Henry update

This is quite a long video of Henry reading the concluding pages of The Lion King. The sound isn't great and of course we're still working on his pronunciation and enunciation, but I hope you'll catch the flavor of his story-telling ability. You may recognize the dramatic final battle between Simba and Scar/the hyenas. I did not prompt him to do this. I headed upstairs to have some homework time, and found him reading aloud to himself, with great flair.

Christine was correct in her recent comment- I have been kind of quiet lately. For one thing, I kind of lose perspective sometimes on what I want my blog to be. I want it to be more than just a “log” of what I did each weekend, for example. Or a big bitch session about things that are bugging me (like today our shower curtain rod broke. At least it was after my shower.) Add to that the fact that some things are not to be written in a public forum, and mix in a little of January-is-a-generally-gloomy-month, and you get, well, nothing written here.

One thing that I had wanted to blog about seems to have (knock on wood) resolved itself.

Henry's teacher (Mrs. C) and I had a phone conference two weeks ago (on the18th). At that point his behavior had badly deteriorated, and she was searching for what to try next. He was refusing to do any independent work at all, arguing with the teachers and, when they tried to ignore him, following them around shouting at them and/or randomly pushing or scratching other children in the class.

He was wasting so much time trying to argue about not hanging up his coat or doing his "independent work" (which is always an easy worksheet) that he was missing out on all his mainstream time with the other 2nd graders.
I also discovered that the time he had been spending with the regular class had not been as successful as we thought. Mrs. C had recently found out that the aide working with Henry had allowed him to just flip through the science book, for example, instead of following along with the science class that was being conducted. She was not challenging him at all.

Mrs. C wasn't wanting to be discouraging, but I think was more just trying to brainstorm with everyone involved to come up with a new strategy. I asked if she thought this was just transition trouble after the Christmas break. She dismissed that idea promptly: school had been back in session for 2 weeks. (But I know that Henry often starts back to school ok but then burns out after the first week or so.)

We were heading into the long MLK weekend- my kids were going to spend some time with Grandma and Grandpa and Henry's teacher was taking a little trip herself. She said she had some new books to read and was hoping to come up with some new ideas for working with Henry.
I felt pretty down after this conversation. I worried that his behavior would alienate him from the other children and prevent him from learning. I felt terrible knowing that my child was hurting other children. And I didn't know how I could help, aside from trying new medications or maybe taking Henry to a psychiatrist.
(After our parent-teacher conference in November, we began giving Henry a medication that our pediatrician had suggested. It has not helped at all, and we are weaning him off of it.)
I was pondering a lot of big questions, like what are my goals for my child? To be mainstreamed? To be able to work independently? To be challenged? To learn? To treat people with respect? All of these are potential goals, but some seemed to be mutually exclusive. It did not appear that he could be challenged to work independently and still behave productively at school.

For the past week, Henry has brought home glowing reports in his notebook. Mrs. C told me that she gave some thought to what I had told her about swimming lessons.

You see, Henry never argues with his swim instructor. He works so hard for her and never asks for help like he does in most other situations. I think this is because she is so no-nonsense. She is definitely not warm and fuzzy. But when she tells him to swim from one end of the pool to the other and then pull himself out with his scrawny little arms? He does it.

Mrs. C said she thought about that and realized that the swim instructor has created an environment where there is no room for negotiation. So when Mrs. C came back to school after that long weekend, she just told Henry here's how it's gonna be: you're going to do your work right now, and if you don't do it now I'm going to do it with you, hand-over-hand (which he hates). And after that, he was "the old Henry": smiling and happy and cooperative.

Some mornings he arrives at school and has maybe forgotten "the deal". So they sit down at "teacher table" and go over it again- you won't backtalk, you won't argue, you'll do the work. And then he's fine.

I know this sounds kind of hard-ass and cold-hearted. But Henry really seems to respond to it. Right now at least. We are all keeping our fingers crossed. It just seems to prove the old adage that kids need boundaries. And maybe the same way a good boss can't usually be your best friend, maybe a good teacher can't be the kids' best friend?

Mrs. C and I talked about having a reward system at home that corresponds to how his day is reported in the notebook. I proposed that he earns a star every time he has a good day, and then a certain # of stars earn him a new DVD or something. She suggested something even better- he can earn money according to how his day went, which will help reinforce the money concepts they are learning. She will report on his day using a 5-star grading system, and I will come up with the financial equivalent. That way, even if he has a rough day, he can still earn a small bit of money for his 2-star day.

Yesterday, the first day of the new system, was a 5-star day! Way to go Henry!
A certain 3-year-old someone has a birthday in February, and so does his daddy, so I should have some fun things to post about in the coming weeks.