In So Many Words

“Back to School” are words that often strike terror (or at least high levels of anxiety) into my life. We have had so many ups and downs with school, especially at the beginning of the year, that I dread re-entering the limbo period of school hours where I work and run errands and such not knowing whether the end of the day will find me in heaven or in hell.

And yet, every year I somehow find a bit of hope – hope that this teacher will get him and be patient with his needs while also seeing the ways in which he could excel.

We went for a classroom visit on Friday and was pleased to find that his desk was ready, almost all of the visual supports were in place, and the teacher was familiar with the IEP. Such a relief, especially compared to some previous years. By all accounts, she runs a highly-structured class without yelling at the kids (as some others have been reported to do).

I was also impressed that Michael’s break spot is actually the same spot that she has used for years with the entire class. Any student can request a break, and she has even used break cards for students who seemed to need the visual/physical cue for it.

All that remains is to get him there on Monday morning and hand him over once again.

I have to admit that I have been starting to get really stressed out about school starting up again. Between Michael’s own anxiety and my worries about how things will work out with a new teacher and a new set of expectations, my mind has been whirling.

I recently agreed to start participating in some blog tours and reviews through Kathy Carlton Willis Communications and received an email with this encouraging and timely article about praying for our kids as they go back to school. It was so encouraging, and I am glad to be able to share it with you here.

Back to School … Pray!

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, when you walk by the way, when you lie down, and when you rise up.
Deuteronomy 6:5,7

Excitement’s in the air! Anticipation rises. It’s that time of year when the kids go back to school.

Who can forget watching your child go to “big school” for the first time? I remember those bittersweet moments as each of my four children kissed me good-bye. I always knew that day would arrive, but nothing prepared me for the moment.

Elementary school seemed to fly by and almost overnight they were in junior high and then high school. And in a blink of an eye, they were off to college. Where did the years go?

I learned early on that when my children were away from home, praying for them comforted me. By turning them over to God I experienced a calm peace. Year after year my prayers intensified, yet remained the same…

• Elementary School – Will he make a friend? Will he eat all his lunch, or just the cookies and chips? God, help him to love You with all his heart.
• Junior/Senior High –Will he make the right friends? Is he paying attention to the teacher? God, help him love You with all his soul.
• College – Will he make some forever friends? Is he making the right life decisions? God, help him to love You with all his strength.

Just as our children face challenges, we as moms face our own set of challenges…

• To pray over our children no matter where they are in life.
• To be on our knees for those God entrusted to us.
• To ultimately pray for each child to love Jesus with all his heart, soul, and mind!
• Finally, to let them know we are praying for them each day! What a blessing it is to pray for our children.

I ask you to take advantage of this new season too. Do you need a fresh start? Where are you in your relationship with God? In my Bible study, Reflecting Him – Living for Jesus and Loving It, I encourage you to find Jesus in your everyday activities. He is there for us 24 hours a day, and He wants to hear our everyday prayers!

Author Bio

CARLA MCDOUGAL is founder of Reflective Life Ministries headquartered in the Houston, Texas area. Her true passion for her Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, shines brightly, whether she is speaking or writing. She shares experiences from her own life to encourage women to live every day for Him. God is sending Carla around the world to speak to women from all walks of life—those living in the best of circumstances to those who have hit rock bottom.

Carla’s book, Reflecting Him: Living for Jesus and Loving It, is a 10-week study that encourages you to open your eyes to God’s daily life lessons. The more you ask God to be in your life, the more you will recognize His hand on everything you do. For more information on a growing number of products from Reflective Life Ministries, and to see about booking Carla for an event or interview, go to www.reflectivelifeministries.org.

I wanted to share with the results of the poll on reasonable expectations for how early in the school year IEP supports should be in place.

Of course, legally, we all know that supports should be in place as soon as the IEP goes into effect, based on the details listed for each one as to time and frequency. Realistically, however, our kids start back to school and it seems to be a crapshoot as to what supports are ready to go versus missing or not even started.

For my son, his current IEP has a number of items listed, but only about half of them were in place on Day 1 of school. I had been informed about only one that would not be ready on the first day, so I fully expected the rest of them to be there.

If I had known about the other items that were missing and told when they would be ready, we could have prepared for that and most likely shortened the amount of time that Michael was not participating over the first few days of school.

