Wednesday, August 24, 2022
Been thinking about Mike a lot. In him, I had someone who loved being in my company. What a gift! Thoughts of all I've lost came to mind. Those frequent gentle touches. His wonderful kisses and hugs, those little moments of assumed intimacy. It reminded me of something I observed at Costco one day. A couple was looking at men's shorts. The woman stood behind her husband and checked the label on his shorts. It was a small gesture that said worlds about their relationship and much about how they related to the rest of the world. Some people might have thought such a gesture inappropriate for public display.
Elsa's leg was in perfect shape this morning, and my legs were doing well. The insides of my thighs felt strained last night. I didn't complete my 9,200-step goal. I only made it to 8,553. On our morning walk, Elsa chose to go up the hill instead of down at the intersection. I followed. Coming down the hill was harder on my legs, but my biggest problem was my left ankle. It limits my movement. The X-ray showed I didn't have severe arthritis there. I should be able to get it in shape one day. This problem stems from a sprained ankle. Horatio, a PWD I disliked, charged me from behind and knocked me over.
I had three tutoring sessions scheduled. I contacted everyone for confirmation. My first was with second-grade-homeschooled L. Her mom responded. "Oh, I thought we were meeting on Friday this week." She had asked me to meet at ten on Fridays instead of noon. I often have someone else scheduled at that time. I put her in for Wednesday this week. We had some back and forth before we settled at 11 a.m. on Friday for this week.
I made myself some soup and sat down to do word puzzles. I got Wordle on the second try today. My first trial word, ready, produced three green letters, _ e_ d y. I played around and got three possible words. I played eeny-meany-miny-mo and got the right one on the first shot.
I had my second session with Adolescent D for the week. We only met twice a week for half an hour at a time. I told him all the good news his mother had given me. He was responsible for getting his work done for his online school. This alone was amazing. He had a history of just floating. I spoke to him about the importance of being at the wheel of his own life instead of being a passive bystander.
I just recently spoke to him about this and the need for him to work independently if he was going to learn to read. He said he knew that. Wow! When did this happen? He said, "A while ago." "When," I asked. "When you were seven, ten??" He said, "When I was fifteen." He just turned fifteen. His mom said he has some weird distortions around time. Interesting. It's worthwhile looking at some point.
His mother's understanding of what he was doing was accurate. He read along while Google text-to-speech and reread it for greater understanding. Again, Wow! Wow! Wow! I pointed out that six months ago, he would only have listened to the audio file; he would never look at the text. "Look at all the progress you've made!" He finally got it. He finally got that he was in much better shape than when we started. With the aid of Google Docs, he is in survival mode.
I experienced him as more alert, more attentive, and more participatory. I asked him if he understood conversations more. He said, "Yes and no." I asked, "Why yes, and why no? The yes was he understood what people said more; the no was he didn't understand what he read more. Making that distinction is a significant difference in this boy. Holy cow!
He had been listening to the PDS 5 Stories audiofile most nights. His mom said when she told him to get off his phone and go to bed, he would turn on the file on his own without further input from her. He didn't wait until he was ready to get into bed. I remember telling him to link the act of turning it on with something he regularly did. There is no 'evidence-based' proof that this audio file works, but there is a fantastic amount of anecdotal evidence. Every person who does listen to it reports improvement in their ability to comprehend conversation, and some see improvement in their ability to communicate their thoughts. In at least one case, a seven-year-old boy went from unintelligible speech that even his siblings couldn't understand to clear speech that everyone could understand. I kept telling D to listen to it. While we can't be sure it is that which is producing these amazing results, we can be sure it will do no harm.
The recent improvement in D's reading performance relates to my reverting to drill procedures. I used the word list his other tutor compiled of sight words he still didn't know to show him how word families work. For instance, with the word that, I wrote every single syllable word that used that pattern: th-a-t, b-a-t, c-a-t, ch-a-t, f-a-t, h-a-t, m-a-t, n-a-t, p-a-t, r-a-t, s-a-t, th-a-t's, and v-a-t. When we did this exercise, D said, "This is easy." Yes, if you look for patterns, reading gets easy. I pointed out how this exercise illustrated the importance of identifying the vowel pattern before adding the initial sounds. With contempt in his voice, he said that he didn't do that when he did that exercise. He started with the beginning sounds. I pointed out that he didn't need to because the vowel sound and pattern were given.
