"GET OUT 'CHA HOUSE!"

I know, it's been a long time since I've posted...sorry about that. To sum up the year thus far, my class is awesome. I love 'em. So great.

I am up to 22 kids. I have 20 full time and 2 who join us part time for calendar, math, science, social studies, sight word exploration, and play time. They are both in the deaf and hard of hearing class. It's so awesome to have them in my class. I am loving getting to use my sign language again - I had pretty much forgotten all of it - and my kids are picking up on lots of it as well. It's really awesome.

We went on a great trip to the fire station last week (check out the picture!). It was a fantastic trip. The fireman leading the tour sat my kids down and started talking to them about what to do if there's a fire in your house. "What's the first thing you should do if there's a fire in your house?" he asked.

One of my girls raised her hand, "Get out 'cha house!" she exclaimed.

"Yes!" he said, "So everyone, what's the first thing you should do?"

And the whole class yelled, "GET OUT 'CHA HOUSE!" Oh what good English we have...

He proceeded to be very impressed because, he said, most often, kids don't say this. They usually say, "Call 911" or "stop, drop, and roll." I felt very proud of my smart kiddos.

Later, we got a chance to ask questions, and the fire fighters got a chance to be impressed again. The captain noted, after we finished our questioning, that he'd never seen kids ask such good questions. Typically they just tell you about how their uncle's sister's friend's brother saw a fire once. They did a great job, though. One said, "I wonder what's in a fire extinguisher that puts out a fire, because it's not water." They all looked shocked. Then the captain stepped forward to answer that one. Later, when we were back in the classroom that afternoon, I asked the kids what they learned. He raised his hand and said, "I learned that inside a fire extinguisher is a chemical that takes the oxygen out of a fire."

I'm telling you, my class is SMART.

So at the end of the trip, I asked the fire fighter if he would put on the gear for us. He looked at me all sly and said, "Why don't YOU put on the gear for us?" My face turned a nice deep shade of red, and I started sweating, while trying to explain my germaphobia. He promised that it had just been washed, so they helped me into the gear, all the while sweating and continuing to turn all colors of the rainbow. "I don't have cooties!" he tried to convince me.

"Everyone has cooties when you're germaphobic." I explained. But man, I love 'em, so I put it on, [unwashed] helmet and all.

New Year, New Students, Up and Runnin'!

Well, I had my first full day of school today, and it was fantastic. I love my kids so much. I had such an amazing summer, and it was perfectly-kid-free. I loved getting to travel with B all summer and see him play, and it was the perfect amount of time, because I came back refreshed and ready to go. And good thing, because this class is going to be a handful, and I am PUMPED.

After the first half day, I said to Brenton, I really hope I get a more challenging kid, because right now, uh, I'm, uh..."
"Going to be bored?" he finished.
"Yes."

I need my neglected, behaviorally challenged kids, who look at you like, "And you're telling me what to do why?" when you give them a direction. And today, I got two of them. One, who, as an example, walked down the hallway poking the butt of the child in front of him. "I didn't do nothing!" he said, as he continued to put his hands on the other child. I spent time reading "The Story of Mrs. Flynn" with the two of them during rest time, since I read it with the rest of the class on Monday, and they weren't there yet. They cuddled up, got so excited to see me as a baby, and asked questions and pointed. They were thrilled, and I was in heaven. This is what I live for.

I have a kid this year, that is beyond gifted. He's crazy gifted. And he hasn't been tested yet. But he's quirky, and a very kinesthetic learner. I am so excited about him. I explained that I make my skin with a peachy color crayon. When he started working on his, he picked up the crayon and said, "Mrs. Flynn, this one says apricot. Can I still use it?" This kid is reading the word "apricot." That's not normal.
"Well, aren't apricots sort of a peachy color?" I asked.
"Yes," he agreed, and used it.
On the next day, during one of his perfectionism spurts when he cannot get past something, we were working on drawing our faces. He ended up scribbling all over the face in a fit of frustration, and we worked through the next one together. "Okay," I said, "What does a face need?" And I pointed to his eyes.
"Eyes!" he said.
"And what shape are they?" I asked, all the while, silently begging for his answer to be 'round.'
"Well, they're sort of a deep oval," he said, thoughtfully, while feeling his eyes. After we finally got those drawn, I pointed him towards a nose.
"What shape do you want to make your nose?"
"Nose-shaped," he replied. Duh. I pointed him toward his mouth, to which he picked up the pink crayon and noticed that it didn't just say pink. "Can I make my mouth with carnation pink?" he asked, concerned.
"Well do you think it is your lip color?" I asked.
"I think my lips are carnation pink."

