Where to start with math and reading ?

[Lots of boys]

Hi, my youngest ds has ASD, apraxia of speech, global delays etc. He is turning 6 soon and would have typically started k this year but we spent the year concentrating on his Autism therapy (we had someone come to our home everyday for 4 hours) so will be treating next year (we start in the fall) as his official K year.

 

I need some help picking resources for this little guy. The things I used for his two older brothers may not suite him well. He still has some speech issues (articulation mostly) and I see them hampering his ability learning to read.

 

So far I have planned to use AAR 1 and 2 with him (I already have these plus OPGTR) but am not sure what to do for math. I have Miquon Orange and MM 1 but I think it will quickly get too advanced for him. I have read about Ronit Bird books I might try. I'm really not sure. I know whatever curriculum I use it needs to go slow, and stay interesting. Thoughts ?

 

Also, what about other reading resources? He actually has no interest in learning to read which worries me. I would appreciate any suggestions you have. Thanks!

[bluebonnetgirl]

At that age if I remember correctly Headsprout was helpful for learning to read. For math, we had success with Touchmath and Mathusee. We now use Teaching Textbooks and ACE Math with success.

 

Beth

[OneStepAtATime]

I think you might really find help with the Ronit Bird books, and you can use them as a supplement to other systems, too.  Get Overcoming Difficulty with Numbers first.  You might find the other books useful, too, but I would get that one first.  Go at your child's pace for when to move on.

 

And with reading, since you are planning to use AAR would you be coupling that with AAS?  The two combined, going pretty slow and consistently might work just fine.  I say that as someone who has not personally used them but who has friends that have and with SN kids.  Most have loved pairing the two and felt it was worthwhile but they had to move at the pace of the child (in once case this meant they had to move faster since the child was bored but the others had to slow down).  

 

Whatever you decide, I would definitely recommend lots of read alouds and if he can handle books on cd then let him listen to books on cd or other audio source at a bit above his reading level so he gets exposure to more advanced vocabulary and concepts without being bogged down by decoding and fluency.  Do this with content as well as just for pleasure reading, including living math books.  I did not do this enough with my kids when they were younger.  I regret that now.  DD struggled with comprehension when a book was on cd so I just didn't push it.  I should have read to her more than I did, since I could slow down, explain words or phrases that were tripping her up, etc.

 

Best wishes.

[PeterPan]

LOB, have you done the Barton pre-test to see if he's actually ready to learn to read?  Have you gone through Earobics or something similar yet?  I was reading recently on an apraxia FB group, and it seemed like some of the kids had fine phonemic awareness and learned to read with no difficulty at all and other kids had severe, severe problems (dyslexia).  My ds is the same age as yours, and he can't distinguish vowels.  He's only just in the past few months gotten to where he can discriminate s/sh with some consistency.  For him, I had to back up and do LIPS.  Earobics we did quite a bit, but the auditory working memory stuff frustrated him immensely.  He only started hearing rhyming relatively consistently in the last few months.  

 

Oh, I got AAR pre- with him, and while it was immensely fun, when we tried it at the normal age he wasn't even CLOSE to being able to do it.  But there's just no way to say, kwim?  These kids just vary.  IF he can't distinguish sounds or hear individual sounds in words, you're probably going to have some more work to do before he's ready.  

 

You mention he's turning 6 soon.  I've noticed that it's very common to redshirt even NT boys with summer birthdays.  My ds has a fall b-day, and I don't feel at all bad that he's turning 6 as he starts K5.  He has no developmental delays either.  I would free yourself to grade adjust and even call him K4 this year if that suits him better.  If you did that, he'd basically just be *1* grade behind, not the *2* that it feels.  Seriously.  I'm not saying you should, just that you should free yourself to teach him exactly where he's at. 

