Rip, Thunk

Nicky loves to take his shoes and socks off, will do it anywhere, anytime, he's given the chance.

We were driving over to M.E.'s school for a dinner and an open house. It's a short drive, less than 10 minutes. About halfway there I hear rip, thunk, rip thunk from behind me.

"Nate, did Nicky take off his shoes?"

"Yep"

"Nicky, don't you dare take off your socks."

After a minute of silence...

"Na, na, na..."

"Nate, did Nicky take off his socks?"

"Yep, and he's saying na na na boo boo."

Sure enough, in the rearview mirror, I see that Nicky has his thumbs in his ears, waggling his fingers singing "na, na, na"

I did the only thing I could, laughed.

I wish I had a Crystal Ball

We had Nicky's IEP meeting this week to set new goals and decide his placement for next year. His current teacher was somewhat bemused (or more like what the h---?) with his previous goals. Oh well, I think his new goals are more understandable and measurable.

His placement for next year will be in an inclusion pre-Kindergarten class. The other options are to keep him in the preschool class he's in or a self contained Kindergarten class. They pre-K curriculum is language based with an emphasis on pre-reading. I worry that we are selling him short and that he should be doing a Kindergarten curriculum next year. But, pre-reading is where he is, he recognizes most of his letters, is starting to associate sounds with them, can count to 5 more or less. Because of when his birthday is he will be in school until he is almost 22, so a few extra years at the beginning may be the best thing. But, we don't know for sure.

Also, they are not seeing any of the behavior issues we saw last year, with difficulty transitioning and refusing to work with or for therapists. We also decided against a full psych evaluation at this time, having him keep the developmental delay label. There are pluses to having him evaluated now but he also doesn't test well more by refusing to perform than by not having the ability.