I certainly have my hands full, and I am so excited to see what adventures lie ahead!!! Can't wait for tomorrow. :-)

Field Day Fun

We had field day this week. What fun! Well, here's the thing. I'm sorta competitive when it comes to winning against the other kindergarten classes. I've been talking a big talk this whole year, about us winning, although deep down, I think I've always known that we had no chance this year. You see, last year we got really close, and lost in the end, and I had more testosterone in my class than in a room full of grown men, I'm pretty sure. My boys were psychotic and they were "boys" in every way. When they lost to the girls in one of the games, I had more than one kid, literally, in tears. It was ridiculous. Sportsmanship was not even an afterthought. Well this year, my boys are the gifted/ quirky type. All of them are super smart, love math, building with blocks and legos, and Star Wars. And they are all athletically challenged. I have one boy who is athletic, and he's tiny. So although I've been talking the big talk, well, I was all talk.

The week before, when I picked my kids up from PE after practicing some of the events, I asked them, "Are we going to win?!" Here's what I was told by one of my kids:

"It doesn't matter if we win or lose as long as we have fun."

Yea. Great. Gooood.

During Field Day, here were some of the comments:

Me: "Okay, so here's the game plan for tug of war..." (I was very into it; a parent got me on video and everything...)
A group of students, in response to my game plan: "Look Mrs. Flynn! We're being cats! MEOW!" (while crawling on all fours)

After a game where we were in two teams and everyone either got 1st or 2nd:
"Mrs. Flynn! We got second place!!!!!!!!" (Sincerely thrilled)
"Mrs. Flynn! Now EVERYONE has a ribbon!!!!!"

As I told the other teachers after we lost both of our chances at tug of war, "This year we have the brains, not the muscles."

A few autism stories

I have loved seeing the growth in my child with autism. It speaks wildly of what a general education experience can do for a child, if given the chance. Now, that doesn't mean the chance to be "normal" because there will always need to be accommodations. But with those accommodations, my student will achieve great things. Just Friday, for the first time, after 1 1/2 years with me, he asked for the first time, "Mrs. Flynn, where's Gabe?" "Right there," I said, and pointed. "Oh, Gabe, come play with me." He had gotten out a toy that they had played together the day before, and for the first time ever, he asked a student to engage in play with him. What an amazing accomplishment. These are the boundaries that can be broken. Here are a few other funny stories about him from the last few weeks:

1. S was playing a sentence building game. He put words together to build the sentence,
"The furry donkey jumped over the kangaroo."

Then he dragged me over to see what he made. I read it aloud. Then he thought and sat for a second and said, "SWITCH!" He moved it around so that it said,
"The furry kangaroo jumped over the donkey."
"There." He said.




2. When I tested S on coins, I pointed to the quarter and said, “What’s this?” and he said, “penny.” And I said, “No.” So then he said, “quarter.” I said, “How much is it worth?” And he looked at me for a second, then said, “George.” So I changed my plan. I went and got the names and how much each is worth, and gave them to him to match to the coins, and he did it perfectly! He had all the info in there, including who was on each of the coins, just couldn't get it out! :-)






3. Guns... Recently, he has been obsessed with guns. Here is an example of a self portrait that he completed. (They are supposed to draw and write their favorite thing they did that month.)

Nice, huh?

So, after he continues to "shoot" people and draw people shooting others (and their heads blown off...), I finally sent a note home to his parents, hoping to get some information. We'll call him S for the remainder of this entry.

"S has been making pretend guns, "shooting" classmates, and drawing guns a lot recently. I'm wondering if he watched a movie or something with guns recently. I remind him very firmly "no guns" when he does it, but he seems very fixated on them right now. Thanks for your help in this! - Hilary Flynn"

Here is the note I got back. "Hi Mrs. Flynn: We also noticed this at home recently. We bought S a joybox 2 months ago and the first game on the list is a gun game. He played it from time to time. Some times he pretended to shoot his dad or me, we pretended to fall on the ground. He likes that. Maybe it is not a good game to play with him. He might expect to play this in school with his classmates. We are sorry about this. The good news is that the joybox was broken. We'll pay attention to anything he might access from the web. Thanks a lot!"

