Another sleepy day at Bikram. Afterward, I stopped off at the Friendly Place to drop off another sleeping pillow and a bag with a drawstring that came with my new yoga mat. I had meant to make a stop and Good Will too, but I forgot to load the stuff in the car.
Cleaning is on the schedule for today, except for some time at school. And, of course, picking up the linens Damon ordered at Macy's.
At school, I started with Mrs. B.'s class. I. read the first of the transcribed stories a bit more smoothly, but it was clear he was still struggling to remember some of the words. I had him color all the occurrences of the a followed by a single consonant: at, ap, an. Then he read the second story with equal skill and difficulty. He was able to start the third story. This is definite progress, but he couldn't read the word this. He read this as there, and then tried they. He had no idea. Again, we were confronting his memory problem.
I asked him which side of his brain he was using to retrieve the information. He said the left. Okay, then why was he having this problem. I asked if he experienced spinning. He said yes. I told him he would have to do many spin releases before the problem cleared up. He was able to allow the spin release to happen without any further instruction on my part. My theory is those who have problems have many such disturbances. It takes many conscious attempts before the storehouse of these spins is emptied, and/or releasing them becomes automatic.
He still could not recognize the word after the release. I intuited a block. He confirmed it and showed me where it was, right behind the ears. I asked him to describe it to me. What color was it? Brown. Was it large or small? Large. What is hard or soft? Hard. Was it like rock or like wood? Rock. He said it was a large, brown lava rock wall. Then I asked if it was an old rock wall where the stones are piled one on top of one another or were the rocks set in cement as they are these days. He said they were set in cement.
Then I asked him if he had to knock down a lava rock wall, how would he do it? He understood my point and started on the wall without further instruction on my part. A Hawaiian child knows how to tear down a rock wall. Shortly after that, I told him to go back into the classroom. How is this going to play out? I have no idea. When children have done visualizations like these in the past, I have had some degree of success. Will this fix his memory problem? Will this visualization help him remove what is blocking his memory? Stay tuned. Actually, I may never know. I sometimes have had students who I wasn't able to help at the time come up to me years later and tell me how something I taught them did help them. We teachers sometimes never know our impact on our students, for better or for worse. I feel I am introducing the possibility of changing the brain. Once I've introduced the idea, the students can work on solving the problem on their own.
I worked with D. in Mrs. B's room next. Last time, he asked to take home the transcribed stories. I gave him a copy of every transcribed story in the Carpenter A book, seventeen of them. He said he was reading them with his mom, and she was very impressed with the difference in his reading. He certainly read the stories he did read more fluently today. I don't quite know what to do with D. He has been improving, but I do not have a magic bullet for his problem.
Then I went to Mrs. D.'s class. I started with R. She sailed through three of the transcribed stories today. This is much better. I asked her if she wanted to read another one or read the book she brought out. It was on a level H; J is the end of first grade. Yes, she is way below grade level, but she couldn't read a book on level A when we started. This is a vast improvement.
Next, I worked with M. He read five of the transcribed stories with relative ease. He made some errors, but his fluency was good. I asked him if his reading was better; he said no. However, I remember him having problems with remembering the sounds and blending. He didn't have those problems today.
After school, I talked to Mrs. L about a disruptive child. I spoke to the child who is diagnosed with ADD. I asked him if he wanted me to help him. He didn't look receptive. He was standing still talking to me, and his body twitched. I asked Mrs. L. if he had had a functional MRI. She said no. I don't think this child has been referred to a neurologist. I have no idea why. It is clear from watching him that something is going on that should be appropriately diagnosed and dealt with on a medical level.
Mrs. L. has to deal with this boy calling out inappropriately and disrupting the class. Since it is clear to me, this is not something that can be handled behaviorally. Most ADD cases can't just be dealt with a behavioral plan and instructions to control themselves. I told her of a situation I had in Ohio.
This second-grade boy would cry hysterically if something went wrong for him. I believe he had been sexually molested. Whatever it was, this is how it manifested. I was being observed by my supervisor when he had a meltdown. He couldn't calm himself. I called the school counselor to come to get him. This made him even more hysterical. I put him outside the door to wait for her—another increase in hysteria. I was concerned for his safety. I brought him back into the room, tucked him under my left arm, and continued teaching. What else was I going to do? Let the chips fall where they may. The students just attended to my lesson.
Now in all fairness, they knew this boy and his troubling behavior. This was nothing novel. Besides, his crying was constant, not stop and go. The stop and go would have been much more difficult to ignore. I told Mrs. L. this story to see if she could guide the class to just ignore outbursts from this boy. They were able to ignore outbursts from other students in the common area. While my idea has some merit, I think it would be difficult to get the class to cooperate.
Then went to Safeway to pick up apples and Better than Bullion vegetable soup, and of course, since they were on sale, two Hershey's Milk Chocolate Bar with whole almonds. Then I went to Macy's to pick up Damon's order for bedding, a set of sheets, a blanket, and two pillows. Mine are not good enough. He's doing the same thing with his mother. He has standards to uphold.
I spent the rest of the day cleaning and taking FreeCell breaks. Yvette came up for dinner. We are doing so much better. It is worth a great deal to me. We are getting comfortable with each other. We had a salad and a grain and a bean dish. After dinner, she did some bodywork on me. She is amazing. She 'knows' what a body needs. She also loves doing the work.
Tomorrow Damon, Cylin, and August are arriving. I can't wait.
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