Unity Day 22: Some Things Old, Some Things New

From Facebook:

"We had a pretty good day today at Summit Centre. We're trying some new programs. Ryan is definitely showing more personality, inquisitiveness, and attitude . . . which can be both amazing AND annoying. ;)"

It was just L.. Ryan and I this morning, so we had some time to chat and look back at all Ryan has accomplished in about 5 weeks. The changes in him are astonishing. Not only have we accomplished about 7 goals already, but Ryan is showing a lot more personality and inquisitiveness, both at home and at Summit Centre. 

It is, quite frankly, a mixed blessing. There are many times when I'm laughing and groaning, or celebrating and sighing, at the same time. For example, Ryan has become quite the explorer. It's wonderful to see him going from room to room, checking out toys, opening cabinets, climbing up on furniture, and trying to open doors.  But as you can imagine, opening cabinets, climbing up on furniture, and trying to open doors can also lead to some potential danger and lots of mischief!  And toys, well, I love that he is pulling out and examining toys, and even playing appropriately with many of them now.  However, he hasn't learned the concept of "clean up" yet. If you could have seen my house this afternoon, it looked like a toy bomb went off, and it was all from Ryan!  I never believed I would see the day Ryan would be dragging out every toy he could find, and even transporting some favourites to various rooms in the house.

In terms of personality, L. remarked today, we've discovered that Ryan has a great sense of humour, as well as a very stubborn streak.  He knows what he wants and doesn't want, and can indicate that quite clearly in many situations.  Through his gestures (like tapping or pushing away) and his body language (frowns, smiles, turning away) he's built up some basic communication skills.  He'll giggle and laugh when you're talking about how silly he is, or he'll give you a dirty look when he's not impressed about something.  Today he threw the rings when he got tired of working with them.  Was that appropriate behaviour? Not exactly, but L. views Ryan's new, occasionally non-compliant and defiant behaviours as a good thing. He cares about things now. He's starting to show the signs of the typical inquisitive, stubborn, mischievous three-year-old that's in there.   

Here's a perfect example from today of the mixed blessing, the laugh and the groan:  We were in the Rainbow Room, talking about some new things we could try with Ryan. Since he had just thrown the rings across the room, L. suggested Ryan might try throwing in a constructive way: bean bags into the holes.  I picked up a bean bag and showed it to Ryan. He was wandering a bit, so I tossed it up and down a few times and shook it to get his attention. He started to walk back toward me, so I held it out to him, waiting him to come and grab it.  Well, Ryan walked right up to me, turned his head away, put his hand up in a "stop" motion, and kept right on walking.  In other words, it was a perfect, and very clear, "TALK TO THE HAND, MOM!"  L. and I laughed so hard!  Again, it wasn't really an appropriate social interaction with Mommy, but he sure made his stance clear! He wanted nothing to do with me and my stinkin' bean bag! LOL  

 

Reviewing Skills and New Goals

In discussing Ryan's regression in some skills which we witnessed yesterday, L. mentioned that some kids pick up on a new skill, and once it clicks, they always have it.  Other kids may lose their skills if they are not practiced frequently.  We are not exactly sure where Ryan is on that spectrum, but since he did show some uncertainty in a few of the skills we hadn't practiced in a while, L. suggested that we keep practicing things he's already learned. Even if they're not in our formal program, I should probably throw a couple in each day to keep it fresh in Ryan's mind.  Like I mentioned earlier, we already have an amazing 6 or 7 skill programs Ryan has successfully completed in the past few weeks, so we'll work those in occasionally to make sure he still knows them. 

For "push a train" today, he did really well. Right now, he's pushing the train down on the floor with no track (remember, he our "track addict").  I had to wrist prompt him for one or two trials, and then he did the rest independently. L. said if we have a few more days of him consistently being independent, then we'll introduce a single, long piece of track, but still on the floor. The train table has way too many distracting pieces for Ryan to mouth.

"Where's the ball?" was a complete success again. I said, "I wonder if he will do it with anything else?" so we tried a few toys, and yes, he uncovered them all  independently.  Therefore, "uncovering" has been replaced with a new, higher-level skill: matching.

