Our First Week--In Review

Pamela is clearly in a search for meaning. The other day, we were reading the introduction to Augustus Caesar's World, which began with the myth of Janus and Rome's city gates. The story shifted to Octavius, who was attending college in Apollonia. Pamela wrote on her graphic organizer, "Octavius, 18 years old." I told the year was 44 B.C. Then she asked me, "What is B.C.?"

I didn't know whether to praise God or Snoopy dance, but ecstatic does not begin to describe my emotions. Not only is Pamela thinking and trying to make connections, she is able to ask me for more information! She could not do this two years ago!

I drew a hasty timeline and wrote "Creation" at the beginning and Pamela said, "Just like Old Testament." Then, I wrote "Jesus as a Boy" with a the number zero below and asked where the New Testament would go. Pamela pointed in the right place. When I wrote "Today" at the end, she said, "21st Century." I finally explained that A.D. is Anno Domini, Latin for "Year of the Lord", while B.C. is English for Before Christ.

Full of inspiration from my friends at ChildLight USA, I matched our first week with the recommendation of Charlotte Mason very closely. The highlight for Pamela was poetry, especially reading Walter de la Mare's Tired Tim in the mopiest, boredest voice and the pouchiest lip! Imagine! A person with a history of severe language delays loving the pictures and images painted by words.

The keys to helping her love poetry are context and meaning. While Pamela had no problem with Tired Tim and The Horseman, the other three poems were tough. Pamela has no idea why a butcher shop would disgust the poet, so, before the reading, we talked about things we thought that were ugly. I explained to her that our meat is wrapped us nicely in packages we buy at the store. In those days, people might see dead animals at the butcher shop. As I read I Can't Abear, Pamela's facial expression showed me she understood the poem. Before reading Mrs. Earth, we cleaned a silver spoon with a white cloth so Pamela could see the black tarnish and we studied two cans of paint, one rusted and one shiny. I thought the hardest poem would be Up and Down because I had trouble following it. Then, I found a map of Dicken's London and printed it out for Pamela. Before the reading, Pamela colored all the places mentioned in the poem with a yellow crayon. While I read it to her aloud, Pamela astonished me with her auditory processing skills and pointed out things like Ludgate Hill, Fleet Street, and Temple Bar on the map. She sure has come a long way!

The following is a list of what we accomplished this week, according to plan. The keys are to have short lessons and to keep in mind what is really important (context, meaning, process, ideas). We are not at full schedule yet, but we managed to pull this off in less than 3 hours and 15 minutes a day. I do not have as much literature as other Charlotte Mason educators due to Pamela's severe language delays.

Mathematics
We did three short lessons, totaling an hour a day, on geometry, number theory, and algebra/arithmetic. In geometry, Pamela measured the length and width of small and large rectangular objects, learned what a square inch is, and discovered how to find the area of rectangle by counting square inches or multiplying length times width. She measured the base and height of right triangles and discovered how to find their area. In number theory, Pamela played various games that preview the concept of negative. Her B.C. question inspired me to invent a time travel game, too. She now understands how to add two negative numbers and how to add a positive and a negative, except when it crosses zero. Even though we said things like "going north/south" or "going back/ahead in time" rather than negative or positive, Pamela was practicing how to handle negative numbers. In algebra/arithmetic, we reviewed fractions and covered whole, equal parts versus unequal parts, fraction, numerator and denominator, the syntax of saying fractions, and equivalent fractions. I cleared up some gaps in her understanding and found out where she needs work.

History
We worked out of five books for our two threads of ancient history, and Pamela added pages to the book of centuries we started last year. For the most ancient of history, Pamela read and wrote a narration of Cain and Abel (Chapter 4 of Adam and His Kin and Genesis 4:1-15 from an illustrated version of Genesis). For the era leading to the birth of Jesus, she just started Augustus Caesar's World and typed narrations for 44 B.C.. She recorded some sidebars from The Amazing Expedition Bible and the meeting between Elizabeth and Mary at about 3-6 B.C. (Luke 1:39-56 of an illustrated version of The New Testament). I plan to blog her book of centuries down the road.

Geography
While formal geography was not on the schedule, we located Fleet Street, London and found Apollonia on a map of ancient Rome. I pointed out Sicily to Pamela and told her that her grandparents lived there for many years. Literature, history, and family reminiscing provide many opportunities to study maps!

Language Arts
Pamela did studied dictation of a one page story about Pandora and needed no special lessons. She started memorizing The Horseman for recitation and practiced her articulation in reciting, reading aloud poems, and singing songs. She typed narrations of Watership Down and her history readings. Pamela copied a poem she selected called "A Morning in Fall" by Reeve Lindbergh and part of a story she picked called Who Took the Farmer's Hat? into her copy journal for penmanship. Pamela completed Lesson 1 of Writing Strands Level 2 (emphasizing adjectives and commas). She took a picture and typed a story about her rabbit. Pamela learned syntax for saying fractions correctly by comparing the denominator to how we say singular versus plural nouns. She wrote out many of her answers in math in complete sentences. Pamela orally narrated her readings and two paintings by Monet.

Literature
Pamela read five poems by Walter de la Mare and one chapter of Watership Down.

Life Skills
Pamela helped me deliver hot lunches to eighteen elderly people through the Meals on Wheels program. She learned to rename and color-code tabs of Excel worksheets as well as add, move, and delete worksheets. She is creating a workbook with the calendar information she loves to track. She decided which way to turn while we were walking the dog, taking a different path every day. We talked about people we saw while we worked up a sweat (the neighbor's son getting off the bus and Opa driving to Sumter). She spent a little bit of time with her cousins who are visiting from Virginia.

Recreation
We exercised by walking the dog and took one nature walk sans pooch. Pamela painted a leaf in her nature journal and nearly has the melody for Blessed Assurance and Land of the Silver Birch. What astounds me is how expressively Pamela sings: when she sang in the choir a few years back, I could hardly get her to articulate and now she sings with gusto! We listened to Mozart in the car (Pamela nearly always puts on classical music in the car anyway) and did two picture studies on Monet: The Picnic and Camille Embroidering.

The Rabbit:

My furry, white rabbit with long, white ears, furry white hands, short, white feet, small, white tail, short pink bag and long, orange carrot was sitting on the grass. It slept.

Picture and Text by Pamela Glaser after her first lesson Writing Strands Level 2.

Unedited by Tammy Glaser, who is thinking her decision to go without the association method for language arts might be justified.

Geometry, Charlotte Mason Style

Have you ever looked on the Internet for original ideas in math? You can find tons of supposedly "fun" worksheets or kill and drill computer programs that focus on procedure or facts, not knowledge.

