How to create a deviant

Quick review:  Psychs wanted to be respected as "scientists.". Behavioralists created "reasons" for learning nonsense, or learning nonsensically, depending on how you look at it.  Now here's another interesting development--enter the number crunchers!
Now, first, I have to say that number crunching is fun.  I know you math-phobic people don't believe that, and that's okay.  But I think it's great fun to find patterns like "square root day" (3-9-81 when I was a kid, or maybe 2-4-16 coming up in a few more years).  It's fun to prove that the "economy size" isn't necessarily the most "economical" per ounce.  It's fun to "count cards" and try to beat the odds in blackjack.  Shoot, it's just fun to even understand the odds in blackjack!  And it's even fun to answer simple questions with long calculus based explanations!  Math is way cool!

And I'm not the only one who thinks so.  Businessmen think so, because they want to calculate risks and measure success and minimize loss.  Environmentalists think so, because they want to calculate risks and measure success and minimize loss too.  Politicians also think so, for the same reasons.  Even Sly measures risks and opportunities and tries to make the most of his calculations and deliberations (thus his refusal to subscribe to some online game because it was just that--an ongoing commitment to continuing to give up money for access, rather than a one-time "you own it" purchase.  I had nothing to do with it!).

Even math phobic people like to see numbers that "prove" something or that back up their thoughts and values or that tell them what they did right or what they should do next.  

Enter the testers.  I found this fascinating.  When the US entered WWI, they had a huge number of recruits that they had to sort through and organize to fill jobs and roles in the military in execution of the war.  In order to manage the task, evaluators and testers were hired to figure out who should be officers and who should be infantry and who should be artillery and so on and so forth. They did the job, and the war eventually ended (on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, btw, for you number people. And obtw, no one "won" the war--everyone just agreed to go home and quit, basically.  But that's another post--sorry!). 

So, the war ended and there were all of these newly unemployed evaluators and testers who enjoyed determining people's military assignments for them.  Guess where they found a new set of subjects?  In the schools, of course!  There were all these captive kids with disconnected "nonsense" to learn at prescribed times in prescribed grades in prescribed ways--perfect fodder for testers and evaluators! 

The testers want people to test and categorize.  The mega-employers wanted warm bodies to fill factories and jobs and be "good employees."  The politicians wanted to know how to spend money and on whom to spend money to make suitable employees and suitable (manageable) citizens.  The testers and evaluators were willing to calculate and categorize the students for them, some for menial labor, some for academics, some not worth either, and so on.  

Thus also began "tracking" in schools.  It was a win-win for everyone!  "Smart" kids were the ones who tested well.  They were the ones who could more easily learn the prescribed "curriculum" in a detached, artificial, classroom environment, regurgitate the "right" answers for the test, and not rebel at the system in general.  They were the good kids, the ones that were teachable/trainable, the ones that got A's and gold stars and smiley faces, and followed the rules and colored between the lines and stayed inside the prescribed box.

Then there were the other kids.  They weren't on the same time line.  Or they were bored.  Or they didn't learn the "right way," which strangely enough was this new invented way of "learning" and not the classic way of learning (by interest and collaboration and in the real world with real relevance).  Those kids were "behavior problems" or "problem children" or "learning disabled.". The tester and evaluators (and employers and politicians) were more than happy to create new "scientific" groupings for these "deviants," and to be able to "allocate resources" accordingly.

Fast forward, and we have federal govt dictating national standards and rewarding and punishing performance of not only individuals but of entire schools and systems, and it's all based on a very un-natural/artificial system of measuring the learning of "nonsense.". Kind of makes you stop and think (if you didn't unlearn how to think when you were in all that schooling!).

Okay, enough for now, and sorry this post has been more "disjointed.". Between flu recovery and baby-brain, it's what I'm capable of at the moment!

Creating a "Reason" (that's reasonable, isn't it?)

So, back to schools discussion (humor me!).  Last post I talked about how psychologists a hundred and fifty years ago or so were trying to establish themselves as a legitimate "science," but in order to do so they had to generate something "scientifically experimentable.". The way they figured out how to do that was to eliminate experience and prior knowledge and personal relevance (and thus personhood, when you think about it), and teach and test people on something no one could possibly know or even have a use for, NONsense.  The discovery was that people have a hard time learning nonsense because it's, well, nonsense, and WHO in their right mind wants to work hard at learning meaningless disconnected useless information simply for the sake of learning it?  No one! (no one in their right mind!)

Enter the behavioralists!  They gave people (starting with animals) a "reason" to learn the nonsense that they would otherwise NOT spend time learning (to only forget/brain dump quickly after "learning" it).  They gave "reinforcers"--postive reinforcers (such as cheese at the end of a maze) for right answers to encourage repeats of that behavior (doing/choosing the "right" but non-relevant to anything otherwise personally meaningful answer), and/or negative reinforcers to discourage repeats of other behaviors (doing/choosing the "wrong" answer, or perhaps refusing to participate in the first place because there was no reason to, except for the artificially created reason/reinforcer).

Is any of this sounding familiar to anyone?  Not necessarily the details, but where this is heading?  I'm out of time for this installment, but I foresee part 3 and maybe a part 4 (depending on time blocks available to me).  Oh, and please forgive the typos in these posts--again, with my time availability, typos are low on my list of priorities!  

Regurgitating and Brain Dumping

I want to talk about school for a few minutes.  Do you remember back when you were in school wondering why on earth you had to learn some of the things "they" said you had to learn?  The particular "irrelevant" subject certainly varied from kid to kid, but there was almost certainly some class that you had to take to meet "graduation requirements" that just seemed to have no relevance to your life at all.

Even more so, I bet there were classes, including perhaps many you did agree might have usefulness down the road, but especially the boring/irrelevant/meaningless to you classes, where you spent a lot of time "cramming" for the test so you could regurgitate the correct answers and get that good grade, or make the honor roll, or keep yourself from being grounded.  And odds are you brain dumped most of what you "learned" as soon as the test (or the class) was over and the "final results" were in.  

I could give you many personal examples from my own schooling, but I really doubt that's necessary.  I'm sure you've already thought of your own.  

So, what's up with that, anyway?  Do you remember how stupid itnall seemed back then?  Do you remember griping with your fellow classmates, wondering when you would ever use any of this disjointed information you had to pass tests on?  

Okay, now here's another question:  Have you actually used or needed a lot of that regurgitated and brain dumped information, or was it really just something to "test" you on and keep you occupied with at the time?  I bet you say "yes and no."  Some of the info you probably did need or want to know later and some of it you probably didn't.  

So, one more question:  When you DID need to know that "something" down the road, how hard was it to learn and actually understand and even remember it (instead of forgetting it again) when it finally had personal relevance to you (beyond the relevance of getting the grade)? Is that not when the "real" learning finally happened?

Okay, so, if the "real" learning happened when you had a personal, meaningful interest in the subject and it had personal relevance to your life (perhaps of necessity or perhaps as a hobby), and if that learning actually came easier and lasted longer than the disected "regurgitate and brain dump" learning for the test/grade/credit, why do we spend so much time and effort learning disected information in chopped up classes and segments that we are just going to brain dump anyway once the class is passed?  And if this is something we already know intuitively (as we did when we were cramming and regurgitating and brain dumping and wondering why when we were in school), why do our schools not only still "teach" that way, but do it even more so than they did when we were in class?

Guess what!  I found out why!  There IS a reason for the insanity!

Back in the 1800's, psychology was trying to prove itself as a legitimate "science.". But there was one BIG problem.  To be a respected "science," you had to be able to conduct experiments, and you had to have both an "experimental group" and a "control group" and a testable "variable."  (surely you can still recite the steps of the scientific method!  If not, then how do you judge all the "science" in the news today?)  But psychology with regard to human learning had some big challenges, because everybody's life experiences were different, and what they had already learned was different, and how they learned it was different, and why they learned it was different.  The wanna-be psycho-scientists couldn't create valid and repeatable experiments because they couldn't create "equal" or "comparable" experimental and contorl groups, and they couldn't find unique variables to test the groups' ability to learn because everyone already knew different stuff and had different learning backgrounds already.  That's just how life is!

So they had a real problem on their hands.  They needed to invent a way to create testable and compare-able groups, and they couldn't find a way to do it.  Until someone solved the problem--you had to detach the "learning" from real life!  You couldn't scientifically test and compare how people learned in real life (which people had already "known" for thousands of years--you learn from other people, and you learn what is interesting and relevant).  Instead, you had to scientifically test and compare how people learned NOT in real life.  Which means you had to create "fake" learning.  Detached learning.  Disembodied, disconnected, irrelevant learning.  Irrelevant meant it had to have no possible meaning to anyone's real (real--relevant).  What the testees had to be tested on, what they had to learn, had to be irelevant, it had to make no sense, it had to be NONsense.  