 

Does he enjoy read alouds or content?  Hands-on?  Have you read the book on Rapid Prompting?  It's a teaching method for working with non-verbal dc, and I think the site has videos too.  It's AMAZING.  Someone recently posted a video they found showing someone's progress over the years teaching in this way.  To the extent that he *is* ready for stuff, definitely free yourself to work together in non-verbal ways as needed.  (touching the correct response, etc.)  I'm going to try to take our reading that direction, because saying the sounds in isolation messed up his speech motor control, ugh.  But everyone is where they're at.  That's just us.

 

I'm using Ronit Bird with my ds, but I think he has dyscalculia and dyslexia.  Today he could tell me how many fingers he has, but that's the first time I've ever gotten it from him.  There was no click before.  We tried RS A (I used RS with my dd), and he just had this total blank look.  It was too many leaps too fast.  RB takes nothing for granted and builds everything very, very slowly, spending a week on what RS might do in a day.  That's what my ds needs, but that doesn't mean all kids with apraxia do.  In fact EKS just posted a link to some MRI results on the Eides' blog showing results indicating that autism and dyslexia *ought* to be mutually exclusive.  You just get too many paths for these kids to get autism, get apraxia, and then they're all lumped together as if their homogenous.  Your dc might not struggle with what mine does, and I think it's because of these different ways of getting into the apraxia, etc., kwim?  

 

So that's why I'm saying just feel the waters and see what you've got.  Try the Barton pretest and see how his phonemic awareness is coming along.  Try some math and see if anything clicks.  Hopefully it will be fine!  If it's not, you'll back up and find stuff.  I'll tell you though that what they do now is NO indicator of where they will be in a few years.  We're just going to take our time and make sure everything we try to do we do WELL and with understanding, no freaking out about grade levels.  And when he's 20 he'll be exactly who he was meant to be.  That's what I'm telling myself.  It doesn't help to compare.  All I can do is build that foundation as thoroughly and accurately as I can with stuff that connects with him.  

 

Btw, does your ds have a thing he's really into that you'll be harnessing while you teach him?  With my ds it's weapons, so everything goes back to that.  We play Whack-a-vowel for reading, pirates for vision therapy work, have visiting Egyptian figures threaten to kill us if we don't spell the word they want, etc.  Lots of weapons, hehe.  He enjoys history, because it goes back to weapons and war.  I read him CHOW and got a bunch of activity books to work through.  The VMPAC shows him dominantly kinesthetic.  My theory is to give him all the content via read alouds and audiobooks, nature walks, field guides, that kind of thing that I can, and just slowly, diligently work on the rest.  MP has wonderful enrichment books with nice reading lists themed through the year.  You might consider them.  We've been using them and enjoy the diversity.  Again, don't get all freaky about ages and levels.  Just go with what connects with him.  

 

That's a lot of ideas, and probably half don't apply, sorry.  

[PeterPan]

Btw, I don't know if Jenn will still be reading and replying, so I'll say this.  She consoled me immensely recently by pointing out that a LOT of her K5 experience with her boy with apraxia was therapy.  It finally clicked in my mind that there's NOTHING more important we can do than build those foundations.  Sounds like you've been doing a lot of that, but for us we needed to step up the pace.  

 

I'm just acknowledging that it feels really weird to say your dc is starting K5 and realize you don't have ANY of the curriculum rat race that the other people on the K-8 and whatnot are having.  It's just not at all the same, and yet he's probably a joy to you and a delight to work with (hopefully at times?).  

 

Ronit Bird is really awesome btw.  It won't screw up anyone; a NT dc would simply go through it faster.  I'm seriously, seriously impressed with it.  We're using the ebooks and are in the dot pattern book.  Today he's just now ready to start working on dot patterns for 8, woo-woo!!   :thumbup: 

[kbutton]

MUS Primer is a good place to slow things down but introduce concepts that will be used in Miquon. Are you aware of the Education Unboxed videos online (free)? They pair well with conceptual math programs like Miquon, MUS, etc. We went from Primer into Miquon. The rods are different, so if you really want to use Miquon and think that will cause a transition problem down the road, you might need to "remake" the MUS pages to use c-rods. You can use the MUS book as a guide and do all of the exercises with number cards and c-rods rather than their rods. We didn't end up using the workbook much at all, and when we did, we did the stuff orally. It was easy enough to see what they wanted us to do and just play. You will have to make your own decimal street (and clock if you choose to introduce that at the end of the year) with centimeter graph paper/posterboard. Truthfully, you could probably use MUS Primer as a way to make your own pre-Miquon lab sheets if that appeals to you.

