachers tried to do last year.

So we are trying this method: Visual Alphabet. 

I bought 2 packs of Appletters and lined up the alphabet, then had my Boy match the extras.

He did it. Which means we went through a lot of peppermints. A. Lot. Cuz we are still at the one-to-one reinforcement stage.

And it's totally worth it.

Because one day he will read and write. No matter what the Negative Nellies say.



There's a million ways to do this, and we've only tried a dozen so far...


Suggestions????

Letter A

We've had some success with the ''type it yourself into YouTube'' practice so I pushed the envelope today.

Play D'oh lettering.

Most Pinteresting Mommies know this one, but my guy hates letters. He does love him some Play D'oh though.

Well, now that he knows LETTERS = YouTube cartoons, he's a smidgin more pliable. Just a smidgin.

But here's the growth factor from the above little factoid that really blows me away; my Boy doesn't understand why we do things. Curse those "wh" questions!

But really;
 "Why do we wear shoes?"  Shoes and socks on feet.
"Why do we eat?" Apples and banana peels.

That's our language reality. So....
"Why letters?"  So that I can find my cartoons on YouTube like a big man.

Window. Opened.

Why answered.

Welp.... I jumped all over that like hotcakes. Spectrum Mom + Pinterest = Homeschool success.

Here's to ONE letter of success. One letter? Yup!!! I'll take it!



Hi there, Momma 'A' and Baby 'a'. How you doin'? (If you didn't read that in Joey's voice, you're doing it wrong; click here to become edjumacated: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjQ1xD6UL-4  )

Lovely free printables found on Pinterest via http://www.123homeschool4me.com/ . Printed, added to slickies and put in 3 ring binder.

BAM!

'A' is for "ausome".

Momma letters, baby letters and squeakless learning.

Writing his name is coming along. Slowly. Very slowly. Painfully. Slowly.

So slowly that I've learned something new; Letters are not writing.

I am just starting to wrap my brain around this.

Letters are not writing.

Letters are the base of the pyramid of written, typed and most other non-spoken forms of communication.

Writing involves fine motor skills and squeaky sounds on delicate paper.

Letters are not writing.
Typing is not writing.
Writing is not reading.

And which do I want more? Writing or reading? 

So we are taking a mini-break from writing to learn letters. Not A is for Ant because Boy couldn't give a Hootie's Blowfish about Ants or Aunts or Alphabets. And no, he can't sing the song. So I'm trying a work around.

He learned the letter 'H'.

 "It's a line (finger down his chest) and another line (finger down the other side of his chest) and a line (finger across the middle). That is Hero Factory."

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh....

Light bulb moment. I love light bulb moments.

"Yeah. That's called an 'H' and 'H' is for 'Hero'."

Now he's telling everyone. Our world is the letter H.

So progress a few to rainy day/not enough to do/Youtube day/Momma's beat day.

"What do you want to watch?" YouTube, I love/hate you.
"Hero Factory." Of course.
"Ok." (Starts typing)
"NO! I will do it! I will type it." (proceeds to find iphone's mini letter 'H').

Spectrum Mom mind blown.

I tried to help him with the rest but E & R.... they don't mean anything. They are rambling sounds that his little auditorilly challenged self just can't grasp.

Ok. Open up your brain.... think...

"Boy, what shows do you want to type into Youtube?"

"Hero Factory. Mixels. Thomas."

Type it up for him. Print it out. Let him follow the letters like he follows his Lego directions.

Problem solved.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-iqosn6ny4ZcEtjb0NsNVRpb2c/edit?usp=sharing

I thought.

But typing in himself he noticed the 'E' he typed came up on Youtube as 'e' and we narrowly averted a meltdown.

Ok. 

"There's a momma letter and a baby letter for each letter you type. They sound the same and they build the same words. You might type a momma and baby comes up. That's ok. They're the same letter."

Got it.

Problem solved version 2.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-iqosn6ny4ZQ3Y4ZmRPU1lucUU/edit?usp=sharing

If any of your kiddos are struggling, I hope you give this a try. It took me about 5 minutes on a computer doing pic searches for Google and copy/paste. Let me know if it works for you!!!!

Early Intervention

     My boy is sitting in my bed, watching Transformer videos. Or rather, he is watching videos made by grown men and posted to YouTube about the +s and -s of certain Transformer figurines. I am trying not to be bothered that these reach him in a way that I can't; supporting the interest.
But as I watch him the thing I wonder about most, and am perhaps the most upset with at the moment, is the reality that the term 'early intervention' is very, very empty. That it's a catch phrase. That people use it to make it seem as if problems are being addressed, questions answered, services rendered.
     They aren't. At least, in our world they weren't. The Dr. who helped us with Boy's evaluation made certain to put his IEP assessment percentile rankings on her report. She did that to draw attention to them. Attention even I hadn't paid. I focused on the fact that he was ''at least'' receiving services. 15 minutes a week was better than nothing, right? Well, that depends. It depends on these nice little numbers, numbers Mommy's who don't know what they are looking at don't understand, mean.
These numbers were from last spring. One year ago. Before he qualified for the DD pre-pre-K class they enrolled him in and promptly tried to graduate him from without services.

1%

     That's 1 percent. That puts Boy in 1 percentile ranking. Which apparently means 1% of children his age score LOWER than he does and 99% score higher. That is not good. The PhD and OT and SLP at his school gave him that ranking in more than one domain on his Batelle Inventory. His total was 7%. I'll let you do the math.

And then I'll ask you a question;

Does 7% sound like ''does not require services'' to you?

Well, golly.

     So you see the frustration. A year later, after countless concerns and fits and interventions and assessments here we sit with a diagnosis that explains EVERYTHING and then I have to back track and wonder what happened. I mean; what the hell happened? Where did these specialists who do nothing but provide early intervention, get the idea that 7% ranking is ready to go into a typical classroom without modifications?
     I don't have the exact answer. I have suspicions. One of those haunting suspicions, lurking in the shadows, whispers that this is the reason IEP advocates and lawyers exist.

And it sucks.