And that's the magical solution that a German psych named Hermann Ebbinghaus came up with in the late 1800's.  In order to study how people learn and remember (and later how they forget), he devised a list os NONsense syllables for people to memorize (and regurgitate).  Because the syllables were not part of any known language, they could have no relevance to anyone's previous life and learning, and therefore they not only made for a great test variable, but they also created by default acceptable experiment and control groups.  Problem solved!

And guess what his experiments showed?  Exactly what everyone already knew, of course.  Learning nonsense, information with no relevance to ones life experience or interests, takes a lot of effort, precisely because it has no relevance to the learner.  Subsequently, he "discovered" that we quite quickly and easily brain dump all this irrelevant nonsense because it is, well, irrelevant.  What we learn and remember is information and skills we are interested in and which have relevance.  (It has a lot to do with "short term memory" vs "long term memory," btw, but I'm already writing a book here!)

So. if the discovery was the confirmation that we learn and remember what we are interested in and what has relevance to our lives, and that we only "memorize, regurgitaite, and brain dump" the info that we don't have experience with or interest in learning (beyong learning for the grade), why on earth do we run our schools (and our autism intervention programs, I might add) precisely that way?  I can answer that question too, now, but I really ought to stop for now and get on with "real life" again this morning!  Perhaps I'll find another large uninterrupted block of time for "part 2" if anyone else finds this relevant and interesting!  (I sure do, and not because I have to pass a test for "them," whoever "they" are!)           

Jman's Words, update #2--"progress"

Last week I blogged some about several obstacles we/Jman has had with using his ProLoQuo2Go and/or the iPod in general. Those obstacles still stand, and I could add one more I think I left out: He likes to "chew" on the iPods (and charging plugs/cords and headphone cords). Spit and electronics just don't mix real well. Here's a tip for anyone out there who has had the unpleasant experience of "wet electronics:" After you dry the outside as well as you can, close the electronic device up in a sealed jar or container of DRY (uncooked) rice. The dry rice absorbs the internal moisture that you couldn't get to with a towel. Unless something has short circuited inside (keep the power off to avoid that!), there's a very good chance your electronic device will survive the wet event just fine. (Yes, we've done this with iPod and cell phones multiple times, thanks to "belows in headwork" from both Sly and Jman!)

Now, on to "progress" updates from Jman with regards to his "words" on the ProLoQuo2Go. Jman still primarily uses the ProLoQuo2Go for "instrumental" or "means-to-an-end" communication, such as making requests ("Let's eat dinners." "Let's go to McDonald's." "I want to use the computer.") The "progress" is that he is both using the iPod/P2G to make more 'verbal' requests such as those, AND he is also making more 'verbal' requests such as those WITHOUT using the iPod/P2G. In other words, he is 'learning' and 'practicing' the language/statements/words on the P2G, and transferring them into his head. He is then better able to access those words/phrases out of his own head even if he doesn't have the P2G available at the time. It IS still very scripted, but at the same time it is reducing a 'frustration' factor from knowing what he wants but not being able to find the words in his head and get them out of his mouth. So, I still consider that progress.

Now, with regards to "experience sharing communication," or communicating with others just for sharing perspectives or letting each other know what the other is thinking (rather than trying to 'get' something from the other, such as food or the computer), Jman has made some noticeable progress as well, although the quantity is much less. In particular, P2G comes pre-programmed with a "feelings" section. Jman can select the "feelings" page, and from there contruct the simple sentence "I feel ______." His most commonly shared feelings have been 'hungry' and 'thirsty.' He will also tell us he feels 'scared' or 'sad.' But his newest shared feeling, and one that has come 100% from his own personal studying of the pre-programmed options on ProLoQuo2Go has been "FRUSTRATED!" Yep, he can now tell us (sometimes) when he feels "FRUSTRATED!" And when he tells us he's frustrated, he clearly IS frustrated. He apparently put together his internal feeling with the symbolstix icon/frustrated face, and learned the word from listening to it repeatedly on the P2G. So, I personally think that's pretty awesome. Not only is he recognizing and naming his own internal state, but he's found a way to share that internal state with us in ways other than just looking and acting frustrated. That means there's some improved levels of self-awareness and intersubjectivity going on up there in that head of his, despite his many obstacles.

Jman has also added other words or phrases to his vocabulary/communication (both spoken and using P2G) as a result of playing around with the P2G on his own. Some we get tired of hearing ("youtube" or "What do you watch on TV?" come to mind!). Some are funny ("home chat" or "community chat" or "school chat"--we wonder who he's doing all this 'chatting' with!). Some are useful or make sense ("check this out"). Some are just plain weird ("Today at school, I . . . " and he of course never finishes the sentence because it has no meaning/context for him--it's just a pre-programmed phrase/sound he can make the P2G say, and I haven't bothered to take it off).

Jman has sometimes used other 'visual' ways of trying to communicate something to us if it's not available in his head or on the P2G. For example, he and I were leaving a store the other day, and he saw a restaurant and decided he wanted to us to go there. He pointed at it, and then spelled out to me: "R-Y-A-N-S" (the name of the restaurant). I told him how to SAY the word, and after a few tries, he could copy "Ryan's" (he clearly has auditory processing issues, because it DOES take him sometimes several tries PLUS watching my mouth for him to really say a word correctly that he has misheard/misprocessed). Later I was able to add an icon to his P2G for Ryan's, which gives him not only the option on the P2G, but more chances at practicing hearing the word pronounced over and over, without me having to pronounce it over and over (and over) myself. It's just terrific to be able to add words of HIS choosing to his P2G, thus giving him the chance for further practice without driving mom completely insane in the process! These are words that he clearly DOES want to communicate with, and this facilitates his own expansion of available verbal language.

Another interesting thing with regards to Jman playing around with the ProLoQuo2Go is that he is also teaching himself some spelling. For example, he will be trying to program in words for himself, using symbols included with the programming or using pictures/images that have been uploaded to the iPod or downloaded from the internet. He'll know what he wants to say, and he'll find the image he wants to use, but then he'll come to me for spelling help when he gets stuck. He is a very visual kind of reader, tending to spell by sight memorization rather than by 'sounding it out.' When he types into the P2G an incorrect spelling, the device doesn't say the correct word. He'll then come to me to have me tell him how to spell it correctly so the device will say the words he means for it to say. I think that's kind of neat. Sometimes he knows that he can't remember how to spell a word in it's entirety, and then he'll come to me sooner. He really seems to have fun playing around with adding and/or rearranging and/or deleting and then replacing words on his P2G, and it does seem to have an impact on his generally bizarre way of learning and processing and using language (both verbally, orally, auditorially, and written, and for both instrumental and experience sharing purposes).

I wish that I could say that I was seeing miraculous improvement in his experience sharing communication as a result of the P2G, but that's something that comes not as a result of having more words available but rather of having more shared experiences together and a better relationship overall. Thus the P2G is NO replacement for RDI/life, but it is a potential enhancement. We have much further to go in that arena, and hope to perhaps find a personal guide for US when we move in the not too distant future.

Intersubjectivity and pill bottles

Several of my cyberfriends have written some fantastic posts on the concept of Intersubjectivity. Rather than reproduce their awesome work, check out these posts by Tammy, Niffercoo, Penny, and Kathy. For a very quick synopsis, I’ll just say that each person has a Subjective or personal view of something, and when we share our personal subjective views with each other (influencing our own and each other’s views as a result), that is called INTERsubjectivity.

For a quick word picture, intersubjectivity like an INTERstate: Interstates are roads that connect different states, making travel possible across state boundaries, vs an INTRAstate which would be entirely contained within the boundaries of one state, precluding travel across state lines. Similarly, Intersubjectivity allows for the sharing of personal subjective perspectives and experiences between multiple people, whereas intrasubjectivity (is there such a word? Hmmm.) would be keeping your perspective to yourself and NOT connecting or transmitting that idea to or with others (such as not commenting on my post). Clear as mud, right? Read my friends’ posts—they explain it better than I do!

What I really wanted to do was to share with you an example of the highly sophisticated Intersubjective development of a typical 19 month old—you guessed it—SB3. Yesterday afternoon, he had moved a chair over to the kitchen counter and was busy stacking pill and vitamin bottles (who said you need to spend money on blocks? Haha!). SB3 stacked them four bottles high, which was about as high as he could possibly reach. Then he turned and smiled at me, sharing with me his personal subjective thoughts—that he was proud of his good work--and checking out mine, making sure that I was as aware and proud of his accomplishment as he himself was (thus, he was being intersubjective).

Just a few minutes later, Habeeb got home from work. SB3 was still playing with the bottles. They’d fallen over and he was restacking them. He stopped to acknowledge Habeeb’s arrival, but then went right back to his very important work. In a few seconds he had his stack finished, and then the beautiful intersubjective dance began again.

