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Verity

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Everything posted by Verity

  1. Have you considered writing with ease and first language lessons? I really feel that those covered everything i needed for LA until about Middleschool grades.
  2. Wow, thanks for all the replies! :) I know that meds work differently for different kids, I've been down this road before when we had insurance and both of my diagnosed kids were in public school. I've been homeschooling mostly without meds for the last four years but puberty has hit him hard. Puberty, along with this move and better insurance led me to seek out the meds. I am in the process of getting an appointment with a developmental pediatrician who I imagine would be of assistance in fine tuning the meds or referring us to a specialist. Waiting to hear back from the ped probably early next week to see what she recommends since the Focalin isn't covered.
  3. Met with our new pediatrician yesterday, overall a very positive meeting - she was supportive of homeschooling for kids with Aspergers and talked to me like I had a brain in my head (so many dr's don't)... She ended up prescribing Focalin XR but my insurance doesn't seem to cover it so I'm looking into alternatives. I'm looking specifically at Intuniv, Strattera and Vyvanse for one a day assistance with ADD (inattentive) and some anxiety. My son is almost 14 with Aspergers and ADD, almost 200lbs so not too worried about lessened appetite. Any suggestions on what has worked for other Aspies?
  4. Thanks for the tip - just downloaded it!
  5. You are a saint! I've been in my new house for 5 weeks and there are still boxes in pretty much every room. I don't know how you did that + homeschooling! Just laugh at how petty these comments are - they obviously have nothing to do with reality. :grouphug:
  6. :iagree: How could they not know about the poultry, manure etc if they walked the plot and chose where to build the house. Sorry you are being bothered by idiots!
  7. Prime also gets you access to a free Kindle book, once per month from their Prime Member library and supposedly some extra access to Amazon movies/videos. I use the Kindle but not the other so I don't know those details.
  8. This. Aspies don't learn social skills by being around kids their age. What they learn in that setting is that they are "dumb", too slow to keep up and always inappropriate. Social skills need to be learned both at home or on small outings with parents or in a social skills class where an adult teaches implicitly things like sharing, being a good sport, taking turns talking and gives the small group of kids time to practice those skills in a safe setting. I had my ds (now 13, high functioning Aspie) in public school until early 4th grade. He did well academically through 3rd grade so didn't qualify for an IEP. At that time his only official dx was severe ADD. What I realized at the end of 3rd/beginning of 4th was how much he was teased and bulllied. He got a nickname at school and because he doesn't understand social interactions he wanted to take on the persona that was being applied to him. He was also becoming more angry and belligerent - very different from the sweet and loving child I sent to school. The final straw was when he couldn't keep up at PE running (his fine and gross motor skills are quite behind) and started breaking the craft sticks they used to check laps, then was spitting at the ground close to where other kids were standing. After his meltdown I realized that ps was not the best fit for him, no matter what we had to do he needed to come home. It's tough at times and since bringing him home we made the decision to hs all three kids, but I don't regret it at all.
  9. Ahhh, I did not know that, yes they require flash. Bummer.
  10. I play Cityville and Castleville - it's so nice being in control of something.:tongue_smilie:
  11. Peach, From what I can tell it doesn't look like the Google Nexus 7 will play the games from Zynga...there aren't any definitive answers in the searches I have done...which probably means No. I think it may be only an iPad that will play those or a laptop. :P (dh would rather me get a laptop but I would prefer something small I can carry in my purse.)
  12. We had a death in the family last night...of my old Kindle. I got this from my mom as a hand me down when I bought her a Kindle Fire last December for her birthday. Since she lives with us she said I could "borrow" it indefinitely. I have it in a nice protective case/holder but the last drop (missed the shelf) seems to have killed it. I know it's out of warranty because this one is a replacement for a previous warranty use. So...my birthday is next month and I've been asking dh if some kind of tablet but I'm going to really miss my e-reader. I use it multiple times daily. Here's what I want my tablet/reader to do: 1) read books of course (I buy through Amazon alot and have Prime membership), use free book sources, etc... 2) download PDF files for use during school 3) would like to be able to access email/facebook 4) Play Zynga games (they relax me) but I don't know if any tablets can actually handle those 5) WIFI for general internet access when in a hotspot...for GPS, websurfing So, is there any one electronic item that can do that or do I need a new ereader *and* a tablet of some type? I was thinking about the new Google Tablet or a new Nook...or do I need an iPad? I have a go ahead to make a purchase for my birthday but I need it to be the right one. Help!!! :)
  13. The student book comes with a cd. Now Classical Academic Press has also made a dvd for students to use. I did SSL two years ago before the dvd and enjoyed it with my middle son. I have to check out that dvd, my youngest would probably love it. I'm a big fan of CAP materials. :)
  14. Hi all - we've had a kinda tough, busy year. We moved less than a month ago to a new town 3 hours away from our old one. We are more or less settled in (though nothing hanging on the walls yet) and planning to start school officially on Monday. We have also joined a co-op that meets once a week starting on Thursday. I joined because I think it will be good for my kids to have more social and intellectual interaction with other children in their age range, and it will give us a chance to meet friends in a new town, and so forth. My oldest son will be 14 in October and is in 8th grade this year. He has Asperger's, is very bright but has alot of trouble with social interaction and with fine motor and gross motor skills. With the job change that caused this move we have better insurance; so, in addition to co-op once a week, he will also be getting into some counseling, a social skills group and I'm hoping to find an OT that can help him with strengthening his body overall. His classes this year are listed below: MUS (finishing zeta, starting pre-alg), Rainbow science (at home and labs with coop), Latin, Logic, listening in on history with youngers and Sotw 4 at co-op, bible study with family and free reading. We will be starting Spanish for Children A in a few weeks, after three years of latin I think that this will be fairly easy for us. He is also going to be in a Thinking Games class at co-op. (sounds fun doesn't it?!) My initial plans were for him to also do WWS2 (I got the first two weeks beta in email this week), but after looking at it I'm not sure if I need another writing curriculum for him. Outside of the issue of what levels of stress he can handle in his life right now (writing is hard for him because he can't organize his thoughts well in his head)...does he academically need writing in addition to Lightning Lit?
