Connecting to the student

Well, things are interesting here...Tyler has just about finished his Reading house and car projects. This was an incentive to give him a reason to want to read. He is doing very well now. I was beginning to think that I could not teach properly, nor connect with this very unique child with Cystic Fibrosis. The treatments alone get very tiring and recently he was on additional time on the vest as well as additional SVN treatments. He is usually cooperative with his normal routine, but can get quite resistant with the extra requirements….these occur randomly at times, with one extra SVN scheduled every other month.

With his mandatory treatments, his parents, (my daughter and hubby) had tried to give him as many choices in other areas of life as possible. Unfortunately, just before I took on this job, they realized they had over done it. Tyler had decided he was in charge of most everything. So, the first few months consisted more of MY taking charge and getting him to show respect and settle down to focus.

He was okay with the science and math end of things, but decided he did not want to read. So, I had to come up with a plan…he loves to tape things together with duct tape! AND he loves boxes. So, the incentive became the reading house…first…earned by learning the letters, sounds, and then phonics, and words related to things in his house. As he studied he got to tape boxes together and make a house. As he began to read sentences like: “The wall is tan,” he could paint the wall tan, etc. The house is really quite detailed. We moved math into the project by making a microwave in need of a numbers panel, “ x “ amount of paint, and measuring for contact-paper flooring. We made actual quilts of 6-12 cloth squares, (thus including shapes) and painted the names of family members with fabric paint.

Then we moved on to the Reading Race Car made from a 50-gallon water heater box. Quite elaborate, if I do say so myself. It even has muslin material representing exhaust and a steering wheel that makes car sounds. The wheels are made from cloth Frisbees with jelly jar lids for hubcaps. Electrical tape makes great black racing stripes! Two flashlights inserted into holes in the front make excellent headlights. And the mesh bags containing the cloth Frisbees made a wonderful grill. He is the envy of his friends now. They want to know if they can come to his school next year. Yikes!!!

Today we made the car. Tyler has been working hard on his Hooked on Phonics program and has completed the home-school curriculum his mother purchased. He enjoyed painting while his brother played on the playground in my backyard. His reading house and now his car are in a large walk-in closet at his house. We decided to combine his "open house" and kindergarten graduation. As it looks now, we shall aim for May 23. Most public schools here get out either May 9 or 16, but we started in September, while they started in August. Ty a lready has his list of friends and relatives he wants to invite. He states however, that he is not reading for the whole crowd, but possibly for mom, dad, and grandparents. I suspect he may be persuaded to include a cousin or two.