New Learning Goals for Gavin

Thursday I opened Gavin's book bag and was greeted by his newest Individualized Education Program (IEP).  It was really exciting to see the great leaps and bounds he has made in the past year and a half.  The first file contained the previous years goals and notes that his different teachers took.

Occupational Therapy

February 2011

• He struggled with holding scissors correctly, progressed with fasteners and buttons and snaps, taking turns, didn't know a single color and couldn't count to 5 (let alone 10), his vocabulary was incredibly limited, his gross motor skills worried his teachers, and many other little things.  When he first began therapy he really struggled with being verbal.  One of the main skills they wanted to work on was the ability to put items in categories.  He struggled with putting items such as animals and food in their category.  Instead he would group them by what he liked and disliked.  He struggled with spatial concepts and following directions

 February 2012

• He now will tolerate 15 minutes of upper body strengthening - which aides him in his gymnastics at the Little Gym!!! 
• He makes good attempts to hold his pencils and crayons but always reverts to this weird way of holding his writing utensils.  (His dad has the same grip). 
• Gavin has improved on taking turns, but hasn't met his goal   LOL, we have this problem at home too.  We are working on it daily - but he isn't very patient!
•  He now knows all the basic colors, and his basic shapes.  He counts to 13.  (he then consistently goes 16, 21, 14, 15 . . . )it cracks me up how he gets into his own pattern and sticks to it.  Last week he started to count, paused at 13 and then went to 19.  Oh, I was so proud of him
• A year later now has a good understanding of spatial concepts (He is so close to his goal - he is 70/80%  Way to go Gavin).  He knows large medium and small 100%, he struggles with two step directives.  
• Gavin struggles with who, what, when, where, and why questions.  He often gets this lost look, or will answer with something completely off the wall.   The speech therapist mentioned that he is very inconsistent with the goal.  There will be some days that he will answer the questions at 100% and then others he just misses the mark completely.  The great news is he is labeling his vocabulary words correctly most of the time.  It is so neat to know that a year and a half ago his vocabulary was around 100 words and now we can have an entire conversation with him.  
• Over the year Gavin can now catch a ball both while he is sitting and standing, and he has increased his throwing ability.
• He has met all of his gross motor skill goals. Yipee!

New Goals
Here is a list of his goals for the next six months (He will have a new IEP for Kindergarten)

•  Hold his pencil correctly
• hold scissors correctly and cut a 3 inch sized object with less than 1/2" deviation
• be able to perform a variety of manipulatives (Stringing, lacing, fasteners)
• Count by rote to 20 and be able to count 15 objects.
• improve appropriate classroom behavior (wait his turn, stay in his own space, share toys)
• point to pictures/objects when presented a descriptive/concept word (Hard/soft, same/different, long/short, empty/full)
• sequence 3-4 picture cards
• Identify groups of items that belong together (clothes, food, animals, etc.)
• He will verbalize social acceptable behaviors (wait my turn, don't interrupt verbally, don't touch game or person).
• He will sequence 3-4 picture cards using a simple sentence in imitation and then with prompts.
• Label nouns, verbs, and adjectives in picture cards
• Work on throwing to a target, underhanded, and overhanded.
• Hop on one foot, in linear fashion.  Walk on a line or balance beam for 8 ft (he hates the balance beam, he is afraid he will fall off.  We are working on that one at little gym).

I think these are great goals.  What I love about getting his IEP is that I know specific things that he is working on at school and it gives me a guide as to what to work with him at home as well.