Christmas!

Mac a hit!

Mikey still in the dark about Disneyland

"You got me a Mac?" he said as he opened the gift bag. "We got you THE Mac," Grandma answered, "It's the one you've been using," she added, as a grin surfaced on David's face. Outside of the chocolate-covered marshmallow Santa (consumed immediately), the only other thing that had brought a big smile to that point was an iTunes card.

When I started probing Mikey earlier in the month, "What do you want for Christmas?" he responded, "Presents!"

I tried to get a clarification - the best we did was when his Mom asked him. His response? "Candy cane!"

Because Mikey has no real concept of time, except short amounts, he has not been told that his present is an annual pass to Disneyland. The Southern California pass isn't good right now, and won't be, until Jan. 3 anyhow.

You never know with Mikey - this year, the one thing that caught on was a Sesame Street book with buttons and sounds that has Christmas songs and carols. The container of animals got an open but was quickly abandoned quickly.

This has been quite an up-and-down Christmas for me. Usually my favorite time of year - and still is - there have just been a bunch of downers that have sapped some - but certainly not all - of the joy out of the season. None of them had anything to do with the boys. Our daughter was in a car accident (everyone's more-or-less OK) and then she got sick right before Christmas. She was well enough to come over for a couple of hours, but not the usual whole day.

Some family members got upset with other family members, and refused to show up at the same place as the "other" family members (we elected the "Dear Abby" response of "Everyone is welcome here and we're not changing whom we invite.") It discombooberated the routine.

On the up side, I had a wonderful visit with one of my sisters in Florida in early December, and one of our brothers was able to join us for a day.

I did not get to the usual baking (minus) because of some construction we had at the house running almost until Thanksgiving - and the cleanup afterward really took a lot of time. OTOH, all the decorations got up (plus) in plenty of time !! And the house is VERY clean (double plus).

And Christmas Day, while somewhat quieter than usual with the reduced crowd, was actually very nice and much more placid than usual. My husband and I had a wonderful, quiet morning to share gifts and I even had time to add omelettes to our traditional Mexican hot chocolate and sweet breads. The boys had a wonderful day - not a single incident to report - and we did get to spend dinner with our daughter. So while it was not "the ususal chaos" it was a good Christmas.

Music, Maestro

David has become very interested in music. He is playing the drums - actually taking lessons and paying attention - and he has a iPod onto which he has loaded a lot of music, and he has created numerous mixes. His taste is definitely eclectic - not just "today's hits" but a whole array of music, from Ella Fitzgerald forward. (Unlike Mikey, he only tolerates symphony and does not care for opera.)

So yesterday I bought the new Sting Christmas album. The album is very non-traditional in the current sense; it contains many traditional and seldom heard carols, although there are a few standards like the Cherry Tree song.

I left it out on the piano; David saw it and started to comment on it immediately. He also looked it up online. He knew already who Sting was.

When asked if he liked Sting, he responded, "I appreciate his work. He is a modern-day Kenny Loggins"[!]

He launched into a set of comments made by other people, including those who think Sting "sold out" and several other criticisms. David has decided he likes the album, with the exception of one or two of the songs, and asked to borrow it (to add to his iTunes library).

Additionally, he has decided, "even though I don't really like your voice" that he would like to "make a cover album" for this one, using Garage Band, himself, my friend Richard and me. We shall see. (David has met Richard before but it's been a while.)

Captain Underpants

One of the book series that is - interesting - to the 10-12 year old male set is a series called, "Captain Underpants." The hero is - yup, you guessed it, a chubby male who wears diapers. I have not read them. David was into them several years ago; out of nowhere, Michael has suddenly taken a significant interest in them. This is progress, trust me. He brought 3 of the books with him today, and read through parts of them from time to time.

We also went to the park today, and Mikey engaged in play, with me, for the better part of 1/2 hour. (Also some progress - often when I'm around he pushes me into another place or room.) It was fun, but Grandma is not in the same shape as her 13-year-old grandson. The one who ate 2 hotdogs, a big mess o' baked beans, and 2 helpings of cheesy potatoes for dinner (then wanted dessert.) We suspect he'll shoot up to meet David soon.