  15. So sorry to hear about your husband! My prayers for a quick resolution of this melanoma and restoration of sanity for your family! This year I chose to use Rainbow Science for my 8th grade son with Asperger's. I have been trying to combine all three boys and he needed something more that I thought could get done. I ordered a used kit here from the board that has almost all of the components for the experiments and all the books. I think that this is something he can do mostly independently with me reminding him. I know he will like the humor in the books so I'm giving it a go. In your shoes...depending on finances (and illness is expensive I know), I would probably go with what I knew. If I had the money and wanted to make sure that ds had a better fit for his school year I would be very tempted to try Rainbow. :) Good luck with making this decision!
  16. Word lists have their place, maybe as a separate part of language arts you could incorporate vocab from their read aloud but I wouldn't stop too much in the middle of reading a story just because it will kill the pleasure of a good story. :) Even young children can learn alot of vocab just from context - it's a great skill to develop too!
  17. We are finishing up Detectives in Togas from our summer reading and will be starting Call It Courage as part of our unit study from ANWOA. I'm excited to try out unit studies, fingers crossed! :)
  18. Have you looked into file folder games? I googled it and got a big list of file folder games for homophones. :)
  19. :grouphug: If we had a "like" button your post would blow it up! :D
  20. :iagree: American the Beautiful has a good bit of reading and literature analysis (I am remembering??) Another language would be a good start here, something she could continue for two years in highschool to get the credits needed to graduate?
  21. I pulled a child out of school who had learned how to "work the system" in a similar way. It is important to figure out what his real learning challenges are and what he is capable of. (sorry grammar police!) In our case I set some tangible rewards up front for really good performance - it can be as simple as an early "recess" to extra video game time or even credit towards some purchase he would like to make (create a chart to chart visually if it helps!) Then when I knew I was getting his real, honest to goodness best I could design his classwork to his level. It turns out that my child is one of those kids who is still flipping letters and numbers at age 10 and he does have weak fine motor skills. Those are areas that I need some professional help to remediate. But now that I know what he *can* do I have him working in the upper ranges of his ability several times a week. That sometimes means recopying a sentence that he was intentionally sloppy on, or going back over a math test where he skipped problems. Just not every writing assignment or every math test. KWIM? For the horrendous spelling (he was taught phonetic spelling at public school where they encourage them to just write regardless of spelling) we have been using the Phonetic Zoo and it has helped. Not sure what we are using this year - maybe All About Spelling since I am ordering this program as part of my 1st graders curriculum. PS the school psychologist tested my 2nd ds and said he came out with an IQ of 88 (and that I should be grateful because he was so much better off than so many she saw)..but I knew that he was much brighter than that...he just didn't care about what she was doing with him and was bored. This is a kid who now is learning Latin (and doing well!) along side complex math and science. It can be hard to judge a child's learning abilities without really getting to know the kid and creating a desire (of some type) to do his or her best. :)
  22. I was new to Latin when I choose to teach it to my kids - I went with LfC and have been very happy. I watched the videos with my oldest and did the work with him side by side (in the younger years he required alot of hand holding). He is finishing up LfC C this year and ready to start Latin Alive while my middle son is in LfC B and will progress the same. My youngest is starting first, I'm hoping that he will be ready for SSL towards the end of this year or the beginning of next. I have enjoyed Classical Academic Press's products for Latin and Logic. They are my pick!
  23. AoA was my ds's favorite subject last year. Not only did he learn alot but in conversations with his younger brothers he used examples from the subject to teach them about logic and fallacies. Be excited! :D
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