Wednesday, August 3, 2022

Wednesday, August 3, 2022

 

                 I got up early this morning. Yvette started up driveway yoga again. I would have to get used to getting up early.

        I ran into Anne Marie on my morning walk with Elsa. I hadn't seen her in a long time. She stopped to talk. She had a tight schedule, having to be at school to teach her 4th-grade class. She was wondering what had happened to me. I hadn't been walking early between sleeping in and the THR operation. We spent some time catching up. I asked how her home repairs were coming. She had visitors for 31 days this summer, and then her family took a one-week vacation to New York City. I told her I would have put my guest to work. Elsa and Tulip were happy to see each other too.   

 My blog stats had been in the single digits recently. Last spring, they were in the triple digits. I assumed a teacher assigned them, and there would be a precipitous drop when the class ended. Yesterday, I had double-digit numbers from India and Spain. When numbers spike, I assume it's a bot unless they show up repeatedly. They didn't. Why that would happen is beyond me. Why would a bot be interested in my writing? However, a few visitors from India showed up again with two pages read. That's not a bot.

   Elsa comfortably rested on my shoulder while I typed in my old-lady chair. I wanted to meditate. I did it without moving her. Elsa is a thirteen-pound Havanese. Her weight doesn't count for much. I didn't have to support her; she could balance on my shoulder without effort. We both could relax. She stayed there for the entire hour.

   I had Adolescent D this afternoon. He had no recall of what the V stood for, even though I had gone over it repeatedly on Monday. Holy cow! He has trouble understanding and trouble remembering. This poor kid. How can I fix this? The good news was he finally allowed me to see his memory and auditory processing problem. It is impossible to help someone with a problem when all their effort goes into concealing it. However, this is the first time I have seen a problem quite this bad in a fifteen-year-old. It was a little scary. It would be scarier if I guaranteed him that I could fix it. Other programs might help him, but they are beyond his parents' financial means.

       I don't promise my students that I can fix their learning problems. I teach my students about brain plasticity. When they have serious learning problems, each lesson focuses on impacting the brain rather than learning a set of facts. The facts we concentrate on are used to foster brain modification. I also tell them if we can't figure out a way to fix their problem, someone will in their lifetime.

   D's other tutor worked with him on sight words. Despite her effort, she left a list of about eighty words, all from the first four or five sight word lists he hadn't been able to learn. While I would never have used that approach, her list was helpful to me. I converted the sight word drill into a phonics drill. I wrote single-syllable rhyming words with the same spelling next to the 'sight word." Memorizing patterns is easier than memorizing each word individually. There are fewer patterns.

  I did 10,000 steps today for the first time in a long time. I wasn't doing that anymore before the surgery. I had foot problems that limited me then. Even when those got better, I wasn't as mobile as I had been before. I can now get more done in a shorter time. I still can't keep up with my fellow walkers when they walk at their best pace. I hope to achieve that.

  I watch Age of Adeline on Netflix with Blake Lively. Wonderful!