D is for DeSales

I first was exposed to St. Francis DeSales and his teachings by the Oblates who staffed Father Judge High School in Philadelphia, PA.  Judge was the the "brother school" to my high school, and through the many interactions the schools had, I learned about St. Francis and was intrigued by his steadfast belief that regardless of what happened in life, God was there for us.  St. Francis' words have long brought me comfort:

Do not look forward in fear to the changes in life; rather, look to them with full hope that as they arise, God, whose very own you are, will lead you safely through all things; and when you cannot stand it, God will carry you in His arms.

Do not fear what may happen tomorrow; the same understanding Father who cares for you today will take care of you then and every day. He will either shield you from suffering or will give you unfailing strength to bear it. Be at peace, and put aside all anxious thoughts and imaginations. 

Though it took us several months to accept, it quickly became obvious that a formal school was not working for Jude, no matter how many pleas I made when I dropped him off: "Please, God, let this be the day something clicks!" "God, just for one day let him find his way."  "Lord, I need to take somebody else to an appointment this morning, so today would be a TERRIFIC day to not get a phone call at 10 am to come get him..."  It was a hard to accept that he just was a proverbial square peg, and no amount of coaxing was going to make him fit into a round hole.  As much as we wanted him to go to a "regular" school, and his doctors and therapists felt it was a setting where peer modeling would help him succeed, it became clear that he did NOT want to be there with equal fervor.  Not being in a formal classroom style school setting was clearly better for him, but we also felt he was ready to move beyond passively learning through television shows aimed at the preschool crowd. This meant the decision to not be in a group setting  "in a classroom school" meant we were "homeschooling" by default, so we easily made peace with the choice.  However, the process of actually homeschooling -- well, for someone who never expected to be doing this, it's a whole other issue.  

There are many days where I am afraid D really just is a D, and I am failing as a teacher.  Some days go exactly as I would like, and he picks up the concepts quickly and we zoom through what I have planned and are staring at each other saying "What now?" and it's only 9:30. Then there are days where it seems like lessons are taking forever and we are stopping to wait for him to re-focus more than we are actually working.  A month in to the "school year," and we have had two weeks where we spend part of every day at doctors' appointments and have to scale down expectations to "what can we fit into the few minutes we have here and there," topped off with a day like today where we spent 8 hours between the car ride and appointments at the hospital and we get no "real" schoolwork done at all.  I am afraid he's not learning enough, even though we spent breakfast discussing "If you had ten blueberries, and you ate five, how many are left?" for Math, and stopping at every car asking "Can you tell me what's on that license plate?" for letter recognition.  It's the best we could do, but I'm afraid he's going to fall farther behind than he already is because we missed a day of working in his books and the lesson plan I spent three hours carefully crafting has been tossed out the window. I worry that if someone were to evaluate him, they would find us severely lacking.  In theory, we should be able to do MORE around doctor's visits, since he's not missing days and days of "brick-and-mortar" school, but it seems like we get precious little actually done because of logistics.  "How to effectively homeschool when you are always on the road" was never gone over in the education classes I took in college.

There are times I doubt my ability to teach him. (Another "D" word.)  Sure, shapes and letters and basic math aren't that hard.  I mean, there are even blue puppies that understand the basics of the universe; even a particular blue omnivorous monster knows "C is for Cookie."  Our first thought was for Jude to stay home through kindergarten, and then move to a regular school next fall.  It's becoming obvious quickly that his other needs are not going to permit this, and we are now looking at a much longer commitment.  I am trying to take things one concept at a time, but I have to admit I wonder how we're going to do when things get harder. (Especially with math.  I am not kidding that there was a reason I did NOT major in Mathematics in college.)   I see him struggling so much now and wonder how on earth is he going to be able to manage later; if he can't figure out what sound a letter makes, how will he read entire words?  I will never, ever give up on trying to teach Jude, but some days I wonder just how much he will be able to learn, and is it really his medical issues holding him back or is it just me and I'm not very good at this?

St. Francis DeSales

I've never been opposed to homeschooling; it just wasn't something we felt was best for our other children, so it wasn't something I had researched much about.  To suddenly be thrust into it without notice is like being sent on to a high wire with no net below and hurricane force winds swirling about you.  

