Reception auties 2018/19 - thread 2

[openupmyeagereyes]

Thanks to LightTripper for the thread title. This is the continuation of the thread for parents and carers of dc with autism in their reception year at school. Please join us if you can or, if you have dc due to start reception in 2019, feel free to drop by and ask us questions.

Thread 1

I love forty ten!! That's pretty much what they do in French isn't it so why not??

Sending magical sleepy vibes to all your beautiful boys ~°~°~°~°~°~°~°~°~`°~

Night night.

I came across this pretty good list of CVC words. For now I like the idea of giving ds a group of words with the same beginning or end to help reinforce it rather than completely different words.

Light the sleepy vibes worked, thank you. Ds slept until about 5:20 and so far this morning he seems a bit calmer. You realise you have to do this every night now!

danni your ds is doing really well. One day soon he will just start reading those words rather than blending. Our teacher gave us a laminated high frequency word mat from Twinkl. We haven’t used it because lots aren’t blendable and he’s not there yet.

It looks like another beautiful day today. I hope everyone has a lovely weekend.

Yesterday DS woke at 5:30 - today 7:30. Hurray!

Today we are off to collect his first pair of glasses. Wish me luck in persuading him to wear them!

Good luck dimples, how’s it going?

Not good - he told the optician that the glasses were hurting him and they kept adjusting them. I explained that he has sensory issues....

Wow, just as I was typing the above he said 'I'm going to put my glasses on'. He only lasted 30 seconds but this is progress.

He just put them on again and I said, ' you look so handsome'' DS's reply: yes, I do!

😍 brilliant

Brilliant dimples. Hopefully he'll get used to them soon.

Ahhh, so cute!! I bet he does look gorgeous in them. I live littlies in glasses. 😍

Hope he keeps them on dimples I'm sure he will get used to them soon x

Ds was back to school today. Lots of noise about not wanting to go back this morning but with a bit of low level bribing (promise of a blind bag) he went in ok. I’m hoping a couple of good days will remind him that he actually likes it when he’s there.

Apart from a couple of days he’s still waking around 4:30 unfortunately.

I hope everyone else had a good day.

Well done getting him in to school open. Sorry about the wakes ups though.

Getting ds ready for school and in we're both fine. Apparently he told one of the TA's to shut up today. Oops. Pick up was another disaster that ended with me half dragging half carrying ds home.

I think I'm going to have to start picking him up with the buggy as I am just not strong enough anymore. I really didn't want to add another thing that made him different but DH said it's already pretty obvious to everyone that he's different and he reckons no one will notice the pram.

liv that sounds tough. I think you have to do what makes things easiest with the buggy. Do you also have dd with you at pick up? Can you strap him in it easily when he’s being difficult?

I certainly can’t carry ds far now when he’s struggling, especially with bags as he’s over 19kg in weight. Luckily, recently, I’ve only had to carry him from Tesco back out to the car when he’s being difficult. Hardest bit was opening the door, putting him in the back headfirst and shutting the door again without catching his feet!

No we pick up dd second so that she can have her tea at nursery. I think if I stapled him in and gave him the iPad he would be ok.

Oh yeah getting them in that car when they don't want to is a nightmare!

Liv, your typo made me laugh - although stapling in would probably be more effective! Sorry that pick up was difficult.

Our day did not start well as DS came v close to scalding himself by knocking over my cup of tea - fortunately no people were damaged, just the furniture.

However, DS kept his glasses on all day at school - still won't wear them for me though!

Yes stapelling would be more effective

Brilliant he kept his glasses on at school though dimples. Glad no one was hurt, we are definitely in a period of not being able to have nice things.

dimples fab he kept his glasses on.

Ds’s TA said he didn’t want to do his work yesterday morning. Hopefully it’s just the transition from the holiday, he has odd days where he just wants to play and is a bit defiant. Most of the time he does all the activities they have for him. They tend to cover most of his learning in the morning I think as he’s more tired in the afternoon.

He did more phonics and writing with me yesterday. It’s been 6 consecutive days which is great. I’ve ordered some pencil grips (from Amazon, natch) to see if they help. Because he struggles to hold his pencil in the correct position he doesn’t get much purchase on the paper and his writing is very light and skittery. OT wants us to work on the strength of the tripod fingers as he has a lot of mobility in them but he’s so tricky to engage with specific activities like that - at least for us. I got him a fiddle cube which he’s used a bit so hopefully that will help too.

And glad no one was injured. They can almost give you a heart attack at times, can’t they.

Open we got these ones for amazon, these are good and force his fingers into a good tripod.

From amazon not for*

Dimples glad your ds is ok! Only takes a split second doesn't it!

Ds does dangerous stuff all the time! he genuinely doesn't have a smidge of danger awareness. He flicked the kettle on yesterday while I was beside him cleaning the patio windows. Luckily I always empty it now when I've made a drink and hot drinks go on the kitchen window sill.

I've had a few really shitty days with ds and behaviour, yesterday involved a smashed sweet jar with thousands of bits of glass all over my kitchen because he threw it at the wall and then he crapped on the trampoline and bounced it all in and then I couldn't get him out.... the mess! (then he was awake 3 hours in the night to top it off )

He's at school today (morning then afternoon - yep they are still taking the piss!) and I'm supposed to be painting his bedroom right now.......

Liv yes staple him in!! sounds much more effective!!

Ds was horrid to get in a pushchair, I had a technique which involved an invented wwe move he used to tantrum so much he would tip it all the way over while he was strapped in! Nightmare in it, bigger nightmare out of it, can't win!

Open ds' writing is very light too, you can barely tell he's wrote anything on the paper, so I started giving him a biro instead. Which poses it's own problems, at least the pencil doesn't show up on their hands and arms and the table

Sounds like a few of our children have issues with handwriting.

Ds' letters are still 3 foot long upside down and back to front and he really really doesn't enjoy doing any practising.

Well I did an hours painting, made a start at least, now to collect him for lunch! & do another hour and half on it this afternoon when he goes back.

danni what a rough few days you’ve had. The trampoline incident sounds particularly hideous. At least you can hose it off though, easier than mess on soft furnishings.

What colour are you painting the bedroom? We’ve been meaning to move ds into a larger room for ages but we haven’t got around to it yet.

I’ve had an industrious morning too (well in a homely way, I’m not exactly a captain of industry!). I sorted out all of ds’s painting and craft items and organised them separately into storage boxes. Went through the many small tubs of play doh to get rid of the dried up ones and organised 3 shelves in our large hall cupboard which houses all manner of things. I found a few stubby pencils which I think will be good for him to use.

I’ve planned DS’s phonics and writing for later - well the writing is just the write from the start book but I encourage him to practice his name too.

While I had lunch I watched an interesting video from Fathering Autism on ABA (from 5/9/18). They have pretty much the same goals as you Light, helping her to learn but not to suppress stims.