First SB3 turned from his finished stack to smile with great pride at Habeeb, who was likewise enthralled with the architecture. Then, even though Habeeb was ‘with’ SB3 in the dance, SB3 quickly pointed at his stack of bottles as well, furthering highlighting his pride and joy. Then SB3 turned and looked at me again as well, still grinning from ear to ear and with a happy little chuckle to further highlight his great satisfaction and pride, making sure that I was in on the experience too, sharing his perspective and checking out mine (which he found matched his quite well—the proud momma and the proud boy!). I of course already knew that he was a good pill bottle stacker from moments before, but now SB3 wanted to share with me that daddy now knew it too, and that made it even bigger and better than before! SB3, even at just 19 months old, is already becoming a master of Intersubjectivity!

For some reason (or reasons), that development of Intersubjectivity breaks down somewhere early along the way for our kids on the autism spectrum. In fact, it’s more that lack of intersubjectivity that is “autism” instead of a set of specific and commonly listed behaviors (such as lack of eye contact or lining things up or having very short attention spans, all of which are behaviors common in autism, but far from universal in autism, whereas a lack of intersubjectivity is universal and is the contributing factor to all the varied behavioral symptoms, whether there is 'eye contact' or not).

The good news is that even though Intersubjectivity breaks down or fails to develop in the first place in autism, it IS repairable and can then continue to develop to higher levels and complexities, just as the brain continues to grow and develop throughout our lives. Approaches like RDI (Relationship Development Intervention) focus on helping the parents create opportunities for reestablishing the development of Intersubjectivity through repairing and working through the Guided Participation Relationship.

Most often that begins with re-establishing the first level of Intersubjectivity, a simple me-and-you-together or a we-go (as opposed to an ego), such as is seen in a first game of peek-a-boo with an infant just a few months old. By about a year old, infants have progressed to the second level of Intersubjectivity, often referred to as the beginnings of “joint attention,” where the child and the adult can both share their reactions with each other about some third and ‘outside’ object or event, such as the child pointing at a plane passing overhead to make sure mom sees it too. The child is aware that what he sees isn’t necessarily what mom sees, and that mom’s subjective perspective (whether she likes something or doesn’t) may not be the same as his own. Notice, the key is that both parties are sharing with each other their own personal subjective experiences and perspectives. A child with autism can be taught to point at something, or to look at something someone else points at, but that does NOT mean that the child is aware of and considering the other person's personal subjective perspective or feelings about the object pointed at. Following a point is a skill. Sharing perspectives the key to Intersubjectivity.

In SB3’s case, he was clearly demonstrating age appropriate levels of Intersubjectivity, making every effort to share his perspectives and experiences with us, making sure we understood where he was coming from, and making sure our personal perspectives and experiences made sense to him as well (for example, we could have been proud of his success, or angry that he was up at the counter again, or worried that he was playing with pill bottles—many possible reactions, any of which he could have understood, even if he didn’t agree with them himself—it just so happened we were proud and impressed with his towering building project too).

Now, if anyone would like to share their own personal intersubjective perspective with me and other readers of the blog, please leave a comment!

Teamwork!

Today was a lovely day for stringing up Christmas lights! Habeeb was eager to get to work, and I reminded him to include Jman as much as possible. Jman had been asking for the computer (go figure!), but as soon as I told him that dad was going to get down the 'red boxes' he dropped the computer idea in a flash and was out in the garage ready to get the lights down out of the attic.

Habeeb and Jman worked together to get the lights up along the front of the house. Each had a ladder, each had a job, and each kept a "good enough" eye on what the other was up to. SB3 also wanted to get in on the action! He kept trying to climb the ladders, especially "Jman's ladder." I did some quick problem solving and got him an "SB3 ladder"--the step stool. He thought he was big stuff then, just like Habeeb and Brother Jman!

Jman did fantastic 95% of the time he and Habeeb were working. He helped pass up clips to Habeeb (along with a saw and pruning shears for a quick tree limb fix). He moved his ladder when Habeeb moved his. He knew when to run back inside and grab another string of lights without having to be asked. He even kept a bit of a watchful eye on SB3, particularly with regards to the ladders.

Jman did have one major issue, though. He and Habeeb started from the garage corner of the house going towards the middle of the front. When that string was done, Habeeb went to the other corner of the house to again work towards the middle. That's when Jman freaked out. We couldn't figure out what his problem was, but he was seriously freaking out, including flailing and throwing himself on the ground. We weren't sure what his problem was, but I speculated that it might have something to do with switching to the other corner and going in the opposite direction. He did eventually get over it, and got back to being a good helper for Habeeb. When they finished that string and went back to the end of the first strung string, Jman again began to flip out, and that's when we both agreed that yes, it was the transition from one location/direction to the other location/direction that was throwing Jman for a loop.

Now, what we don't know is if it was because he was confused and didn't understand why we were doing what we were doing OR if it was some kind of OCD type thing where even though he may have understood, it just FELT wrong and wigged him out for a while. In either case, he got over his second flail-ex much more quickly than the first, and he and Habeeb finished stringing the roof line. They do still have the front door to string up, and Jman's bedroom, and whatever else Habeeb decides to string up in the house. (Actually, Jman has strung up the hallway bathroom, and is stringing up his bunk bed in lights as I type!)

A ProLoQuo2Go note: While Jman was NOT using the ProLoQuo2Go to communicate during today's festivities, he DID say at one point, "I need help." He had switched roles with Habeeb and was trying to attach a clip to the roof, and was having a bit of difficulty with a particular shingle, and so he told Habeeb he needed help quite calmly. He had a few other P2G-esque moments today as well, but it was mostly means-to-an-end and not experience sharing. Today's most common line (even prior to lights going up) was "Let's go to snow." He loves snow!

A few take home points for anyone doing RDI/Guided Participation with a kid on the spectrum: 1) No one's perfect. There are lots of flaws we make, both us and the kids. Just move on. 2) Think through what you want to do before you try to guide your kid through the activity. Habeeb had a plan for how to string the lights, and he has experience from stringing them in the past. It's much harder to guide your kid when you don't know what you're doing! 3) Don't expect your kid to be excited about an activity just because it excites you. In this case, stringing lights was an activity that really does excite Jman. He'd have been far less interested in helping us do other mundane chores. That doesn't mean you only do things that they find exciting, but do be aware that you may have a more willing apprentice when you have a "mutually meaningful project" rather than a project that one or the other person isn't really into. 4) Whatever your project, make sure the roles of the people are both clearly defined and are 'legitimate' roles. Don't assign a role that is either beneath the other person OR that is overwhelming to the other person. Do assign roles that have legitimate value, that are respectful of the other person as a person, that are in someone's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD). Remember, work in the ZPD is work that someone can't necessarily do alone but can do with proper guidance. It should be just challenging enough without being too challenging. 5) Slow down. Give the person time to think and respond and solve their own problems.

Yes I like it

For all of those readers who just can't get enough Jman stories about his ProLoQuo2Go, let me share with you the latest.

Today, Veterans Day (thank you, vets!), we pulled the Christmas tree down out of the attic and put it up (sans decorations) in the living room. Yes, it's early--we know that. But for starters, Jman LOVES all things Christmas, so, why not? And for seconders, we figured if we put it up NOW, maybe SB3 would get used to the tree being around before we put a bunch of decorations on it for him to play with. So, we put the tree up (artificial pre-lit) without decorations.

We had told Jman we were going to put the tree up today, but we had some errands to run first. Along the way I was playing around with the ProLoQuo2Go on my iPod, finding the preprogrammed Christmasy words. I was thinking we could organize them a little better, customize things for Jman, and maybe create a useful 'activity page' for him to help him communicate more about Christmas with us. Once Jman saw what I was doing, he began trying to swap iPod with me, only this time it was because he wanted the Christmas words and not just because he wanted to watch youtube videos (blocked on his iPod).

While we were out and about, we went to Target. There, Jman remembered we had no star for the top of the tree (ours bit the dust last year or the year before), and he took it upon himself to pick out a new star. We came home, put up the tree, and Jman had Habeeb put the star on top. Jman promptly disappeared and returned with the camera, immediately taking this picture of the new cheap-o star atop our otherwise undecorated tree. Too funny!

Btw, Jman also promptly began building a train set under the tree, and doing his best to try to keep SB3 away from said train. It was pretty funny!

Now, back to the ProLoQuo2Go and the real communication lessons. This evening we were out and about again, and Jman asked to go back to Target, both with and without his ProLoQuo2Go. He was muttering something about 'balls.' Now, knowing Jman, I KNEW that he was talking about Christmas ornaments, but he just didn't know that word. On the way into the store, I quickly programmed in to his ProLoQuo2Go a quickie for answering the proprogammed question "What's that?"