We covered area in our first week of 20-minute geometry lessons, Charlotte Mason style. She suggested giving a child "such problems as he can work, but yet which are difficult enough to cause him some little mental effort" (Volume 1, page 255). In other words, tedious long division problems or cutesy little worksheets are pointless. If a math lesson does not spark an original thought, then it is a waste of time!

Rather than make children memorize, Charlotte recommended making math so clear and understandable that any other way of learning a fact or doing a procedure would seem absurd.

"We remember how instructive and impressive Ruskin is on the thesis that 'two and two make four' and cannot by any possibility that the universe affords be made to make five or three. From this point of view, of immutable law, children should approach Mathematics; they should see how impressive is Euclid’s 'Which is absurd,' just as absurd as would be the statements of a man who said that his apples always fell upwards, and for the same reason. The behaviour of figures and lines is like the fall of an apple, fixed by immutable laws, and it is a great thing to begin to see these laws even in their lowliest application." (Volume 6, page 152)

How does this look in real life? My plan for this week was to introduce the concept of area and work through the area of various shapes. Most curriculum hand down the magical formula from on high that some smart dead guy figured out a long time ago. I wanted Pamela to discover it for herself.

Day One
I gathered a bunch of flat, rectangular objects (refrigerator magnet, sticky note, Netflix envelope, etc.) for Pamela to measure. First, I grabbed two items and asked her which one was bigger. She had no problems understanding this preview of area. I had a 7" x 10" grid (an Excel spreadsheet) that represented 70 square-inch blocks. I gave Pamela a piece of paper with columns for the object, length, width, square inches, and shape. We measured length and width with a ruler and outlined the object on the grid. Then, I introduced the idea of a square-inch and measured the sides of one. We counted up the number of square-inch blocks in the first item, and then Pamela recorded her observations for the first object. We continued the process until we hit the fourth object when she figured out the pattern: length times width yields the square inches.





We repeated this process for all seven objects so that Pamela could know through her own reason that the area of a rectangle is the length times width. Anything else would seem absurd to her. Imagine I said to ADD the dimensions. She would know that made no sense because she figured out the pattern for herself!

Day Two
This lesson took much longer because I wanted her to apply the same thinking to larger rectangular objects. At first, we covered the objects with the grids. You can see how we covered the top of the toaster with grids.



When the objects were too large, Pamela calculated the square inches for herself. She worked hard until she finished the fourth object and realized she was not even half of the way done. Measuring large objects with a ruler required her to skip count and do mental math in her head. She became tired and disheartened with five objects left. I checked the stopwatch and realized she had only four minutes left, so I showed it to her and said, "We only have enough time for one more problem!" Pamela's face brightened and she eagerly went back to work. Charlotte knew the value of short lessons: "Give him short sums, in words rather than in figures, and excite him in the enthusiasm which produces concentrated attention and rapid work" (Volume 1, page 261).



Day Three
Rather than jump to the formula right away, we worked on word problems today in which Pamela drew the items (and even colored them) and figured out the answers. Since we dropped the association method, I even encouraged her to write the answer in complete sentences. Often we jump so quickly to new symbols and formulas that meaning disappears. "I recommend strongly that no new symbol should ever be introduced before it is necessary to use it in practical work. A new labour-saving symbol is like a new machine, extremely interesting when you realize its usefulness, merely strange when you see it lying idle" (Parent's Review Article).

Day Four
Pamela discovered how to find the area of a triangle. I spotlighted the difference between the area of a rectangle and triangle with similar dimensions by having Pamela doing them together and filling out this chart.


To figure out the area of a triangle, we identified and counted the whole blocks first. Then, I cut out the partial blocks and Pamela matched them. We counted the matched partials and added it to the whole blocks to get the number of square inches.



We found an alternate and easier way to do this with a square!


As you can see on the video, Pamela did well. She caught onto the pattern by the third and fourth set.



Day Five Plan
We continued to work on triangles, which are tricky because of the concept of base and height, which I plan to flesh out next week. We had a wonderful week and Pamela's opinion of geometry is that, "Great! Fun! I measured." Now, that is what I call an accurate gestalt of our week.

Let his arithmetic lesson be to the child a daily exercise in clear thinking and rapid, careful execution, and his mental growth will be as obvious as the sprouting of seedlings in the spring. (Volume 1, page 261)

Original Thinking about Geometry

Warning: You are about to enter the Land of Original Thinking. If you like the security of following exactly what a text book says and marking your own trail makes you feel dizzy, find another math guide!

Last June, I presented the topic of how Charlotte Mason taught math. Inspired by the soundness of her ideas, I will attempt to implement them this year with Pamela, who is taking Pre-Algebra. Judging by the reaction of people in my audience, the most controversial recommendation was the following:

Pronounce a sum wrong, or right––it cannot be something between the two. That which is wrong must remain wrong: the child must not be let run away with the notion that wrong can be mended into right. (Volume 1, Pages 260-261)

What! No partial credit? But . . . but . . . but . . .

I know!

I even admitted to my class I had never really attempted this. Someone suggested a brilliant way to do it, so I went home and immediately adopted her idea with David, who was working his way through the final third of MUS Algebra II. We loved it!

What she suggested is to assign only half of the problems and mark what is right right and what is wrong wrong. Then, assign an extra problem for each wrong one, keeping in mind Charlotte's admonition that "he may get the next sum right, and the wise teacher will make it her business to see that he does" (Volume 1, page 261). How? Assess what went wrong and resolve this issue before trying more problems, whether it be careless execution, misunderstanding one little thing, or completely missing the boat.

Charlotte believed that arithmetic trained children to be accurate and clear-thinking. We foster slipshod habits of mind by "the copying, prompting, telling, helping over difficulties, working with an eye to the answer which he knows" Volume 1, page 260.

While Charlotte Mason's books do not go into great detail on math, clues are scattered online. The latest complete PNEU schedule for the highest form available online is for 1922: Charlotte Mason broke math up into three short lessons (Arithmetic, Geometry, and Algebra), using different books for each. I modeled our plan around this idea and spread Math-U-See's thirty-lesson schedule for Pre-Algebra over 36 weeks. The following is my plan for Geometry (roughly one-third of the book) in 20 minutes every school day, five times a week:

