I discovered a rash on my forearm before I went to bed. Fortunately, I had the steroid cream on tap and applied it. The rash was the result of my gardening activities yesterday. I was reaching through the branches of a bush to cut out plants that were growing through it. It got some minor scratches on my arm, nothing that even broke the skin. I am usually careful to wash my arms thoroughly after I do gardening. I am aware that we are vulnerable to these infections in the tropics. I didn't do that yesterday afternoon and paid the price.
The rash and swelling looked a bit better in the morning. I will keep an eye on them. I may have to rush down to Kaiser for a same-day appointment if the cream doesn't work. You don't want to let any infections get out of hand here. Judy did that and nearly died.
I had lots of thoughts about my students.
M., who is having comprehension problems. I have made some observations but need to speak to her mom before feeling secure with my conclusions.
1. She showed a remarkable capacity for empathy when we were reading Winn Dixie together. There was a scene in a church where a dog saw a mouse and chased it. My mind switched the image of a dog to a cat. I shared that with M. (I believe in showing students when I make mistakes.) She said that probably happened because it is usually cats that chase mice, not dogs. Wow!
2. On the other hand, when reading about Ivan the Gorilla, she didn't understand that humans would not conclude that knuckle-walking was better if they only tried it, nor would gorillas find walking upright better. I had to point out that our bodies are designed differently. She was assuming that all animals would be better off walking upright, including dogs and cats.
3. In another story, they talked about the hardships people had to face during the Montgomery bus boycott. Yes, they had to walk a lot. I directed her specifically to one paragraph that spoke about them walking in the rain. It took me some time to get her to recognize that it was a hardship. She said, "Oh, the weather is changeable," or was her word unreliable. Either way, she went to a superordinate category. I suspect she is more comfortable in the realm of abstract thinking than the concrete. I have to check this with her mom.
4. She had another problem dealing with time, determining how the long walk affected the rest of their day. I couldn't get her to see that she would have to get up earlier if she had to leave earlier. Later, it occurred to me that maybe she got up extra early as a routine. This happens so many times. I start out wondering why a student doesn't understand a concept that is clear to me. After the session, I can see why and have to go back and clarify that the misunderstanding was my responsibility.
I made another mistake with D. I read a passage with him the other day and couldn't get the information out of him I wanted. Duh! The passage included information that Socks, the kitten trapped in a box metal street mailbox, was scared by the sound of rattling keys. I kept asking what was going on in this paragraph, what the actions were. He kept repeating that Socks was scared and there were rattling keys. Sometimes, I am so dense.
I have told him over and over to stick with what it says in the passage. In the past, he would have told me something like the little girl doesn't want to give up Socks. A true statement, but not relevant to the current paragraph. He indeed gave me what I asked for. He told me only what it said in the paragraph. Inferring the mailman holding the keys and opening the mailbox was automatic for me. Now I have to go back over that passage and teach him when it is okay to add more.
I also had a ton of thoughts about Et.
1. His dad said the worst is the way people respond when they don't understand him. Two points: one explaining their reactions and two suggestions of how to respond.
People respond as they do because they are disoriented. They expected to have a delightful conversation with a lovely boy but then find that the script isn't going as expected.
Dealing with the unexpected is the basis of comedy – if the audience can quickly find their footing.
Here's an analogy: If you approach a young child who knows you well with a mask on, they will laugh. If you leave it on too long, they will become somewhat alarmed. If you take off the mask and have another one underneath, they will be frightened. If you take off the second mask and have another one underneath, they will be terrified.
When someone can't produce the correct line in the script in our daily exchanges, it falls on them to help their 'audience' regain balance. This is not to say that the disabled are responsible for making all the accommodations for their own needs. Ramps are hard to carry around. However, there are ways someone with a disability can help smooth over the situation.
Here are my thoughts. These are ideas for experimentation. Et. who is still very young, five, is never without an accompanying adult.
1) Et. can be trained to look to that adult when he sees the confusion on the face of the person he is talking to. The adult will then restate what Et. said, translate his words into an intelligible form. If Et. just keeps his gaze on the other person with an expectant smile, he's up to mask number two. I know I felt a little lost when I started with him, but I deal well with the unexpected.
What the parents are doing now is fantastic; they are not speaking for him. They let him say what he wants and then translate.
2) in a similar vein, here's something that can be done to make Et. 's transition to the classroom easier. I already proposed he could have one or two friends who understood them, and they would serve as his translators.
In that vein, here's a thought. The classroom teacher should announce Et. 's problem, reward those who can figure out what he is saying, and help translate for the rest of the class. One of the five-year-olds in his class would get it quickly.
3) teach Et. to supplement his words with gestures.
4) have the parents make up a list of his substitutions.
For example, when he says 'dog,' he says 'tog,' god, kod etc.
Such a list will be helpful for me, his classroom teacher, and the speech therapist. Although the speech therapist will probably do a more formal evaluation.
5) Dorothy had a great idea. Do exercises to help understand how the mouth works. For example, put the tip of your tongue against the tip of your teeth, the back of your teeth, trying, to put it on the front of your teeth. The mom and dad can actually do things like touch the center of his tongue and the roof of his mouth and say to try and get those two parts of the mouth to touch. They can also let him set some of the challenges.
Yesterday, I felt lousy. There was an earthquake going on inside of me. It felt like my insides were jelly. Not a good feeling. Meditation helped because it helped me get it together enough to present as a normal human being for my 5 pm tutoring session with a new family.
I felt lousy today. I had deep black circles under my eyes. I had never seen that before. I had to shorten my session with D. I spoke to his mom about helping his sister. His mom thought she was having problems with word recognition rather than comprehension. We'll see if her problems are as serious as D.'s.
Today when asked what 9x 4 equaled, his answer was 95. Oh, dear. He said he was tired, as was I. Also, having introduced two new facts scrambled his memory. He drew the 9 from the 9 x2 problem and the 5 from the 6 x5. Oh, well, back to the drawing board. While he has progressed in his word recognition fluency and comprehension, his associative recall is still not working. This case is very frustrating.
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