I guess if you are keeping up to date with A 4 Aspergers you might be wondering why there hasn’t been an update from Mondays session at TSSV.  Don’t worry I haven’t forgotten to post, the session was not on as it was a public holiday here too.  So Elliot gets the day off, not that he really thinks he is doing anything other than playing.  So it is along week between sessions as his next session is friday with PTS…..

As Simon is away in the UK and I have no option but to take Oliver to Elliots session, so we head to PTS together.  Elliot seems to be quickly striking a bond with Joyce and is always happy to go play with her.  Lets hope that it is the same today as I will be leaving him in the class and then just going in for a 5 minute session towards the end.  I find this really frustrating as it is interesting to see what they are doing with him to know if there is any follow up at home we could be doing.  I can’t help think though it will be better for Elliot in the long run.  His 45 minute session goes really slowly trying to entertain Oliver and worrying about Elliot.  We head in for the last 5 minutes to catch up with how the session has gone.  They made an obstacle course again, sticking with the the picture maps theme Joyce helped Elliot draw what they did so he could explain to me and Miss Christie.  They played with the stretchy tunnel again, fish swing, trampoline, flip flop faces & Trapeze all to help work on strength co-ordination and motor skill. Joyce comments that he did fine without me there but was a little quiet again and reverted to lots of screaming/pointing rather than talking and communicating with her.  So little change I guess really.  He is however pretty relaxed and doesn’t seem anxious that I didn’t stay for the session so we agree that next week we will try the same.  Elliot also informs me that he likes playing with Miss Joyce on his own so it looks like this is the way forward.

As we head to the SLT session with Christie Joyce asks me if we had plans for therapy for the summer.  I tell her that we had considered the sessions at PTS  but it didn’t work out with our holiday plans.  Joyce still recommended that it would be worth putting him in a language and motor group to really help him in social situations even if he were to miss some because of his holidays.

We sit in SLT and wait for Miss Christie armed with the map of Gilroy gardens and the pictures on the ipad that we promised to prepare last week.  We also had one of Elliots favourite reading books with us that he insisted on brining.  Elliot is really pleased to see Christie and tells her all about what he did in his session with Joyce and is really making a big effort to speak clearly and form sentences.  He moves on to the map he brought from Gilroy gardens and he tells her what we did there and he then reinforces it with the pictures from the ipad and explains to her who everyone is.  He is really animated and really enjoying chatting to Christie and really opens up to her.  He then shows her his book that he brought with him and reads pretty much all of the stories to her well as best as he can as he can’t actually read.  It was pretty amazing really as i have only been reading the book with him for a few weeks and he nearly knew it all.  After he finished the book he told her that his poorly finger was better and that he had a been having some strange dreams.  He then went onto to describe the dreams very vividly to her.  It was amazing it was like someone had turned on a tap, the shy little boy that never speaks couldn’t be silenced.  The best thing was that he was really forming his words well and communicating easily with Christy and he was enjoying it :o)  It was a great feeling to see him opening up.  I got a big pat on the back from Christy she was really pleased with the massive progress he is making in a short period of time.  So we agree to do the same next week. In retrospect I am worried that he has done so well this week because Oliver was there. I suppose for the speech and language it doesn’t matter or does it.  I guess for next week Oliver will be present again and then we can see what Christie thinks going forward.  Christie has also mentioned about PTS sessions for Elliot. Maybe we should consider another programme and to hell with the expense.