More Science! Saturday, Aug 22 2015

Big Man (15) is doing High School Biology while Peanut (10) tags along for some of the fun, but what about our middle boy?  I really didn’t want to have him doing High School Biology when he’ll most likely do that next year.  What to do?  Well Little Monkey (13) has always been our little engineer so I thought this would be a great year to have some fun exploring Engineering!  I must say, it’s been a huge hit.  At no other time in his life has Little Monkey grabbed for the science lessons first thing on a Monday morning.  I do believe we have a winner and her name is Mom.

Engineering?  Not my bag, people.  Need me to gut and animal and explore the mysteries within?  I’m your girl.  Need me to formulate an equation to find the load bearing capacity of a skyscraper and earthquake-proof that puppy? Not so much.  In fact, if you find out the structure you are currently residing in was designed by me, you may want to rapidly vacate said premises for the good of your health.  Sooooo what to do?  Turn to the beautiful land of the internet of course!

My two favorite websites (so far) have been Teach Engineering and Try Engineering.  The beautiful people who contribute to these websites put complete STEM lesson plans right in my hands totally free of charge!  If you are trying to teach a mini engineer in your home, you’ll want to take some time browsing the lesson plans on these sites.  I bet you won’t be sorry!

Here’s a little peek into some of the activities Little Monkey has done so far:

Testing how to earthquake-proof a skyscraper using Legos.  (found at Scientific American)  Two other good sites while learning a little about skyscrapers were found at PBS and the amazing SkyscrapersIM.  I have no doubt we’ll come back to that last website later in the year.  You just can’t go wrong with a 3D Building Simulator!

Next we moved on to water and learned about how water towers function.  (this is a terrible picture, but he was given a few household items and had to build a water tower that could deliver water to a cup 3 ft. away…..and he had to be able to start and stop the flow of water at will)  A good book to go with this activity is Engineering the City.

Another terrible picture, but next he studied the different types of dams.  These are two of the four he had to build.  He built two types (arch and embankment) in Minecraft and had to make the other two (buttress and gravity) out of clay.

Since we’re playing with water, next up was making his own water wheel and calculating the rate of rotation in preparation for……

exploring hydroelecticity!  This kit is too fun!  I thought he was going to start drooling when he saw it.  It’s very much like putting together a Lego kit, but if you get it working properly you will learn about how hydroelectricity powers the light bulb included in the kit.  The lit bulb is too tiny to see in this picture, but it was working!  He now wants to build something, anything, that will run on hydroelectricity in our house.  Any ideas?  Anyone?  Bueller?

So far so good with our Engineer Man, his new name on this blog.

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Flat Stanley Tours Kentucky, Part II Monday, Jul 27 2015

This week we took Flat Stanley to check out our State Capital Building in Frankfort.  Peanut (10) was sure this would be a boring trip, but even he conceded that it was a great day!

With all of the Confederate Flag nonsense going on around the country, and knowing that Jefferson Davis was waiting for us inside, we just HAD to bring our little ol’ flag along for the trip

Little did we know that just a few hours earlier a large Flag History and Preservation Rally happened on these very steps.  We were quite sad to have missed it.

The Rotunda ceiling was unexpectedly gorgeous.

Of course, one of our first stops was to visit the only President of the Confederacy:

Peanut wanted to be sure Stanley had his picture taken with Abraham Lincoln as well

Next we had a real treat!  While I was trying to get Stanley to pose outside of the Governor’s door, his Secretary let us know she is a huge fan and insisted on giving us a private tour of the Governor’s office!  Now someone has gotten a little big for his britches:

His plan for World Domination has begun:

In case you can’t see it, Stanley stuck himself between the Governor and former President Bill Clinton.  We left with a little gift from the Governor’s office:

The next stop on what had become Stanley’s power trip was the Supreme Court of Kentucky:

Someday he wants to be sitting in that head chair up there

Of course, since Stanley doesn’t know the first thing about law or the lawyering business, he wanted to spend some time in the Capitol Library.  Let the studying begin!

