Studio3Music Blog

Posts Tagged ‘sensory child’

May
18

Feeling Like a Failure

Yesterday, I felt like a complete, utter, failure. I’ve got a sensory child, and I’m also a home schooling mom of three. People often ask me how I do it, and to be perfectly honest, sometimes I wonder, too. Most days, I look (at least I think I do – please don’t crush my delusion) put together on the outside, but like teachers everywhere, there are days when we go, “Did they actually learn anything?”

Back several months. Rob had just finished vision therapy, which for us, was the missing piece of our sensory journey. We’d already done occupational therapy, physical therapy, water therapy, seen a sensory motor specialist, and finished speech therapy. At this point, you can meet Rob and you wouldn’t know he’s a sensory kid. I thought the rest of this schooling year would sort of be an all-come-together year. So much for my plan.

Do I have to post a picture relevant to this post? Just my dimpled Rob turning 10. Oh wait! Our grammar chant charts are on the wall. Grammar = homeschooling = relevant. It works.

Yesterday, I was doing Singapore Math with Rob. And suddenly, he looked at me and said, “I don’t remember how to divide.” Three weeks ago his violin playing took a huge leap backward. His biggest complaint was that (and I quote), “I can’t keep all the information straight in my head.” I’m having lots of trouble getting punctuation rules to stick in his brain, too.

I’ve noticed over the last couple of months that all he wants to do is PLAY. With his friends. And read. For hours. This from the kid who a year ago couldn’t read for more than 15 minutes without his eyes getting tired. That doesn’t mean, of course, that he doesn’t do school. He does. He likes grammar and history and anatomy and physiology especially.

But yesterday, I kept thinking, “How could we get this far and do division all the time, and suddenly, you can’t do it?” It seemed to appear so out of the blue, that I thought that perhaps I just had my head in the clouds and wasn’t paying attention and finally noticed what was going on. Where had I missed the signs?

So I emailed Jesikah, who used to be my assistant, and now bears the more lofty title of Director of Operations. She’s my email therapist, sometimes, too. (She’s also the mother of Rob’s best friends.)

I wrote –

He’s so struggled in some areas at school this year – it’s not a cognitive thing. His brain has just had difficulty processing all the information now flowing in (thanks to vision therapy). However, I feel like I’ve failed him somehow this year. We haven’t accomplished as much as we’ve needed to.

And then I got back the most amazing response –

The Montessori teacher told me recently that some years the children really pour themselves into academics, and some years their social/emotional development needs are so much that it is a distraction against academics and not much is accomplished there…but social/emotional needs are more important than academics – it is what makes us good husbands/wives, parents, friends, siblings, good students and even employees… At the end of one’s life, we always want to be better spouses, better parents, better friends…we never regret that we weren’t as academic as we could have been. Children have a knack for catching up academically, too.

You have not failed Rob. Perhaps, this is a growing year for him socially/emotionally, which is why school is so hard for him. Those other needs are more important at the moment, even if he is incapable of expressing those sentiments.

Thank you, Jesikah. The fact that as a fourth grader, Rob’s brain has felt the need to do something else for his development (rather than what I want it to do), is perfectly okay. So we’ll do a little math this summer, and practice writing a few friendly letters.

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who wants to tell discouraged parents and teachers everywhere that it’ll be okay. Because it will. Even if you have to pull out of the violin recital at the last minute.There will be another one.

Tags: brain, learning, Miss Analiisa, parenting, sensory child

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Oct
19

Ben. Autism. Kindermusik. Dancing. Miss Allison. They’re all connected.

Posted in Bits and Pieces, Things We Love

The big question of what I would be when I grew up was not such a big question. I’d known since before I went to school that I wanted to be a teacher. Occasionally I get an AFFIRMED stamp on that decision, and on those days my heart just sings. Last week, on Tuesday morning, October 4th at about 10:55, I had one of those moments.

I have this little guy in that Our Time class. His name is Ben, and he’s been in class with me since before he was born. I actually think he was in class before his mother even knew she was pregnant. After he arrived on the outside of mom, he came as a tag along in a car-seat with his older brother, and when he could sit up, he came to Village (you don’t have to wait that long… come before they sit up!) and now he is coming to his second year of Our Time. So he’s less than three years old and has been in class longer than that.

Ben and I have a connection that I can’t quite explain… so when his mom came to me last fall and said Ben had been diagnosed somewhere on the Autism spectrum I was literally shocked. Not this child, who is so lively and connected, who smiles at me and hugs me and makes eye contact and snuggles into my shoulder so tight that you couldn’t slide a piece of paper between us. Nope. I couldn’t see it… ‘cause Ben and I are connected.

