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mamajoanOne of the problems I've seen with us being home is the lack of structure to our days. Too many of our days are just filled with dithering and lack of direction. Our bedtime routine for months now has always ended with Isaac getting into bed and us having a brief conversation about what we're going to do tomorrow (after which I turn out the light and say goodnight), but lately, far too often, it goes "and in the morning we'll have breakfast and then I don't know what we're gonna do." In fact, Isaac now fills this part in for me, even when we DO know what we're going to do the next day! Ugh. And I think that the above is stressful for Isaac in his own little way, not to mention making it harder for me in ways too.
So yesterday I sat us down and got Isaac involved in drawing up a calendar. I divided a piece of paper into 5 rectangles for the days of the week (weekends are still too nebulous right now) and had Isaac participate in helping me decide what to draw for each thing we'll do, and in drawing them. So each day starts with a brown circle, which is a bagel representing breakfast. Then on Mon and Wed we have some trucks representing Isaac playing at Cori's house. And so forth. Some of the pictures are consistent for all days -- noodles representing lunch (now he's going to expect noodles for lunch every, ugh, heh), a plate representing dinner, a little picture of Thomas representing Isaac's alloted half-hour of tv, etc. -- and some are different, e.g. a grocery cart representing a trip to the store. (And believe me, this is stretching my drawing abilities to the limit!)
Isaac enjoyed coloring the food on the plates, picking different colors for each one. And he is really enjoying going over the calendar again repeatedly, talking about what the different pictures mean, and what we're going to do. When we were drawing it and he colored green food on the plate, I said "maybe that's broccoli" so now EVERY time, he says "The green food might be broccoli!"
It's hard to be sure exactly how well he understands it, or whether having our days planned out like that really makes sense to him, or whether the consistency of the same pictures for the same activities each day has sunk in / will sink in. I think that at least he does grasp the idea that each box represents a day and the things we'll do that day. (We have been talking about this for a while, because the Red Sox calendar in our kitchen is right behind my chair, so every time we're at the table, if he looks in my direction, he sees the calendar. So we've been talking about days and weeks and months; he can now recite the days of the week in order; and he's getting exposed to the concept of boxes on the calendar representing days. He was greatly interested in the process of switching the calendar over from Sept to Oct last week.)
But anyway, I'm reinforcing it frequently by saying "if we don't know what we're doing next, we'll just look at our calendar," and I think he's starting to get it somewhat. I don't know whether it'll help, or whether I'll be able to keep it up, but at least it's something. Sigh.
In other news, today I put all the hideously ugly baby clothing that I received as gifts (mostly third-hand from one particular source, so I don't feel too guilty calling it ugly) into a box, and stuck it out on the sidewalk with a "Free" sign, and posted about it on Freecycle. And when I went out tonight to take the box in for the night, it was gone. So yay. I hope someone gets some good use out of my rejects. ;) And yay for getting some stuff OUT of the house!
So yesterday I sat us down and got Isaac involved in drawing up a calendar. I divided a piece of paper into 5 rectangles for the days of the week (weekends are still too nebulous right now) and had Isaac participate in helping me decide what to draw for each thing we'll do, and in drawing them. So each day starts with a brown circle, which is a bagel representing breakfast. Then on Mon and Wed we have some trucks representing Isaac playing at Cori's house. And so forth. Some of the pictures are consistent for all days -- noodles representing lunch (now he's going to expect noodles for lunch every, ugh, heh), a plate representing dinner, a little picture of Thomas representing Isaac's alloted half-hour of tv, etc. -- and some are different, e.g. a grocery cart representing a trip to the store. (And believe me, this is stretching my drawing abilities to the limit!)
Isaac enjoyed coloring the food on the plates, picking different colors for each one. And he is really enjoying going over the calendar again repeatedly, talking about what the different pictures mean, and what we're going to do. When we were drawing it and he colored green food on the plate, I said "maybe that's broccoli" so now EVERY time, he says "The green food might be broccoli!"
It's hard to be sure exactly how well he understands it, or whether having our days planned out like that really makes sense to him, or whether the consistency of the same pictures for the same activities each day has sunk in / will sink in. I think that at least he does grasp the idea that each box represents a day and the things we'll do that day. (We have been talking about this for a while, because the Red Sox calendar in our kitchen is right behind my chair, so every time we're at the table, if he looks in my direction, he sees the calendar. So we've been talking about days and weeks and months; he can now recite the days of the week in order; and he's getting exposed to the concept of boxes on the calendar representing days. He was greatly interested in the process of switching the calendar over from Sept to Oct last week.)
But anyway, I'm reinforcing it frequently by saying "if we don't know what we're doing next, we'll just look at our calendar," and I think he's starting to get it somewhat. I don't know whether it'll help, or whether I'll be able to keep it up, but at least it's something. Sigh.
In other news, today I put all the hideously ugly baby clothing that I received as gifts (mostly third-hand from one particular source, so I don't feel too guilty calling it ugly) into a box, and stuck it out on the sidewalk with a "Free" sign, and posted about it on Freecycle. And when I went out tonight to take the box in for the night, it was gone. So yay. I hope someone gets some good use out of my rejects. ;) And yay for getting some stuff OUT of the house!
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Date: 2006-10-10 04:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-10-10 01:24 pm (UTC)Calendars and specific things are *very* big for this age. We have some activity that "marks" every day. Monday is "back to school", tuesday is gym, wednesday is music, thursday is swimming, friday is pizza for lunch, saturday is gym, sunday is "goofing off with the family." And within each day, we have regular occuring events (but my kid's still at school, so I just steal their schedule when we're home). Every night Zoe talks about what tomorrow's going to be, and every morning she talks about what today's going to be. I think this gives her a greater sense of control over her world.
And there's also a sense of fait acompli. "Well, it's time for us to clean up now so we can go have our picnic. If we don't straighten up we can't have our picnic." It's no longer a free form choice. If that makes sense.