 

One of the advantages of Primer is that it's topical, and you don't have to follow a particular sequence. If you get bogged down, you can move around to other topics. You could incorporate your Ronit Bird books into it wherever you'd like to.

[PeterPan]

If you need RB, don't bother with MUS, mercy.  It's just unnecessary expense and duplication.  (just being radical and controversial, hehe)

 

RB has a c-rod book to follow up her dot pattern book.  Both are sequential, thorough, and MORE than adequate for K5.  I'm not saying the op has to do RB, because I really don't think that.  I'm just saying if you are doing RB with a dc who really needs it, don't feel constrained to do another program as well.  I'm blown away by how well it's covering things.  

 

Now you're making me excited to get to the c-rods book!  I've never even looked to see how many chapters the RB dot pattern ebook has.  We just keep slowly working and not looking ahead, not looking ahead.  He's finally getting some click and noticing things, and it's so hard just to restrain and be PATIENT and let it all develop!!  Today he actually told me first that he has 5 fingers (I asked), then that he has 10 but actually 20...  He counted his toes!  So that was cool, hehe.  And I see other little progresses, like the idea of evens and odds has clicked.  Now RB is going to incorporate that into the patterns for 8.  But we've been working at this for months, doing a bit at a time, and we're just now up to 8.  RightStart is the same conceptually, but it goes so quickly.  Ds couldn't handle that.  He had no ability to say/conceptualize that 1 ten and 1 ten would be 2 ten.  No click.  It's *almost* there now.

 

Well whatever, total rabbit trails.  I'm excited to get to 8, hehe.  She skipped 7, so I guess she'll hit that later.  I remember doing those lessons with dd in RS, so it's fun to be there again.

[Jennifer-72]

I don't have any curriculum suggestions, just wanted to say that I agree that K is all about making sure you have a strong learning foundation and trying to shore up any of those obstacles to learning. Which it sounds like you have been busy doing.

 

We spent our K year expanding ds's play, since play is the main way to work on the language piece. We acted out lots of picture books and spent lots of time drawing pictures of what we read and talking about them all. We also spent a good amount of time working on following multi step instructions and overall listening skills. Which I focused on mainly by way of play as well.

 

Hope you have a fun year with your boy! Enjoy!

[kbutton]

If you need RB, don't bother with MUS, mercy.  It's just unnecessary expense and duplication.  (just being radical and controversial, hehe)

 

RB has a c-rod book to follow up her dot pattern book.  Both are sequential, thorough, and MORE than adequate for K5.  I'm not saying the op has to do RB, because I really don't think that.  I'm just saying if you are doing RB with a dc who really needs it, don't feel constrained to do another program as well.  I'm blown away by how well it's covering things.  

 

Now you're making me excited to get to the c-rods book!  I've never even looked to see how many chapters the RB dot pattern ebook has.  We just keep slowly working and not looking ahead, not looking ahead.  He's finally getting some click and noticing things, and it's so hard just to restrain and be PATIENT and let it all develop!!  Today he actually told me first that he has 5 fingers (I asked), then that he has 10 but actually 20...  He counted his toes!  So that was cool, hehe.  And I see other little progresses, like the idea of evens and odds has clicked.  Now RB is going to incorporate that into the patterns for 8.  But we've been working at this for months, doing a bit at a time, and we're just now up to 8.  RightStart is the same conceptually, but it goes so quickly.  Ds couldn't handle that.  He had no ability to say/conceptualize that 1 ten and 1 ten would be 2 ten.  No click.  It's *almost* there now.

 

Well whatever, total rabbit trails.  I'm excited to get to 8, hehe.  She skipped 7, so I guess she'll hit that later.  I remember doing those lessons with dd in RS, so it's fun to be there again.

