I was just thinking about how little teaching / instruction goes on in our house. I've written many times before about the king, and how he hasn't made any significant cognitive / educational progress in years. I always say that he has the expressive & receptive language of an 18 month old. And he's been stuck there for YEARS.
Now he's made some behavioral progress... and I've recounted some simple things that I consider progress that you can read HERE.
But speech, or knowing his letters or numbers, or refining his point, or picking up PECS or sign language... very little progress over the years. The school tries their best... and I think they're doing a pretty darn good job... but not much progress... So when they say he had a "good day at school" what that means is behaviorally he was happy/pleasant, he ate all his lunch, and maybe he sat for all of the circle time.
And I've written before that when Kyle perceives that you are asking him to work ("point to eyes" "where's the letter d"), he gets stressed out and breathes heavy, and will try to get out of the situation...especially when it's mom or dad asking him.
And with all the medical stuff (seizures, weight loss, holding breath) & behavioral stuff (aggression, hyperactivity) we've been dealing with over the past year we've really stopped trying to get more out of him.
And I think we are happier and he is happier.
What we do instead is fill his out of school time with as much fun structured activity as possible. And with all that activity it truly feels like there's not much more time in his day for "instruction" from mom & dad.
He gets out of school at 2:10pm. On Tues after school wifey takes him to an OT swim lesson. On Thur after school he has a special needs sports class.
On Mon & Wed, thanks to his Medicaid waiver he sometimes has a sort of "play therapy" in the afternoons with one of his aides from the school. On Fri, maybe wifey will take Kyle food shopping.
With all the driving back & forth from all of these get they usually get home at around 5pm. Then he maybe has 30-60 minutes to unwind, watch some tv, before it's 6pm and dinner time. I get home around 6:30pm-ish and they are usually just finishing up dinner. And lately by 8pm he's ready to go upstairs to bed. So that leaves 6:30pm-8pm as the time that I could be trying to "work" with him.
But I will readily admit that I'm tired from working all day. And he's tired from a full day at school. And so 6:30-8pm is more tv watching for the king.
The weekends, we have lots of outside activities that I write about often. Music therapy & swim on Saturday. And gymnastics & swim on Sunday. And we get home from those around 2pm. And yes, from 2pm on we have plenty of time to try to have structured play time with our kid. But we don't. We do laundry, have lunch, watch tv, etc. Sometimes we will have family over... but not much structure or learning going on.
My wife has always been fine with this routine...but I would very often feel shitty about Kyle's lack of progress and would feel guilty about not doing more to "teach" him.
But when I would try to work with him it was SO FREAKING HARD... and would make me angry & depressed & more guily.
I wrote this in a previous blog post
... if your kid shows a glimmer of interest in learning it makes it SO much easier to "work" with him on your own.
When you get something back from your kid when you use a particular teaching method (ABA, Pecs, etc), even if it's just a glimmer of something, an iota of something it makes you want to work with him on your own outside of the "school day".
We haven't seen that from Kyle in a LONG time. He doesn't enjoy learning anymore. With mom & dad he gets stressed when you ask him the simplest question like "point to nose"
And that still is true. So we've kinda given up. And we are all much happier for it.
Now that's not to say that we don't push him. We got him potty trained. We still try to push him to dress himself. And to use a fork properly. This stuff is a struggle too. But this is stuff we will push him more on.
I guess you could say we push him on "life skills" at home but we are thru pushing him on academic / educational stuff. If he doesn't know "point to the letter A" by now maybe he never will. And if he knows it, but his point is off, then we will try to work on his point (another life skill?).
But if he knew the letter A but his point was off wouldn't that frustrate the shit out of him? If he could read or type but couldn't because of some fine motor issue, wouldn't he melt down because of it? But he doesn't. So I don't think he is a Carly Fleischmann. He is not frustrated with what he can't do. He is just happy being who he is. And enjoying his toddler shows & toys.
When Kyle is in a good place behaviorally things can feel kinda normal in our house. Not like raising a typical 9 year old...but maybe like raising a typical 2 year old.
So for now we are going to continue doing what we are doing and not feeling guilty about it. Letting the school do their thing as best they can, sending him to lots of activities after school, and on the weekends, and home time with mom & dad is down time...a time to chill & flap & watch tv & jump on his ball...and mom & dad will be there to feed him, tickle him, love him up, wipe his butt (another life skill we need to work on), and prevent him from climbing on the staircase above the sofa...
This post is all over the place. But I guess I'm gonna end it here.