Week 1 - Assess and fill in gaps for the area of a square/rectangle/triangle/circle.
Week 2 - Introduce surface area of cubes, rectangular solids, and rectangular and triangular pyramids by using concrete objects. Transition to pictures of them by making shapes from paper and unfolding them to figure out surface area.
Week 3 - Transition from unfolded shapes to labeled pictures to drawing surface area for word problems.
Week 4 - Do selected surface area problems from Lesson 15 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 5 - Introduce the volume of rectangular solids by slicing up blocks of cheese or using building blocks. Transition from blocks to slices and transition to labeled pictures.
Week 6 - Transition from drawing pictures for rectangular solid volume to word problems and working through the equations.
Week 7 - Introduce Pythagorean theorem by measuring by hand, squaring each side, and looking for a pattern. Transition to figuring it out from a labeled picture.
Week 8 - Transition from solving the Pythagorean theorem for labeled pictures to drawing right triangles for word problems.
Week 9 - Do selected Pythagorean problems from Lesson 10 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 10 - Introduce volume of cylinders by finding the volume of stacks of coasters, pineapple, etc. Transition to labeled pictures.
Week 11 - Transition from labeled pictures to drawing cylinders for word problems.
Week 12 - Do selected volume of a cylinder problems from Lesson 24 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 13 - Introduce volume of pyramids with a square base and cones by filling different-sized objects of these shapes with rice and pouring them into rectangular solids and cylinders with the same dimensions. The goal is demonstrate that one is one-third of the other. Transition to labeled pictures.
Week 14 - Transition from labeled pictures to drawing pyramids and cones for word problems.
Week 15 - Do selected volume of a pyramid and cone problems from Lesson 27 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 16 - Assess memory of ratios and proportions. Using concrete activities like cooking and whole/part pictures and thinking to reintroduce ratios and proportions.
Week 17 - Transition from whole/part pictures to drawing them for word problems.
Week 18 - Do selected ratio and proportion problems from Lesson 19 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 19 - Measure the sides of similar polygons (while practicing knowing their names) and look for a pattern. Transition to doing the same for labeled pictures.
Week 20 - Transition from labeled pictures to similar polygon word problems.
Week 21 - Do selected similar polygon problems from Lesson 20 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 22 - Practice carrying and borrowing in inches, feet, and yards using strips representing each. Transition to labeled pictures, drawing, and equations.
Week 23 - Transition to labeled pictures, drawing, and equations. Then, try it with adding and subtracting time.
Week 24 - Do selected adding and subtracting time problems from Lesson 26 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 25 - Read temperatures of various liquids in Fahrenheit and Celsius. Measure freezing and boiling temperatures of water too. Show the logic of how the conversions are made using two strips of paper with these two temperatures in both units.
Week 26 - Transition to drawing and equations.
Week 27 - Do selected Celsius to Fahrenheit problems from Lesson 16 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 28 - Show the logic of how the conversions are made using two strips of paper with these two temperatures in both units. Transition to drawing and equations.
Week 29 - Do selected Celsius to Fahrenheit problems from Lesson 17 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 30 - Show the same civilian time and military time until she sees the pattern. Develop a formula for converting time.
Week 31 - Try adding and subtracting multary time as was done with measurements and civilian time previously.
Week 32 - Do selected adding and subtracting military time problems from Lesson 28 of MUS Pre-Algebra.
Week 33 - Add and subtract measurements through concrete activities: feet and inches, yards and feet, pounds and ounces.
Week 34 - Add and subtract measurements through pictures: feet and inches, yards and feet, pounds and ounces.
Week 35 - Add and subtract measurements by drawing for word problems: feet and inches, yards and feet, pounds and ounces.
Week 36 - Do selected adding and subtracting measurement problems from Lesson 29 of MUS Pre-Algebra.

In the following posts, I will include my plans for Algebra and Number Theory and what we covered in our first week of each.

Sailing through the First Day of School

Because we spend three weeks ramping up to a full blown schedule, Pamela breezed through her first day of school today! Attending ChildLight USA's annual conference last June renewed my enthusiasm about applying Charlotte Mason's methods even more thoughtfully than I had before. I have changed some aspects of our homeschooling program:

• I let go of the daily hour of the association method because Pamela has made such wonderful progress in overcoming her aphasia that I think a combination of Relationship Development Intervention, Charlotte Mason language arts (oral and written narration, copywork, studied dictation, recitation), Writing Strands Level 2, and picture study will be enough to spur more gains in language.
• I split Math-U-See's Pre-Algebra into three twenty-minute tracks a day to allow more time to ground Pamela in new ideas (up to two weeks) before having to work in abstract symbols: number theory, arithmetic/algebra, and geometry. I promise to blog more later.
• I cut some classes back to two or three times a week (as Charlotte Mason did) to add a few important subjects or to have time for things that seemed to get neglected (*ahem* exercise).
• I am thinking very hard about how to apply the dynamic thinking skills listed in Chapter 2 of The RDI Book in all subjects of our curriculum and daily life. I even put on the schedule carved out time for chores and life skills to motivate Pamela (who loves crossing things off our weekly list).
• With the help of free courses online, I am guiding Pamela through how to get the most out of spreadsheets so that we launch her love of writing lists and making connections between calendars, the Chinese zodiac, places we have lived, PBS television stations, favorite movies, roman numerals, etc. into the digital age.
• I split up history into short blocks with a block of notebook time every day to continue two book of centuries from last year for Ancient History (The Story of the World, Volume 1, The Amazing Expedition Bible, and Adam and His Kin) and Roman History (Augustus Caesar's World and The Amazing Expedition Bible) and start two new ones for English History (Our Island Story) and American History (The World of Columbus and Sons).

So, how did our three-hour-and-fifteen-minute day look?

Morning

• Covered columns/letters, rows/numbers, and cells and renaming and color-coding the tabs of worksheets in Excel to make a calendar spreadsheet for 20 minutes.
• Copied part of a story that she choose in her copy journal for 5 minutes.
• Measured length and width of seven flat, rectangular objects and used a grid of square-inch blocks to figure out the area for 20 minutes--she figured out how to calculate the area halfway through the activity!
• Reviewed whole numbers versus fractions and the need for pieces to be the same size using the concrete idea of pizza, pie, and cookies for 20 minutes.
• Played the map game and recorded her movements north and south to introduce the idea of negative numbers for 20 minutes.
• Typed a narration of Chapter 11 of Watership Down for 10 minutes and read a page and a half from Chapter 12 for 15 minutes.
• Typed a narration of Cain and Abel based on a storyboard from last June for 10 minutes.
• Wrote three sentences from a story about Pandora for studied dictation with no mistakes for 10 minutes.
• Read half a page from Adam and His Kin plus Genesis 4:25-5:4 for 10 minutes and started a new storyboard about Seth's family for 5 minutes.
• Sang three verses of Blessed Assurance for 5 minutes.
• Read aloud Walter de la Mare's poem The Horseman for 10 minutes.
• Use the poem as a springboard for understanding adjectives and doing the first day of Lesson 1 in Writing Strands Level 2 for 15 minutes.

Afternoon

• Walked the Arwenator (our hyperactive dog) for 30 minutes.
• Listened to Mozart for 10 minutes while running errands.

I was especially pleased with Pamela's very succinct narration of Cain and Abel:

Adam and Eve had two babies called Cain and Abel. Cain and Abel was burning some animals. Cain Fought Abel. Abel was dead. Abel went to Heaven. Cain was homeless.