 

I didn't know RB was that thorough--I thought it was more remedial. Good to know. Yeah, I wouldn't try to do MUS if RB will cover it. It was just a suggestion for pre-Miquon.

 

[PeterPan]

I didn't know RB was that thorough--I thought it was more remedial. Good to know. Yeah, I wouldn't try to do MUS if RB will cover it. It was just a suggestion for pre-Miquon.

 

I know, I was really amazed too.  It's not going to hit *everything* a K5 curriculum covers, but it's thorough enough that, at least for my purposes, I'm just going to stay focused on working straight through it.  It's certainly covering the computation equivalent of RS A.  No geometry, time, or $, so far, but I assume some of that is in the main book, meaning we just haven't gotten to it yet.

[Lots of boys]

LOB, have you done the Barton pre-test to see if he's actually ready to learn to read? Have you gone through Earobics or something similar yet? I was reading recently on an apraxia FB group, and it seemed like some of the kids had fine phonemic awareness and learned to read with no difficulty at all and other kids had severe, severe problems (dyslexia). My ds is the same age as yours, and he can't distinguish vowels. He's only just in the past few months gotten to where he can discriminate s/sh with some consistency. For him, I had to back up and do LIPS. Earobics we did quite a bit, but the auditory working memory stuff frustrated him immensely. He only started hearing rhyming relatively consistently in the last few months.

 

Oh, I got AAR pre- with him, and while it was immensely fun, when we tried it at the normal age he wasn't even CLOSE to being able to do it. But there's just no way to say, kwim? These kids just vary. IF he can't distinguish sounds or hear individual sounds in words, you're probably going to have some more work to do before he's ready.

 

You mention he's turning 6 soon. I've noticed that it's very common to redshirt even NT boys with summer birthdays. My ds has a fall b-day, and I don't feel at all bad that he's turning 6 as he starts K5. He has no developmental delays either. I would free yourself to grade adjust and even call him K4 this year if that suits him better. If you did that, he'd basically just be *1* grade behind, not the *2* that it feels. Seriously. I'm not saying you should, just that you should free yourself to teach him exactly where he's at.

 

Does he enjoy read alouds or content? Hands-on? Have you read the book on Rapid Prompting? It's a teaching method for working with non-verbal dc, and I think the site has videos too. It's AMAZING. Someone recently posted a video they found showing someone's progress over the years teaching in this way. To the extent that he *is* ready for stuff, definitely free yourself to work together in non-verbal ways as needed. (touching the correct response, etc.) I'm going to try to take our reading that direction, because saying the sounds in isolation messed up his speech motor control, ugh. But everyone is where they're at. That's just us.

 

I'm using Ronit Bird with my ds, but I think he has dyscalculia and dyslexia. Today he could tell me how many fingers he has, but that's the first time I've ever gotten it from him. There was no click before. We tried RS A (I used RS with my dd), and he just had this total blank look. It was too many leaps too fast. RB takes nothing for granted and builds everything very, very slowly, spending a week on what RS might do in a day. That's what my ds needs, but that doesn't mean all kids with apraxia do. In fact EKS just posted a link to some MRI results on the Eides' blog showing results indicating that autism and dyslexia *ought* to be mutually exclusive. You just get too many paths for these kids to get autism, get apraxia, and then they're all lumped together as if their homogenous. Your dc might not struggle with what mine does, and I think it's because of these different ways of getting into the apraxia, etc., kwim?

 

So that's why I'm saying just feel the waters and see what you've got. Try the Barton pretest and see how his phonemic awareness is coming along. Try some math and see if anything clicks. Hopefully it will be fine! If it's not, you'll back up and find stuff. I'll tell you though that what they do now is NO indicator of where they will be in a few years. We're just going to take our time and make sure everything we try to do we do WELL and with understanding, no freaking out about grade levels. And when he's 20 he'll be exactly who he was meant to be. That's what I'm telling myself. It doesn't help to compare. All I can do is build that foundation as thoroughly and accurately as I can with stuff that connects with him.

