Parent teacher conference

Tonight was the night! I was a little nervous even though it seems Ryan has been doing a lot better the last couple of weeks. It turns out I was nervous for nothing :-). I got to talk to the Autism support teacher as well as his regular teacher. As far as the acting out/up he was doing (my biggest concern), a sticker chart for breakfast, lunch, special class, and therapy has been helping a lot. If he does well, he gets a smiley face sticker and if he is defiant or throws a tantrum or is uncooperative, he gets a sad face drawn in instead. He loves to work for those smiley stickers (much like when he was potty training lol) :-). That has been working well for the last 2 weeks, so hopefully it continues.

Academically he is doing great :-). His teacher told me she is going to start putting challenge words in his folder for him to practice since he can read so well and knows all of the sight words they are learning already. All the words they were tested on for their report card (which they get December 7th), he knew :-). His handwriting has improved a great deal just since the beginning of the year :-). He is writing darker, neater, and staying in the lines better.

I was very, very, VERY happy to hear that he is starting to initiate conversation and play with his classmates more and more :-). It used to be he would just stand on the sidelines or do parallel play or ask an adult to play with him. Now they said he will start talking to a classmate in the lunch line or while sitting and eating lunch and approach other kids to play during recess. There are also a few kids in his class that help him when needed and love to do so. His teacher was sure to tell me that they aren't babying him or jumping in when not needed and they are trying to get Ryan to ASK when he needs help and the other kids to wait for him to ask instead of just helping him when they notice he needs it. Last year at his preschool graduation, after the little ceremony the kids were able to play and none of the kids played with him or even acknowledged him, except one little boy told him bye when we were leaving. It was heartbreaking :*(. It sounds like things are very different this year and I am SO happy :*). I could tell that even just being in his classroom for a few minutes to help him get in his costume the day of the Halloween parade.

Ryan's biggest issues are changes in routine (apparently his name being called over the intercom today because he won a prize from the health fair yesterday sent him over the edge briefly) and needing help with physical things, like lunch or cutting things out, etc. His teacher is really hoping for a TSS to help with those things and also so if he gets done with something early, they can work on other areas that he needs help in, like fine motor skills. Hopefully the TSS services can/will start soon. Overall they are both very pleased with how he is doing :-). I am SO proud of my little guy!