Wednesday, April 28, 2010

Weekly Update -- 26 April - 2 May 2010

Yay, I'm 173 weeks old today!

Masinja had a pretty busy week. During Speech he continued to experiment with pretend play. We had another tea party and we also go to make and eat pretend cupcakes. He seemed to really enjoy making the cupcakes. He got to put the paper cups in the pan, followed by the cupcake, and then he got to put the frosting on and decorate them with icing as well. They have the coolest toys at Children's Hospital! The only bad thing was he kept asking for chocolate afterwards :o)

Masinja continued to work on stringing shapes during OT. He seemed to do a much better job this week but it's most likely due to the fact that we were in a room with minimal distractions. He also copied pictures again this week but he used magnetic shapes instead of foam shapes. He also worked with Duplos. He seems to be getting much better at putting them together and pulling them apart although he still struggles on occasion.

I attended two Parent Connections trainings this week. The first was entitled Handwriting Without Tears. The OT that is on Masinja's team was the presenter. Handwriting Without Tears is an actual writing curriculum that is used as an alternative to traditional handwriting curricula for children with special needs. It incorporates a lot of really cute activities and materials to help make handwriting a pleasant experience for both the child and the parents. I am definitely going to be asking more about this curriculum once Masinja enters school. The second training that I attended was on Separation Anxiety. I went more for myself than for Masinja! He doesn't seem to be having any issues at the moment but I wanted to be prepared for the fall when he will begin preschool. I'm pretty confident that he will be just find but I can't say the same for myself :o)

Masinja had his 35th ECI session this week as well. His teacher brought the vision consultant along to do an evaluation. We will be meeting again next week to go over the results as well as to discuss the results of the school pyschologist's evaluation that was conducted a few weeks ago.

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 19 - 25 April 2010

Yay, I'm 172 weeks old today!

Masinja didn't have Speech or OT this week due to a quarterly meeting. They try to rotate the meeting to a different day of the week each quarter so that the same patients aren't always missing therapy and this quarter the meeting was on a Tuesday. I did take him to the doctor this week though and it is now confirmed that Masinja has seasonal allergies. He is now on Zyrtec. Hopefully he will get some relief soon!!

Masinja had his 34th ECI session this week. We discussed the use of the picture schedule and how well it is working. We also decided to include additional pictures since the original ones have been working so well. Masinja's teacher also suggested doing more gross motor imitation with him at various times of the day such as between activities, as part of play, or as part of mealtime. In addition to this, she suggested alternating active play with quiet time. She feels this will help Masinja increase his attention span.

We participated in the March of Dimes walk again this year. We weren't able to participate last year because of severe thunderstorms. Thankfully this year it wasn't raining but it was cloudy, windy and really COLD!! Our friends Nick and Holly and their two little girls, and Patricia and her husband and their two little boys did the walk with us. We finished the entire 3 miles in just over an hour because it was so cold. It meant a lot to T.M. and I to be able to do the walk this year though because it is our way of honoring Maddie. The walk is held during the same week as the anniversary of her passing so that makes it even more meaningful for us. Of course we also do the walk in honor of Masinja and how far he has come!!

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 12 - 18 April 2010

Yay, I'm 171 weeks old today!

Masinja had a good time at OT and Speech this week. During OT he got to sit on the edge of the slide again because all of the rooms were occupied. He worked on stringing shapes instead of beads. The shapes had two holes and typically would require putting the string through both holes, but the main objective was for Masinja to practice stringing something other than a bead or pasta. He struggled quite a bit with it because he was more interested in trying to collect the shapes. There were all different sorts, (i.e. airplanes, apples, cars, etc.), and he just wanted to hold as many as he could! He also had a hard time concentrating because there was a maintenance man changing light bulbs. After he reached his frustration level, his therapist moved on to having him copy pictures using foam shapes. He seemed to really enjoy it and was able to complete the task without too much trouble. When he was done, he got to eat some chocolate pudding which is one of his favorite treats. His therapist is still trying to work on getting him to eat with a spoon independently. He's still having a lot of difficulty grasping the spoon correctly though and ended up wearing more than he ate :o)

During Speech Masinja continued to experiment with pretend play. His therapist gave him a baby doll and showed him how to feed her, rock her and brush her hair. I don't think he knew what to make of it and he didn't seem all that interested. T.M. was relieved when he heard that :o) He doesn't want his little boy playing with dolls! Masinja also worked on putting the boy and girl cards into piles. This week his therapist had him using the word "is" to describe what the boys and girls were doing. The goal is to broaden his vocabulary in an effort to help him form different sentences. He tends to be very rigid in his sentence structure and only uses sentences that he has heard repeatedly.

Masinja also had his 33rd ECI session this week. We put the picture schedule together and talked about how best to utilize it. We also talked about the progress he has made with the adaptable spoon as well as some of the other skills that he has been working on during OT.

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 5 - 11 April 2010

Yay, I'm 170 weeks old today!

Masinja's week was pretty typical. During OT he worked on copying patterns with Duplos again. He also spent quite a bit of time working on drawing vertical lines. He got pretty frustrated when his therapist wouldn't just let him scribble!