He found more fans in the library, so they let us escort Stanley around the upstairs portion with its snazzy glass floor!

If nothing else, I was able to see the vision in my husband’s head for the library set up he would like

What a fun day!  It was hard to get Stanley back in the van with his swollen head after all of the love from his fans in the Kentucky government, but we managed.  Stanley will be back, Frankfort.  Stanley will be back.

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Flat Stanley Tours Kentucky, Part I Tuesday, Jul 21 2015

I decided that we would spend the first four to six weeks showing Flat Stanley around our beautiful state of Kentucky.  Peanut (10) absolutely begged to visit Newport Aquarium first so off we went!

Newport Aquarium sits just across from Cincinnati, Ohio.  Peanut thought it was neat that the same river we live close to extends all the way to his favorite aquarium!

Peanut was a bit sad to find the Jellyfish room had been changed around a bit since the last time we were there.  Stanley still thought it was a calming room to rest in for a while.

Both Peanut and Stanley know that their sweet friend, Gracie, loves penguins.  This picture is for her ❤

Stanley was just as nervous as Peanut in the shark petting area.  They both felt a little bit like shark bait.

It took a good thirty minutes, but Peanut pushed his fear aside and finally began to pet the sharks.  As soon as he touched one, he couldn’t be pulled away.  One hour later, we moved on to his other favorite spot in the aquarium:

It’s hard to tell from this picture, but this is a deep window where people can sit and feel like they are floating inside the shark tank.  Peanut loves it here.  Since it’s tucked behind another exhibit, it’s usually a nice, peaceful spot to watch the animals swim by.

It only seemed right that we end the day with a little visit to The Colonel.

This was such a fun trip to begin Flat Stanley’s Kentucky adventure!  There’s so much to see in Kentucky, it’s been difficult to narrow down where we will take him.  Check back next time to see where we visit next!

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Our Flat Stanley Adventure Begins! Friday, Jul 10 2015

Little Flat Stanley has begun his adventures for our family!  Since it’s vacation season, Stanley decided it would be great to kick off his tour with some Jamaican style fun.  A big thank you to the honeymooners, Hank and Charity, for letting Stanley tag along!

We started by watching this fun Tourism video.

Yah, mon, I am craving some time in Jamaica now, too!

We found the island on our world map, and added it to our map wall along with the “tropical haiku” postcard.  HA!!!

We looked at the fun pictures of Stanley on the island, and couldn’t help but check out a few others from your honeymoon, H & C.

Yay, they made it!!

Not surprisingly, this was Peanut’s favorite picture from Stanley.  He thought Miss Charity and Stanley were awfully brave touching that gator!

Next week we will begin showing Stanley around our new home state, Kentucky!  Learning geography has never been so fun!

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Biology! Thursday, Jul 9 2015

I’ve waited ten years.  The time has finally come for my favorite: High School Biology!  Let’s break out the microscope and scalpel, sort through some frog innards, and have some fun!  Since this will be an amazing hands on subject, I’m including Peanut (10) in some of the activities.  I hope to update this a couple of times a month….but we all know that may be a pipe dream 😉 Hey, I’ll do my best.

The spine we are using is actually a DVD Series called Biology 101.  They include a disc that contains an accreditation booklet and guidebook to aid the parent in using these DVDs as a full credit science course.  Honestly, I’m adding a whole lot more than what they suggest in their guidebook, some of which will be documented here.  I suspect Peanut will be shown more often than the Big Man (15) because, well, he’s fifteen.

Week one was a simple introduction to classification.  Big Man watched the video and completed the reading pack, while Peanut did a classification activity with me while we talked about why classifications are used by scientists.

Separating foods, people, and toys into groups.

We focused in on the food group and broke them down into the more detailed groups of dairy, fruits, veggies, grains, meats, and fats.