But St. Francis spoke the truth: the days where I wonder how I will ever manage this, God shows me I'm not doing without His help.  Sometimes it is when we are having a rough day and when I am praying for patience that I feel a quiet calm and think maybe this isn't so crazy an idea after all, and we're going to be ok.  Other times it is through friends who say "I have an idea that might work for you."  And there are moments where Jude says something that lets me know something "stuck" -- he tells a random stranger in the hospital cafeteria, "The sun made the water evaporate!" or he walks along the construction wall at the hospital and says each letter correctly as he points to N-e-m-o-u-r-s, or he just remembers more of the Lord's Prayer on his own than he needs prompting for.  

I don't know what each day will bring, other than to be almost absolutely certain that it will be full of surprises.  And I'm trying not to let my fears overwhelm me; I'm working on remembering the teachings of St. Francis: even if I still have them, with God's help it will all be fine. 

Adventures with Apples

 

 

 

 

Today I am guest blogging over at Kids with Food Allergies Foundation.  KFA has been an invaluable resource for our family in managing our multiple food allergies, and I'm thrilled to be asked to share our story with their readers.  Join us for Adventures in Apple Picking as I talk about our recent trips to local farms for apple picking and how we are preserving our apples for winter.  We are making allergy-friendly apple pie, and canning apple chunks and apple sauce. My post there includes delicious recipes for all three.

 

 

 

 

Here I will share Jude after Round Two of apple picking.  He wanted to pull the wagon back to the farm stand himself.  A little sing-song makes everything easier!

Kids With Food Allergies Foundation is a nonprofit organization that educates families and communities with practical food allergy management strategies to save lives and improve the quality of life for children and their families. Our online community includes public blogs. To post a comment, you will need to register or sign in. Registered members have access to additional specialized support forums for food allergies. Registration is free!

L'Shana Tovah!

We are doing a "Holiday Cooking" theme for our reading unit this week. Today marks the end of  Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year) so we are reading Sammy Spider's First Rosh Hashanah and making challah bread.

We used our friend Ahuva's challah recipe.  Ahuva has children ranging from almost 16 years to 16 mos (and like us, only one girl!) so I think she knows a thing or two about cooking! 

Ahuva's Challah

Mix together:

1 kg + 1 c. flour (8 cups total)
1 c. sugar
1 T. salt

Then add:

2-1/3 T. yeast

Mix, then add:

2 c. very warm water (not very hot)

Mix.












In a separate dish, mix:

3/4 c. oil
2 eggs.

Pour into the dough. Mix in mixer on medium speed for 10 minutes.

Cover with plastic wrap and set aside until doubled. Punch down and let it rise again until doubled.

Ok, we used aluminum foil. We were out of plastic wrap. The important thing is to use something that seals the container well, to help hold in moisture.  We also put a little oil in the bottom of the container so the dough would stick less.

Divide in thirds.  Braid* and cover to rise for about 15-20 minutes.

Brush with beaten egg and top with sesame seeds if desired.  Bake at 180' C (350' F) for 30-35 minutes.

*For Shabbat challah, the traditional shape is a long, six-strand braid. Rosh Hashanah challah is traditionally made into round/spiral shape to emphasize the circular nature of life.  We followed the "Weaving Round Challah" tutorial, found at Chabad.org.  We made two plain Challah and one with cinnamon sugar.  The house smells delicious!















While we waited for the dough to rise, we read our story. Sammy is an adorable little spider who doesn't really celebrate the holiday in the same way as his "host" family, the Shapiros, but is anxious to learn about what and why the Shapiros are doing. 

Thanks to all of my Jewish friends for their recipe and story recommendations! L'shana Tovah Tikatevu to each of you!

Just like the big sibs (Wordless Wednesday)

Remember to love each other.

This is my commandment: love one another as I love you.
John 15:12 (NABRE)

I wasn't sure how to handle teaching Jude about 9/11. To be honest, I was really thinking about ignoring it entirely. It's something that as an adult I find so hard to comprehend; to expect a five-year-old to grasp any of the events was more than I could imagine.

