Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Speech Therapy



I talked to Andrew's Speech Therapist the week before Winter Break. She is working with Andrew primarily on social language: how to greet, how to ask a friend to play, how to pretend play with friends, and reminders about eye contact. She'll often bring a classmate to his sessions for him to practice and play with.

We've noticed a lot of progress in his speech over the last six weeks. Particularly with his greetings.

*When we arrived at my parents' house in Vermont last week my mom walked out to the driveway to help us in. Before we had even opened the car doors Andrew saw her and shouted, "I'm Andrew!" To which she responded, "Yes! I know!"

*On our drive home, I was passing snacks back to the boys and Andrew says to me, "I'm Andrew and I want a banana!"

* The other night I was on the phone with a friend and had closed the bedroom door for some quiet while I talked to her. Andrew knocks on the bedroom door and yells "I'm Andrew and I want to come in the bedroom!"

I think in each of these examples there is something a shade off in his usage of "I'm Andrew!". I find his overuse of his new phrase funny, adorable and so interesting! It's really pointing out to me how subtle social language is and how hard it is to learn if you are not naturally adept with its use.

Though, the other day at the playground a little boy ran up to Andrew and said, "What's your name?" and Andrew said, "My name is Andrew!" and I felt so stinkin' proud of how far he has come.







Today I made Cinnamon Toast Bread. A perfect snack for after school on this dark and rainy day. When Andrew saw me spreading the butter on the bread before toasting it, he said, "I'm Andrew and I want bread and butter!"

12 comments:

debs14 said...

I'm Debs and I love the stories you post on your blog.
Oh, and the baking's pretty good too!

Deb @ PaperTurtle said...

:o) Adorable story ~ so glad to hear that Andrew is making progress. And the cinnamon bread looks yummy!!!

Mama V said...

Sweetest post EVER.

I'm MamaV and I'm proud of you, too, Scooby Drew!

Wendy said...

I'm Wendy and I love this story! Isn't it wonderful when you can see the progress your kids are making? My 5yo is in speech therapy too (for different reasons though) and he's made some incredible breakthroughs in the last month. I find it completely delightful.

Ms. Walker said...

I'm Jennifer and I want bread and butter too!
Very, very cute!

MandiCrocker said...

That is ADORABLE. What a sweetie!!!

Loralee said...

Great story. And I just love the grins you captured in both pictures. What beautiful little boys, Robyn!

Melissa Belmonte said...

I want to come to your apt. after school for snacks!! I'm thinking more and more about making bread.

I love this post. I am so relieved that you and Dave have prioritized getting Andrew the kind of intervention that seems to be helping him. I think back to my experience at Landmark (the high school for kids w/ learning differenced), and so many of those kids didn't learn these basic social skills until much later than Andrew. And they weren't as cute as Andrew, so they came across as rude, ungrateful teenagers. But really they just hadn't picked up on a lot of social cues that are so subtle.

I feel very proud of you, Robyn.

This might be my favorite post ever. I feel like I can picture Andrew saying "I"m Andrew!" all over the place, and I love the addition of the bread snack. But now I'm hungry. (-:

Ruth said...

An inspirational post, thank you for sharing. My DS has his 1st Speech Therapy appointment in 2 weeks time.

Miss Vicki said...

That is the cutest, except for the story about sitting in the middle of the chair at dinner. SO Andrew!

Rhona said...

I'm Rhona and I'm so pleased to hear how well Andrew is doing. It sounds like this school is just what he needed. Love the look of that bread too (and I LOVE cinnamon!)

ComfyMom~Stacey said...

That is adorable! The bread looks delicious!