Later we played a classification game I found online.  Each person had to pick an animal and ask the questions on the page that would eventually lead to revealing what animal the other person held.  Big Man put up with this…..Peanut had to play it about a half dozen times.  Typical.

Lastly, we did this very fun Lego Classification activity from The Homeschool Post.

Classifying the Kingdom of Lego into the Pylum of colors

They picked a stack to build from, and recorded how their creation would be classified.  Big Man built a pretty sweet Star Wars-like space ship, while Peanut built a boat with both a sail and motor.

Not a bad week for the most boring part of Biology.

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Autism Awareness, Take Three Thursday, Apr 2 2015

Three and a half years ago our Peanut (now 10) was diagnosed with Autism.  It feels like so much longer than that, only because autism was on our radar for years before the formal diagnosis was finally made.  Last year I was able to give a very positive update, and that trend will continue tonight!  This will be a quick update.  Unfortunately today has been filled with thunderstorms and our little man is dealing with not fun reactions to those.

This past year we saw great progress!  So much progress that Peanut was actually released from Occupational Therapy!!  He still struggles in certain areas.  That nasty Dysgraphia will forever plague him, I’m afraid, but the O.T. did everything in her power to help.   Peanut is now able to stay with his brothers while my husband and I go out on a quick date.  That has been such a HUGE blessing!  Everything must be just-so, and we can’t be gone for a long time just yet, but being able to get out of the house together for a couple of hours is a major win for this Mom & Dad.  Peanut was able to attend a cottage school for two classes on Friday mornings this school year.  That was something I couldn’t see happening for a terribly long time.  Now, these were classes taught by an O.T. and coincided with his therapy needs beautifully.  Of course, again everything needed to be just-so in the weather department, but he has enjoyed his “school”.  We were very sad to learn this will not be offered next year, so yet again there will be no educational options outside of the home for our Peanut.  He continues to work hard during our reading instruction time.  He is severely dyslexic, but is almost through what I consider to be the most difficult level in our reading program!  I am so very proud of him!  He continues to progress well in math as long as we do things as naturally as possible.  Few worksheets and tons of real-world application provide him with great math skills.  He will begin horseback riding lessons this spring.  I still have not told him.  His head may explode from excitement!

Rainy/stormy weather, barometric pressure changes, and wind continue to plague him.  Anxiety continues to be his greatest challenge.  Sleep still never seems to be something his body gives in to willingly.  Expressive language is still a challenge for him, so we will begin speech therapy again.  Peanut will still stim, however if we can keep his anxiety in check the stimming is usually minimal.

Overall, he is doing fantastic.  Still lots of challenges in the day to day, but such a change from a few short years ago!  Is he still autistic?  Always.  He will not outgrow it, Autism is a forever partner.  He is becoming more “socially acceptable”…..but who decided what that is?  He shows more bravery in dealing with everyday life than most people who have been deemed socially appropriate.  He makes us proud.  We are forever thankful for his life.  Our lives would be dim without his shining light.  Tonight we light it up blue for our Peanut, River, Gracie, Luke, Nicky, and all the others who make this world a brighter place with their unique light.

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Skip Counting Tricks Tuesday, Sep 9 2014

Here I am!  I promise I haven’t abandoned this little blog!  Life has been moving along at blinding speed.  I mean really, why can’t life just slow down to just nine kinds of crazy so I can put out a blog post every so often?  Oh well.  Someday I’ll be back on a more regular basis 😉  In the meantime, a friend was asking about teaching multiplication.  Since there’s not much multiplication without skip counting, I shared some ideas I’ve used with success. Peanut (9) has a problem with working memory, which means if I can make something visual it has much more of a chance of sticking around.  Here’s what we’ve done so far.

2’s:  First we took a tape measure and placed little Post-It strips on all of the odd numbers.  I pointed out that all of the numbers were even and they all ended with a 0, 2, 4, 6, or 8.  He practiced counting by 2’s by touching each exposed number.  The next time we worked on this, I pulled out the tape measure, he counted by twos while covering the odd numbers with his finger.  He loved that he could easily count this way for twenty-five feet.