A new wing at DuPont is currently under construction. It is being built in front of the main entrance, where the flagpole used to be. The pole was moved to outside the playground, and today was re-dedicated to in memory of the September 11 victims. Of course, the flag was flown at half staff. Jude noticed this difference as we drove by, and remarked "That flag fell down to the middle." I told him that the flag was in the middle on purpose -- to remember people who died. Of course, the next word out of his mouth was "Why?" *gulp*

After a quick prayer for the right words, and fighting to keep my voice even, I explained that a few years ago, some people didn't like our country very much and wanted to hurt us. They killed a lot of people, hoping to scare us into hating each other and doing what they wanted. But they weren't able to scare us, and make us listen - Americans decided it was a time that showed us we needed to love each other more than ever. The flags were only halfway up today to remind us that everyday we need to tell and show people how much we love them, and then the bad men will know they've lost.

When we got home to do our schoolwork, I found an age-appropriate 9/11 coloring printout from Apples 4 Teachers - a heart shaped flag. Jude colored it "red and white stripes and blue, like the flag at the hospital." After gluing it to the construction paper, we wrote the date at the top, and I asked him what we should write on the bottom. He looked at me straight on, and said "LOVE, Mommy. We have to remember to love."

I thought yoga was supposed to bring peace!

Today is a gorgeous early fall day -- sunny, breezy, big puffy clouds  -- which made it perfect for moving our Monday PT to outside.  Having the ability to run all over the yard is very much appreciated after last week's soupy weather and thunderstorms that kept us inside (humidity like that, pollen, and asthma don't really get along well).  We did our "regular" work as soon as we got home from dropping the big kids off, so we could play outside before having to go pick them up.  After running around and playing for a bit, Jude and I did a little bit of yoga.  He really tried (most of the time) but he's not going to be an advanced student any time soon. 

The hardest part was getting his mind into the poses. I would say "Let's be..." and he'd say "But I'm a BOY, not that!!"  When you have a child who sees things in black and white,  you have to make sure you are very mindful of how you word things.  The phrase "pretend to be" is critical...

 We started with "Let's be trees...ok, let's PRETEND TO BE tall trees."  Officially, this pose is called "Talasana," or "Palm tree pose" but we don't HAVE palm trees in New Jersey.  We are Christmas trees.

Today was a windy day.  Now we are "Waving Palm Christmas Trees."  

Then we were animals:

 

Cobra, or Ssssssssnake. 

 Flying like an Eagle.

("But Mommy, they're not REAL wings...I'm a people, and people can't fly.") 

Downward Facing Dog.  Woof!

 (Being chased) Cat.  

Even though he HATES cats, and refused to talk like one.  He was willing to try Cat if I was Downward Dog and chased him, and then we could switch.  After his Cat clawed my Downward Dog, we gave up on animals.

Plank.  Sort of -- he was giggling too hard and making pirate noises...

because, you know, Mateys...aargh! Pirates walk the plank!

A modified Triangle Pose. He wanted to know why there isn't a "Circle" pose.

 

Savasana, or Corpse Pose.  Pretty much how I felt when we were done.  

He wasn't buying "It's Sleepy Boy Napping pose."

 

Namaste!

Physical and Sensory Therapy on the Playground

Back in May, Jude had a re-evaluation of his gross & fine motor skills and speech abilities. After numerous phone calls, an incredibly helpful receptionist with a vendetta against the computer system in the records department, several more calls, and an in-person cornering of one of the evaluating therapists, we finally got the report yesterday.

The very excellent news is that he has maintained and built upon all the fine motor skills that we worked so hard to build up two years ago. He and Miss Kathleen met weekly for what we called "Charm School" - they worked on skills used for getting dressed, eating with utensils, and coloring pictures for people. Nine months after his discharge, his Peabody-scaled skills ranged from a 50th percentile/55 mos "age equivalent" grasping skills, and a 63%/65 mos visual motor integration score. Given his chronological age at the eval was 57 months, this is awesome, right? Right.

But that just sets you up for the kill.

Speech -- we expected there to be a delay. It's pretty obvious to anyone who tries to talk to him that this is something he struggles with. His articulation is generally poor, and "intelligibility" scores were 70-80% in known contexts, 50-60% if you didn't know what he was talking about. This seems pretty accurate to me; even being Mom, there are many times I have to say to him, "Honey, I don't understand what you are trying to say." He is being referred for speech services. No big surprise.