When we got back to the Christmas section of the store, Jman went straight for a set of ornaments that he wanted to buy. I took advantage of the real-life context to work on the language contructs of "What's that?" and the corresponding "That is . . . " along with introducing the vocabulary word/phrase "Christmas ornament." There's no better time to teach someone something new than when they are personally interested in real life. Now, because he's still very much learning, I demonstrated for him both asking the question and answering the question. I navigated from the home page to "Questions" and pushed the preprogrammed button for "What's that?" Then I jumped back to the home page and navigated through "Starters" (for quick and easy sentence starters used frequently), where I programmed in "That is", which took me directly to "Categories", from which I chose "Holidays" and ultimately "Christmas ornaments." Yes, that's quite a few pages to navigate through to get out the simple sentence "That is Christmas ornament" but it works much more quickly than it reads here. With a Christmas specific activity page, we could converse on Christmas things with fewer button pushes, but then again, we have fewer options as well. This seemed a more 'general' way to work on "What's that?" and quick answers for future additional real life opportunities involving more than just Christmas ideas.

So, back to the scenario in the store. Jman paid attention to what I was showing him, and began echoing "ornament." So far, so good: He was indeed stowing away and practicing that new vocabulary word, increasing the chances of him being able to use it in the future.

We wandered around the Christmas section for a while, me debating whether to indulge him and buy any ornaments. I finally decided it wouldn't hurt to get one pack of non-breakable ornaments and take greater advantage of this fabulous learning opportunity for Jman. So, I told Jman he could "Pick one." I of course meant one SET (he was looking at sets of ornaments), but he was a little confused. He was concerned that I meant one piece from a set of ornaments, and he began pointing to each of the 10 ornaments in the set and saying, "that one, that one, that one, . . . " I chuckled and said yes, one SET of ornaments. (Thinking ahead here, this could be a great scenario for working on that math language of 'each' vs 'set').

As we were leaving the Christmas section I had a huge lightbulb moment: This would be a GREAT opportunity to work on some "experience sharing" communication with Jman, as opposed to just the question/answer/vocabulary word aspects (which are important, but stale and static compared to sharing thoughts and ideas and perspectives with each other, which is particularly hard for someone on the spectrum, even without language issues), and in particular with some other preprogrammed buttons he'd been stimming on and playing with in the "Comments" section--"I like it" and "I don't like it."

So, I said aloud, "I like the Christmas ornaments you picked." Then I navigated to the Comments page and punched in "I like it." I asked him if he liked them, and then demonstrated for him, "Yes, I like it." He was VERY interested, and he repeated aloud, "Yes, I like it." Then he and I said something about going home, and of course taking the ornaments he picked.

Well, since he'd been stimming on the "I like it/don't like it" buttons as a pair, he began to say, "No, I don't like it." Every time he'd do that, I'd stop and say, "Oh, if you don't like it, then let's go put them back." That'd stop him cold in his tracks and he'd say and/or punch back in, "Yes, I like it." Then I'd say, "Oh, you do like it. Okay, we'll let's go buy them and take them home." We'd start back towards the front of the store, and after a couple aisles or so, he'd go back to 'balancing' out the words and punching in "No, I don't like it." At which I'd stop and offer to put the ornaments back, and so on and so forth. This happened several times before we made it to the cash register, where we finally bought the ornaments and started home.

Once we were out of the store, he again said he didn't like it, and I offered to take them back. He began to get a little distressed, because he really DID like the ornaments, and he was really wanting to decorate the tree with them, but he also had this autistic NEED to 'balance' the words out, or 'cancel' the words, and he really WAS not liking the 'excitement level' he was having to process at the time, made even harder by my stepping up the challenge with not only language but with 'commenting' or 'experience sharing language' to boot. He was trying really hard to deal with all those challenges, and began to get a little overwhelmed. Then things got even more interesting.

We climbed into the car, Jman holding his ornaments and intently looking at me trying to get ME to parrot for him, "I don't like it" (because I had only said that I did like the ornaments). I was trying to not 'give in' to his manipulative request, but he was getting more distraught.

Now, another area on ProLoQuo2Go is a category for "Feelings." We had demonstrated for Jman a few times in the past, "I feel hungry." He cataloged that, and was interested, and had copied it a time or two, but mostly hadn't done too much with the "Feelings" page to date. However, the "Feelings" page is very conducive to some of that "experience sharing" communication we'd particularly like to help him develop. Yes, it's great to be able to get one's needs met, but we as humans also have a 'need' to share our ideas and thoughts and feelings with others too, even those on the spectrum, even though that is one of their most challenging areas.

So, Jman, increasingly distraught, navigated to the "Feelings" page and punched in "I feel" (one preprogrammed button) and then hesitated briefly over the symbol for "frustrated" (a snarling, frustrated looking face) before moving on to "sad" (a word he's familiar with). He proceeded to tell me, therefore, "I feel sad." He couldn't tell me WHY, of course, but he was able to say, "I feel sad." Now, he's told us before that he was 'sad,' but it was only by saying the single word, "sad" OR by echoing a couple lines from a favorite story, "so, so sad, so so bad." This was new because he included "I feel" and also said aloud, "I feel sad" after punching it in.

I tried to talk with him a little about it, and along the way he also informed me that he was hungry (he didn't eat a lot of dinner, and it was 10pm by this time). I told him (and showed him on ProLoQuo2Go) that I was "sleepy." He noticed that "sleepy" and "tired" had the same symbol. He punched in "I feel sleepy sad tired," all of which were probably true! We decided to come on home, and I did along the way indulge him by saying "I don't like it" just to give him a little 'rest' from his 'frustration' (which was the real thing he was feeling, I think).

So, now in one little jaunt to Target, we'd worked on the language constructs "What's that?" and "That is . . .", we'd been introduced to a new vocabularly word "ornament," and we'd introduced the experience sharing language of "I like it" or "I don't like it" and worked a bit more on "feelings." All for the low low price of $5 worth of cheap-o plastic glittery Christmas ornaments! Wow!

One other little tidbit of info, for the autstically interested crowd: Folks with autism had an underdeveloped sense of "Self." Kind of funny when you think about it. Folks tend to think that someone with autism is ONLY interested in 'themselves' but that's not really accurate. Instead, they have a hard time actually learning who they are and who they aren't in comparison to other people and their likes/dislikes/experiences. So, working on "I like it" and "I don't like it" will be great for helping Jman develop a better sense of who he is IN RELATION TO who others are. For now, we can work on him saying what he likes (or doesn't) when he likes it (or doesn't). Down the road we can compare that to what someone ELSE may like or dislike. That will help him develop both a sense of his own Self and a sense of who others are, and whether he and others are 'the same' or 'not the same.'

Oh, that reminds me of one other 'aside' in the ProLoQuo2Go language lessons for the evening. While we were at the Chrsitmas section of the star, we noticed a box of ornaments in the wrong place. I glanced around and determined where they belonged, which happened to be next to where Jman had moved to. I carried the box over and showed them to Jman and also pointed out the matching sets on the shelf. I had navigated to his math lessons ahead of time, and, pointing to the matching sets of ornaments, I asked him, "Are they the same?" He looked, and quickly punched in his reply, "They are the same." And so we placed the ornaments back where they belonged. Is that cool or what? An opportunity to apply our little 'at home' focus lesson in the real world!

Okay, so, sorry this is such a long post, but I'm just amazed at the opportunities we're finding for communicating and for expanding communication and for learning language and for sharing experiences with this fabulous little ProLoQuo2Go app. It's fascinating to watch him both when he's learning/using it 'properly' and when he's just 'stimming' on it, laughing at the funny (to him) things he can make it say. When he's stimming on it, I remind myself that babies learning language for the first time do much the same thing--they 'babble.' Jman stimming on his ProLoQuo2Go is his version of 'babbling,' and we're already seeing little glimpses of his babbling growing into 'real' language. And just like a baby takes a year and a half to start talking, and even longer to make sentences, and even longer to ask questions, or tell a consistent tale, so to I expect this to be a 'long haul' process with Jman and not an overnight miracle. But boy, some of the little highlights along the way are just as fabulous as some of SB3's emerging language (which deserves it's own blog post sometime!).

They are the same color.

Jman has continued to work on his math language using ProLoQuo2Go. Last week we played a card game in which he demonstrated mastery of "They are the same" vs "They are not the same." He is on a VeggieTales kick, and I had an old VeggieTales card game that plays like Memory/Concentration. I pulled out the 4 cards each for Bob the Tomato, Larry the Cucumber, and Junior Asparagus, shuffled them, and Jman and I played a game of Outhouse Solitaire. I pulled the top and bottom cards of the deck and held them up. He, being Jman, made sure they were "upside up" ("upside down" is NOT allowed in Jman's world!). Then Jman's job was to tell me, using the ProLoQuo2GO, whether they were the same or not the same. If they were the same, he got to keep the pair of cards. If they were not the same, they went into the discard pile.