3’s: I wrote each number on an index card and taped them to the wall in the hallway.  He had to chant the numbers as he touched them.  The most interesting thing we observed was that if he had trouble remembering, he would visualize the wall of numbers in the hall with his eyes closed, sometimes even reaching out to “tap” the invisible number as he counted.

4’s: Sidewalk chalk.  Lots of sidewalk chalk.  I wrote out the numbers 0-40.  He stood on zero, I asked him which number we would start with if counting by fours.  He moved to the number 4 and I drew a box around it.  He counted out four steps and stopped at the number 8; I drew a box around it.  We continued this until we got up to 40.  He went back to zero and could only jump to the correct number while counting by 4’s.  We saw how all of the 4’s are even numbers, so that meant multiples of two shared some of the same numbers as multiples of four.

5’s: Two colors of construction paper: 10 green and 10 pink.  Any number ending with a five was green, any number ending with a zero was pink.  We noticed how all multiples of five either ends in a five or a zero.  Then he walked while chanting, left foot only hitting the green papers, right foot only hitting the pink papers.  He especially enjoyed the path leading to a bed or crash pad of some sort.  Kind of like a sensory reward for counting all the way up to one hundred!

10’s: A song of course!  I’m singing it right now…..you can hear it obviously 😉

9’s: Okay, we haven’t started this one yet, but I know the trick to learning it.  Take a blank sheet of paper, write the number 9 at the top.  While keeping the ones and tens columns lined up, write the multiples of 9’s vertically.  Notice that the ones column starts at nine and counts down by one number while the tens column starts at zero (blank) and counts up by one number.  Why didn’t someone teach me this??  I had so much trouble learning these as a kid and this would have made so much sense!!  Of course, there’s always the “add ten then take away one”…..but that’s more math to just get me to nine more than I left off.  I much prefer the visual trick of ascending and descending numbers.  Not to mention it’s way cooler.

Still to come: 6’s, 7’s, 8’s…….still thinking……

Once he had comfortably learned to skip count a few numbers, I moved on to showing *why* he learned them.  Multiplication is just fast addition.  We showed it with blocks:

He immediately understood and pretty much felt like the most brilliant kid ever.  Mom breathed a huge sigh of relief.

Feel free to leave suggestions for those last three numbers in the comments!

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Autism Awareness Month, One Year Later Wednesday, Apr 2 2014

I know this blog is overwhelmed with updates (*cough, cough*), but this is a great time to update our journey with Autism.  Peanut (9) wasn’t formally diagnosed until just a year and a half ago, although it had been suspected for years.  If you haven’t read the post from Monday, let me reiterate that it can be quite difficult to get an Autism diagnosis, especially if there are other disorders/disabilities involved.  The more severe those other disorders/disabilities are, well, you can imagine how much more difficult it is to secure an Autism diagnosis.  That is, unless you have a more stereotypical autistic.  If a child is nonverbal or constantly stimming, the parent would not have to wait so long for a firm Autism diagnosis.

In short, the past twelve months in the life of Peanut have been breathtakingly different than all the months before.  We’ve had a good number of changes in our life and those things have added up to Peanut doing well and making progress.  Finally!  A year ago at this time Peanut was doing a therapy called Interactive Metronome (you can find the post about it here).  I give a huge amount of credit for Peanut’s improvements to that one therapy.  Now every therapy builds on the previous, don’t think I’m saying that we wasted time with all of the other things.  However, Interactive Metronome had the most profound effects in just a few short weeks.  Okay, those weeks felt terribly long, but they were just a blip in the grand scheme of things.  The improvements we have seen from that therapy not only stayed, but continued to build.  The lone regression has been in his Expressive Language Disorder.  A couple more months doing the IM therapy in hopes of recovering the short season of improvements yielded nothing.  Our biggest fear when it comes to regressions is the unknown of whether that skill will ever return.  This one has not as of yet, but we will continue on with speech therapy to try to lure it back into our hands.