I wrote th, b, c, ch, f, h, m, p, r, s, t., and v and told him to tell me the word in the -at family. This finally got through to him. This is one stubborn boy.
Next, I taught the six syllable patterns: V, VC, VCe, VV, Vr, and the final stable syllables. It took forever before he could consistently remember V stood for the word vowel. He reached the point where he would name the vowel letters rapidly in the correct order but still couldn't remember the word 'vowel.' That is good enough for now. Then, I had him give me examples of the patterns. Then, I had him identify the syllable pattern in every syllable in a text. Some words were regular and conformed to the rules, and some were not. Of may be a VC word, but it's not phonetically regular. When a syllable didn't conform, I sounded it out using the rules for regular words. Then, we saw if he could figure out the actual word from context. It is an essential skill for all readers of English, even the most competent. He was reasonably good at using context clues to figure out words.
I didn't use phonics drill strategies with this boy when we started because his ego would have rebelled, and I would have lost him. I started with a philosophy book on Spinoza. Then, I went to 7th-grade material. Then, I went to 2nd-grade material. And only then did I begin phonics drills with him. This boy might have been spared eight years of delayed reading if he had been in a strict Orton Gillingham program at age seven. Whatever, he was a non-reader- didn't even read signs- when I started with him in March of 2021. Not bad for a year and a half.
I called D's mom right away to share my excitement. There is a good chance he will eventually be up to grade level. I hope the parents will have me continue working with him after his word recognition skills become functional. He has missed a lot of school. He would need to work on reading comprehension and writing.
I met with Mama K's crew immediately after finishing with D. I started with Twin A. She was the one who was further behind when we started and was further ahead now. I started with the second Carpenter story. She did well but still needed help with the recall of unfamiliar words. She read was with a short /a/ and an /s/ instead of the /schwa/ and /z/. I asked her how she would normally pronounce that word. She gave the incorrect pronunciation. Her mom yelled at her and told her how she pronounced it. I asked the mom to stay out because this was an opportunity for me to teach her to hear how she pronounced words in preparation for using context clues. Besides being unable to hear how she normally pronounced the word, she couldn't remember the word.
I asked her if she could 'see' the word was in her working memory. No. I asked her if she could see her blanket in her mind Yes. I told her to write the word on it. She did and could see it. I asked her to tell me the first letter, the second, the third, and the second and the first. That's a good test of the strength of the visual working memory. She was using the correct part of the brain for this function. Then I asked her to hear my voice in her head. Where did she hear it? She pointed to her forehead, which is good for visual recall but not auditory. I showed her where to listen for auditory input. She was able to do it but didn't like it. I asked her why. It made her sleepy. Good point. That's something to be dealt with.
Then, I worked with Twin E. She couldn't remember words that she couldn't decode easily. The words she could read she read one at a time as if reading a list. There was no natural speech intonation. I would have done work with her on her processing, but someone called on the phone she was on, and she signed off.
When Mama K reconnected to the Zoom, fourth-grade K was on. We worked on comprehension using the questioning per-sentence method. Factual questions about the topic came up that prompted an Internet search. At some point, he stopped responding. I figured he had fallen asleep. He had.
I completed all the available Indian Matchmaking episodes. I miss them. I love how marriage is depicted in the series: marriage first, then love. Behind that expression is the assumption that love is something you work for; marriage requires accommodations from both partners.
I have difficulty believing this representation of marriage in India is common. Men are dominant, and women must do most, if not all, of the accommodating. I have difficulty believing all, or even most, arranged marriages wind up as joyful as the ones depicted on the show. One husband said, "The key to a happy marriage is to keep falling in love with the same person over and over." This is what I experienced in my marriage. I loved Mike more after years of marriage than when we first committed to this partnership. The other oft-repeated needed skill for a good marriage is tolerance.
I watched Stupid, Crazy Love last night. It's a rom-com about marriage plus. The main character announces he has always been in love with his wife, even when he hated her. He made a side comment about how married couples would understand that. Yes, indeed. But those moments don't overwhelm the positives. It's all about statistics, that 1 to 5 ratio.