She also wrote a neat sentence for Writing Strands 2 with very little guidance from me:

This is a pink hat with moon, stars, and patches.

We will be phasing in literature, chores, science, geography, and the new history material in the next three weeks, so stay tuned!

Monitoring May Be Too Much of a Good Thing

We spent many hours in the car on Saturday, and I was able to take three terrific shots that spotlight some interesting things about Pamela's development. Pamela took sign language homeschool co-operative classes for about three years (ages 9-11 and age 14). She struggled with the same issues in sign language that she struggled with autism: problems reading and using facial expressions, word order and syntax, and intricate details in gestures. Now that she is more adept in nonverbal communication, Pamela is starting to recall her favorite signs and is becoming creative! A few weeks ago, she invented her own sign for "old woman": instead of signing woman and then old. She made the wrinkled face pictured on the left and signed "woman"! Pretty clever, huh?
One thing that struck me about Pamela on this trip was how well she connected to her brother and her cousin. She always looked the person in the face, turning her face to them, whenever they were talking. At one point, she played a game with them. Jose whispered something to Pamela, and then she whispered something to David. Then, David whispered to Pamela and she turned around and whispered to Jose. She enjoyed playing these silly games with her brother and cousin.
Two years ago, Jose's younger brother Antonio stayed with us for about two weeks when Pamela was only six months into our RDI journey. She was not able to interact with him in the rich manner she interacts now. Jose told me that this is the first time he has ever been able to make connections with her. He finds it novel interacting with her like this for the first time in twenty years, so he plays along well: he knows that she likes to "cure" people with her magic finger, so he coughs and she zaps him and says, "Hocus pocus!" Jose has already figured out her favorite songs and tries to encourage Pamela to sing along with him. Sometimes, she joins him and, at other times, she makes a raspberry. He gets a kick out of her desire to interact, and he will say, "Pamela, give me five" or "Pamela, can I see the old woman face?"

Today, Jose and I howled with laughter at something Pamela did at the Post Office. We were standing in line, and this little girl touched the fan. Not only did Pamela monitor what the four-year-old did, but she also scolded her in a gentle but serious tone, "Don't touch it . . . you be in big trouble . . . you're a naughty girl!" A year ago, Pamela would have been oblivious. Today, she noticed the action, she realized it could be harmful, and she took an appropriate step (appropriate being based on her level of social development, not her age).

Fortunately, the grandmother of the little girl took it well and the girl looked up at Pamela with wide eyes, unsure of what to do. I thank God the little one did not cry or get flustered!

Daddy's Girl

Pamela and Steve are sharing joint attention, a cognitive skill often lacking in autism, as they look at his Blackberry, while he checks his email. Joint attention, a triangulating relationship between two people and an external stimuli, is much more than a snapshot in time. By the age of twelve months, a baby desires "to broaden her own subjective impressions by learning those of her partners. She is borrowing the perspective of another person's mind to enhance her own ability to obtain meaning" (The RDI Book, page 120). We are using this ability to guide Pamela through three cool milestones right now, captured in a very brief conversation caught on video at Walmart the other day.

Pamela is more able to tolerate things that might be broken. I dropped the camera when I tried to turn it on. While I was picking it up, Pamela asked, "Is it broke?" A few years ago, such an incident would be cause for a meltdown. Instead of flipping out, she noticed that I was calm so she referenced my reaction and stayed calm, too.

For some reason, Pamela switched topics to Steve and his running schedule. Because Pamela did not like his unpredictable departure times for going to work she practically stalked him until he was out the door. Last January, as part of our whac-a-mole campaign, we started working on her anxieties and very slowly, but surely, she learned to embrace the idea that he leaves for work at a different time every day and some days he even works at home. Her final tactic was to talk Steve out of running because she observed a pattern between running and later departure times. We guided her out of pestering him about that too once he realized that his soft spot for Pamela allowed her to manipulate him, knowingly and deliberately.

Tuesday morning, Steve's touch pad on his work laptop died. Pamela walked into the room while he quietly tried to figure out the problem. She stayed calm as we searched the drawers for a wireless mouse, located batteries, and realized the mouse was no good. She asked, "Is it broke?" Steve calmly replied, "I am going to give it to the techie at work. He's really good. He can fix anything."

Pamela is also learning to monitor my movements. When we dropped David off at the dentist, she sprinted ahead of me into the waiting room and let the door close on me. Her cousin Jose and I stood outside the door, peering at her through the glass, waiting for her to realize what happened. On the way in to pick up David, Pamela showed much more caution. In the second and third clips, filmed the next day, we are going in and out of a new building and Pamela monitors me much more carefully this time.

Pamela shares a close bond with her cousin Jose, who is only six months older than her. She cracked up him up the other day when he was chatting with one of his friends via webcam on his laptop. Jose asked her to say hi to his friend. Feeling a bit jealous of competition, Pamela said, "P-U! You stink!" Then, she fired her magic finger (seen in the picture to the left) and said, "Shoot her!"

Wordless Wednesday: Pamela Hits the Jackpot at Walmart

Chim, Chiminea . . .

Last Friday, we learned that we would be hosting our nephew from El Salvador for twelve days until his dormitory opens. We planned to meet up with his father and brothers on Saturday and take him home--a five-hour round trip. When I let Pamela know about her cousin's visit, she bolted and Snoopy danced her way through the house. Later, she came up to me and said, "Tomorrow's an exciting day!"

Yesterday morning, Steve was sitting in bed with his laptop, and I was just beginning to wake up at about seven. Pamela walked in the room, moved to Steve's side of the bed, looked at him, and said, "Good morning." Then, she walked around to my side of the bed and greeted me good morning, too!

These two stories illustrate a point: Pamela knows how to share sweet moments without having a hidden agenda. She did not share her excitement as means to worm her way into a trip to the mall or her favorite restaurant. In fact, they ended up shopping for golf clubs and eating at Outback, a restaurant we have never tried (yes, I know they feature a gluten-free menu and yummy food). She did not greet us with good morning and then hit us up with questions like "What's for breakfast?" or "When are we leaving?" Sometimes, people talk simply to share what they are thinking!

Those who endorse teaching through positive reinforcements often point out that we all work for money, and, if left unpaid, we would quit our jobs. Abraham Lincoln made a great point about work, "My father taught me to work; he did not teach me to love it." If offered two jobs with the same pay, one boring and the other fulfilling, most people would choose the latter. If all of our income needs were met, would we still work? It depends upon the nature of the job. Work that has intrinsic meaning and fulfillment would still be worth pursuing for its own sake.

Why do people volunteer? Once or twice a month, rain, stifling heat, or freezing cold, the kids and I deliver meals on wheels. We are not paid for it. The weather makes it unpleasant sometimes. The people we are serving will probably never be able to return the favor for they are poor and elderly. We serve them out of gratitude for our blessings in hopes of brightening their day with food and a friendly face.