He still struggles with anxiety, but it is so much better than it used to be!  Yes, I still need to escort him to certain areas of the house sometimes, but that’s much better than needing to be by his side every single time he moves.  There are times I even find him in his room playing by himself quietly!  Only those closest to us know what an enormous victory that is!  Changes in barometric pressure still bring about mesmerizing changes in his body.  Storms are still horrible, but he can read a weather radar and forecast with the best of them, and that helps.

We have changed churches.  Not just churches, but denominations.  I won’t go into sordid details, but it has been an extremely frustrating, heartbreaking, infuriating, and joyless few years.  We are thrilled to say now, however, that we are where we feel God has been pushing us.  We have joined a conservative Presbyterian church where we, Peanut included, have been lovingly embraced.  Following a liturgy every week has been extremely comforting to Peanut.  He very quickly began picking up the songs that are sung weekly.  He learned before the rest of us at what parts you kneel or raise your hands.  We are excited to say that Peanut will be baptized into His family soon.  For friends at our old church who disagree with our change in denomination, do not comment on this.  I will delete your post. Period. Peanut is a believer.  He displays great faith in the way he is capable.  In the way that God designed him to be.  It is a time of rejoicing, not of arguing denominational differences.  Rejoice with us!

School with Peanut?  Well, there are still a boatload of learning disabilities to contend with, but he is doing extremely well overall!    He is now in the fourth level of our reading program and doing well.  Each lesson takes close to a month to get through, but he is doing very well.  Our OT is still working with us on his dysgraphia (the nastiest curse word that starts with a “d”)   But he is progressing.  Science is still his favorite, and I’m trying to be better about letting him help or experiment in the kitchen since he enjoys that so very much.   We are very excited about a new Friday-only cottage school starting in our area that is *very* special needs friendly.  A huge bonus is that his sweet friend, Gracie, gets to share a class with him!  How amazing is that?

He still loves fiercely, laughs uproariously, and can’t resist playing practical jokes.  His quality of life has improved dramatically, but autism is still a part of him.  It always will be.  And one year later, I am saddened to type a lower number than last year.  Last year the statistics were 1 in 88.  This year?  1 in 68.  When will the number be so low that people sit up and take notice?  Tonight, we light our front entrance blue for Peanut, River, Gracie, Luke, Nicky, and the other 1 in 68’s.

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Autism Awareness Month–repost Monday, Mar 31 2014

One year ago I posted my first Autism entry on this blog.  We had suspected it for so long, and finally had confirmation.  Wednesday I will post an update for this year’s Autism Awareness Month.  Today, let’s take a look back.

It isn’t as though Peanut’s diagnosis came out of nowhere for us.  Quite honestly, it was a relief.  He was “different” even inutero.  The way he responded to outside stimuli was just….different.  He was “different” as a baby.  I could hold him tight to me, upright, but usually not cradled in my arms.  His head lagged behind when the doctor would pull him from a reclined position by his arms…..until he was about a year old.  He didn’t walk until he was 1 1/2 years old.  He didn’t quite interact with toys the way his brothers had.  He adored his brothers, but didn’t really connect with people outside of his own family.  He could barely speak in 2 word “sentences” when he was two years old.  But…..he was smart.  This child, at 18 months, could point to any letter in the alphabet when asked.  He was even beginning to learn a couple of the sounds.  He could lay number pieces out 1-10 in the correct order.  He was just…..different.

