This is Christopher at church. Some Sundays he brings the mug he made in Ceramics class. The look on his face is reserved for when he’s indulging a request of mine (posing with his mug for a picture) but doesn’t mind.
Tomorrow is Christopher’s sixteenth IEP (Individualized Education Program). This is the plan that is created to determine what services a child in Special Ed will receive and what accommodations will be made to support the child. This is also where goals are established for the coming school year. The goals, whether or not they are achieved, reveal the child’s progress.
Last week he took a vocabulary test (PPVT-4 for those in the know) and scored the age equivalence of a 25-year-old. Christopher is sixteen.
That’s pretty impressive for any kid, but for a young man who is hard of hearing it’s flat out amazing.
I’m proud of my boy.
Hooray, Christopher!
I laughed at your title for this post because the most effective way we found to punish our children when they were not yet adults was to take away their books and other reading material. It wasn’t a thoroughly effective form of punishment because they would then make up their own stories for entertainment. But it worked better than any other methods we tried.
And just as an “I can really relate” sort of thing – I homeschooled our oldest son for the first five years of his schooling (He asked me to teach him how to read when he was 3 years old. What mom could possibly turn down that request?) In Florida, where we lived at the time, homeschoolers were required to have their students tested or evaluated once a year by a professional educator. When Josh was 7 years old we went for his eval at the end of the year. The educator who did the evaluation pulled me aside after he completed the vocabulary section and explained that he was reading at a sophomore in COLLEGE level, but she couldn’t put that on the paperwork for the State because first of all she didn’t think they’d believe it, and secondly each student had to show progress from year to year and there wasn’t really anywhere further for Josh to progress.
As a counterbalance, though, Josh is also special needs and he can’t do math to save his life.
Thanks, Pam B! We are so with you on the math!