It took him just a couple of turns before he figured out the game, and he was always delighted to get a match and keep the cards. Once he had all the cards matched in pairs, the game was over and so was the 'lesson.' It was especially neat when he'd look up at me with a big grin when he got a match. That's showed me that we were working not only on language but also on experience sharing. He wanted to share with me how happy he was and look to see what my reaction was. Hmmmm. Down the road maybe we can compare our reactions and whether they are 'the same' or 'not the same.'

Prior to the math lesson, btw, Jman wanted to do Reading Milestones. However, he never even waited for me to open the book. Instead, he punched into the ProLoQuo2Go his memorized version of the story: "The boy rock jumps. The boy log jumps. The boy water jumps. The boy fence jumps. Home. The end." I throw that in here to point out some of the 'disorder' in Jman's language. He comprehended the story (the boy jumps over those various obstacles to get home), but his language is mixed up in describing it. Instead of subject-verb-direct object, Jman said subject-object-verb. That's something we'll have to work on down the road.

Back to math language now. Today Jman and I played a different version of Outhouse Solitaire using the VeggieTales cards. Instead of identifying same/not the same characters (completely identical cards), I wanted him to learn to identify when thing which were not identical ('not the same') were still the same in some way, in this case the same color. Instead of having 4 each of identical cards, I had only one each of certain character cards. Most of the Veggies are green (Larry, Junior, Archibald, the French Pea, Pa Grape), two are orange (Laura the carrot and Jimmy Gourd), and one is red (Bob the Tomato). I left Bob out (no other match for red) and Pa Grape (had an odd number of green veggies). That left me with 4 green veggies and 2 orange veggies.

The first pair of cards I showed to Jman were the same color, but of course they were different characters. Jman quickly punched in "They are not the same." He thought he was correct, and of course he was correct. But I pointed out to him that they were both green, and modeled for him, "They are the same . . . color" using two different buttons (one for the phrase and one for 'color'). We set them aside and pulled out two more cards. I again had to demonstrate for him that they were the same color. He was thinking, but still not quite sure what we were doing here.

Through a few more turns I developed the pattern of showing him the two cards and saying out loud, for example, "Junior is green. Larry is green. Are they the same color?" With this extra bit of scaffolding, Jman was able to figure out the game and begin to correctly respond with "They are the same color" or "They are not the same color," depending upon which two cards we were looking at. We had to reshuffle the cards a few times, since I had so few cards in the deck, but he was okay with that. And once again, once Jman had the game figured out, he would look up at me with huge grins when he punched in the right reply. It was way cool!

So, that's our update on math language as of today. A next step will be to compare colors of other items. Then we'll want to teach him to identify when things are not the same, but ARE the same color. We also will want to compare other attributes, such as shape and size. But one step at a time. The goal is not to frustrate or overwhelm him, but to let him learn at the best pace for him.

Speaking of learning, Jman likes to stim on ProLoQuo2Go, which I think I mentioned before. However, some of the words and phrases he stims on he is beginning to use in real life. This morning when Habeeb left for work, Jman said, "Good bye" to him. When I got up and said good morning to Jman, he replied back "Good morning." He's getting opportunities to practice some of the words on his on, and is applying them in real life. That's way cool.

Last little bit of info: Yesterday we dropped the bucks and got Jman an iPod Touch of his very own. That way I don't have to share mine with him (he was deleting things and rearranging things and surfing youtube and such), and he will always have access to his "words." Now we just have to order a waterproof case for his if we want it to survive! Anyway, he was very excited to have his very own iPod/ProLoQuo2Go, despite the fact that we passcode protected all the online stuff so he can't use it to go online and watch videos himself. It'll be fun to see how the increased access works for him.

The boy jumps: Automorphology on the ProLoQuo2Go

Jman has some reading books that were originally developed for deaf kids and are also useful for helping teach kids with language delays or disorders how to read. Now, Jman already can read quite a bit, and write quite a bit as well, but it's still very "Jman-ish." I was interested in these books not for teaching Jman to read, but for helping Jman to slowly master language. Rather than being phonics based books, as is typical with beginning readers, these books instead introduce reading through one syntactical language structure at a time. For example, in the first book every sentence of every story is ONLY of the form subject + verb, and in particular the verbs are limited to singular present tense intransitive verb forms (verbs that do not take a direct object, eg, jumps or runs: The boy jumps. The girl runs.) There are other advantages to this reading book series. You can read all about it here: Reading Milestones.

Now let me tell you a little about a really awesome feature of ProLoQuo2Go. In ProLoQuo2Go, you can identify each button/word by its part of speech, indicated by the color of the border around the button. Nouns have a yellow border, verbs have a pink border, adjectives have a blue border, etc. Here's what's really awesome, though. If you have a button for "boy" and just press the button, it will pop up as "boy" in the message window. However, if you hold that button down for just a little while (you can change the duration required--we have it at .5 sec), a small window of choices will pop up for you that automatically offer you different versions of "boy": boy, boys, boy's, or boys' (singular, plural, singular possessive, and plural possessive, respectively). With one button, you quickly and easily have all those options available, without having to navigate to other pages or do fancy things or have a bunch of extra buttons cluttering up your pages.

Even cooler, IMO, is the automorphology ir auto-conjugation of the verbs. If you hold down the button for "see," it will give you the following choices: see, sees, saw, will see, seeing, seen. How cool is that?!??!? I do have one wish, though, and that is that it would also offer the infinitive "to see." But hey, the English major in me would find something to complain about!

So, recently we pulled Jman's Red Reading Milestones books back out with the intentions of 'reading' them via the ProLoQuo2Go. He was already very familiar with the first story about a boy who jumps a variety of obstacles to get back home. As we turned the pages, I demonstrated to Jman how to punch in the words on the page: "The boy" (programmed in as one button for the purposes of this lesson) and "jumps." Jman's initial attempts were to simply push 'jump' and be done with it, but that says, "The boy jump," which of course is 'bad English.' I demonstrated for him instead that when you hold the 'jump' button down, you get choices. Then I chose 'jumps.' He wasn't terribly impressed. We continued on.

We read through the first story the first day, with me doing a lot of Guided Demonstration on how to choose "jumps" instead of "jump." The next day, we read the same story, and Jman would hold the button down for choices, but he would be as likely to still choose "jump" as "jumps." We went ahead and read story two as well, adding in a new verb, "runs." Jman began to correct himself sometimes if he chose the wrong verb form, but he was very unreliable. However, he was very engaged and definitely trying to figure out the pattern of what we were doing.

Fast forward a couple days to yesterday afternoon. We only read the first story, but Jman was all over it this time. He read the page and entered "The boy." Then he'd pause as he pushed and held down "jump" waiting for the choices to apeear. He'd look up at me eagerly, with that crooked half grin of his, giving a little bitty nod, and then he'd quickly look back down and choose "jumps," perhaps followed by a verbal "all right!" from him. Was he excited because he was learning something, or because he was anticipating getting the computer that much more quickly? I don't know, but I know that we are making progress. The automorphology feature of ProLoQuo2Go should be absolutely fantastic for helping someone who has language learning issues to experience more success more quickly with less pain. I'm sorry I don't have pictures for you, but you can watch some great demonstration videos at the ProLoQuo2Go website. You can see the auto-conjugation of verbs in video 4 (intro to vocabulary part 3).

The same or Not the same--that is the question!

People often think of math as being about numbers, calculating and manipulating numerals. But 5 - 2 = 3 doesn't have any meaning by itself. However, if you have five dollars and want to buy a slushie and candy bar for two dollars and wonder if you'll have enough left for a slice of gas station pizza, then the 'math' has meaning.

But the language of math begins long before we ever reach numeral manipulation. When we look at an object and declare it to be big or small, we're doing math, we're measuring. When we describe an object as round or square, we're doing math, we're doing geometry. When we locate an object as inside or beside or behind something else, we're doing math, we're doing visual-spatial graphing. Likewise, when we compare two items and declare them to be the same or to be not the same, we're doing math. "Equals" = "the same as." 5 - 2 is the same as 3. It's part of the language of mathematics.

That is one of Jman's new language lessons we're addressing with the ProLoQuo2Go. To begin our study of the language of mathematics, we started with 'the same as' and 'not the same as.' I programmed two button choices for him into the P2G. Each button speaks not just one word, but the complete sentence, "They are the same" or "They are not the same." I could have chosen to use the words 'same' and 'different,' but by using 'the same' and 'not the same' we achieve two purposes. First, it comes closer to 'equals' and 'does not equal' and will therefore translate better into traditional math symbols down the road. Second, it introduces the language concept of 'not,' which we can develop more generally in other areas of language studying. "The boy is jumping." "The boy is NOT jumping." And so, Jman's first math language lesson is learning to appraise when things are "the same" or "not the same."


