reading comprehension
- anxiety, autism, post high school, post secondary autism, reading, reading comprehension, teen years
2020
I’m not into numbers like J, but 2020 is going to be an interesting year for our Beck family. And I’m trying to keep my 2020 outlook on my family because the year’s barely started and between the Australian fires and the Iran stuff happening (my sister lives in Saudi Arabia, so I’m always nervous when stuff happens out there) there’s some really disheartening things happening in the world right now and we’re only six days into the new year. So… We’re heading into that stretch of the “end of childhood and into adulthood” with J, which is equal parts terrifying and exiting. In May, he’ll be finishing grade 11.…
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A Funny Thing Happened When We Gave J an iPhone 4
I think it’s one of the biggest ironies of my life that I am obsessed with language, communication, and literature and those three things are the biggest things my son struggles with. I’ve loved language as long as I can remember. I remember staring at my Cheerios box as a kindergartner, figuring out that gratuit next to the picture of a key chain meant that something free was inside, that the word pamplemousse on the juice container meant grapefruit, and being absolutely thrilled to finally start learning French at school in grade 4. The only math I liked was when had to solve math facts in order to decode messages…
- autism, helps, high school, learning strategies, motherhood, reading, reading comprehension, teen years
J and the Scarlet Ibis
Once there was a boy who was born sick with disabilities. Nobody thought the boy would live, but he did. He had physical disabilities and he had intellectual disabilities. Nobody thought he would walk, but his brother taught him how to walk. The disabled boy learned how to speak. He was smart. His brother would take him to the swamp near their house and there the brother had plans on how to teach the disabled boy how to run, and swim, and do all sorts of physical things kids his age did. The brother planned to do all of these things before the disabled boy went to school. The disabled…
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Calling grandma for backup
June 8, I got my first, real, spontaneous “word picture” from J. It’s a skill we’ve been really working on over the past month (so much so that my mum has been living with us in Fargo for all of June to help us with it). J and I went out for a run and I asked him where he wanted to go. His first answer? “Back yesterday.” That’s the typical sort of answer I get from J when I ask him a question. 5 word sentence maximum, always vague. Then I rephrased the question. “J, I just can’t see that. You’re going to have to use your words to…
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This changes everything
There are very few clear moments of revelation when raising a child with autism. As a parent, the autism puzzle is always on my mind. I’m reading constantly about autism. I’ve gone through phases of intense research on ABA and Stanley Greenspan’s Floortime approach. I’ve read about Temple Grandin, read things written by Temple Grandin, have heard Temple speak on Youtube, NPR, and in person, and while all of these sources have given me a better insight into J, nothing has been a “perfect fit” solution by any means. So when I went to the Lindamood Bell conference last week in Minneapolis, I wasn’t sure to expect. Because I had…
- autism, creativity, cross-country, exercise, home strategies, learning strategies, reading comprehension, strategies
Rehabilitation–or just “habilitation”
Sometimes I feel like J has been in rehab almost every day of his life, except that instead of relearning skills he once had, J has never had the skills. Like all the skills. Sometimes I feel like it’s just one big, impossible task. NOTHING is intuitive with J. There are some days where I feel like I am literally programming a human like I would be programming a computer. Every little skill, every little nuance has to be first modeled before he can learn it. Which makes it feel like the biggest task on the planet. It’s also why I feel really, really grateful for the people who send me little…
- autism, Education, helps, home strategies, learning strategies, reading comprehension, sensory processing, strategies
Back to Basics
Because of my recent observations while working with J, I’ve been seeing examples of J’s processing issues in real time. One of this week’s highlights of auditory processing flubs was when we were discussing the new Disney movie Moana. I don’t remember exactly what we were talking about, but we were making up scenarios and one of them involved W and Moana. All of a sudden J said frantically, “W shouldn’t use marijuana!” J really paid attention in health last year, and was really concerned with what he “heard.” This is a perfect example of some of the many processing issues J is dealing happening at once. He failed to…
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“Deeper Magic”
A few weeks ago, J came out of his bedroom, looked me straight in the eye, and with a big smile announced, “I had a dream last night.” In the thirteen years I’ve been his mother J has never once talked about dreams. In fact, I’ve wondered if autistic kids dream at all. When W was a toddler and having all sorts of dreams and nightmares (one time after watching the Wizard of Oz, W woke up crying about the flying monkeys she thought were in her room sitting on her dresser and was shocked when we turned on the lights and they weren’t there), J was consistently radio silent…