Best Part of Kindergarten

I know it's been a really long time since I've posted. I've had so many stories, but I've been SO EXHAUSTED and some were too hard to write. But here's a heartbreaker for you...

Today, my kids wrote their class book about the best part of kindergarten. Each day, I give "my baby" food to bring home, because she used to steal it. So we solved that when I told her that all she has to do is ask. Now, every day, I send her home with food. Below find her favorite part of kindergarten.

"My favorite part of kindergarten was when Mrs. Flynn sends food."

Watching him grow!

My little autistic boy has come so far. Now that he's been full time in my classroom since January, he is growing and growing. His language skills are improving to the point where he walked in to the class yesterday morning, and when he got to the sign in table, he said hi to two students, addressing them both by name. Now keep in mind, he was almost non-verbal except when giving verbal choices last year, when he started, part time in my class.

The other day, we were playing a word building game, where students were at a table with a group of letter cards. So if I said the word "mud," a student at the tables with the 'm,' 'u,' and 'd' would come up. He had a vowel for a consonent-vowel-consonent word. (He is great speller.) So when he got up there, he saw that the student who was supposed to be on the end was standing next to the student with the first letter, so he yelled, (calling the student by name), "Move it!" so that he could get into the middle spot. The whole class burst out laughing, including me. He just stood there.

Yesterday, he and I were working together on a book report activity after he listened to a book on CD in the listening center. The book was Diary of a Worm. He had to write the title, circle one of the following "I liked this book a lot. I liked this book a little. I did not like this book," and he had to write his reason. So he was able to tell me "I did not like this book." We needed a reason. Not his strong suit. "Reason?" I said. "Reason." he repeated. So I tried a different route. I opened the book and asked him, "Did you like the worm?" "Yes," he said. "Did you like the spider?" I asked. "No, I did not like the spider," he told me. So he wrote that. That was awesome, that he was able to point out the exact thing that he didn't like!

Well yesterday, he forgot about these new communication techniques, apparently. During book buddies (where a class of 4th graders comes to our class and we read together and do activities together, in groups of two and three students), his book buddy and another student in my class came running up to me, "Mrs. Flynn, Mrs. Flynn, he has a bloody nose!" Sure enough, there was dried blood covering his nose, cheeks, arms, and hands. I almost threw up. "Ehhhh," he said, as I grabbed his nose with a tissue and held it tight. I spend the next 15 minutes more or less giving him a wet wipe bath to get off all the dried blood. It was by far the most disgusting thing I have experienced in quite some time. Well, we stopped the nose bleed, just in time for dismissal.

Luckily, the good stuff is far outweighing the bad with him. He has come so far, and he is simply adorable. At his parent-teacher conference several weeks ago, his dad held back tears, when he heard about how wonderfully he's doing and told me that he is experiencing the same, in his broken English. We are all so proud of him! He will make such a great first grader next year. What a great example of least restrictive environment working perfectly for a precious little boy with autism.

Only good reason to cry...

A couple of days ago, my little student I so lovingly refer to as "pipsqueek" in previous postings came in to my classroom in the morning telling me that his momma was picking him up to go to the dentist. (He usually rides the bus home.) Well, during centers, at about 10:45, I received a call from the office, letting me know that his mom was there to pick him up, and would I please send him down to the office for dismissal. I asked if he was coming back, and they said no. So, I told him to go gather his things because momma was here to get him for the dentist.

Well, when he got back over to me, he was hysterically sobbing. I mean, drooling, nose running, tears streaming, sobbing. I said, "What's wrong?" And he just kept heaving, and couldn't answer. Now, you should know that he does have a language impairment, so often it's hard for him to get out what he's thinking, so he just resorts to crying. "Stop crying and use your words. I can't help you if you just cry. What's wrong?" I said to him, "Are you scared to go to the dentist?" He shook his head no. "Then what's wrong?"

Between sobs, he was able to muster, "I.....[heave]...wanna...[heave]....come...[heave]...back!" While trying not to laugh, I walked him to the office and his mother who stared at me in shock when he walked toward her, still hysterical.

"He's crying because he wants to come back," I relayed.

"Okay, okay, I'll bring you back to school," she assured him.

Well, if any kid is going to cry, that is certainly the best reason I can think of!