So, Jman has two options on his ProLoQuo2Go--'They are the same' or 'They are not the same.' My next task was to find things for us to compare. I gathered a variety of objects I intended to use--cards, pick up sticks of different colors, bear counters of different colors. I quickly decided against the cards because while the numbers might be the same, the colors might be different, or at the very least the suits would be different (unless I used two decks of identical cards). There were too many potential attributes to compare, so I decided against the cards for now. I decided to use the bear counters. I have two different style of bears, but I have plenty of each style in each color, so I could easily generate lots of pairs that were exactly the same.

Now, I should clarify one point, perhaps. Jman KNOWS when things are exactly the same and when they are not. That was not the issue or the lesson I was trying to teach. What I was trying to help him learn is what LANGUAGE to use in order to share with someone else the observation that things are the same or not the same. This wasn't a lesson to learn about 'sameness' but a lesson to learn the language about sameness.

When I sat down with Jman and the bag of bears, Jman was in no way interested in comparing a pair of bears and saying whether they were the same or not the same. I demonstrated a few times for him (Guided Demonstration), but he would have none of it. He either wanted to play with the bears (sorting or lining them up or setting them up like bowling pins), or he wanted the bears put away. And so, thus ended lesson one of "the same or not the same."

The next day I decided to try our 'same game' with coins. I grabbed some pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters. Jman was more cooperative and interested this time, in part because he'd asked for the computer and I had told him we were doing a few things first. Yes, sometimes bribery is your friend.

I placed a couple of pennies together, and punched into the P2G, "They are the same." Jman watched. Then I put together a couple dimes, and together we punched, "They are the same." Next nickels, and Jman happily punched in "They are the same," and ditto with quarters.

Okay, we'd covered 'the same,' and he seemed interested and cooperative, so I put together two different coins. Jman promptly punched in, "They are the same." Um, no. They are NOT the same. I erased his error and punched in "They are not the same." He didn't care. I tried again with a couple other different pairs of coins, but he was done. Lesson over. You can't teach a kid who has checked out.

The next day, Jman and I were stopping by the drive thru for some french fries. I pulled out two one dollar bills to pay for them, and while we waited I showed them to Jman and pointed out that they were 'the same'--they both had numeral one's and they both had the same picture of George Washington. "They are the same." Jman listened but didn't comment. And we got our fries and drove home.

Back at the house, SB3 brought me a pair of identical yellow wood blocks from a knock-off Jenga game. I commented to SB3 that they were the same. He of coursed loved the acknowledgement and the attention, and maybe he'll learn "the same" faster too. :)

I turned to Jman, who was eating his fries, and showed the two blocks to him. I commented again to Jman, "They are the same. They are both yellow." Jman finished his fries as I gathered a pair of red blocks and a pair of blue blocks to go with the yellows. Then we sat down together and Jma (again hoping for the computer, which he did get after this) himself selected the two yellow blocks and punched into the ProLoQuo2Go "They are the same." I offered two reds, and he qucickly and enthusiastically shared "They are the same." Ditto for blue.

And then I grabbed two of different colors, and Jman quickly and easily identified "They are not the same." Woo-hoo! He was quite pleased and having much fun. I don't know if his excitement was about his being 'right' or if it was mostly in anticipation of getting some computer time, but either way, he was happy and participating. I pulled out several more pairs of matching or not matching blocks, and he quickly and correctly identified each pair as being the same or not the same. Hooray!

We called it a day and he happily began watching Animaniacs on the computer for a while I made some modifications to the 'same' choices on the ProLoQuo2Go. I added in buttons for "color" and "shape." This week coming up, we will try to help him expand and differentiate not only when things are the same or not the same, but clarify whether they are the same color or not the same color, and later whether they are the same shape or not the same shape. We could add choices for size, location, function, category, orientation--lots of possibilities. However, some of those will come further down the road. For now, we'll focus on same or not, color, and shape. Yes, he knows his colors by name, and his shapes by name as well. This isn't about teaching him those things, but about teaching him language, developing his ability to communicate thoughts and ideas with others.

As an aside, in case anyone is actually interested, I have an old used set of the Singapore Math workbooks for kindergarten. The table of contents includes, of course, the list of lessons, along with the objectives of each lesson and the vocabulary or phrases associated with each of these math objectives. Some of the langauge Jman already has (such as colors, shapes, numbers, counting, etc). But other bits of language he doesn't have, even if he understands the math concept (such as 'the same' or 'not the same'). It is from these vocabulary and phrases that I am developing Jman's math language lessons, but with as much variance and adjustment on my part as will be necessary. Think of it this way--the Singapore Math workbooks are my 'Guided Demonstration' of one way of approaching math and language. I don't have to do it exactly that way or follow their workbooks exactly as laid out. In fact, I most certainly won't, because the books are all written in from years ago. But they are serving as a simple guide to how I can approach helping Jman learn the language of math, and I'm very pleased with our first few days. It may take years for Jman to master all the language in these K workbooks, but hey, if that's what it takes, that's okay. For Jman, learning math will be more about learning the language to describe what he already knows rather than learning the 'math.' These early Singapore books are a handy reference because they have that 'language development' component that I haven't noticed being emphasized in other curriculums I'm familiar with from homeschooling Sly over the years. I don't know what the Singapore books are like after the K workbooks, but it'll be a long time before we're there anyway.

Fwiw, Jman just came up wanting the computer. I asked him to find me two things that are the same. After cleaning up the spilled counter bears that SB3 dumped out earlier, Jman selected two red bears and happily punched into the P2G while he muttered under his breath repeatedly, "They are the same." I asked for two 'different' bears, and he looked at me a little unsure. I realized my mistake and asked for two bears that were 'not the same.' He promptly pulled out a red bear and a yellow bear, muttering, 'not the same, not the same' and punching "They are not the same" into the P2G. He then pulled out two red bears again and muttered 'they are the same' as he punched in "They are the same." So, I'm guessing he's got 'the same' and 'not the same' down in his head now! Tomorrow we'll add 'color' to his sentence!

Guided Demonstration and ProLoQuo2Go

A few nights ago, Jman and I were on the couch late in the evening. I pulled out the ProLoQuo2Go and navigated around to produce the message, “Good night. Let’s go to bed.” Jman watched what I was doing, and agreed with the thought. We got up and got ready for bed.

The next night I went into Jmans’ room to say good night to him, and he took the iPod and punched In, “Good night. Let’s go to bed.”

One of the important things we learned from our days of formal RDI was Guided Demonstration. So often we parents of autistic kids try to get our kids to do something, to perform. Often though, we expect them to perform before they have any idea what they are supposed to do. One aspect of autism is that they are very bad at reading someone else’s mind, knowing what they are thinking or expecting or intending. And so we often expect the child to do something for us, but we fail at helping them know what it is they are supposed to do.

Now consider that most folks on the spectrum have anxiety issues, related in part to the fact that they can’t read other people’s minds very well. When they do try to join in, they often make mistakes, and they have enve more trouble trying to fix those mistakes or recover from them. Often it’s easier to just avoid joining in at all, especially when no one seems to be particularly aware of or helpful about your challenges. The person on the spectrum is expected to join in, to play a part, but for a variety of reasons related to autism, they don’t know what they’re expected to do, and it’s quite stressful.

With Guided Demonstration, the Guide (adult/parent/teacher/person with a clue) can first model for the apprentice (child/learner/person needing a clue and security) without placing any expectations or pressure on the apprentice to perform or to even join in. Many people, not just those on the spectrum, like to watch someone else before trying something new themselves, or prefer to have an example or a model to work from, even if their final creation turns out completely different from the sample. For someone who doesn’t easily read minds or intentions and who probably has performance anxieties too, ismply modeling for them without immediate expectations can create a sense of safety that not only enables them to learn, but also ultimately invites them to join in when they feel ready to try (as opposed to demanding that they join in before they feel ready to try).

So, all that to say that rather than teaching or expecting Jman to say good night with (or without) the ProLoQuo2Go, I simply modeled for him one way to do it. I let him look on while I navigated through the screens, and he watched. In addition, what I modeled was contextually appropriate at the time—it really was time to go to bed. Later, when he was ready to use his new info himself, he voluntarily and spontaneously used the iPod to tell me good night.

I should also add that following his good night message to me, he backed up and explored some of the other greetings preprogrammed on the “Hi, Bye” page of ProLoQuo2Go. Those were not directed to me, as was the good night message, as evidenced by his body language. When he was just exploring on his own, he wasn’t making the somewhat subtle eye and body orientation changes that would indicate he was addressing me. Instead, he was intrigued by his discovery of when and how to use the ‘good night’ greeting, and was now studying the other options on the greetings page, pushing the buttons and reading and listening to the responses, perhaps considering when those other greetings might be useful in the future or why they didn’t apply to going to bed.

