Body Mapping

The Lark has found his hips! As I wrote in the last post, the Lark had been having trouble moving his hips from side to side. When he tried to imitate me shaking my hips, he would move his head or his torso from side to side. So for the past two days we've incorporated hip shaking into our movement work. I chose some music with a really slow beat, raised my arms in the air, and spotligted my hips. After a few tries, the Lark got it. Today we did it to faster music, and we varied it by doing a double "shake" on each side. The Lark really seemed to enjoy this new dance!

Mindfulness/Focus: The Lark has been doing really well with the piano. We're learning all the pentascales, one by one. We address many goals when we practice piano.

Imitation. We're not using a book right now. Instead, the Lark has to what I do. Coordination. Once he learns a new scale, we play it together. He has to coordiante his actions with mine to match my tempo.
Mindfulness/Focus: He has to remember the scales and he has to overcome the impulse to use any old fingers, and use the correct fingers instead. This is difficult for him, but he's doing very well.

All by myself!

Mindfulness: The Lark delivered some muffins to my mother's house (about half a mile away) all by himself (I trailed him). He was really excited when I told him to go by himself. He really seemed to enjoy himself, skipping, running, even walking backwards at one point. He got a little mixed up when he got to my mom's place, which is a condo in a huge complex with lots of buildings that all look alike. But he didn't get flustered. He tried a couple of different doors. Then he peered into someone's patio door. That's when I had to appear from behind my tree and offer some guidance. But with that guidance he was able to go the rest of the way by himself.

Imitation/Body Mapping: During exercises today we worked on "twisting" and shaking our hips, both of which motions elude Marco. It seems the body map in his brain is missing the coordinates for his hips. When I move my hips, he tries to imitate me by moving his shoulders or his head or his whole body. It's like he can't find his hips. Imitation is the foundation of all learning--especially social learning. If someone has an incomplete or inaccurate body map, imitating will be harder for him. If he has trouble imitating, he is less inclined to do it. If he doesn't imitate, he will not pick up all the subtle gestures and sounds that unite us culturally. So the trick is not to teach specific gestures and sounds, but to help our children become more competent, confident imitators generally. Then they will pick up communicative gestures and sounds as the need arises.

Okay, Frances!

Today was the end of the second week back at the Gray School. So far, so good.

Narrative comprehension: We had another little break-through today! We were reading our abridged version of "Bedtime for Frances" again. At the part where Frances gets out of bed, the Lark said in a playful-scolding voice, "Okay, Frances!" This is a level of involvement in a story that is brand-new for the Lark.

Imitation: The Lark was very engaged during our spring dance-songs. Here are some signs that all of the imitation activities we do are helping:

1. The Lark has picked up some expressive gestures that he never used before. For example, when he's enumerating something, he sticks out the fingers on one hand and, with the index finger of the other hand, he touches one finger at a time as he lists the items. Also, the other day, he pointed to his head to show that he was thinking.

2. The Lark mirrors my intonation and facial gestures in a very pro-social way when we're talking. For instance, we were having a conversation about all the things we could do during our upcoming trip to Miami. I said, "We can go to the be-each," with a rising intonation, and he responded, "We can swim in the poo-ool," with the same intonation and expression.

These things are more important than any specific skill.

Taking an Interest

Narrative Comprehension: Today while we were reading our simplified version of "Bedtime for Frances," the Lark stopped at the picture of "Father" as he lies in bed looking grumpy about being woken up. He studied it for a while, then said, "It's her dad."

This was really exciting for me. The Lark took enough interest in the characters to think about their relationship to each other. As I have written before, one of the main things holding up the Lark's progress in narrative comprehension is a connection to the characters. Without that, there is really no reason to read stories at all. A lot of our activities are designed to help the Lark discover connections between himself and others. This was one tiny sign that maybe we're getting somewhere.

Taking Ownership

Mindfulness: The Lark did a great job dressing again today. I need to provide more opportunities for him to anticipate and initiate activities so he can take ownership of more of our activities.

Imitation: The Lark did a great job learning by imitating during our calendar activity today. We were writing the number words in each of the squares on our calendars. The Lark had never had occasion to write some of these words before (like twenty-one), so he just kept observing me and imitating what I was doing. He was very eager and interested.

He also did a great job acting out our little starfish story.

Theory of Mind

Pretty good day today.