But I started watching him with other folks and I did notice that he only makes eye contact with his mom and me in class. He doesn’t touch anyone but the two of us, and he doesn’t really interact with the other children, and the other moms are treated like shadows on the wall. He is very interested in the activities, but on his terms. So after the shock wore off, I began to understand. It didn’t change anything, ‘cause Ben and I are, well… we’re connected.

Last week in class we we’re doing the Keel Row, just like we always do after we’ve found Lukey’s Boat (Because you dance a Keel Row on a boat- duh!) But I wanted to add a level of personal connection to the communal experience of the dance so I asked the parents to call out to the children across from them and to use the child’s name when we go in and out of the circle during the refrain. The song is highly patterned- intro, verse, refrain, interlude, verse, refrain, and interlude, verse, refrain, refrain. So, there are exactly eight times in the song where the parents were calling out the kids across from them.

Last Tuesday was a running in and out day for Ben; this means he dashes into the action, watches for second or two, or maybe longer, and then dashes back out. Sometimes back to mom, sometimes to a spot of his choosing. I know sometimes he’s watching, sometimes he’s absorbing, but not actively focused on what’s going on. During the dance he ran around the outside of the circle. I could tell he was aware of what was going on, because he knew when to back up so that no one stepped on him when we were backing out of the circle.

But what happened next was so unbelievably wonderful. As we came out of the circle for the second to the last time, Ben dashed in to the middle of the circle, threw his arms up in the air and beamed at the whole class. I took the opportunity and shouted out for everyone to say hello to Ben as we came in; I fully expected him to dash out of the circle before we got there. We all headed back in, the whole class shouting “HI BEN!” and he squealed with delight and wriggled with obvious joy, even jumping up and down a bit. And he made eye contact with a goodly percentage of the class and was a complete member of the community. My heart swelled… my eyes got teary. I blinked hard and did a Scarlet O’Hara,“ I’ll think about it another day” because we we’re about half way through class. I still had plenty of work to do and no time for tears.

So I pulled out the memory and thought it about on the way home- and I realized something really important; not only did Ben choose to make a connection with his class in a socially huge way, he knew when to do it… he knew the pattern in the song, knew it was the last chance to be a part of the dance, knew when he needed to be in the center of the circle and knew how to say “MY TURN” with out any words. I got all teary again… no matter how far away he seems sometimes, he’s not. He’s right there, and he’s getting it. This was only the 4^th time we’ve done the dance in class, and he knew what the pattern was, knew this was a safe place and that he could take that leap of faith to join the community.

Today, Ben danced the WHOLE dance. Standing right next to his mom. He kicked, he went around, he went in and out- he squealed with delight, he made eye contact with other adults. When we read the “Pete and PJ” he Wishy Washy Whee’d with the group, right on time, every single time. And his WHEEEEE! was whole-heartedly spectacular.

And later, when he came to drop off his big brother for his class, he gave me the sweetest hug, with his head on my shoulder, and a pat.

-posted by Miss Allison, who says, “Here comes that stamp- AFFIRMED! I so made the right decision back when I was five and decided to be a teacher.”

Tags: kindermusik, learning, Miss Allison, sensory child

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Aug
22

Inside, Outside, Upside Down

Posted in Child Development, Education

Prepositions. Can you name one? Before I started homeschooling my children (6 years of Shurley English later), all I could remember about them was that a preposition wasn’t something I was supposed to end a sentence with. And something about not dangling them… no, that is participles.

Anyhow, prepositions are all about spatial relationships – meaning, where you are in relation to an object. How important are they? Just try giving your child a direction without prepositions.

You: “Go get the ball.”
Child: “Where?”
You: “The backyard.”
Child: “Where in the yard?”
You: “Tree.”
Child: “Which tree?”

See, you can’t give the clear, accurate directions, “Go get the ball in the backyard. It’s under the tree opposite the shed”, without using prepositions.

Beside, between, and next to are all prepositions that must be understood before children can make and understand patterns (pre-math stuff). Prepositions are a really important part of language development, too. Children with sensory issues often have trouble learning prepositions as they don’t often have good body awareness.

So, how can you teach prepositions? There are many (because you say them so frequently) they will probably learn on their own. But games (musical ones, of course!) are a great way to teach new ones.

over under in out on inside outside up down behind in front beside above below through between around across with against following before to from

I’m using the song “Go ‘round the Mountain” in my Kindermusik camp this August. I’ve put it below for you to listen to. You can also download it at www.play.kindermusik.com.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

In class, we use hoops on the floor to be our “mountains”, but you can use a chair, an exercise ball, a taped-off square, a box, or other objects. Once you’ve learned the song, turn the music off. You sing, and change the words. Here’s a slew of ideas:

Jump in the box…
Crawl under the chair…
Tiptoe around the ball…
Fly above the mat…

See? Pretty easy. Be sure to play with prepositions two ways. Have your child do the preposition, like in the examples above. Then, sing again, and this time, direct your child to place an object (like a toy turtle) in relation to the chair, or box, or hoop.