Guided Demonstration works well no matter what activity or lesson you’re hoping to help your child learn. It gives the child the opportunity to safely observe and prepare before having to risk his own performance. It increases his chances of joining in successfully. It increases his feeling of safety and security with you. Trust is essential to helping your child with autism. We’ve been intentionally using Guided Demonstration for a long time now with James. In the case of saying, “Good Night” with the ProLoQuo2Go, he picked it up very quickly and subsequently used it for himself very quickly. Granted, he already was familiar with both pecs and with navigating through ProLoQuo2Go in general, and he was familiar with the context/routine of going to bed. When it’s an entirely new activity and he has no context or foundation upon which to build, we have to do more demos, more scaffolding, backing up to lay useful foundations. Guided Demonstration preceded Guided Participation and is one way of slowing down in order to go faster.

what can a 14mo do?

Well, a 14mo can start to walk into his big brother's bed room, until he notices the robogator standing guard in the doorway. Then the 14mo stops, considers, and then carefully walks backwards until he's a safe distance away, at which point he turns and finds some OTHER room to go into.

A 14mo can drop a ball at the head of the driveway and watch it roll all the way down until it's in the street. He'll start chasing after it, at which point mom will catch up with the ball and kick it back up the driveway. Seeing mom kicking the ball with her foot, the 14mo will be completely fascinated. He'll hurry over to where the ball is, slow down, stop, and then try to kick the ball himself. If he's lucky, he kicks the ball a foot or so. If he's not so lucky, he kind of steps on the ball and may even fall down. But, being the resilient and determined little fellow that he is, he just gets back up and tries to kick the ball again. When he does, he beams with pride, then watches as the ball starts to slowly roll back down the driveway into the street again.

A 14mo can screech an amazingly loud and high pitched vocalization when he's being ignored, particularly if he wants something to eat or drink. Once he has your attention, he may smile and will reach in the direction of whatever it is he wants. He'll look intently at the desired cup of water, glance at you to see if you're paying attention, and screech again if you're not. If you are paying attention and begin to move in the right direction, he will start smiling and laughing, glancing back and forth between you and the cup until he finally has it in his hands.

A 14mo can try to put his hands and feet in the sleeves and legs of his clothes when you dress him. When you take his shirt off, he can raise his hands up over his head to make it easier. When you put it on, he may bite the shirt as it goes over his face, and then smile at you with the shirt stuck between his teeth. He thinks this is hysterically funny.

A 14mo can decide it's time for a bath and start trying to get his diaper off. He can also pull at his shirt to tell you he wants the shirt off too. If you pull his pants down while he is standing, he will carefully step out of his britches and to the side so he isn't still standing on them. Then he'll start trying to throw one leg up and over the edge so he can get into the bathtub. Sometimes he may just succeed at that. When he's finally ready to get out, he can come to the edge of the tub and hold his arms up for you to wrap him in a towel and lift him out. Then he can wiggle and squirm when you try to get a diaper and clothes back on him because he'd really rather run around the house wearing nothing at all.

A 14mo can think footie pajamas are weird the first time you put them on him, especially if he still doesn't wear shoes and hasn't worn socks for months. But then he'll decide that they are different and fun. Then he'll start picking up everyone's shoes and putting them in piles or delivering them to some lucky person who then drops them in piles. If you later put shoes on the 14mo, he may think they aren't so bad after wearing footie pajamas a few times, though they still won't stay on his feet for too long.

A 14mo who still nurses can be very good at saying his first two real words--"mom mom mom mom" and "boooooooooob!" If he's gotten mom to pick him up, he can pull at mom's shirt while saying "boooooooob" just to make his wishes a little more clear. If thinks he's going to get some boob, he'll start smiling and chuckling. Once he's happily nursing, he'll stop, look up and grin like the dickens, and then get back to business. Somewhere along the way he may take a break for the express purpose of blowing a bunch of zerberts on mom's belly. After a while he'll grin at her, laugh at himself and how funny he is, and then get back to his booby. A nursing 14mo is hysterical!

A 14mo can also be quite good at speaking feline. When one of the kitty cats meows, a 14mo can reply with a nice "Eeooooooooooooowwwwwww" in a really high and soft squeaky mewing pitch. When a kitty walks by quietly, a 14mo may start pointing and saying, "gack! gack! Eeoooooooowwwww." He will also try to pet the kitties, whack the kitties with sticks (or whatever else he may have in his hands), and give the poor kitty a bear hug. Fortunately, we have very patient kitties!

A 14mo can wave bye-bye when he or someone else is leaving (unless it's mom, in which case crying and having a fit is more appropriate!). He can wave at neighbors ariving home from work, or at daddy leaving for work, or at people left behind at the train station at the zoo, or at cashiers in stores. A 14mo can also be learning and using two more real 'signs' as well, such as "all done" and "more." Of course, he'll still prefer his loud attention getting screech to a less noticeable but more polite "more" in sign language, in which he brings his right and left fingers together in front of him to let you know he wants more of whatever it was he was getting. He also likes to use the screech to get your attention let you know when he's done eating. You can then ask him if he's all done, and he will very quietly and politely make his "all done" sign, waving both hands in the air over his head, indicating that he is indeed done eating and ready to be let down from his chair.

A 14mo can get up in the morning and want to go right outside to play. He can walk over to the back door, point very nicely, make his funny little narrative baby talk noises, and glance around to see if you're noticing he wants to go outside and play. Then the cat will walk over to the door, thinking you'll open it. When you open it to let the cat out, but you keep the 14mo inside, the 14mo will try to climb over or around you to make his escape. When you close the door with him still safely in the house, he'll have a fit and proceed to give you the evil eye. He may then go over to the garage door instead and try to get you to let him outside through the garage. A 14mo very much enjoys being outside. He may especially enjoy the rain, reaching out to feel the rain drops hit his hand.

A 14mo can see your hairbrush and want it for himself. If you give it to him, he will try to brush his own hair. Likewise, he can see you sweeping and want the broom for himself. If you give it to him, he will try to push it around on the floor, banging it into all sorts of things. A 14mo can see you open the refrigerator door and will try to get all the bottles in the door out before you get it closed again. He can also empty the drawer of kitchen towels you just put away yet again.

A 14mo can see your toothbrush and want to brush his own teeth. He can see you getting ready to take a shower and drop what he's doing, making a bee line for the tub, because he wants to take a bath too. A 14mo can pull all the tissues out of the tissue box, grinning at you after each and every pull.

A 14mo can pick up your cell phone, hold it up to his ear (probably upside down), and start making cute little narrative baby noises as he talks on the phone.

A 14mo can find every cabinet you forget to put the child locks back on, and then pull all the pots and pans out. He'll also dump out everything you just picked up, especially if it involves blocks and multiple pieces. He can pull book after book off the shelf, sometimes leaving them in the floor, sometimes bringing them to you, sometimes sitting and flipping through the book (multiple pages at a time, half the time with the book upside down, pointing at pictures or words in the book and making his funny little narrative baby noises, occasionally glancing up at you to make sure you're aware of what he's doing, and sometimes he'll decide to tear the pages too).

A 14mo can help you unload the silverware from the dishwasher, even if it's dirty and you're trying to load the dishwasher. He will hand you one piece of silverware at a time, giving you a little baby noise comment with each utensil. He may sometimes wait for you to take the utensil he's offering before dropping it and going after the next utensil, but you can't count on it. He'll do a better job if you keep up with him, rather than him keeping up with you. A 14mo will enjoy beginning sorting the silverware as he selects which piece to pull out next. He may sort by going front to back, or he may sort by getting all the knives, then all the spoons, etc. This is easier if you also put your wood handled steak knives in the dishwasher (pointy side down, of course, for safety). After a while he'll lose interest in his self-created sorting and just go back to grabbing a piece and handing it to mom with a very "Tim the Tool Man Taylor grunt." A 14mo will think helping mom with the dishes is wonderful, but mom has to be willing to have the occasional breakable dish dropped on the ceramic tile floor (ouch!).

A 14mo can hear an airplane flying low overhead and run over to the door to try to get a better look. He will point in the direction of the plane or noise, and he will comment with his little narrative baby noise grunts. When he loses sight or sound of the plane, he'll turn and look for you to see if you were as amazed as he was at the low, loud plane flying by.

A 14mo can bonk his head or toe, and then look right at you and make the most hysterical face with squinty eyes, a scrunched up nose, and an "ooooooo" mouth when he bonks and it actually hurts him a bit. Once he gets validation from you with a comparable "poor baby" face and comment, he will continue on with his business as if nothing happened. Meanwhile, you'll be cracking up at how cute he is when he looks at you with that squinty, scrunchy, puckery boo-boo face!

Yeah, those are all things a 14mo can do, assuming he's not autistic of course. SB3 is so NOT autistic!

Backyard Makeover

When we bought our current house a little over a year ago, this is what part of the backyard looked like. There aren't many pictures of that section of the yard because, quite frankly, it was unattractive and little used. We'd intended to take down that ratty metal swing set, but somehow, it just didn't happen. You probably know how that goes!

However, over the last week or so, we've been finally working on that section of the backyard, and it's becoming quite the hang out spot for the family, especially with beautiful weather we've been having!