Narrative comprehension. We were reading "Bedtime for Frances." I photocopied the pictures and then made my own book with simplified text and story. The Lark really enjoyed the song Frances sings to herself when she's trying to fall asleep. It's an alphabet song, and I rewrote it to include some items that I thought the Lark would find amusing. We were reading it together, and when we got to "G is for Greg" (the Lark is a huge Wiggles fan and he loves Greg Wiggle), he looked at me with surprise and amusement. This was good first of all because it was social referencing (like, did you catch that?) and he was sharing his pleasure with me. But I think it also showed some theory of mind--or something like it. It showed that the Lark understands that there are things that we know about that aren't general knowledge for everyone else. At least I think it did.

Mindfulness. The Lark seems to be taking a little more ownership of getting dressed in the morning. And tonight he took some initiative in taking his medicine/vitamins. After dinner, I asked him to bring his pillminder over to the table. He brought it over and then, without any further prompting, asked me what day it was, found the Monday pm box, and took all his pills.

Day Five at the Gray School

Lots of fun today.

Narrative comprehension--discovering connections. Children are not born with the ability to comprehend narratives, and young children work very hard to develop this ability. They ask to hear stories over and over, they study the pictures and try to recreate the story from memory, they act out stories in an effort to work through the events and the characters' actions and intentions. Young children are motivated to do this work in large part because they identify with the characters in the story. A child who has yet to discover the connections between himself and others has very little motivation to try to understand stories about other people (or characters). The Lark is going to have to discover these connections on his own. This is not something anyone can teach him. Our job is to help him make discoveries.

Today we took another worm walk. The sidewalk was covered with worms from last night's rain. I suggested that we "rescue" the worms that were stranded on the sidewalk and help them get to the dirt, where they would be happier. The Lark joined in this activity eagerly. He spontaneously imitated the way I was picking them up with a stick. In some cases, when that wasn't working, he improvised and picked them up with him fingers. After a while, I pointed out that some of them were dead, and we didn't really have to move those ones. After that, the Lark moved only the ones that wiggled when he touched them. I announced that I was naming one worm "Amber," and the Lark added, "Amber the worm," to distinguish her, I suppose, from Amber the person we know.

Physical integration: The Lark's jumping jacks were even better today--perfect, really. This is one of many activities that we're doing to help the Lark learn to integrate his top half and his bottom half--something that has been surprisingly difficult for him. Other activities include swinging on a swing (which is going very well) and "frog hopping" (which he is still struggling with).

Other connections: Yesterday we made limeade by squeezing limes. The Lark enjoyed it so much that he asked if we could make grapefruit juice too. So we did. Today he was having a popsicle and decided he wanted to make popsicle juice. I asked how we should do it. He suggested putting the popsicle through the juicer. I said I didn't think that would work, so we decided to let it melt in a cup. We went and did some math and reading, then we came back and drank the popsicle juice.

Day Four at the Gray School

Today was a good day.

Mindfulness. Great job dressing. The Lark did something new. Instead of getting and putting on one item of clothing at a time, he went down his list, got everything he needed, brought it all over to his bed, and put it on very purposefully.

Narrative comprehension. The reason most of us take the trouble to comprehend a narrative is that we identify with the characters in it. This is a challenge for people with autism and NCDD. To help the Lark discover the connection between himself and others, we took a walk in the rain and went looking for worms. We found several beauties making their way across the sidewalk over to the grass. We stopped and watched their progress. We named two of them and rooted for them. The Lark seemed pretty interested. This is obviously going to be a long process. Today was one tiny step.

Imitation: We did our Spanish movement songs and played "Simon dice."

We went around the room with clipboards again, tallying up various items. The Lark did a super job and got into it. (This is also a math objective--understanding how and why we tally things up in groups of five.)

We worked on imitation along with narrative comprehension and building our core by acting out a little story about a starfish trying to turn over.

We did lots of other things too, but those are the highlights.

Day Three of the Gray School

Choosing did not go so well today. In fact, many things did not go so well today. On the upside, the Lark did really well on his core exercises (sit-ups, etc.), and he did the best jumping jacks I've ever seen him do!

As for the things that didn't go so well, I think I may have been too focused on my own ideas and goals and things, and not enough on my interaction with the Lark and the feedback he was giving me.

We'll keep trying!

Day Two at the Gray School

Here are some notes from our second day:

1. Choosing. Modeling my own choosing strategy seemed to help the Lark. I used "self-talk" to share my thought process: "I think I'll choose a black top to match my black socks." Then we went to the Lark's room, and he was much more focused than I've ever seen him about getting dressed. He chose some grey underwear and then, without hesitation, chose a grey top. (Usually he pulls out three or four different tops and then wanders off without putting one on.) After putting on the top, he stayed focused and chose some pants right away.