What shocked us was how terribly he performed on the gross motor portion of the testing. Doctors have mentioned from time to time that he has some heel cord tightness, but it never has been significant enough to document. It's now documented. However, in a way this makes sense. He has long been a toe-walker, and "true" autism has been excluded as a diagnosis after all of his psychology evals. Toe walking is a classic symptom of tight heels. The Gross Motor Peabody test was also revealing. His overall score quotient was 70, putting him in the bottom 2% for kids his age. (An "average" child will have a raw score of 90-110.)  His overall score puts him at an "average" developmental age of 33 mos (less than 3 years old),  with the individual tests scoring at 30, 32, and 38 mos development (object manipulation, locomotion, and stationary skills, respectively.)  He used to be in PT from about 18 mos of age until last fall and seemed to be fairly caught up. Apparently not. (There was also the thought that peer modeling at school would help him.  Yeah.  Not so much.)  The therapist's assessment was that he is "functional" but unskilled. It makes sense - to look at him, he gets around "fine" but it is obvious when you look at him compared to his peers that he is lagging.

So obviously, he is going to be going back to PT and speech. He was discharged from speech 18 months ago due to behavior issues -- hopefully, we have addressed them enough that maybe it will be less of a struggle.  (We can hope, right?)   They are recommending speech therapy 1-2 times per week, along with weekly physical therapy.  Hopefully, they will also be able to show us how to safely stretch his heels -- the therapist is setting "increase dorsiflexion from 0 to 10 degrees" as a long term goal. I haven't googled enough to figure out what all that means, but it sounds to me like it's a lot to expect if it's considered a long-term goal, lumped in with the seemingly more open-ended/subjective "improve communication and language function to optimal levels."

Obviously, these are definitely not things that will be fixed in a weekly therapy session.  Speech is something we will definitely need to work on all the time with him, by modeling and over-enunciating sounds.  And while a formal PT program is going to be invaluable, the only way to build muscle is to use it, so our homeschool program suddenly is going to add "covert gym classes" to the daily schedule.  The major activity recommended by the therapy team is lots of playground time.

 Concordville Park,pictured here, is one of our favorite places for a "sneaky PT" session.  It is a nearly all-wood playground with lots of opportunities to climb up and down stairs, walk across bridges and balance beams, and over & under climbing. Jude always has a good time on the equipment, but also enjoyed playing Follow-the-Leader. He led Damien and me all over the playground:

Follow me across the bouncy bridge...

This is a new accomplishment for him, because not only is it a wobbly/physical challenge, but from a sensory perspective, it's a whole lot of proprioceptive stress.

Hey! Who put a beam here?  Up and over - use that core!

This beam is easy!

This narrow one, not so much.

 (Makes sense -- putting feet in a direct line position is hard.)

Sideways is a little easier, but he gave up after a few steps. 

Jude's trunk muscles are weak, and that makes even standing in a balanced position difficult. 

His whole body tends to wave like a flag.  But a few steps is better than none!

Stairs are another challenge for him. Balancing on one foot is tough. He is "functional" in that he can get up and down, but he does not properly climb in an age-appropriate alternating step pattern, or even pushing off with his legs - he usually needs a good amount of upper body involvement to propel himself up or lever himself down, or simply climbs up in a toddler-style "bear crawl."

These stairs help with balance, weight shift, eye-foot coordination, perception and muscle strength.Even with all the obstacles ... he's off and running.



©2012- 2016 Adventures with Jude. All rights reserved. All text, photographs, artwork, and other content may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the written consent of the author. http://adventureswithjude.com

If you start talking about food, your kindergartener is going to want to make some!

Originally on today's schedule was the book, "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" by Laura Numeroff.  One of Jude's favorite books her "If You Give a Dog a Donut..." He really enjoys the silliness of the story, so I thought he might enjoy another of the books in the series. However, it turned out to be a food-themed day.



When we opened his math book, the next page was a subtraction page that had bake sale items for visual cues.  There were pictures of cookies, brownies, pie, and cupcakes.  He told me the SQUARE brownies were his favorite, but he liked cookies, too.  (Usually one or the other is his pre-breakfast snack -- when Daddy goes into the kitchen before work, Jude cons him into giving him one of those so he "won't starve to death" waiting for me to come downstairs a few minutes later.)  I think he may be smarter than big brother Luke, who always asks for "Breakfast Dessert."  Jude eats his dessert before the meal...making sure he has room for it before he fills up on silly things like yogurt or cereal.