Then.  He just stopped.  He stopped recognizing those letters.  He stopped counting.  He demanded 5 of anything: 5 crackers, 5 toys, 5 cups.  His speech didn’t progress.  At four years old, he still only spoke in 2-3 word “sentences”, which only his immediate family could figure out…..sometimes.  We noticed he couldn’t reach across his midline.  He physically couldn’t move his left arm across his body to his right side, and vice versa.  He still could not figure out how to pedal on a tricycle.  Even putting his feet on the pedals of that tricycle brought on mind blowing meltdowns.  His anxiety levels went through the roof.  He couldn’t move around in his own house without an escort (almost always Mom).  We began therapies, and all of those diagnoses started rolling in.  Sensory Processing Disorder, Auditory Processing Disorder, Visual Processing Disorder, Executive Functioning Disorder, Dyslexia, Dysgraphia, Hypotonia, Anxiety.  I could go on, there are almost a dozen more.  Autism?  Possibly, but there were so many other developmental/learning disorders no one could pin down autism.  People who have not tried to get an autism diagnosis have no clue how difficult it can be.  Some people aren’t diagnosed until adulthood.  Those who say the phenomenal increase in the diagnosis of autism in recent years is because of more aggressive diagnosing are full of crap *ahem* uninformed.  There is a feeling of great helplessness when your child cannot function in day to day life…..and no one can quite tell you what, fundamentally, is going on.

There were therapies that we could not access because the first thing you must have is an autism diagnosis.  Even though we couldn’t do some therapies, we threw ourselves into the ones available to us.  He was too old for First Steps.  The school systems around here blow when it comes to accessing therapists.  That meant we had to go to private therapists.  Expensive therapists.  Thousands of dollars a year, much of it out of pocket.  That vacation to Hawaii I’ve always dreamed of?  We probably could have taken a couple of month-long vacations staying in posh resorts instead of the therapies we were paying for.  There was no sleep.  He would only sleep about six hours a night, but wake between two and six times during those six hours.  There was no relief.  If I tried to leave overnight somewhere, his reaction to that one night lasted weeks…..months in some cases.

We were supposed to “keep on” with those therapies until he was about 1st grade level in his schoolwork.  We went back when his math was close to a first grade level.  It was the one subject he seemed to progress through enough to see, well, progress.  Was it autism?  We as his parents thought the signs were there but that certainly didn’t mean anything.  The neuropsychologist had given us some things to watch for in the years between coming for evaluations.  Peanut was absolutely demonstrating every one of those things.  Did that mean autism?  We weren’t thrilled, but we thought yes.  The last time we went, the doctor said he thought if Peanut was autistic at all, he would be borderline.  When we went back, we were told yes, definitely autism.  Not borderline.  It was not a shock.  It was not a blow.  It was just……Peanut.  It fit him perfectly.  It was, if anything, a relief.  Finally, a diagnosis that fit him to a tee.  Diagnoses are not meant to be a label.  They are meant to give clarity.  Without a diagnosis, how do you help?  It’s a crap shoot.  Might you help?  Yes.  Might you waste years of precious time?  Most definitely yes.  The autism awareness symbol is a puzzle piece.  It is because when we could finally “put the pieces together” we found autism.  The autism puzzle piece is the piece that finally pulls together the whole picture, causing it all to make sense.

So now, here we sit.  We know what we’re dealing with.  It isn’t as scary if you know the monster hiding in the closet.  You’ve exposed him to the light.  And you know what?  Things are easier when you take time understand that thing you thought of as a “monster”.  That “monster” brings things to us that we probably would not experience so thoroughly if it wasn’t with us.  Peanut is a joy.  His laughter is pure sugar.  There isn’t another sound as sweet.  He loves to play “tricks”.  Those he loves, he loves with passion.  He loves science.  He loves animals…..as long as they’re not wild animals.  He has taught us true patience. He has taught us how to not fear man.  He has taught us to lean more heavily on each other, and more on God.  Will he ever be a high-roller in the business world?  Probably not.  Will he ever even be able to get a drivers license?  Have a wife?  Live completely independently?  We don’t know those things, but God knows.  Our Father is in control, just as he’s always been.  He has designed our Peanut, paved the path of his life, and holds Peanut in His hands.

So, tonight we light our front entrance blue.  For Peanut.  For our sweet friend, Gracie.  For the other 1 in 88’s.