2. Narrative Comprehension. I read Strega Nona and the Lark was very interested. He especially liked all the different pictures of Strega Nona and Big Anthony wiggling their fingers over the magic pot. This reminded him of a bit in a Wiggles video in which they do some magic by wiggling their fingers and saying, "wiggle waggle." The Lark made the association. The Lark often resists reading or even looking at new books, so this is good progress.

3. Imitation. We walked around the room, each with our own clipboard, tallying up cerain things. The Lark did a great job observing and imitating me, so he learned to do this without having to be "taught." We also did some act-outs, but the Lark wasn't as enthusiastic as he was yesterday.

4. Mindfulness. Here's one example: we did a puzzle, and the Lark was much more focused than I've ever seen him be with a puzzle. He dumped out the pieces, turned them all over, and began to work on it without any encouragement. I think the difference was precisely that I didn't provide any encouragement (or pressure). I tried to make a friendly comment now and than to show that I was interested, but otherwise I just waited and let him figure it out. Eventually he did need some help, but he stayed motivated until the end.

Sharing thoughts

Yesterday afternoon the Lark and I took a walk and he shared lots of thoughts with me--about a "bunch of geese," a fire engine sign, and a bare rose bush, among other things. He stopped to examine the bare rose bush. He was looking at it and touching it, apparently trying to figure out what it was. Then he surprised himself by pricking his finger on a thorn. He laughed and said, "don't hurt your little finger." Then he looked at me triumphantly and declared, "it's a rose bush." The thorn had provided the clue he needed.

When we got home we watched a bit of Mary Poppins. Only recently has the Lark been willing to watch anything other than the Wiggles and Blue's Clues. This new interest in moveis is a sign that his narrative comprehension is improving! He's trying really hard to understand what's going on. He checks his understanding by making comments and asking questions. When the characters in Mary Poppins jumped into the chalk picture, the Lark asked Tony, "what is it?" Tony said, "they jumped into the picture." The Lark thought about this and then said, "on Mary Poppins they jump into a picture." He also said, "Mary Poppins is like the Wizard of Oz" (one of the few other movies he's seen). And it's true. They both have lots of music and lots of magical things happening. The Lark is especially interested in magical scenes--people flying, the nursery cleaning itself up, etc.

First day back at the Gray School after a long break. It went really well. Here's what we worked on:
1. Imitation/Mimesis. A big part of our program involves building the Lark's capacity for imitation--both the spontaneous imitation that forms the basis of empathy and social connectedness, and the self-conscious imitation that forms the basis of play-acting, social rituals, and apprenticeship. First I introduced a new series of five dance-songs, all with an early spring theme. The Lark did a super job following along with the movements and singing bits of the songs, which (except for one) were all new to him. Throughout the morning we did other "Act-Out" activities. We acted out "Five Green and Speckled Frogs" in two ways, first with little frog figures and then playing the frogs ourselves. The Lark really enjoyed both versions and participated enthusiastically. After that, he initiated acting out "Ten in the Bed," and he even pushed me off the couch when it was my turn to roll over.

We also practiced imitation when I showed Marco a new way to use the abacus (vertically) and a new calendar activity (shading all the even boxes one color and all the odd boxed another color).

2. Narrative Comprehension. I introduced a much simplified version of Strega Nona today. (Actually I introduced the chant that Strega Nona uses on her magic pot the last time we made pasta, so the Lark was already familiar with that. He is also already familiar with witches and magic, and has actually shown some interest in the idea of magic recently.) We just looked at the pictures today and the Lark read a few lines here and there. We used mimesis by wiggling our fingers over a pretend pot as Strega Nona does in one of the pictures. All in all, the Lark seemed pretty open to the book, and I will try reading it through once tomorrow.

3. Mindfulness. We focused on mindfulness as our main objective during breakfast lunch, bathing, and dressing. The Lark knows how to perform his roles in these activities, but tends to lose focus and wander off in the middle of things. The scaffolding I provided was simply to use my body as a kind of corral to keep him from wandering off and then give him the time he needed. With this support, the Lark did really well. Here's an example of his mindfulness. He did a great job washing his face but forgot to wash his nose. He rinsed his hands off and was about to rinse his face when he realized what he'd forgotten to do. So, again without my saying anything, he got some more soap and finished the job.

Celebration. During a break, we jumped into the beanbags. The Lark sat on my lap, facing me, ready to play. I just smiled and waited. He thought for a minute, then initiated a clapping game. We played it several times, adding variations each time--some variations were his and some were mine.

Here's something I learned today. During dressing, I noticed more than ever how much choices can stress out the Lark. He seems to see them as a test, and he's afraid he's going to get the answer wrong. I'm going to try to model with my own clothing choices that we can use choices to express ourselves and that, within certain parameters, there are no wrong answers.