 

Btw, does your ds have a thing he's really into that you'll be harnessing while you teach him? With my ds it's weapons, so everything goes back to that. We play Whack-a-vowel for reading, pirates for vision therapy work, have visiting Egyptian figures threaten to kill us if we don't spell the word they want, etc. Lots of weapons, hehe. He enjoys history, because it goes back to weapons and war. I read him CHOW and got a bunch of activity books to work through. The VMPAC shows him dominantly kinesthetic. My theory is to give him all the content via read alouds and audiobooks, nature walks, field guides, that kind of thing that I can, and just slowly, diligently work on the rest. MP has wonderful enrichment books with nice reading lists themed through the year. You might consider them. We've been using them and enjoy the diversity. Again, don't get all freaky about ages and levels. Just go with what connects with him.

 

That's a lot of ideas, and probably half don't apply, sorry.

Thanks for your post. No, I haven't done the Barton pre screening but I will. I worry that he will really struggle with reading. He still struggles with many aspects of language and speech. For example, he often mixes up related words (tells me he is done "watching" his cd instead of "listening", or tells me to "rewind" a movie when he means "fast forward". He refers to every pronoun in the masculine form (refers to both men and women as he, him, etc. ). He still struggles with a lot of speech sounds (can't say all the late sounds like l, r, and all blends). He knows most of his letter sounds but mixes up w and r because he says r as w. He often has to restart a sentence many times while he works out the mechanics for how to say what he wants to say.

 

He has no interest in learning to read which concerns me too. He barely tolerates audio books but I have him routinely listening to one or two each morning now. He is still very much interested in early picture books so the CDs are only 5 minutes each which is about his max.

 

I don't know what lips or eararobics is?

 

I was hoping to use AAR with him because I have it but I wonder if we will end up needing Barton (really hoping not because of the price).

 

I will definitely try the RB books. Is there a particular order I should get them in after the first one you recommended?

 

Thank you so much for your thoughts on all of this.

 

Oh, his hook is definitely Angry Birds!! If I could incorporate that into all of our work he would LOVE it!

[PeterPan]

I think you can talk with your SLP about the grammar and word retrieval issues to see what they advise you do to work on them.  

 

You could make a couple beanbag creatures that look like Angry Birds or get a couple small AB toys and have the birds read the words, the birds fly through the air while you recite memory work, etc.  

 

LIPS is by Lindamoodbell, and it's to try to connect speech and written for kids who can't hear it.

 

Earobics is software for phonemic awareness.  

 

My ds doesn't have a delay, meaning I don't have a lot of personal experience to speak, but it seems to me if you know he has a delay and see where he's at, you just roll with it, kwim?  Picture books and short read alouds are a place to be, so you start there and move forward.  I'm not sure it's typical to have reading happen at 5.5 or 6 if the person has a 2-3 year delay, kwim?  I'm not meaning to be rough, but I'm hearing numbers more in the 8-12 range from people in that position with those labels.  Maybe you could give yourself permission to meet him where he is?  I don't think Barton solves a developmental delay or timetable issue.  It's just a help if dyslexia is the issue.  He might need time more than he needs Barton.  

[Lots of boys]

I think you can talk with your SLP about the grammar and word retrieval issues to see what they advise you do to work on them.

 

You could make a couple beanbag creatures that look like Angry Birds or get a couple small AB toys and have the birds read the words, the birds fly through the air while you recite memory work, etc.

 

LIPS is by Lindamoodbell, and it's to try to connect speech and written for kids who can't hear it.

 

Earobics is software for phonemic awareness.

 

My ds doesn't have a delay, meaning I don't have a lot of personal experience to speak, but it seems to me if you know he has a delay and see where he's at, you just roll with it, kwim? Picture books and short read alouds are a place to be, so you start there and move forward. I'm not sure it's typical to have reading happen at 5.5 or 6 if the person has a 2-3 year delay, kwim? I'm not meaning to be rough, but I'm hearing numbers more in the 8-12 range from people in that position with those labels. Maybe you could give yourself permission to meet him where he is? I don't think Barton solves a developmental delay or timetable issue. It's just a help if dyslexia is the issue. He might need time more than he needs Barton.