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The New Math Sunday, Mar 2 2014

Fear not, friends, I’m not talking Common Core.  But I am talking about something that is just about as controversial in educational circles.  I have ditched math curriculum for Peanut (9).  I still have the books I bought for this year……but I haven’t used them for quite some time.  I won’t buy him a math curriculum at the Homeschool Convention this year either.  Rebellious?  You betcha.  Is his math suffering?  Definitely not.  In fact, math is the one subject where Peanut is almost at the level of his peers.  Did you read that closely?  Peanut.  Level of his peers.  Shut the front door.  Peanut hasn’t been anywhere close to the level of his peers in *anything* at *any time* in his entire life.  Ever.

Just eighteen months ago I wondered if he would ever even be able to do simple math.  Addition with carrying?  No.  Subtraction with borrowing?  A pipe dream.  But almost completely ditching worksheets and traditional math instruction has made this flower blossom.  Profound Dysgraphia coupled with vision issues (not near/far sightedness, but things like convergence insufficiency, a neuromuscular difficulty)  prevent him from being able to progress well.  Anyone who has heard me speak of Carol Barnier knows just how much I love that woman.  Here’s another example of why.  A quote from her most recent newsletter:

“If we tie writing to every subject, our kids might get somewhat better at writing, but. . .
they will progress in every single subject at the speed of their weakest skill.”

Writing?  By far it’s Peanut’s weakest skill, even worse than Dyslexia.  He has been demonstrating exactly what she said above, he was progressing at the speed of his weakest skill.  If I had gotten this newsletter at the beginning of this schoolyear, it would have been a game changer.  A light bulb moment.  But through trial and error I found it out on my own, so I found myself “amen”-ing all the way through that newsletter.  I cannot overemphasize just how true that statement is.  We work on writing…..when we do handwriting.  As much as possible I take writing out of the equation in other subjects.  Who needs writing in math?  Certainly not Peanut at a second-moving into-third grade level.

So what do we do?  Here are some examples:

We use manipulatives tied to the real world application of that skill.  We don’t figure perimeter by looking at a worksheet that has little boxes with supposed measurements next to each side.  I tape a shape onto the parquet floor and he measures by half-foot increments.  We get out a tape measure or ruler and actually measure a box, room, or piece of furniture.  He measures and I write as he calls out the measurements.  If he wants, he can take over the writing of the answer as he does the addition, or he can tell me the answer and I will write that out as well.

Working on perimeter with a little help from Skittles.

We play games.   One of his favorites is a place value game.  Roll the die, enter the number in any of your open spots (ones, tens, hundreds, thousands).  When each player has every spot filled, pick a “win decider” piece of paper.  It may say the person that has the largest number in the ten’s position wins, it may say the person with the lowest overall number wins, etc.  Or we set up a snack shop.  He LOVES this and insists everyone buy from his “shop” a few times that day.  He works on both counting money and making change.  And of course, there are the very fun iPad apps that Peanut loves.  A new favorite math game on there is a pizza shop that works on fractions.

We use a giant white board that takes up half of the dining room table as our “paper”.  A traditional worksheet has print too small, too crowded, too many problems, too much information assaulting his brain at once and not enough space for him to manipulate a pencil.  If I give him addition/subtraction work it is handwritten by me, either four problems to a page or written on our large white board.  If we are working on rounding numbers, I write a number line on the board and call out a number.  He points to the number it would round to.

It isn’t that we never use paper for math.  I might give him a page that has thermometers on it with varying temperatures displayed.  He does not need to write the answer, he just points to the thermometer and tells me the temperature.  I might give him a maze where you must skip count to get from beginning to end.  As I said before, I might give him a piece of paper (not lined) that has four math problems written out for him.  That’s where the worksheets end.  Everything else we do is in game form, or somehow tied to the real-life application of that skill.  And he thrives.

We’re moving into multiplication soon.  Praise God.

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