It was an emotional day for me. Jonathan's kindergarten teacher had a "last day" ceremony this afternoon and all of a sudden I realized what a major accomplishment today was. I had a huge nut in my chest and tears in my eyes watching the video the kindergarten teacher made and seeing the teacher give each kid their report cards and awards and telling them that they are now "First Graders".
I approached the teacher and she again told me that she really enjoyed having Jonathan. He is very sweet and loving and she is going to miss him. She was an excellent role model for Jonathan and I could not be happier to have had her as my son's kindergarten teacher. The teacher did a great job teaching them positive behaviors that they will carry for many years.
In Jonathan's report card note for the 4th period, the teacher says "Jonathan has made excellent progress and successfully completed the kindergarten curriculum as defined by (local county) program of studies. Jonathan should be very proud of his accomplishments this year. I would strongly encourage you to enforce Jonathan's literacy development throughout the summer by reading and writing daily. Continued reinforcement will maintain your child's literacy skills and facilitate a smooth transition to first grade. It has been a great joy having Jonathan as a member of our classroom!".
The report card has 6 sections. They are rated between 1 (progressing) and 5 (exceeding objectives). To pass kindergarten, each area must reach level 4 (mastery of kindergarten objectives). Jonathan reached level 4 in 5 of the 6 areas. He reached level 5 in "Reading". But no surprises here since he started reading since he was 18 months. It was a very good report card.
In addition, Jonathan took a test twice this school year called DRA Word Analysis. There are 8 sections in this test. In the Fall, he scored 159 and the class average was 61. In the Spring, he scored 192 and the class average was 167. The maximum score someone could receive in this test is 193. He missed it by 1 point. The teacher was very thrilled. This continues to show that his receptive language and overall understanding has caught up. His major problem continues to be the expressive language.
On May 30, 2008, we had his revised IEP. The Special Ed teacher provided a report based on the new 2 goals already. For the written language goal (Jonathan will compose 3-5 sentences on a given topic using correct grammar over a three week period), she gave him a 3 out of 5 (which is appropriate. This goal was written less than a month ago). 3 means The student has demonstrated some progress towards achieving this goal. Her comments were "Jonathan has started to make great strides at the closing of the school year with his sentence choice and structure".
For the communication / speech goal (Jonathan will communicate with age appropriate syntax and oral communication skills in 4 out of 5 30 minute sessions) she gave him a 4 out of 5. 4 means The student is making sufficient progress toward achieving this goal within the duration of this IEP. This IEP is not even 1 month old. Her comments were "Jonathan has demonstrated growth in his ability to communicate with appropriate syntax within the classroom setting this quarter". If he continues to improve at this rate, I am sure we will need to call in for another IEP meeting when first grate starts.
All these observations are very positive and make me feel very proud of Jonathan and give me the push to continue this recovery journey. There is still lots to do. I notice things that others don't because he is my kid. For instance, he could not sit still today to watch the movie. He needs to focus more. He still lacks some social cues (e.g., when he hugs, he turns his head away. Just need to teach him the proper form. It is not sensory related any longer). And still has a bit of low muscle tone which makes him uncoordinated.
Here are some pictures of Jonathan and a very short video of the teacher giving Jonathan an award.
WHY Questions
During our second visit to Jonathan's DAN! Dr. 3 years ago, Javier asked the Dr. how would we know when to stop all the interventions, and the Dr. said that it was hard to tell, but the milestone we wanted to look for was "Why" questions. When Jonathan started to ask "Why" questions, we would be towards the end of the race.
Javier bought a Johny Walker Blue Label bottle and said that he would open it when Jonathan asked his first "why" questions (which in our mind meant recovered).
Last year, Jonathan started to ask Why questions, but something told us that these were not the right why questions. He first started to ask why if we told him he couldn't do something. Then he started to ask why if we told him he could do something. But we noticed that he never spontaneously asked why questions to satisfy curiosity. So we decided that was not the type of "why" question we were looking for and decided not to open the bottle.
This year he started asking more complex why questions, on some how questions, but these were not the true "curiosity" type questions. They were more to satisfy reasoning.
Today, on our way back home from a restaurant, he looked outside the window of the car and said "look mommy, the moon is moving". And Daddy said "no sweetie, the clouds are the ones moving". I was sitting next to him (in between the kids as my dad rode with use) and he said "but mom, how are the clouds moving?" and I said "because of the wind. The wind is making them move". And he looked outside again and said "is there wind out with the clouds?" and I said "yes honey, the wind is out with the clouds" and asked why and I said "because the wind is always outside blowing sometimes hard, sometimes soft". He kept looking out the window and said "look mommy, the moon and the clouds are following us". That was cute. I said yes. Then we turned and he and I started talking about something else and he turned outside and didn't see the moon. He started moving around looking for it and said "the moon is gone", I said "it is hiding from us. Do you know why we can't see the moon anymore?" and he said "because we turned. But when we get home, I can go outside the car and see the moon and the clouds again". Then I realized that he is starting to ask the appropriate why questions.
We are not going to open the bottle yet!
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