Anyway, here are the poll results:

[poll id="2" type="result"]
[poll id="3" type="result"]
[poll id="4" type="result"]

Thanks to everyone who voted. Is it sad that it makes me feel better not to be the only one who wasn’t happy on the first day of school?

I did find a helpful article on Wrightslaw called 10 Tips for a Successful School Year and thought #6 was especially interesting:

6. Prepare to Deal with Potential Problems Early.
If your child is in general education classes, prepare for the teacher(s) who wants to see how your child “gets along” before making any changes in the way they run their classrooms.

Teachers often take this position because they want to give their students a fresh start. You may need to explain why your child may fail unless the teacher understands his/her unique needs and provides the necessary services, accommodations and supports.

I do want to say that my son’s team was EXTREMELY responsive when I brought my concerns to their attention the second time (the first time was at a meeting several days before school started).

By the second day, they had located or prepared most of the needed supports and even added a scheduled break that I had requested previously. The autism consultant also came on Day 3 and was very helpful in identifying what was still missing, although he did again have difficulty in the afternoons of the fourth and fifth day.

Since my original post about our frustrations with the beginning of school, I came across this incredibly insightful post by Caitlin Wray at Welcome to Normal, Population: 0 entitled Autism Backa**wards. I highly recommend you pop over and read it, as she says so well what I have been trying to put into words over the past week or so.

What a great day! Michael was so excited about starting first grade, especially after we visited his classroom on Friday so he could meet the teacher and see his desk and everything. He also got to see which of his friends from kindergarten would be in his class. He is sitting next to Nancy, who he informed me is his “girlfriend.”

My husband had one extra day off work, so we all walked down together to drop him off. (We live two blocks from the school.) Of course, Bob had the camera with him to document the occasion, but I was still surprised to see how many parents were taking pictures or even videotaping!

Enjoying himself during Daddy's photo shoot

Michael’s teacher reported that he had a great day, with only one outburst in the afternoon that he calmed down from after a short break in the quiet area of the room, and one other minor meltdown at dismissal due to a misunderstanding about which exit he was supposed to use.

He talked nonstop all the way home about the games they played to learn each others’ names and how much he liked having lunch and recess. He doesn’t often share so freely, so it was wonderful for me to get so much information all at one time.

Ready to be done taking pictures

My biggest relief, though, is how much happier I am with the teacher he has this year. She seems kind and understanding about what to expect from Michael. This is so different from last year when I was told by the kindergarten teacher, “His problem is that he just doesn’t listen.”

So I am looking forward to much better things this year. Once we get past the first couple of weeks, they will be taking behavioral data so that we can form a positive behavior plan to go along with his IEP (I’m so glad I pushed so hard for that last spring and am looking forward to what the team comes up with.)

P.S. We had a wonderful time on vacation, although we are still recovering from all that driving – over 2300 miles in 7 days! And we were way too busy for me to even think about posting anything. Once I sort through the many, many pictures we took, I will share more about the trip.

Only two more days until vacation, and my sinuses have been hurting me terribly the last few days. It’s frustrating because I have so many things I want to get done, but my body just wants to sleep.

I’m not sure how much chance I’ll get to blog while we’re away, but I did make sure we would have high speed internet in the room at the hotel we booked, so at least it’s an option if we have time.

Anyway, here’s what’s on the list for the next week:

Vacation Planning List

Find the stinkin’ Dora DVD that is due back at the library before we leave so we don’t owe $1.50 per day times 7.

Get everything packed and in the car by Wednesday night; then go to bed EARLY!!

Relax and enjoy the trip. As much as possible anyway. Between the amount of time in the car and trying to juggle visits to all the different family members, it’s hard not to get too stressed out.

Back to School List

Read through FIND(!) IEP & notes from FBA interview.

Follow up with learning support teacher on Michael visiting his classroom when we get back next week.

Take a deep breath and remind yourself that we will get through another back to school transition, one way or another (this is a daily to do item!).

What’s on your to do list?

For more To-Do Tuesday, visit Crazy Adventures in Parenting.

Well, I only got three things done from last week’s wish list, but they were important ones. Unfortunately I got hit with schedule changes and extra appointments for various things that made it hard to get much done.