 

 

Next up were letters. I copied down the letters p, s. n, j, h, and d - all letters from Book B of Explore the Code.  We have been working on sounding out letters, and then practicing writing letters into words.  P for pie was easy as...well, you get it.  But then S for snack followed, and then N for napkin, and by the time I got the whole page written, we had a theme going.  Before writing each word, he told me a few sentences about something about the word -- either "Could I have a snack?" or "You use a napkin to wipe your face!"  He shared that likes brownies better than pie, apple and orange juices are his favorite, and he thinks he should skip dinner and just eat dessert. 















On to our next installment of The Lord's Prayer.  We reviewed the first to pictures we colored yesterday, and while his speech was hard to follow, he did recall most of the sections.  Today we moved on to "Give us this day our Daily Bread." I thought that since he was able to recall the first two sections, maybe he'd remember this one, too.  He said, "Give us this day our..." (consults paper) "LUNCH!!"  Points for context decoding, but not quite, kiddo.  We reviewed the text of the prayer, and he got out his favorite blue crayon and went to town.


















As he was coloring, the dryer went off and I raced upstairs to move the load of permanent-press uniforms.  By the time I came down, he had colored in the entire picture, cut it out, and glued it to the next page! Proud student!  (And not too shabby cutting all by himself.)



















When we were done with our table work, we sat down on the couch, and read our story for the day.  We recently got the Mouse Cookies & More: A Treasury anthology, and it includes several recipes that go with the stories it contains.  One of the recipes was an oatmeal spice cookie. We adapted it to be safe for his allergies, and swapped the raisins for chocolate chunks.

Measuring out the oats.

Spooning the dough onto a cookie sheet.  

I think he has a future as a baker -- he's a mean spoon-scraper!

Taste-test!  Yum!

He already asked if we can read "If You Give a Dog a Donut..." again tomorrow.   And chances are, if we read that story, he's going to want to make a batch of donuts.

Welcome to Kindergarten

Jude had most of the summer off like his big sibs -- we did a little work here and there, but mostly the summer was so busy that anything "formal" fell to the wayside. I also took the summer to retool what we were doing. Most of our plans for fall stayed the same - our plans for Math and daily Bible study are the same, and we are continuing along with the Explode/Explore the Code series. The major change was we re-tooled the Five-in-a-Row plan to be more thematic. Jude was getting restless at reading the same book every day, so instead I've decided to pick a concept for each week and then we will read a book/do an activity that goes with that idea. Since today started the 2012-13 school year for the big kids, we decided to make it our Official First Day of Kindergarten.

When we took the other kids' pictures, he decided to hide, thinking if he didn't get his picture taken, he didn't have to start school.  Nice try!



 Having taken so much time off, we started off with an easy review. For Math we worked in a supplemental workbook, and did pages on matching the First through Fifth place runners with their medals, and then sorting "which shape doesn't belong."

Jude wanted to try something new -- the subtraction page I had intentionally skipped. To my surprise, he breezed right through it. He really has a very analytical mind and enjoys numbers.



We reviewed letters from Explore the Code Book A, and practiced writing some sight words that use those letters.

Our "Some-a-Day" project is a mini book of the Lord's Prayer. We have been working on learning that for a little while number. Some days are easier than others; one night he refused to pray for "Daily Bread" and instead requested "Ketchup Toast," since he liked that better. He was excited to color the page for "On earth, as it is in heaven" since that picture used his two favorite colors, blue and green.

We also got in some scissor work! He's still shaky there, but now is able to use "real" scissors and not  the spring-loaded OT-style ones. Go Jude!  (Just don't cut your hair like your sister, OK?)

Today was only a short day, since the big kids had half days themselves. We seemed to spend most of the day in and out of the car! Big brother Luke also had a physical therapy appointment so we took "Art" on the road and drew on the giant chalk board in the waiting room. Jude drew the road from our house to duPont, complete with "spension bridge" (Delaware Memorial Bridge, a twin-span suspension style bridge) and a helicopter flying to the hospital helipad. He did a great job drawing Mom driving the car--stick figure representations are very slimming.

We have lots planned for the next few weeks - getting into our new books, starting our Parish/Homeschool CCD program, and if schedules and weather hold, maybe some field trips. Kindergarten is going to be a fun time...follow us on our Adventure!