What motivates people to feed the birds or exceed expectations in lawn care like Mr. Pearl Fryar in Bishopville? Why do we read books like The Lord of the Rings that teach us nothing practical but touch the soul? Why do we drive to a special spot to watch the sunrise? Why do folks cook a delicious meal when something easy like a peanut butter and jelly on wheat sandwiches with carrot sticks and an apple will do?

For some inexplicable reason that has to do with the sacredness of personality, we find it irresistable. Charlotte Mason believed we could teach children without toying with their desires. She wrote, "But knowledge is delectable. We have all the 'satiable curtiosity' of Mr. Kipling's Elephant even when we content ourselves with the broken meats flung by the daily press. Knowledge is to us as our mother's milk, we grow thereby and in the act of sucking are admirably content" (Volume 6, page 89).

Some criticize RDI because it ignores "proven" behavior principles like reinforcement and motivation. Can children with autism learn for the sake of learning without these principles? In Pamela's case, yes! I snicker because one board-certified behavior therapist admits that RDI may help "some advanced and naturally vocal children"--a person with lifelong aphasia who is still mastering English as a first language at age twenty is not what I call naturally vocal.

How do we teach children with autism without behavior principles? The other day Pamela ran into the house to tell me the chiminea had fallen. The news was not all that surprising for the thing was cracked in several spots. I asked Pamela if she wanted to help me clean up and she agreed. First, I pulled over the big trash can, opened it up, and looked at the mess, acting as if I were thinking about what to do first. Pamela looked at the mess too, grabbed a piece of the pot, and tossed it into the can. Then, I did the same. We took turns picking up big pieces, sticks, and trash we had intented to burn.

At one point, Pamela stopped and said, "Wash your hands." I noted, "My hands are dirty too. I'm going to wait until I'm finished." Then, I kept working and she did the same. We got to the point in which the only thing left was ash and small bits of debris. I said, "I don't think we can pick that up with our hands," and walked over to the shed. We found two shovels, a snow shovel and a digging shovel. Pamela had never used a big shovel before so I demonstrated how to use it and then we took turns trying out both shovels as long as it seemed worth while.

Ash was all over that corner of the brick patio, so we grabbed the big broom from the garage. Pamela held the snow shovel on the grass, while I swept ash onto the shovel. When finished, she dumped it into the trash can. To remove all of the fine ash, we walked over to the hose. Pamela secured the spray nozzle to the hose, and I turned it on. Then, she sprayed the brick until she thought it looked good enough. When finished, we put everything away and washed our hands.

Collaborating to figure out a new task is an example of guided participation. I structured the activity through familiar interaction patterns: alternating and simultaneous. When Pamela was unsure of a step, she looked at me and I nodded to let her know she was on track. She struggled to stick the snow shovel under the debris, and I scaffolded with my hands over her hands. I guided the movement of the shovel to the trashcan and held my hands underneath the handle in case Pamela found it too heavy. She did so well the first time dumping ash into the can, I backed out and let her be. The only time I stepped back into assist on her turn was when she asked for help. When I made declarative comments, I was just making talk. The goal of narrating is to describe what we are doing, not to tell Pamela what to do. Directing her verbally would rob her of the opportunity to think.

Behaviorists do somthing similar with "a heavy emphasis on making learning enjoyable, and on engaging the learner in positive social interactions" (Dr. Gina Green). Why must they make learning more palatable? Once Pamela learned to embrace change and novelty, she began to feel competent about the constant variations and unexpected events of life, which increased her motivation to learn. Dr. Steve Gustein's description fits Pamela well, "Apprentices who routinely experience challenges as safe and successful develop a strong motivation to explore and expand their world, as well as a sense of general well being, competence and trust in themselves and their guides." Even though she had never cleaned up a broken chiminea nor handled a shovel, she felt competent enough to try something new.

"These principles are limited by the respect due to the personality of children, which must not be encroached upon whether by the direct use of fear or love, suggestion or influence, or by undue play upon any one natural desire." Charlotte Mason's Fourth Principle of Education.

A Work in Progress

"The human brain is a work-in-progress that reflects your experiences and your relationships" writes Dr. Jeanne Segal. Three years ago, I might have added, "Except for autism," but now I know differently! I would not have believed this nugget ("Scientists studying people over age ninety have found that their subjects' brains can continue to produce new neural pathways even though older pathways are dying") to be true because of all of the neural plasticity blather until I saw Pamela learn to do things children with autism are not supposed to do at the ripe age of eighteen-plus. Three years ago, a statement like this would have made no sense, "The human brain is highly social." Now, I have seen that even the brain of my autistic teenager is highly social when I work within her zone of proximal development (where she is developmentally, even if that means working on preschooler skills).

The following quote fills me up with hope that Pamela will continue to blossom in her ability to make connections and relate to others:

Because the brain remains flexible throughout life, it is capable of continual change. This constant development is influenced by the people with whom we are emotionally attached. As we grow older, this inter-dependence continues to change the way our brains function.

The key factor in shaping the function of the brain is . . . relationship!

Ya, think?

Too many times, I read that RDI is nothing more than a kinder, gentler way of shaping behavior. Okay, I do end up changing behavior, but I do not do it by reinforcing targeted responses because half of the time I am not sure how Pamela will respond. The thought of punishment or reward does not even occur to me when we are interacting with one another. The other day Pamela cried out and acted a bit rude toward me when I did something unexpected. Because I realized right away that she misunderstood what I was doing, I worked on guiding her thinking first.

We have the Netflix option of having three DVDs checked out at a time. Pamela has one, David has one, and Steve and I "share" ours. Right now, we have four out because, when a movie is not stocked, they send the next item on the list plus order the unstocked item. So, we have four DVDs in our possession right now.

I noticed we had FIVE return envelopes because the last time I mailed two DVDs in the same envelope. The return envelopes were on the desk right next to Pamela where she was sitting. Since we only needed four, I threw one away. Pamela got worried and said in a high pitched voice, "We need it! Take it back!"

I paused and, when she grew quiet and shifted attention to me, I explained that we already have four envelopes. That still did not satisfy her because she said, "This one!" and pointed to the trash. Then I picked up the envelopes and counted them out, "We have four envelopes. One" I paused, and Pamela joined in on the count. We counted the rest together, "Two, Three, Four."

Then, I said, "We have four DVDs." We counted them out. Then, Pamela said, "Good."

I did not have to tell her how to change her behavior nor did I have to shape it. Once we shared the same understanding of the situation, my unexpected action made sense to Pamela and she calmed down. The episode added to Pamela's memory bank of situations in which her mother will stop and explain things that she does not understand. I become more trustworthy in her eyes.