As usual, after we got them home, they performed their nightly ablations, then went to bed. Not too sleep. We talked with Mom for a while and then realized that Mikey was still wearing the slippers that we keep at our house - so we went into his room to fetch them. Mom recovered him (he's a cover-kicker, just like his Aunt Evie), and Grandma bent over to sneak in one more kiss. "Sleep with Grandma!" was the response. I told him, "Not tonight" - but it was very sweet.

The Lion King on Broadway

A good part of last summer, Mikey would get on You Tube and look at clips from The Lion King on Broadway, and then he would ask, "May I have Lion King on Broadway, please?"

Now, he's never been on an airplane It's one of the things we are planning to try someday; Mikey is a pretty good traveler. However, starting with a 5-6 hour plane ride and a NY hotel is not our idea of a try-out. :-)

The travelling company is in the area - well, 1-1/2 hours away by car - and we got tickets. OK, it's a $200 experiment, but if you don't try, you'll never know.

Mikey usually wears elastic-wasted sweat pants - there are small motor issues, although he has been working on buttons. For the theater, we wanted something slightly upscale from sweats. So a very nice lady at Sears helped me find pants. We discussed 18/20 versus 30 x 30 and ended up with 30 x 30 twill pants. They fit! and he had a pink-striped shirt which, for reasons not known to us, he started calling his "theater shirt." (We do not tell Mikey in advance that he's going anywhere; if we do, he wants it NOW.) Grandpa loaned him a burgundy pull-over, zip-front sweater. What a treat he looked.

I did the usual prep of a "story" about the day. The story's purpose is to set expectations for Mikey. I do it with words and pictures. Here are the "words" from this story:

Mikey goes to the Theater!

Today, Halloween, Mikey is going to go to see The Lion King.

He is going to go in thecar with Grandpa and Grandma. It’s a very L-O-N-G drive in the car.

We will make 3 stops on the way:

1. To go potty
2. To have lunch
3. To take a break
When going to the theater we dress up. Mikey will get to wear his theater shirt!
What happens at the theater?
First, we park in a BIG parking lot, and walk to the theater.
Then we find our seat. There will be lots of people.
Everyone needs to behave! So everyone can enjoy the show.
When we like a song, and when the song is over, we applaud. When the actors on the stage are acting or singing, we watch QUIETLY.
During the show, there will be a break, called an Intermission.
That’s the time when we can walk around and go to the bathroom.
Then we go back to see the rest of the show.
After the show, we will go back to the car and then go to dinner.

OK I can't wait to tell you: This was an ENORMOUS success! He stayed through the whole show and behaved!

Here is what we learned we need to improve:

We need to add something about waiting to go into the theater after we park. We got there about 1/2 hour early. Mikey wanted to go into the theater (and presumably have the show start) immediately. Mikey did have a behavior issue - I guess he thought we were trying to keep him from seeing the show because we didn't let him go in right away (and the story implied we would)

We need to explain that Intermission lasts a certain amount of time, and even if Mikey is done with bathroom and getting water, we wait for the bells to tell us it's time to go back in

We need to set the expectation that it's a LONG drive BACK as well.

The latter two were not big issues.

Here are some things that did work.

Once we got into the theater, Mikey wanted the show to start. I told him that we had to wait for the orchestra and for the LIGHTS TO GO DARK. He kept looking at things and then finally said, "I want dark, please." However, he did not fuss.

I did bring some snacks and water into the theater. I know, I know, but ..

We got seats on the side of the theater. This particular theater had these loge seats sticking out from the side walls, that have only a few seats in each row. We had a row of 3 seats - This was PERFECT. Although we didn't need to use it, there was an Exit right by us where we could have left quietly. AND not having so many people so close was better for Mikey.

The production was almost 3 hours long, with 1 intermission. He sat through the whole first act, enthralled with what he was seeing. He did, as he does with movies and videos, point and name things he saw: "Antelope. Scar. Mufassa. Rafiki. Giraffe." We had to remind him several times to whisper, and after about 5-6 times he did. He was a little antzy in Act II.

Altogether this was a ROUSING SUCCESS!! and we are really glad we did it.

Assessment!

Lost 2

GAINED 12!

Got another email from David. I Lost 2 Pie Pieces :-\ but gained 12 :-$ , so i really have 10. :-)

Woo-Hoo!!

Periodically, and without any warning whatsoever, ALEKS presents an assessment. Once that happens, you cannot do anything else - including looking at the Dictionary or Review items - until you have completed the Assessment.