Thanks so much. It has taken me a while to wrap my head around the fact that he is his own little person on his own timetable. I use to think/hope that once his speech was better he would be on a typical timetable but I realize now we just need to go at whatever pace works for him.

[Heathermomster]

I know, I was really amazed too.  It's not going to hit *everything* a K5 curriculum covers, but it's thorough enough that, at least for my purposes, I'm just going to stay focused on working straight through it.  It's certainly covering the computation equivalent of RS A.  No geometry, time, or $, so far, but I assume some of that is in the main book, meaning we just haven't gotten to it yet.

I would not worry at all about money, time, or geometry being covered.  RB covers the subitization skills necessary to do all those things.  Once the skills are set, teaching those concepts will be more effective.

 

I don't understand what you mean by main book...RB's regular books, such as Overcoming Difficulties with Number and the Dyscalculia Toolkit, provide math calculating strategies and workarounds to traditional math algorithms.  You take that knowledge and apply it to your chosen math curriculum.  Some curricula work better with RB than others; however, RB doesn't not cover money, time, or geometry specifically.  RB to me is the LIPS training of the math world.

 

OP, definitely consider RB and make it fun.  My DD loves RB activities.

[PeterPan]

I would not worry at all about money, time, or geometry being covered.  RB covers the subitization skills necessary to do all those things.  Once the skills are set, teaching those concepts will be more effective.

 

I don't understand what you mean by main book...RB's regular books, such as Overcoming Difficulties with Number and the Dyscalculia Toolkit, provide math calculating strategies and workarounds to traditional math algorithms.  You take that knowledge and apply it to your chosen math curriculum.  Some curricula work better with RB than others; however, RB doesn't not cover money, time, or geometry specifically.  RB to me is the LIPS training of the math world.

 

OP, definitely consider RB and make it fun.  My DD loves RB activities.

Yeah, that's what I meant, her two main print books.  Honestly, I've tried to stay very, very focused on doing just what my ds is ready to do, and I don't look at the other print books.  I don't own them and won't buy them till we're ready for them.  It's sort of a mental hyper-protectiveness I've made around myself, a decision to be very at where he's at and not let my mind drift or wonder if we could go faster or get confused.  I'm going to stay right where he's at, go through the steps in Dots, go through the steps in C-Rods, then see what he needs next.

 

RS weaves together concepts like skip counting and telling time (for obvious reasons) and of course money and place value, so at some point it will be good to diversify.  I'm totally with you though, that we could go a long way building this foundation and let it either click about the applications or go back and hit them, no biggee.  It's more important that he's actually GETTING the foundation and having it click.  This morning he volunteered ways to make 8, so something is clicking in his brain!  And as long as I'm seeing that kind of thought process, I'm happy.  Of course it's easy for me to say that, as I don't have to test yet.  I'll either have to test or do a portfolio review with a certified teacher 2 years from now, and that could be ugly, ugh.  But we'll work it out.

 

You know, we've never talked about this, but I've sort of assumed the thought process of someone who starts dyscalculia remediation later is that they would have GLADLY taken an unusually slow but REAL understanding of math over anything faster but without understanding/click that leaves them stalled out and frustrated later.  That's sort of what I was banking on. 

[PeterPan]

Thanks so much. It has taken me a while to wrap my head around the fact that he is his own little person on his own timetable. I use to think/hope that once his speech was better he would be on a typical timetable but I realize now we just need to go at whatever pace works for him.

:grouphug:   I know.  Our SLP, who is awesome btw and whom we love, told us ds has pure apraxia, nothing else, blah blah.  I'm so literal and naive I believed her.  When I realized more was going on, it made me so sick my whole system stopped.  We're clicking along now, but I know that whole process is horrible.  You don't realize how long the apraxia will affect them.  It goes beyond articulation and into word retrieval, lexicon (how their brains organize the words), etc.  On top of that you've got the autism.  We don't know if he's spectrum.  He doesn't have autism the way yours does, but he's still quirky.  