Turtle on the box…
Horse behind the chair…
Shark under the carpet…

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who is sitting on the couch with her laptop despite how tired she is, but who shall soon get up and go towards the bathroom to brush her teeth and crawl under the covers and into bed, after she picks up the remote from beside her and puts it on top of the shelf!

Tags: brain, games, language development, learning, Miss Analiisa, music, preschoolers, sensory child, Things to do, toddlers

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Mar
25

The Brain’s Busy First Month

Posted in Child Development

Last time I wrote about sensory integration, I told you what happens by the age of 7 if a brain is well organized. Now, I’m going to start at the beginning and tell you how it all progresses until then.

A Newborn’s Brain
At birth, an infant possesses all the neurons he or she will ever have (billions of them), and a nearly unlimited potential for connections between those nerve cells. They begin the process of brain development with nerve cells that have very sparse branches. During the first few years of life the dendrites (branches) of the nerve cells proliferate. Making these new neural connections is the basis for learning.

Rob at 2 weeks

Touch
A newborn can experience sensations (like the unpleasantness of a wet diaper), or the touch of his mom, but without these neural connections, he can’t tell very well where on his body the touch is occurring.

At this age, touching an infant is the most important thing you can do to help brain development. Every time an infant has a sensory experience, neural pathways are formed. The greater the number of neural pathways, the greater the brain power.

As any mom can tell you, infants loved to be carried and rocked. It is very soothing and calming to a baby. Why? The gentle movements she feels are actually helping to integrate her brain. The clue that this is happening? She’s happy. Her little brain is beginning to organize all the sensory input and thus learn to adapt to her environment. This makes her calm and happy.

Adaptive Responses
An “adaptive response” is defined as “an appropriate response to an environmental demand”. Here’s how it works in newborn as the brain begins to organize itself. If you put a four week old with her head on your shoulder, she’ll try to lift her head occasionally.

Gravity actually stimulates the part of her brain that activates the neck muscles that raise her head. The same thing happens with adults, but we’ve had so much practice at holding our heads upright that we don’t wobble. (And our muscles are stronger, too.)

By the time a baby is a month old, a baby should be pretty good at sucking. Sucking is an adaptive response to taste and smell, which scientists believe were pretty well organized at birth. A one month old will also be responding to the sound of a voice or bell or movement. These responses were already in the nervous system before he was born, but are actually “turned on” by the sensations of movement, touch and gravity that an infant experiences after birth.

If these adaptive responses don’t occur, the brain can’t integrate sensations properly. If that happens, then more adaptive responses (learning) are difficult later.

Rob’s Story
Here’s an illustration: Rob is our own sensory child. After two years of therapy, we hit a plateau that no amount of different therapies could get us past. When we took him to see a Sensori-Motor Developmentalist, he told us that Rob was missing a reflex that all infants should be born with. When an infant is sleeping on his tummy, one arm will usually be bent at the elbow and raised up next to his head. His head will be turned toward the bent arm.

If you put that arm down next to his body, and put the other hand next to his head (while sleeping), he will automatically turn his head toward the bent arm. In Rob, that wasn’t an automatic reflex. Just try this on yourself (while you are awake!) You’ll find it very uncomfortable NOT to have your head turned toward your upright arm.

For weeks, we moved Rob’s arm’s and legs in a Spiderman-like pattern while he lay on the floor on his tummy, until he could do it himself easily in all sorts of variations. We were essentially creating the neural pathways for this reflex. And guess what? He got “unstuck” and could then continue developing his adaptive responses and learn. And an organized brain leads to happiness. (Remember the infant you rocked?)

-posted by Miss Analiisa, who gets tired just thinking about how much work a one month old infant is doing!

Tags: babies, brain, learning, Miss Analiisa, physical development, sensory child, sensory systems

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Sep
24

Meet Luke. You’ll be glad you did.

Posted in Bits and Pieces, Music and the brain

This arrived in my inbox the other day from one of our Kindermusik moms, Melissa. I read it, and by the middle of the email, I had tears streaming down my face. I have never had a story about one of our Kindermusik children touch me quite as much as Luke’s. Enjoy!

My child is special. Yes, I know what you’re thinking, ‘your child is special too’, but my child is REALLY special. Luke is a special needs child. In short, he was born with brain damage. He has developmental, fine and gross motor, and significant speech delays. One thing that Luke is not delayed in is his love for music!