First, we raked up all the leaves, and pulled a lot of the random weeds, and generally cleaned up the 'tree trash' under the huge old pecan tree (remnants of a pecan plantation)and out of the 'sand pit.' When we did that, we realized how nice and pleasant it was under the shade of that huge tree. That got us thinking about putting in a paver patio or some other nice and fancy 'outdoor room.' I actually got the booklets from Lowes and Home Depot and was looking into it. We were talking designs and plans and whether to do-it-ourselves or hire someone to do it for us. And then we realized that we didn't want to sink that kind of money into a house we may not stay at forever. And I began to enjoy just sitting in an old lawn chair out there under the tree with good old dirt for the 'floor.' So, we dropped the patio idea and 'got real.'

What's the right Jam-and-Habeeb way maximize enjoyment of that backyard spot? A good old fashioned wooden picnic table, for starters, as opposed to the fancy porch furniture I'd been scouting all season (and hadn't found a thing I liked yet). Plus it's got a couple added bonuses: It's cheap, and it's a great 'project' for Habeeb and Sly to do together (a trial run of 'shop night'). So, here they are, putting together mom's picnic table in the dark in the light rain. Do they love me or what? :)

Next, the boys power washed an old Little Tikes playset the previous owners left here and which was full of spiders and tree trash from sitting under that old pecan tree. It'll be great for SB3 in the very near future. Sly did most of the power washing, and being the bad mom that I am, I only have pictures of Jman when he took a turn at it. They also both worked on power washing a bunch of old Tonka trucks that were yucky from sitting out in the sand pit for the last year+.

After we took a step back, Habeeb and I had the same thought at the same time: We need to hang the hammock between those two trees! Jman wasted no time giving it a test drive.

Of course, being outside in the evening probably means bugs, plus it gets hard to see once it's good and dark. Habeeb jumped all over those two problems by finding the pair of old tiki torches we 'inherited' with a house we bought a few years ago. He stuck them in the ground and Sly got to work 'playing with fire.' What is it about fire that is so much fun?

Now, that big old pecan tree has a big old branch growing out from it that was just begging for a swing. We already have everything we need to build a playset (except the wood). What we needed for a big tree swing, though, was a good rope. $20 later and some creative rigging by Habeeb, and presto--we have a way cool make-shift swing! He rigged this up for me in the dark (what a guy!). If we leave it as is, we'll have to move that one tiki torch, or someone's gonna catch themselves on fire when they're swinging!

And so, about $120 later, we have have a remade backyard!

And here are some kiddies (and kitties) having fun in the new backyard!

Man Building

Sly is 12. On the one hand, he's still a boy, but on the other hand, he's in the process of becoming a man (or at least he should be!). We've decided to step outside of the 'school box' for a while and take a somewhat different approach, or at least a different emphasis with regards to his homeschooling. In the past, a lot of what has gone on here has been Mom (me) calling the shots, formulating the plans (or using someone else's plan, called a 'curriculum,' working hard to keep everyone else on track and on task. I spent a lot of the day making sure Sly did math, and reading, and history, and science, and this, and that, and the other. Well, we've decided it worked: The boy can read, and he can write, and he can do math, and he has a bit of a clue about how the world works (both scientifically and historically). Could he stand to improve some more in each of those areas? Sure, but who couldn't? It's time to work less on skill-building and more on what I'm calling "Man Building."

Habeeb and I are in the process of making a few major changes to help with our 'Man Building' project. For starters, we're actually dropping a lot of mom-created (or curriculum-seller created) school work. I have a wonderful curriculum sitting there on a shelf, about 1/4 finished, but we're essentially dropping it. Maybe we'll go back to the books someday because we want to read them, but I'm not going to police Sly to read them just because someone else (or even I) scheduled them into some curriculum. Mom playing the role of get-your-school-done-policeman at this point is not "Man Building," it's just nagging and stressful for everyone involved, and quite honestly unnecessary. As I said, Sly CAN read, write, do math, and has enough of a clue to be able to find out more about what he discovers he wants or needs to know more about (even if that simply means asking someone else for help in finding it out). So enough of pre-planned and policed curriculum for the sake of the curriculum. Our priority isn't to do the curriculum but to grow a man. To the extent that curriculum assists in that pursuit, fine. But when curriculum begins to stand in the way of that pursuit, it's time to sacrifice the curriculum, not the student.

So, our emphasis here is changing from Mom policing Sly to "finish your work" and switching to emphasizing Sly's role to Begin (without Policeman Mom reminding or nagging him to start, stay on task, and finish). "Begin what?" you may ask, since we're dropping the curriculum. Well, we're only MOSTLY dropping it. We ARE still keeping a few things, as we as a family feel they support our Man Building situation at this time. Sly still has to practice his guitar (or mom and dad quit paying for lessons). Sly himself wants to learn computer programming, so that's on his to-do list as well. He had started algebra with a co-op a few weeks ago, but we dropped the co-op because the pace was very aggressive (too much too fast to allow internalization and transfer into Sly's long term memory and way too much homework--we were getting NOTHING else done, and that's just not a balanced way to live life). However, other than the co-op pace, Sly was enjoying Life of Fred algebra in general. Therefore, he will still do algebra at home (but at a pace where he's really learning it instead of merely cramming it). These three 'subjects' (guitar, computer programming, and LoF algebra) are all Sly-chosen courses of study.

Habeeb and I have also thrown in a couple academicky requirements. We suggested that Sly continue studying Sonlight 5 science, which includes human physiology, anatomy, etc (handy things to know when you're a boy becoming a man). And, of course, some kind of Bible study: For what does it profit a man if he gain the whole world, and yet lose his own soul? The hugest part of being a real man is knowing that you are a man, created in the image of God, but NOT God; Fallen, and in need of saving, but that you can't save yourself; a sinner, who deserves no mercy, and yet is so loved and valued by his Creator that He sent His own Son to pay the price of saving you when you couldn't. If you don't own that bit of knowledge, or if that bit of knowledge doesn't own you, nothing else matters. And so, Bible study (and prayer), both individually and corporately as a family, will be part of the Man Building project (perhaps I should say it will be the CORE of the Man Building project!).

We're also making a couple of 'structural changes.' Habeeb and Sly are dropping karate on Tuesday & Thursday nights. The Cost Benefit Analysis says that we/they can do better things with that time. (Don't get us wrong: Karate can be a good thing! Our old dojo in a different state was fantastic, and definitely contributed to Man Building (or Woman Building), both physically and spiritually. But that just isn't the case with the dojo's around here, including the one we've been attending for the last year, which was the best we could find. It's time to move on. We may resume karate again when we move to a new place if we can find a GOOD dojo that edifies instead of just sort of, well, being a place to spend time and money).

Habeeb and Sly are replacing karate nights with 'shop night.' Together, they are going to work on building things (or fixing things when necessary, such as tonight's project--try to fix the broken clothes dryer). Not only will Sly learn some valuable skills (woodworking, craftsmanship, problem solving, read the instructions, research to FIND the instructions online, etc), but he'll also learn fabulous people skills (teamwork, delegation, collaboration, responsibility, follow through, etc). Perhaps above all else, it'll be a great opportunity for Habeeb and Sly to work together on meaningful projects, growing not only a man (Sly), but also growing their relationship. In karate, they were both studying the same material, but they were essentially separate individuals under the direction of another instructor. With shop nite, they will be a team, working together, learning both how to lead and how to follow. Plus, some neat and useful projects may get done around the house (like you'll see in the next post!)

Continuing on the team-building theme, Sly has decided to join Civil Air Patrol as a cadet. We'll learn more as we go along, but that will certainly generate some team and man building opportunities, and ought to be a lot of fun along the way, with the added benefit of being 'for real' (they really DO go out and search for downed aircraft or lost persons that need rescue or help in other emergencies, such as flying over cities hit by tornados taking photos to help determine needs and services). We'll see how that goes. He's gonna have to cut his hair off, though!

So, here's the 'what' that Sly will be working on (mostly his choosing, plus a couple mom and dad threw in): guitar, algebra, computer programming, human physiology, Bible, shop night, and Civil Air Patrol, plus, of course, his lawn business. That's plenty full enough without generating additional work assignments for the sake of curriculum! Especially when you consider he gets lots of "extra curricular" conversation about world and national current events and politics in this house, with applicable impromptu history lessons thrown where he lacks pertinent background info. It's a learning house by nature. We don't need to artificially create work, and then police that work for the sake of that artificially created work! Enough aleady! It's time to build a Man, not a Drone!

Now for the "how." Our goal is for Sly to increasingly think for himself, including organizing his to-do list (considering requirements like 'clean the cat box' and desires like 'read Calvin and Hobbes') and police himself to get started (as opposed to mom policing him to get started). Right now, it's more about Getting started" than "getting finished." But, this post has gotten long enough already. We'll save that chatter for another post later.