As mentioned in an earlier post, I am becoming less reliable to teach Pamela the importance of monitoring other people. On one shopping trip, I did not go through the door if she did not hold it for me or I forgot to get a cart. If I did that every time, Pamela would develop a mindless habit of keeping the door open or getting the cart. Some days, I act like my old self and remain completely reliable to avoid getting into a rut.

Other days, I am more of a ditz. Yesterday, I took my socks off in the car because my feet were hot and one fell out of the car onto the asphalt. After Pamela got out of the car to go to the store, she spotted the sock immediately. She said, "Oops," picked it up, and put it back in the car. I do things like grab the wrong cereal even though she told me which one she wanted or drop the shopping list (she picked it up and said, "You dropped it."). I have forgotten to take the cart when leaving the store or left a bag at the self-checkout. In both cases, Pamela acted appropriately in repairing the situation.

Sometimes, I let Pamela learn through natural consequences. She was at the passenger door of the car and called out, "Open the door." I was busy putting bags in the storage compartment before I returned the cart. She repeated her request two or three times but did not come to make sure I was paying attention. So, I pretended that I hadn't heard her! I put away the cart and, when I turned around, I saw Pamela standing behind the car watching me. She did come to see why I wasn't paying attention, but not fast enough to catch me before I walked away with the cart. Then, I apologized for not unlocking the doors and we went home.

I guess you could say I am shaping Pamela's ability to monitor me, but not with clear, direct reinforcements. My goal is not for her to acquire language, knowledge, and the procedures of life in a static, scripted way, but to apply what she is learning in situations that are unique, spontaneous, and unpredictable. Dr. Segal's gestalt nails it here,

To learn in a manner that produces change (and not merely a glut of information), you need to engage the emotional centers of the brain. There is a difference between learning, taking in new information--and changing, consistently applying what you have learned to the varying circumstances in your life.

Wordless Wednesday: 18 Meals on Wheels Delivered

Rhetorical Question of the Season

If you could plan the ideal school for your special needs child, how would it look? What would the setting be like? What must the school teachers do or the school have for it to be a lovely day for your child? How would the day flow? What extra needs must be addressed and how it they be addressed?

The Map Game and Inklings of Negative Numbers

We started a new game yesterday to work on the concept of negative. Sometimes, people express South latitude and West longitude with a negative sign. I want to Pamela to see negative numbers in a "same, but different" framework. I found a map with straight lines marking latitude and longitude, so that the intersection of two lines on the map is a spot upon which a player can land. Crossing the equator is the same conceptually as crossing zero on a number line. It is different because you are working with maps, instead of money.

I chose a region of Africa where you can travel along the equator and still be on land for many moves. The area is covers a rectangle from (10 N, 0 E) to (10 S, 0 E) to (10 N, 45 E) to (10 S, 45 E). Crossing the equator is the same conceptually as crossing zero on a number line. It is different because you are working with maps, instead of money. After much finagling in Excel, I managed to create a document with grids that marked every degree of latitude and every five degrees of longitude. I made the equator red. I copied it into Word and uploaded it here in Google Docs if you want to give it a try.

The game uses two die: one regular dice with one to six dots on each side and the other with two N's for north, two S's for south, and two E's for east. That way players bounce around the equator more than they head east, but eventually they head east. The game ends when the first player arrives in Kenya.

Suppose a player is at (4 S, 5 E) like the blue peg. If the player rolls S 3, then he moves three jumps to the south and ends up at (4 S, 20 E). Click each picture for an enlarged view.


Suppose the next player at (2 N, 10 E) like the yellow peg. If she rolls S 5, then she moves five jumps to the south and ends up at (3 S, 10 E). Conceptually, this player started in positive territory and landed in negative territory.


Sometimes, a player reaches an edge. If he rolls something that would take him off the map, the player stays put and hopes for a better roll next time. We found this heightened the anxiety and anticipation during the game.

This game works on many levels. First, Pamela is exploring the concept of negative. Once she is experienced, we will start keeping track of all movements south and north by writing it down like the money game. While playing the game, we sometimes talked about where we were on the map, which is geography, of course, not to mention exposure to the ideas of latitude and longitude. We worked on likes and dislikes because Pamela was trying to guess which peg I wanted by reading my facial expression. She is not much of a game player, but, as I pretended to grow frustrated about being stuck in the Indian Ocean, she started to reference my reactions. Pamela saw what I needed to roll and, before I rolled, she began to anticipate what might happen and laughed when I got a bad roll. When the same thing happened to her, she found it funny, too.



The other exciting moment occurred when Pamela played the money game. Since Pamela understands the play of the game, I reduced my verbals greatly and let her take responsibility for keeping the game going. She had five cents (a nickel) and wanted to buy a fish for nine cents. She knew she did not have enough money, so she found an IOU for four cents and paid for the fish that way. In essence, she just applied the following equation in her mind:

5 - 9 = -4

I Did Chores (Introduction to the Concept of Negative)

Since June, I have had math on the brain, partially because Pamela will start pre-algebra this year. At the ChildLight USA conference, my presentation covered Charlotte Mason's ideas about teaching math. I had never examined her views closely until then because I have very strong views of my own since I have a degree in mathematics. My goal this year is to test her ideas through pre-algebra with Pamela. What makes it difficult is that Charlotte Mason did not go into great detail about teaching post-elementary school math in any of her books. However, Parent's Review articles do shed some light, especially the ones published during her lifetime as she edited the magazine!

Charlotte Mason definitely believed in the zone of proximal development: "Care must be taken to give the child such problems as he can work, but yet which are difficult enough to cause him some little mental effort" (Volume 1, page 255). She understood that assigning tedious drawn-out problems kept children occupied for too long, ending up with nearly right answers, burnt out minds, and discouraged hearts. She worried about children who knew their tables backwards and forwards but did not understand their purpose nor rationale.

She found that children could uncover mathematical truths by exploring and explaining concrete objects and real-life applications to pictures of these ideas to mental images to abstract written numbers and symbols. Mill’s Logic summarized what she learned during her years teaching the children of English coal miners, "All who wish to carry the child's mind along with them in learning arithmetic, all who wish to teach numbers and not mere ciphers, now teach it through the evidence of the senses in the manner we have described" (Volume 1, page 262). The typical process for the mind to visualize a new concept would be to go from concrete manipulation to explaining pictures to describing mental pictures to written equations.

My goal is to extrapolate her ideas to pre-algebra. The first lesson is about negative numbers, and I have been inventing games that develop the concept without actually using the term negative. Whenever we go shopping, mail packages, or eat out, we talk about spending money. We also talk about how Dad earns money when he goes to work, while David earns money for taking care of people's lawns. Up until recently, we have not focused on chores and earning money and, with Pamela's growth in dynamic thinking, I thought it a good time to start.

