It's been a while

I hate that I have not blogged in such a long time but that's just how life is at the Kerr house. I do have some really fun pictures that I thought I would share.

First, Landon went to his first swim class, well O.K. it was just his evaluation but still he was in the water doing things with someone other than me!! The class is at Kluge Children's Rehab Center. He has 2 teachers that work with just him. There can be only up to 3 other children in the pool at the same time but they each have their own teachers. He will go each Friday afternoon. I really hope that this is something that Landon will like...we will see. Anyway....here are some pictures of the class. (look how small the pool is :)




Second, my mom and dad came for a nice visit. While they were here we had great weather so my dad helped, meaning "did it all", to clean up our back yard. It now looks a great play area instead of a wooded area. Thanks Dad!! Landon had a great time playing both inside and outside with his Granny and Papaw.





Things here are moving right along. Nothing overly excieting just the normal day to day stuff. I am looking forward to the warmer weather arriving and staying for a while. I am already trying to think about this summer and what I can do to to help Landon continue on his fast pace of learning...more on that to come.

Private Speech Therapy

Today was Landon's first official private speech therapy with Ms. Lori. I'm not sure if he was excited but I sure was. I am amazed at what she could get him to do with a little persistence. As you know, I was not overly thrilled with the speech he was/is getting at school. I don't think it is any fault of the therapist, just the way "things are" in the school system. I am very excited about the potential Landon showed today considering I don't feel that he progressed as much as he could have with a little more "push" during the school year. I have VERY high hopes for the months ahead. She has even agreed to allow me to video her sessions with Landon so that Travis and I can look back over it to help us better work with Landon at home.

The first thing we discussed was goals. Ms. Lori has written out a few goals for Landon to get him started. First let me show you the goals that were written in Landon's IEP for last year.

Area of Need: Expressive language
Annual Goal: By August 2010. Landon will increase expressive language skills to be able to communicate effectively , orally or by using signs, in 80% of opportunities in the school setting.

Area of Need: Articulation
Annual Goal: By August 2010, Landon will improve the intelligibility of speech production to be understood in 70% of opportunities presented daily.

These goals sound great and I agreed to them BUT looking back I have a few problems. First, no one really used signs with him. If his speech was not moving along they should have been working on signs in order to meet his expressive language goal. Second, there is no mention of how Landon was going to get from "point A" to "point B". I understand that they can't write all of the short term goals in his IEP but that is why I requested getting update every couple of weeks to let me know what they were working on. How many updates did I get last school year from speech? One, and that was after I wrote a letter requesting an update. Nothing there after.

Now, compare the IEP goals with the ones that Ms. Lori wrote after meeting Landon only one time for his evaluation.

1. Landon will select activity when presented with a picture choice in a field of up to 6 pictures 100% of opportunities with given a verbal command.

2. Landon will imitate a variety of CV sounds on 9/10 trials with minimal cueing.

3. Landon will produce simple CVC words 9/10 trials in two consecutive sessions without cueing.

4. Landon will use a sign or picture card with verbal approximations 4/5 trials to request an object during two consecutive sessions without cueing.

5. Landon will spontaneously use 5 two word combinations in one session.

Ms. Lori told me that she thought Landon would master #1, #2, & #4 soon but that gave us something to start with. #3 & #5 were the two big goals that she wanted to work on and that she would add more as she met with Landon and sees more of what his need is. I can't wait to show you what she does with him during a session. After only one meeting, she has inspired me to create a "communication board" , which I'll write about a little later, to help give Landon choices and chances to talk and put words together that we know he can say.

Due to Ms. Lori going on vacation and Landon and I taking a trip to K'ville before school starts we will not have another session until the 18th. I can't wait!!

First walk with walking toy

It's hard to believe that Landon is almost 21 months old and I am just now getting around to doing this.
Yesterday Ms. Theresa came for Landon's therapy and she wanted me to really start pushing Landon to use his walking toy more and more. He did pretty well with her but I was surprised today when I was working with him and he walked so well by him self. I grabbed the camera and shot this video. Of course, when I began the video he decided that he was over it, but this will give you a pretty good idea of what he can do. I am so proud of him.