For the past few assessments, David has gained and lost roughly an equal number of pie pieces (see earlier blogs for more info on ALEKS - http://www.aleks.com). My assessment is that he is not retaining some of what he has learned. Mind now, he has retained a LOT. I hear it when he gets a problem on an assessment and says, "That's easy."

But ALEKS does not give a person as much review on items as a regular classroom might. Which is fine IFF you GET it and REMEMBER it. So I have approached the issue this way. Each week I assign 10 lessons from ALEKS (they are not that long). I select 7-8 from the REVIEW topics, and then 2-3 new topics for David to try. David is reponsible for completing them and recording what he's done. He's also to let me know what gave him problems. On Friday (my regular teaching day), we look at what he's done and spend time on the ones that gave him problems. Then we usually do 1-2 new pie pieces together.

I am assuming this is working! given the fact that, per his assessment, he was up 10 pie pieces for this review period.

HORRAH!

Slope-Intercept, Face, Freddy Fish and Phone Numbers

Math Stuff

So I got an email from David. "im having problems with SOLVING A SYSTEM OF LINEAR EQUATIONS. the explanation didn't make sense, as of now. :-)"

We covered this for the first time last weekend, and I knew it would take more than once. I told him to do other review exercises in his assignment, and he did. So we lined up the equations, reminded him of LCDs and discussed the signs - after all the goal is to get to zero - and off we went. I expect it won't be the last time ...

We are concurrently (ALEKS is like this) working on graphing equations, x- and y-intercepts; and of course, using the SLOPE-INTERCEPT standard linear equation form: y = mx + b. It took quite a while for David to parse this out so that he understands that "m" is the slope - not "mx + b" or "mx." So I finally gave him what seems to be working as an audio-visual memory tool.

If you are familiar with Children's TV, you may be aware of a character called, "Face." Face morphs shape and color to teach elementary concepts of shape and color. He often starts, "Hi There; Face Here." Many phrases are alliterative and exaggerated, with his voice going up/down and phrases semi-sung.

"R-r-r-ise!" I said, pointing my arm up and using a high sing-song voice and holding the vowel a couple of seconds; then thrusting the arm out in front, lowering the tone, and saying, "R-r-r-un." (This was later followed by "B-z-z-z-z-z." (for "b") It seemed to r-r-r-esonate with him. :-)

Freddy Fish and Phone Numbers

Mikey loves a children's computer game called "Freddy Fish." There are several iterations of the game; Freddy Fish IV lives at our house. In the game, there is a part where Freddy advises the game player to memorize a 3-digit number, which becomes the "combination" to unlock a safe later in the game. So on the way home Mikey started reciting his phone number and declared it was the combination! One never knows where his mind will go, but go it certainly does.

Ordinary Days

Yesterday was a "math day" for David, and I was at his house.

One of the types of problems that David forgot how to do is to find the nth value in a set if the average value of the set is some number. [For example, if a student scored 85, 95, 93, 82 on four tests, and had one more test to take, what would his score need to be for his average score to be 90?] I tried a couple of approaches that did not resonate with him.

Finally, I said, "David - look at me. If I gave you $.96 Monday, $1.04 Tuesday, and kept doing that; and if I gave you an average of $1.00 per day, how much money would you have by Friday?"

"$5!" was the almost immediate reply ...

Anyhow, that seemed to clear up the concept for him.

Oh, and I neglected to mention that David's mom interrupted his lesson, so David could show HER how to do something with iTunes on the computer!

I also waited for Mikey to come home. It was swimming day for him, so while he was chowing down on the M&M cookie grandma brought, I asked him what he'd learned in school. He responded, "Swim."

"Mikey, what ELSE did you learn today?" I asked.

"Australia!" was the response.

Wasn't able to get any more out of him. BUT - a friend of mine who lives in Australia did bring us a wonderful picture / coffee table book about it, so it will definitely be featured on the coffee table today. (It's usually there, except when the Christmas decorations come out.)

Looking ahead to the holidays

It's often a challenge to find a "good" present for the boys, let along one they'll like. David is a little easier these days - he's happy with a slew of iTunes cards. The Mikey Mystery-Wrapped-in-an-Enigma kid is a much harder challenge. His interests vary, wax and wane like the stock market these days.