Masinja continued to experiment with pretend play during Speech. His therapist had a tea set and we all had a tea party. Masinja go to practice pouring the tea and cream, as well as scooping the sugar and stirring his tea. He was fascinated with the spoon and stirring! He even offered to stir his therapist's and my tea :o)

I attended another Parent Connections training this week entitled Parent Child Communication. The presentation was very informative and dealt not only with toddlers but also with teenagers. It certainly made me reflect on my communication skills! Hopefully I will actually remember some of the information and be able to use it as Masinja gets older. Some of the techniques might even come in handy in dealing with T.M. :o)

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 29 March - 4 April 2010

Yay, I'm 169 weeks old today!

Masinja had a pretty good week. At OT we had to sit on the slide in the play area because there weren't any rooms left. His therapist had him work with some easy pegs this week instead of the blocks or Duplos. He kept building on top of her structure instead of copying it like he was supposed to :o) She also had him work on drawing vertical lines by having him draw from one dot to another. He did really well considering!

During Speech Masinja read a book with his therapist. He has gotten much better as far as his attention span is concerned. He also worked on separating the boy and girl cards into piles again. His therapist wants to work with Masinja on pretend play so she introduced a house play set. She gave Masinja two men, a table and chairs, two babies and a double high chair, plates, an oven, cupcakes and pizza. She helped Masinja set everything up and pretend to cook the pizza and cupcakes and have the men eat it. He did a really great job considering he hasn't really been interested in pretend play up until now. He was mostly interested in playing with the boy and girl twin babies and putting them in and taking them out of their double high chair. It was great to see him pretending!! His lack of interest in this type of play has made it very hard to play with him. Hopefully he will continue to engage in this type of play.

Masinja had his 32nd ECI Session this week. His teacher brought the adaptable spoon that the OT sent to help Masinja become more proficient at feeding himself. It is a regular spoon that has a hinge built in and if he tries to turn it upside down it swivels back to the upright position. Hopefully this will help him understand how to hold the spoon correctly. Masinja's is going to schedule a visit for the vision consultant. The remainder of the session was spent discussing ways to help Masinja communicate better with the use of a picture schedule. Masinja's teacher gave us pictures depicting various routines throughout the day. Hopefully this will hep him to process things better as well as be more flexible.

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 22 - 28 March 2010

Yay, I'm 168 weeks old today!

Masinja had a pretty average week. At OT he did several different activities that centered on fine motor skills. Instead of stringing beads, this week he put them on dowels. His therapist made several patterns with the beads that Masinja had to copy. He struggled a bit at first because he just wanted to put as many beads on the dowel as he could, but after a few tries he got the hang of it. Masinja also had to copy patterns with the Duplos. His therapist made towers and he was supposed to make his look the same. He has been having a hard time with this for a few weeks now. He tends to do the exact opposite, i.e. if the order of the blocks in the tower is red, blue, green he tends to build his green, blue, red. Masinja also practiced drawing lines. He's gotten pretty good at horizontal lines but he just can't seem to figure out how to draw vertical ones. He got to finish up by eating some applesauce. He's been struggling with using a spoon but he's starting to get the hang of it!

During Speech Masinja worked with the boy and girl cards by separating them into piles. He stills get confused on a few of them but he's doing a pretty good job; I'd say about 85-90% correct. He also worked with the vocabulary cards and did more gross motor imitation. His therapist rewards him with bubbles and he gets the biggest kick out of them. Every time she blows a whole bunch he says, "Look at all these bubbles!!!" He then proceeds to watch each of them pop before he will do any more imitations :o)

I attended a Parent Connections training this week on Behavior Strategies. The school psychologist that evaluation Masinja a few weeks back was the presenter. She gave us a lot of good information about the correct way to discipline as well some strategies to correct behavior problems. It was a very good workshop and it certainly gave me a lot to think about!

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.

Weekly Update -- 15 - 21 March 2010

Yay, I'm 167 weeks old today!

Masinja didn't have Speech this week. His therapist's little ones were sick so she had to stay home with them. He did have OT though and it was interesting to say the least. His therapist had him take a break from beads and instead had him put washers onto dowels. She tried getting him to copy patterns by using big and little washers but Masinja was too distracted by the fact that the washers were shiny! She also tried working on horizontal and vertical lines again. They have a neat board with a black light behind it that you can draw on with special crayons. Masinja didn't really cooperate with that either though because he was too busy trying to switch colors constantly. I guess it's a good thing that he didn't have to go to Speech afterwards because he probably wouldn't have done very well!

Masinja had his 31st ECI session this week. His new OT and her student teacher came to observe Masinja eating lunch. She wanted to see how he grasps his utensils and give us some strategies on how to help him. He did a pretty good job with his fork although she did notice that he has a hard time seeing the food and often misses. She said it is most likely due to his vision. He didn't do very well with the spoon at all. He doesn't hold it correctly and every time she tried to correct his grasp he would change it right back as soon as she took her hand away! Masinja doesn't hold the spoon upright either but instead turns it upside down so obviously he winds up wearing most of his food. His OT is going to send an adaptable spoon with his teacher next week so we can give that a try.

That's all for now.

Peace,
T.M.M.