OT Again

We had to stop OT for awhile because Riley started going to school all day. We finally got a new time slot and he goes every other week now.

I am starting to see the discrepancies between Riley's abilities and the abilities of the typical kindergartner with regards to fine motor skills. Riley's school just celebrated the 100th day of school and as part of their celebration, they had to color 100 small things on the numbers 1, 0, 0. I use to use this sheet when I taught, and I know what I expected from my students and the way that Riley colored this sheet would not have been acceptable for me as a teacher. We really need to get to work on improving his coloring.

I can say that he seems to be doing well with the Handwriting Without Tears program that the OT started with him. He seems to get that system and keeping in the space that it gives. I see his handwriting when he comes home from enrichment and because they use a dot to tell the students where to start, his handwriting is a mess. The fine motor needs to become a priority.

I am meeting with his teacher on Monday and I am somewhat anxious to see what she is going to say. I know about the fine motor, the lack of ability to follow directions, and being easily distracted. I know that he has made some improvements because of his oral knowledge, but I do not know if they are going to be enough. He has already been referred to IAT, so I am waiting to see what they are going to say also.

I still mostly believe that Riley has mostly sensory issues although the book that I am reading right now says that SPD is not recognized by the DSM, and therefore is usually a secondary diagnosis with a primary diagnosis of Autism, Asberger's, ADD, etc. Maybe I should have Riley evaluated by a clinical psychologist as was suggested at his end of the year IEP conference last year since they knew that Riley still needed services, but was not eligible in the school setting and therefore graduated out. I think I am going to wait until after the IAT meeting to tackle that one.

Just Like Mommy

We have now been in school about two months and the teacher came up to the van last week as I was picking up Riley and asked if she could meet with me to discuss a behavior plan for Riley. I told her we could meet on Monday.

At the meeting the teacher said that Riley is a really nice boy, but he had some trouble focusing on what he was suppose to do. She wanted to set up a plan where Riley would be rewarded for completing his afternoon work. He had trouble completing his first assignment of the day; he liked to talk instead of completing his work.

I agreed to the behavior plan and gave the teacher some suggestions that the OT had given to us with regards to Riley's writing and coloring like having him use a short pencil and half crayons to strengthen his fingers. I also asked that if Riley is switching hands for her to encourage him to use his left hand because he has been left hand dominant since he was 14 months old.

As I was in this meeting, I thought he is just like I was when I was young. I liked to talk and socialize rather than complete my work in school also. In many ways Riley is just like me. He is his mother's son.

Well, he was able to stick to the behavior plan for one day. The other two days this week, he did not complete his first assignment. We'll see what he does tomorrow after all the sugar tonight from trick or treat!

Occupational Therapy

We finally got the call for Riley to start occupational therapy. We started on July 15th and the OT was able to give us some good pointers.

The first day we talked about some of the things that had changed since he was evaluated. This OT was honest with me and stated that Sensory Issues were not her specialty, and she was not sure why she was given Riley except that he might not have had a specification on his OT scrip. She was helpful in providing me information and activities for Riley to do, but eventually, we will have to change OTs in order to help Riley more. I was just glad to get off the waiting list. The pointer from this day was to have Riley use a broken crayon to write with so that it would make him use his fingers more and strengthen them. We also talked about the use of obstacle courses and the crab walk to help with the motor planning and development.

The second visit the OT tested Riley's grip strength and the strength of his fingers. At the age of six the grip strength is suppose to be 32 lbs. Riley's, at five and a half, is 16 lbs. The OT gave us some putty to work on finger and grip strength. She also gave us some ideas for heavy work activities and proprioceptive activities to work on Riley's awareness of his body position.

The last two visits I have not been able to take Riley to. I have had to work. But, from what I have seen from his homework, it seems like she is continuing to work with his fine motor skills and obstacle courses for gross motor skills.