Matching is new territory for us.  I mean, he does it at circle time, matching the animal pictures to the ones in the book, but they always hand him the correct one to match or put it close by for him to pick it up.  Now, we're actually starting the basics of him matching up different pairs of things together.  We moved through several basic steps today on our way to full-out matching. First, L. put a little elephant toy in a small basket.  Then, she took the matching elephant and put it in the basket, telling Ryan, "That's matching."  Next, she did the same thing, but HOH'ed it with Ryan a few times.  Then, she put the one elephant in the basket, held the matching one out to Ryan, and told him to "match it."  She HOH'ed him taking it out of her hand and putting it in the basket with the other one. Finally, she did it again, but only with the verbal prompt to "match it." Ryan took it out of her hand, and dropped it in the basket with the other elephant. "That's matching!" 

Next, we moved on to using a distractor bowl. (We had to switch to bowls because Ryan liked to chew on the baskets. They became a reinforcer. LOL You know, follow his lead . . . anyway . . .) What that means is two bowls are side-by-side; one has an elephant, and one is empty. After a few tries, Ryan caught on that he should put his elephant in the bowl that has the other elephant!  When he got this consistently, I suggested we switch the position of the bowls, just to see if he really had the concept.  L. thought that was a great idea. So, we tried it, and I believe he was inconsistent at first; after switching it around a few times, he caught on that elephant goes with elephant, no matter where it is. We also tried it with a pair of different coloured elephants, and he got it.  Next step is to try matching with 2 or 3 different sets of animals. It was so cool to see his little brain working out this new skill, and it starting to click.

Later we went into the Yellow Room and decided to try another new skill.  We wanted another imitation skill to replace "pat floor," so we went with "stomp feet" since it's in some of our new circle songs. We know he can stomp because he does it all the time sitting down, when he's excited. The key now is getting a controlled reaction. It took some playing around to figure out what prompts would work best for this, but L. determined that it works best when one person sits across from Ryan and models "stomp feet" while another person prompts from behind by holding his leg up a bit at the knee. That way, Ryan has to drop his foot down (the stomp).  It took quite a few tries before Ryan caught on to what he was supposed to do, but eventually, he was doing "stomp feet" when prompted as above.  In fact, at circle time, we did "If you're happy and you know it, stomp your feet," and I prompted Ryan as described, and he did it!

On the other hand, we are all struggling with "Go play" still. L. and I sat and wracked our brains over why we can't get this one through to Ryan, when he's doing so well with everything else.  We need to find a way to make it more concrete for him.  L.'s going to ask around for suggestions from other therapists and senior staff to see what we can do to make this one clearer for Ryan.  He was very confused today. When we told him to "Go play" he looked lost, even when we set out and gestured to the toys, nudged him toward the toys, put out his favourite items, tried to entice him by modeling play a bit, etc.  It was heartbreaking because he was trying so hard to figure out what we wanted; he patted the floor, grabbed L's hands, did the "more" sign, tried to give her high 5s . . . He was pulling out all his skills to try and give us what we wanted, or communicate something, but we hit a roadblock.  It was great to see him tyring so hard to work with us, but also frustrating that we couldn't help him more.

At the end of the day, we tried "kick the ball" again, and it was back to normal.  Yesterday he seemed to have no attention on the ball, but today he was very attentive and did several independent kicks from sitting, and even a few kicks from standing.  I guess he just needed a reminder of how it worked yesterday. If he keeps up with consistent, independent kicking for a few more days, we'll move on to kicking from standing, and then maybe some basic soccer skills!

Things We Want to Try

One thing I love about L. is that she's always looking ahead. What will be our next steps for Ryan? We want to try

• colouring (I told her about Ryan and the magnetic drawing board yesterday afternoon),
• riding a tricycle (Ryan seems interested in the bikes at S.C.), and
• throwing (we've seen him toss puzzle pieces and rings today!).

I am so excited for what will come next. I really want to try colouring. I can't wait to have my first real drawing that Ryan made all by himself, even if it's just a dot or a single crooked line. :) 

Andrea and the S.C. Sibling Group

Summit Centre has a fantastic group for siblings of children with autism. I started taking Andrea a few months ago, and she loves it. They have it at the same time as the monthly parent group, so she goes off to her group and I to mine.  They have pizza, play games, do crafts, and share feelings about having siblings with autism.  I think Andrea enjoys that this is something special, just for her and Mommy.  I'm posting a picture of the card she made for me at this month's group (which was on Monday).  It touched my heart, and I also wanted Summit Centre people to know how much she appreciates the sibling group. 

 

 

                                                                     ("Thank you for taking me here.")