Practicing concepts about money has captured Pamela's imagination. I have little trinkets for sale and spending money is like subtracting. I have chores ready to go and earning money is like adding. IOU slips are on hand so that Pamela can go into debt to buy trinkets, which means she ends up with a negative balance. She can pay back any debt by doing chores. I made a graphic organizer for Pamela to place her coins ("in my purse") and her IOU slips ("in the hole"). I also have a slip to help her keep track of what happened and figure out her balance. The following video is 10 minutes long, but I think it will give you a good idea of how it works.

Even though we focus on math, I try to take advantage of any opportunities for relationship building as shown in the following video.



Pamela has latched onto the idea of chores rather strongly. Yesterday, I told her I would pay her a nickel if she put her clothes in the laundry room after she took her shower. She came up to me a half hour later and told me, "I did chores." Today, I did not mention a thing and she came up to me as soon as she stashed her dirty clothers, "I did chores." So, we figured out how much money she earned all together. This dovetails very nicely with one of our long-term goals for Pamela to monitor things we have requested and let us know when certain events have occurred.

Part I


Part II

Three Steps Backward in the Annuals of Guided Participation

When it comes to guided participation, Steve prefers a benevolent dictatorship with Pamela in charge. He has a very hard time sticking to what he prefers and the moment Pamela senses him waffling, she runs him over with a bulldozer.

We continue to work on her desire to control him, and the lastest thing to address is iTunes. She does not want him listening to iTunes on the computer, for no good reason other than to wield power over Daddy in my opinion. We were listening to music on Steve's computer when the dragon lady emerged from her den. She started to rant, "Turn it off! X! X! X! Turn it off!"

Steve decided to placate her by playing her favorite songs: a good move if your strategy is to scaffold Pamela into accepting us listening to iTunes. I supported him by snapping my fingers and saying declarative things about the wonderful music.

After four song switches, he said, "I am tired of listening to iTunes. I am turning it off because I want to."

AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Marshmallow man strikes again.

I fussed at him for letting Pamela win that round. He acted sheepishly and evasively about her not winning because it was his choice.

Then, he made a fatal mistake. He turned to Pamela and asked her, "Did you win or lose?"

She shot up her arms in the symbol of victory and said, "I win!"

Just now, I recorded Pamela who convincingly shared her testimony of said win (even though she is using the computer, she is cognizant enough of her victory to share this tidbit with me):

Pamela 1, Dad 0 . . .

Okay, I'm over it! Deep cleansing breathes . . . calm and neutral, Tammy . . .

Monitoring Other People

Pamela surprised us by taking our pictures. She framed them very nicely, I might add!

During the RDA, our consultant noticed that Pamela emotionally engages with us and others much more often now. Two things we did last year really helped Pamela reach a point where she could stay engaged: (1) we addressed her anxieties by teaching her to reference us and use self-talk to calm down and (2) we helped her move out of static, scripted conversation loops into talking about what was going on in the moment. She now seeks out information about us: what we are doing, feeling, and thinking. She is trying to figure out relationships with our neighbors by asking me questions: one neighbor has autistic twins that are David's age while other neighbors are the grandparents of one of David's friends. She saw a woman she did not know in the other neighbor's yard and asked, "Who's that?" I told her it was the young man's mother, and they are visiting from their home a few hours away.

When we walked to the car to leave for the store, we heard a neighbor call, "Hi, Tammy! Hi, Pamela!" Pamela asked me, "Who is it?" I shrugged my shoulders, and she asked, "Is it Will's grandmother?" I turned in looked in the direction of the neighbor and said, "It's Charlotte!" I waved and Pamela ran up to me and waved too. She noticed that Charlotte and her husband were getting out of their car, so she said, "Good! They're back!"

Pamela wants to join us when we chat with our neighbors. The couple next door calls to see if we want fresh corn on the cob. Pamela wants to know who called and if she can go too. She greets them and carries the bag of corn home for me. The grandparents of David's friend invites us over to sit near the garden and chat, and Pamela wants to come too because "I'm an adult." The door rings and Pamela has to know who is at the door, "Is it UPS? Is it Will?" When I offer to take David and the neighbor's grandsons to dinner, Pamela wants to join us. She sees a man in a sling at church and asks, "What happened to arm?" and says to the hairstylist with a different sort of hair color, "Purple hair!"

The lady who usually cuts Pamela's hair said to me, "Pamela looks tired." I told the beautician about Pamela's busy June and how VBS and a trip to Raleigh wore her out. The hair cutter, who loves talking to Pamela, asked, "How are you doing without cable?" Pamela said, "Good! We don't need it!" She followed up with, "I heard you did VBS. What did you do?" Pamela said, "Ripped paper," which was not the answer the Brit beautician expected and she looked confused. Pamela added, "It's over." I briefly mentioned that Pamela took down the decorations. "Oh, I see! You liked helping them clean up?" Pamela smiled and said, "Yes!"

Do you see the fundamental shift in Pamela's approach to people and conversations? Not only is she interested in knowing people better, she is more equipped to be competent in brief conversations with them!

Right now, I am juggling two objectives: giving Pamela opportunities to monitor me by being a ditz which comes naturally and spotlighting differences between her and my likes and dislikes. Lately, I have been doing things like forgetting to remove the seal from a new bottle of ketchup, making wrong turns, leaving bags at the check out, forgetting to get a shopping cart, and not going through doors when Pamela is ahead of me. Yesterday at the post office, she went through the glass doors and got in line without me. She was there for about 20 seconds before she realized I was not with her.

You can see that the beginning of the first clip that she is improving in her ability to monitor me at transition points. In the store we sometimes go our own ways and do things. I am hoping she will learn to enjoy finding me and keeping tabs on me. So, I spotlighted the joy of her finding me and that I was hiding. She smiled when I told her about hiding the second time. When Pamela got hyperfocused, she lost track of me. It helped to close the distance when she was absorbed in looking at a video.



I also look for chances to share our likes and dislikes to strengthen Pamela's concept of self versus other. In the clip below, she had an easy time with talking about beans and shopping cards. She was reading me pretty well and sharing her thoughts too. However, Pamela struggled when we were looking at the DVDs. I suspected she was thinking I was going to buy the videos I was liking (Jimmy Neutron or Horton Hears a Who), and she was really interested in Madagascar - Escape 2 Africa. We ended up buying neither because we were really just browsing. Remaining calm and neutral, stopping the action and waiting for her to reference me, and explaining the difference between looking and buying helped calm her down.

America's Birthday and Rice Chex

Oh NUTS! Peanuts, to be exact! I just read the label more carefully . . . the Cinnamon Chex have both MILK and PEANUT flour--why can't General Mills get it right!

Don't worry, Pamela didn't eat any . . . only the Rice, Corn, and Honey Nut Chex are safe for her . . . except that their product formulation is subject to change . . . read the fine print folks!