We started Kindermusik with Luke when he was 2. As we sang during Luke’s first class his teacher, Beth, explained how holding the different sized egg shakers encouraged different motor skills. I felt a pang of emotion shoot like lightening through me. “This is perfect for Luke”.

We played with items with different textures, something Luke’s physical therapist had suggested just weeks earlier. We drove cars on different body parts, played games, and of course sang and danced! I knew right away that Kindermusik going to be great for Luke.

After that first class I buckled Luke in his car seat, drove about a quarter of a mile down the road and began to sob. I was (and am) SO thankful that Luke has this opportunity to nourish and support him in such a fun way. I immediately turned my car around and went back to the Kindermusik class.

Miss Beth saw my tear stained eyes and gave me a big hug before I could even share anything with her. Once I found some composure I briefly shared Luke’s condition with Beth and told her what her class means to us. Here she is, just doing her job, like so many other Kindermusik teachers but she is actually helping to HEAL my child…and expand yours!

For most of Luke’s first round of Kindermusik he was typically just along for the ride. He didn’t have the fine motor skills to play many of the instruments, his sensory issues made it difficult for him to transition from playing to being held quietly during cuddle time, he doesn’t have the ability to talk so singing along was out, he didn’t make any sounds at all for that matter, also, he couldn’t sit still for story or rolling a ball back and forth, and he didn’t mimic so he wasn’t quite developing thru watching either. I pretty much held his hands, literally, throughout every exercise and activity, manually supporting his hands and fingers in participation.

Despite all this, Luke LOVED Kindermusik. He began to get excited when we’d pull into the parking lot for Kindermusik, squealing, smiling, and kicking his legs in excitement! Then one day, as we left class I put Luke in his car seat. I sat my keys in his lap while I buckled him in and he took my keys, put them between his legs, and put his arms up and out to his sides. Luke was mimicking! Luke was trying to play! Luke was thinking in his sweet little brain:

“Jingle, jingle, jingle, go the car keys.
Jingle, jingle, jingle, go the keys.
Lost them, lost them, where are the car keys?”

I couldn’t wait to tell Miss Beth…and everyone else for that matter!

Luke is now three and in his second week of his second round of Kindermusik. Now Luke zips around the room yipping and squealing. He had class this morning and did 6, count them 6, new things in those precious 45 minutes.

First, Luke attempted hammering his rhythm sticks! He switched his grip around until he was able to hit the top of one stick with the other like he was hammering in a nail. No hand-over-hand, he just did it! He knew he did it too! He made sure I saw him and I could see the pride in his smile. I felt that lightening bolt of emotion shoot through me again.

Next, he noticed that I had put the top of the tone bar back on upside down. Noticing this is huge. Next, he tried to problem solve by turning the bar over. Of course his logic was flawed, but for a little boy without a frontal lobe, attempting to problem solve is huge!

NEXT, Luke allowed me to hold, embrace, and rock him during the cuddle part of class! I think he even enjoyed it! After this we played with balls. Luke still couldn’t sit still or roll the ball but he did something unexpected, he caught the ball, a few times!!! I’ve never seen him do this before and, since he has an older brother, balls are big things in our house!

Also during ball time, he saw a classmate sitting on her ball and bouncing on it…what did Luke do? He mimicked! He put that ball under his little tush and tried to sit on it! He couldn’t balance well enough to do it but he tried…I almost cried!

Lastly, when class was over, Luke “eagerly awaited” his hand stamp. His version of eager waiting is standing up an inch from where I’m sitting and pointing with a limp wrist at Miss Beth stamping the other kids. I escorted him up front and he got his stamp. That’s not new, what is new is what happened next: he pulled up his shirt up, along with the sensory leotard top he wears, stuck out his belly, and gently patted his stomach. HE wanted to have his tummy stamped like some of the other kids and, in his own way, he TOLD me this! Talk about leaps and bounds!

Another thing we’ve noticed since starting Kindermusik is that if Luke is “playing” a musical instrument with his hands he may, on rare occasion, vocalize. In a sweet, soft, broken, purposeful whisper we’ve heard him sing: “ahhhhhhh”, “oooooooooh”, and “ooouuuuuuu”. He is always the first to notice that music is playing: in the car, at the mall, on a commercial, anywhere. He is drawn to it.

If Kindermusik can have such an impact on my special needs child, just imagine what it is doing for your child!

If you ever get the chance to meet Luke you will know immediately that he’s special. You may not even notice that he is handicapped because you’ll be so mesmerized by his hugely gregarious smile and his eyes shooting darts of love at you more accurately than one of Cupid’s arrow.

-posted by Melissa, Momma to Luke, who says that there is indeed something special about Luke, and her family is SO thankful that he has the musical therapy of Kindermusik harmonizing with them to help heal him.