 

You want to talk with your SLP about these issues like word retrieval and lexicon, because there are actually things you can do about it.  Lexicon is how the words organize in the brain.  Jean DeGaetano has workbooks for all kinds of stuff on the Great Ideas for Teaching website.  They're a little pricy, but they're easy to implement and very effective.  Our SLP uses a number of them, and I've been trying to buy more to use with him.  She has one specifically on word retrieval.  You have to organize the vocabulary for a scene so it's all in the same file folder in the brain.  It takes some intentional effort.  

 

That's all for now.  Back later.  You're doing great though.  :)

[Lots of boys]

:grouphug: I know. Our SLP, who is awesome btw and whom we love, told us ds has pure apraxia, nothing else, blah blah. I'm so literal and naive I believed her. When I realized more was going on, it made me so sick my whole system stopped. We're clicking along now, but I know that whole process is horrible. You don't realize how long the apraxia will affect them. It goes beyond articulation and into word retrieval, lexicon (how their brains organize the words), etc. On top of that you've got the autism. We don't know if he's spectrum. He doesn't have autism the way yours does, but he's still quirky.

 

You want to talk with your SLP about these issues like word retrieval and lexicon, because there are actually things you can do about it. Lexicon is how the words organize in the brain. Jean DeGaetano has workbooks for all kinds of stuff on the Great Ideas for Teaching website. They're a little pricy, but they're easy to implement and very effective. Our SLP uses a number of them, and I've been trying to buy more to use with him. She has one specifically on word retrieval. You have to organize the vocabulary for a scene so it's all in the same file folder in the brain. It takes some intentional effort.

 

That's all for now. Back later. You're doing great though. :)

Thanks so much. I agree, I really didn't realize how much the apraxia affected more than just the way he sounds. It is just so hard for him to say what he wants to say.

 

We have a great SLP too that we will be going back to soon. Our ds has been away from her for a year now while he was in the Autism therapy so I look forward to reconnecting with her and getting more feedback.

 

I looked up the Ronit Bird books and have ordered one. I am also going to do the Barton screening this weekend with him. I'll keep you posted :)

[Heathermomster]

Yeah, that's what I meant, her two main print books. Honestly, I've tried to stay very, very focused on doing just what my ds is ready to do, and I don't look at the other print books. I don't own them and won't buy them till we're ready for them. It's sort of a mental hyper-protectiveness I've made around myself, a decision to be very at where he's at and not let my mind drift or wonder if we could go faster or get confused. I'm going to stay right where he's at, go through the steps in Dots, go through the steps in C-Rods, then see what he needs next.

 

RS weaves together concepts like skip counting and telling time (for obvious reasons) and of course money and place value, so at some point it will be good to diversify. I'm totally with you though, that we could go a long way building this foundation and let it either click about the applications or go back and hit them, no biggee. It's more important that he's actually GETTING the foundation and having it click. This morning he volunteered ways to make 8, so something is clicking in his brain! And as long as I'm seeing that kind of thought process, I'm happy. Of course it's easy for me to say that, as I don't have to test yet. I'll either have to test or do a portfolio review with a certified teacher 2 years from now, and that could be ugly, ugh. But we'll work it out.

 

You know, we've never talked about this, but I've sort of assumed the thought process of someone who starts dyscalculia remediation later is that they would have GLADLY taken an unusually slow but REAL understanding of math over anything faster but without understanding/click that leaves them stalled out and frustrated later. That's sort of what I was banking on.

Well, if he's talking about making 8s on his own, that is huge.

[PeterPan]

Well, if he's talking about making 8s on his own, that is huge.

It wasn't on entirely on his own.  We started the lesson and he volunteered.  It's something we had done previously.  But yes, it's a wonderful thing that his smarts are kicking in and processing stuff.  To me that means what we're doing is working, even if it is kinda the slow way of getting there.