During last Monday's RDA, Pamela and our consultant went to Chick-fil-A for lunch, bought T-shirt supplies, and made two shirts to celebrate Independence Day. Our consultant assessed many aspects of Pamela's co-regulation/collaboration and social observation.

Recalling their lunch date last August in which Pamela was the French fry thief, our consultant warned her she might steal fries this time. At the restaurant, Pamela wanted more ketchup at lunch. She looked at our consultant and said, "Don't steal it." Pamela monitored her the whole time, preventing any pilfering. At home, Pamela has observed that, when she leaves the computer to use the bathroom, one of us starts surfing the net. Lately, she has been telling us, "Don't touch it. I'll be right back." Such actions are part of social referencing, which means regulating your own behavior in response to the behavior of others.

Pamela accepts the idea that she has different likes and dislikes from other people. Her way of eating fries grossed out our consultant (ketchup, mustard, AND mayonnaise), but Pamela stuck with the way she likes her fries. Being aware of these differences between people is a sign of separating self from others. It also paves the way for positive collaboration. Earlier in the day, Pamela stated she did not want to shop but agreed to make T-shirts. After learning that they had no supplies on hand, Pamela agreed to hit the craft store. While looking at shirts, our consultant blabbed about red, white, and blue for patriotic T-shirts, but Pamela chose purple. While our consultant chose white and seemed surprised at Pamela's choice, Pamela did not change her own mind nor did she try to control the color of the other shirt. She showed great flexibility.

Our consultant noticed emerging collaboration skills while they made the shirts. She pretended to struggle to unwrap plastic covering the paint bottles and began to act frustrated. Pamela noticed her struggle and reminded her to breathe by breathing loudly herself because she was having word retrieval glitches. Then, she began handing our consultant different tools to see which one was most effective at tearing off the plastic. While painting, our consultant looked over to the paper towels to see if Pamela wanted any. Pamela was monitoring her closely because she said, "Paper towels . . . no."

Cinnamon Chex have both MILK and PEANUT flour . . .

RDI is different from most therapies in that we all have goals. Steve is going to practice giving Pamela more thinkspace, while I am going to avoid overcompensating by being a bit unreliable, less intuitive, more silly, and ditzy. Our overarching goal for Pamela will be for to separate herself from others through a same, but different framework and to monitor situations and people more carefully. Because RDI focuses on dynamic thinking, we end up taking advantage of situations that happen on the fly. Today, one popped up when I noticed that Rice Chex is now gluten free!

The very specific objective for this week is to give Pamela an opportunity to read my visual reaction before I tell her what I am thinking. She needs to take responsibility for monitoring my reactions without any guiding from me. One the way home from the store, I worked out the scenario in my head: leave the hatch up with the cereal in the car. With her Monk-like attention to detail, I knew she would notice the hatch and everything would unfold beautifully. Or so I thought!

Everything went according to plan until Steve walked in ahead of Pamela. He did not know my plan, so he inadvertently distracted her. I decided to gasp to see if she would shift attention to me, and she did! At first, Pamela reacted negatively to the cereal because she thought she could not have it. She saw my positive reaction and realized the cereal was gluten-free and that she could not have it. I did not give her my verbal opinion until after we celebrated.

Cinnamon Chex have both MILK and PEANUT flour . . .



Cinnamon Chex have both MILK and PEANUT flour . . .

Major Shift in Communication and Vast Increase in Spoken Language

Last May, we met our consultant for the first time and we went through our first RDA. I blogged the entire thing: RDA 1 and 2, RDA 3, Why RDI?, Why/What/How, RDA 4, RDA 5, and RDA 6. While the process is much more streamlined, I still agree with the sentiments shared last year.

Our consultant assessed that Pamela now meets the criteria for Stage 3.

While we may dip into earlier stages if we run across any road blocks, Pamela functions like a two-year-old, hence Stage 3. Besides working through Stage 2 objectives, our overarching goal last year was to help Pamela find her way out of static, scripted ways of interacting and guide her into experience sharing. What do I mean? In last year's RDA, Pamela filled dead air space with scripts about calendars and highways, and we indulged! All last year, we tried to help her go beyond that to comment on what we are doing, remembering what it reminds us of, thinking about how it relates to the future.

When Pamela watched a movie last year, she would memorize the dialog and repeated it later in cycles of scripting. Occasionally, she could twist it into something to share, plugging in her own words when her syntax failed. Now, when Pamela watches a movie, she makes unique comments that do not morph into endless scripts. Right now, she is watching The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Pamela is saying things like "Oh, no!" when the Pevensies first enter the wardrobe and only find wood. She says, "He flushed," after Edmond left the bathroom. Then, when she sees Lucy wake up, she says, "Candle . . . going back to the wardrobe" and "Hot chocolate" and "What's that?" when she saw the Turkish delight. When the children go to Mr. Tumnus' home, Pamela says, "Poor Tumnus." When the wolf growls at Edmund, Pamela says, "Wolf howling."

Scripting is not a problem in itself. The issue boils down to intent. If Pamela uses a script to communicate declaratively, then she is moving forward. For example, she says, "It's not the end of the world" when David is upset because the computer crashed. So every time Pamela uses a script, we need to analyze it for intent and function and give her other ways to say the same thing. If Pamela says, "It's not the end of the world," we can rephrase, "Everything will be okay. That's not bad. We can fix it. We'll live."

Scripting was also a sign of Pamela's feeling of incompetence. We see now that she wants to communicate with us because she enjoys sharing with us. She did not understand how to speak in a way that was mutually enjoyable, so she fell back on what she enjoyed: scripting. She sought to control our conversation through her scripts because she did not know how to respond to declarative language.

In our current RDI, our consultant noticed that Pamela's thoughtfulness and reciprocity in expressing herself has shifted in major way. Not only does she use verbal language to share experiences and seek information, she also uses multiple channels (i.e., nonverbal communication). Since she feels more confident in her spoken language, the quality and quantitiy have increased vastly! When Pamela is unsure of herself, she uses self-talk to create meaning (the book Awakening Children's Minds gives insight on the value of private speech).

Our consultant was genuinely excited about Pamela's progress. She explained that autistic people undergoing RDI at Pamela's age do not cover as much ground as she has in the past year. Monday morning our consultant put on her FB "looking forward to a great assessment today" and later she wrote "has a great job". She teared up when she tried to help Steve understand how monumental Pamela's progress is. I get it, but he does not know enough about development to understand how hard it is to see the kind of change we are seeing. She said she felt privileged to be working with Pamela.

In my next couple of posts, I plan to review four other areas of dynamic thinking (emotional engagement, co-regulation/ collaboration, social observation, and personal memory) plus the overarching goal of next year if I don't jump over to living books, narrating, or mother culture . . .