However, that said, we are in discussions on two things: an annual passport to Disneyland for Mikey and the used Macintosh computer I bought to be given to David.

Mikey and Disneyland

Mikey loves Disneyland (as you can read in earlier posts) and Disneyland is VERY supportive of special needs kids. There are "special" passes for Southern Californians. They are cheaper than regular passes, and have more date restrictions. However, that's almost a plus for a pass for Mikey.

Think of it this way - How do you find the "best" days to take him? You look for the less-crowded days. How do you know what those days are? You can guess, but DISNEY knows. And BTW, that knowledge transfers into - passes with blockout days on the really busy days ...

And I think I can handle him alone for a few hours at Disneyland or California Adventure. He is very familiar with the parks now and he continues to improve by small amounts. He listens better. We still use "set the rules" documents (one pagers with pictures and words that set expectations).

David and the Mac

For a long time, we've had a PC that is referred to as "Mikey's computer." David uses it part of the time, but we got this used PC so Mikey could have a reasonable but not too expensive machine to access the Internet.

David has gotten totally into music recently. Mactintoshes have software called, "Garage Band" that is pretty sophisticated, and David's friend Bonnie and he spend time at her house making and recording music. She uses Garage Band.

SO I got this Mac as an experiment. The first time David tried it, he did not know what to do. (Neither do I but I understand Apple has a first-rate tutorial.) But I think David ascribes to The Music Man theory of learning - The Think System! Experimentation!

The next time we had the Mac out, David discovered "Magic Garage Band" which has a bunch of instruments and pre-recorded stuff you can use as background; he spend the next several HOURS recording what, to my obviously unsophisticated ear, was a bunch of noise - but it was a bunch of noise with multiple tracks. Go David!

There are several reasons to give it to him and several not to ... we'll see ...

Reality

In the autism community, we refer to non-autistic kids as, "neuro-typical," or "NT" for short. As I write this blog, I realized that a lot of what I write talks about the boys in many was as if they were NT. A lot of what all of us do is based on our knowledge of the boys, of autism, of personality, of what works and what doesn't. So we often don't think of the boys as anything "special," per se, just as themselves.

Sometimes something - a look or the realization of what someone else is thinking - call me back to the reality of their situation. Sometimes, it's just something that happens.

Today I was helping out with Mikey. David is back "in" school. He is home-schooled. Mikey is not back in school until next week. David cannot concentrate on work when Mikey is around; and, with the elopement issues, Mikey cannot be let alone outside. Mom got some respite help for two days this week; grandma is filling in some of the remaining time.

So today, I brought Mikey over to our house. (Grandpa went to work of course.) He asked for nachos for lunch, and I didn't have chips or cheese - kinda important for nachos ;-) - so I asked Mikey, "Do you want to go to Von's?"

"Yes," he replied. So we stopped and picked up the required elements and came to the house.

As lunch time approached, I thought it would be a good teaching opportunity to have Mikey help with making the nachos - it's pretty simple: warm beans; grate cheese; layer chips-beans-cheese twice and pop in the oven. So here is where the reality sets in.

First, Mikey agreed to participate. I opened the can and realized - I have only a manual can opener. There is no way Mikey could open the can - he does not have the strength or dexterity in his hands to do so. I did get him to take most of the beans out of the can and put it in the skillet.

I tried to show him how to turn on the burner. I have a gas stove with an electric ignition. I showed him how to push down the knob, but he was not able to do it - same issue. He was able to adjust the flame.

Then I opened the cheese and cut of some chunks - he was able to handle the electric grater with no problem; he missed the bowl a little but not much.

I then directed him to put the layers on. He didn't put quite enough, and he didn't spread the cheese around - but he was able to complete the task.

I put the tray in the over-stove convection oven, and then had him turn it on. We had to do it 3-4 times before he got the steps in order - it involves the following:

Push the knob

Turn the knob to the right temperature

Push the knob

Turn the knob to the correct time (15 minutes)

Push the knob 2x

(BTW, it took me a while to learn the sequence; I wasn't trying to have him learn the sequence, just go through the steps under my direction.)

I think any "independent" living for Mikey will include helpers of one sort or another. One of my dearest friends reminds me that it's just a matter of an appropriate definition of "independent" that is at issue. It's not that I haven't thought about it before. It's just my "reality" check for today.