Washingtonians

[Ogress]

Quote:
Beautiful Dog!

 

[Mia_]

Okay, it was a challenge. I used to do that one in my head all the time. Someone asks me a question, I answer it, and then it takes me about 5 min to figure out how I came up with that. Ain't Autism fun?

And yes, I have done the "walk by the equation, take a few steps, and then go back and fix it" thing a few times. The looks I get are so worth it!

 

[Kaneke]

beautiful dog, yes, but very ACTIVE .. as is normal for that breed

she wants to run and play and track and retrieve -- but she has been known to run off unheeding of calls, if there is something she wants to go after -- like other dogs

not the breed I would have chosen for myself, in essence she's a "rescued" dog, since her previous owner, a good friend of DS's, could not keep her at her new place, could not find a consistent care-taker for her, and really didn't want to turn her back to Kitsap Animal Control shelter, where her first family had dumped her off (I have all the paperwork)

so in essence I'm dogsitting for DS until he can return home .. at this point we don't know how long that is likely to be

we are doing what we can to teach her where our property ends (or I should say, HER property since we want her to stop short of the road and the sideline with the neighbors) and to teach her to leave the chickens alone (yes she is VERY interested in them) ... also trying to teach her to bark only when WE think it is appropriate (quite a challenge for a mature, multi-owner dog)

electronic collar arrived about an hour ago, so as soon as I finish lunch, I'm taking her out, on leash, to acquaint her with the system -- which supposedly has a 90 foot diameter at max setting; appropriate since we have about 104 "front feet" on the access road, our front 200 feet depth is easement, and the back 100 feet is where we don't want her to go (also where the local wildlife hangs out) house is a 32 foot pentangle

I'll take an old water hose along to mark the boundaries visually for her (couldn't do that without a receiver --- Jake was wearing that when he disappeared ) -- at least the one out front -- the shrubs along the east sideline, and the blacktopped drive on the west sideline, are obvious, I would think

 

[Ogress]

Quote:
I wish I had super-powers, but, much to the dissapointment of my kids, I'm just plain old ordinary Mom. Brainy enough to get in the AP classes in school, but not truly gifted like the other kids in the class were, so I did not fit in anywhere. I hated High School because of that, but happily discovered that I was the norm in college.

The social aspect of Autism is really starting to get to Alex now. When he finds someone who will listen to all his ideas, he does not know when to shut-up, so they listen only once. He hates group-projects at school, his IEP states he can do them solo, but I want him to first try and work with others. He doesn't ever have any friends over to play with or hang-out with unless they are sons of my friends. He's having a birthday on October 9, and wants a party at K1Speed. I'm having trouble coming up with the 6 rider minimum, and now they just e-mailed, they require 8 kids for a party! (There web-site states 6, so 6 they will honor!) How did you make it through Middle School?

 

[Stumpfarmer]

Quote:
That is a frank violation of IDEA and if he's indurate on that point he needs reported to the district director of (compliance, professional standards, civil rights: it varies from district to district). Twenty-how many years and teachers and sometimes schools think they can get away with that garbage: they can't, it violates federal and state law.

It's good that Alex is succeeding, but other kids who could do so with reasonable accomodations will not.

It's good that he's retiring; I rather wish there was a retirement purgatory for old-fart teachers, where they have to help the gifted but LD/ADHD/AS students who they previously hindered until they understand the material and can move on with their advanced education and take a useful place in society.

 

[SadieSue]

Quote:

Huh. The link didn't work for me. I'm not surprised. It's my day so far...

 

[Kaneke]

grrrr -- they shipped the WRONG COLLAR !!!!

the one that arrived was for a wired, in-ground system

we used to have one of those set up, but the transmitter got "fried" during one of our power outages (and we took up half the wire since the lawn mower kept snagging it)

now we have a wireless transmitter base station --- we ordered a PIF-275 collar .. which would work with that -- we got a PUL-275 which will not

 

[VelvettFog]

Quote:

Huh. The link didn't work for me. I'm not surprised. It's my day so far...

The server is down -- try again later. It's worth it.

 

[Ogress]

Quote:
Oh, I DID report him, as soon as I left his classroom, I walked straight over and talked to the counselors and teacher who are part of Alex's team.

When Alex was little, I volunteered a lot in his classes. Mostly, I worked with the kids who had difficulty in math. In second grade they had to do 1 minute math - 40 problems and you had to score 80% correctly to move to the next level. Alex had 3 minutes and still had a very difficult time. There were 3 other kids who the teacher had labeled as troubled that she had me work with. These kids almost never advanced, but like Alex, they NEVER missed a single problem that they did answer. The kids are not slow, they were all very bright. They solve, double check, and are sure of things before they record their answers. This was proven when the teacher introduced multiplication near the end of the year. Most of the kids never got it, but Alex and the 3 boys understood perfectly with the first lesson. They did not work fast, but they knew and they were accurate.

I hate that kids with different learning styles are punished. These kids should have had the highest grades, but because the schools value speed over accuracy, their grades were low.

 

[Stumpfarmer]

Quote:
Dad would say "a little liver with a lot of onions" about her markings: pretty girl! Nice wide brain box with room for something besides run.