After having some sort of congestion/breathing difficulty while at Hersheypark last Thursday evening, I am now taking allergy medication to see if it makes a difference. I’ve never had allergies before, but think I may have developed some over the years of living in this area. I have also had several occasions where I jumped out of bed gasping for breath recently, which I attributed to my reflux. However, I’ve dealt with reflux and GI issues for almost twenty years, so it may also be connected to allergies or to sleep issues. At some point, I get to go in for a sleep study, as well, so hopefully we can get some answers to what is going on with me.

Anyway, we are just a little over a week away from our summer vacation, so that’s pretty much what I need to focus on for now. Well, that and the fact that school starts in less than 3 weeks. Everything else will just have to wait until we get into September!

Vacation Planning List

Make hotel reservations.

Talk to Dad, Grandma S and Grandma K about plans to see each of them. (Already talked to my mom tonight.)

Make packing list and see what we need to buy for the trip.

Purchase necessary items.

Withdraw cash from bank.

Make sure I have addresses and directions for all the places we plan to go.

Have C over to show her cat supplies and give her the house key.

Catch up on laundry and cleaning so the house is decent for our return.

Relax and enjoy the ride!

Back to School List

Read through IEP & notes from FBA interview.

Email classroom teacher and learning support teacher to arrange classroom visit.

Meet w/BSC & TSS to discuss her role in the classroom.

Write a social story about starting first grade to read with Michael.

Stop stressing out so much about it!

What’s at the top of your list right now?

For more To-Do Tuesday, visit Crazy Adventures in Parenting.

If you, like me, are already thinking ahead to back to school time and making the transition as smooth as possible, take a look at today’s Try This Tuesday.

Amazing Grace from Moms of Special Needs Children is sharing a student orientation checklist that you can include with your child’s IEP so that everyone on the team knows what is required of them to support your child right from the start.

What are your best tips for a good transition into the summer and then back into school again in the fall?

It may sound weird, but it was so good to get back to work yesterday!  I did not work at all after Tuesday last week, so this pay period had no hours on it until I got back in the office.  Luckily, the team that is working on updating pricing is awesome, and we are going to finish the main spreadsheet by today.  Then I just have to focus the rest of the week on the other miscellaneous things that need to be updated.  Plus, I get to train someone on one of my other responsibilities and then shift it over to her – woohoo!

Michael had a great first day back to school, which was a relief.  He has been talking about school like a game and saying that each day is another level, which means that it is harder and harder to do well.  I am trying to help him look at it another way so he doesn’t make failure a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

We bought a responsibility/goal chart the other day (yes I know we could make one for free but he has Christmas money left and sometimes you need the shiny motivators).  He loves it!  He is racing around the house to get dressed and put his toys away and asking me constantly if he is showing respect and not whining (those are some of the goals on it right now – you can switch between 20 or so premade ones or make your own).  Of course, he wants to colored magnets put on the chart in rainbow order, but that’s okay, at least he is doing the things I am asking.  I haven’t had to count past 1 for the last couple of days, which is good.

I think we may be getting “real” cell phones one of these days (we have Tracfones now).  Bob just wants a basic phone, but I want something that will replace my Palm so I don’t have to carry it around anymore.  I also want it to play music so I don’t need to get an iPod, which is what Bob thought I should spend my Christmas money on.  He loves his, and it was a great purchase for him because he is such a music buff, but I am happy just borrowing his when he leaves it at home – like today it is coming to work with me since he left it on the charger!

Well, I better finish up and make lunch for Michael.  Poor little guy, he is alternating between hot dogs and waffles right now because the Camp Hill Giant stopped carrying his GFCF chicken nuggets and fish sticks.  Bob thinks the Karns out in Hershey has them, and I know the gluten free store in Dillsburg has the dinosaur shaped ones, but they are even more expensive than the Ian’s brand.  Healthy Grocer only carries Bell & Evans the last time I checked, and they are more like chicken tenders, which are too much like real chicken for Michael, not kid-friendly at all.  I have not been successful making ones he will eat either.  At least he has his ANDI bars for breakfast, so I know he is started the day off with a decent amount of protein.

Anyway, I would say sorry for rambling, but since that is the purpose for this blog, I won’t!  I hope everyone is having a wonderful day.

Make sure to enter the awesome Back To School Giveaways over at 5 Minutes for Mom. You can enter through August 12th for a bunch of super cool prizes!

   

I also saw another great giveaway on what i think.  Visit Going Back to School with HP and A Giveaway to enter this one.  Entries are open through August 19th.