2012 – 2013 school year

Friday, August 17, 2012

What a great way to end the week! Saúl arrived tired and ready to not cooperate but came back to my class after lunch with a great smile and a little hand-made book. He sat on the thinking chair in front of the thinking lights and told the story… asking me to predict what was coming next, demonstrating so many linguistic skills and non-manual markers which show meaning in ASL, and was thoroughly delightful.

Tuesday September 11, 2012

Today Saúl pointed to Zimbabwe pm a globe and asked me the name. I shook my head. He told me AUSTRALIA. I said NO AUSTRALIA IS HERE! He turned from the globe and ran to the bulletin board where a world map had been LAST YEAR and looked and said AUSTRALIA MAP GONE!

He looked at me. WHERE IS IT!?

It’s in the chapel. Elizabeth uses it on Mondays. You see it in the chapel every day.

And then as if it had just been moved… WHEN HAPPEN!?

Saúl has had some moments when he seems to be reverting to his 4 and 5 year old desire to pout and cry but so far, he is winning that battle. He accepts reasonable logic and is working towards developing his own logic.

Last week, we attended a funeral service for another student’s grandfather. Saúl saw the whole thing – coffin, body, crying people, interpreter for the music. After the service, he approached his friend, “YOU SAD? GRANDFATHER DIED?” Yea. And then he hugged his friend and quietly left the room.

October 17, 2012

Saúl has been asking questions. Today at lunch, we were talking about Adriana who has not been around this year. “ADRIANA SICK?” Yes Saúl, Adriana has been sick. “ADRIANA VERY SICK?” Not very sick but enough that she needs to be home and have her parents take care of her. OH.

After bell practice today, “WHO DROVE THE VAN?” Elizabeth. “BACKED IT UP TO HERE? ELIZABETH?” Yes Saúl Elizabeth did it. At which time Elizabeth appeared to move the van from the courtyard. “ELIZABETH DRIVES THE VAN??” Yes she does.

Saúl has been learning that fingerspelling makes words that have meaning. Some of his favorite words include:

H-U-G T-I-C-K-L-E P-A-T

P-O-K-E P-O-O-L

and by mistake one day he learned that P-O-O-P (having mis-spelled POOL) also has a meaning!

Pictured to the right, are Saúl and his puppy and Bazooka who was quite interested in meeting a puppy.

February 2013

Letters! We love letters! Saúl loves to send letters to people. So far his letters have been mostly lists of names of people.

Mostly HIS name and the name of whomever he is writing to. This week he got a letter and he READ it! Thank you Laina for writing a simple letter he could read mostly independently! He took the photo to show to Bazooka. Bazooka complied nicely

Next to write back. It went something like this:

LAINA SAUL LOVE.
BAZOOKA SAUL HUG.
TICKLE. (He giggled as he wrote that one!)
HUG.
LAINA LOVE.
SAUL (heart)

Amazing letter to his friend!

Also this week Saúl asked, “GERRY FLY?”
Gerry is building a new cupboard for the school kitchen. Saúl intends to work with Gerry. He was so concerned that Gerry had left without working with Saúl.

Finally Gerry returned from a drive and collected Saúl. They worked on the drawers. Saúl mastered the task of putting the wood glue onto the drawer grooves in preparation for the drawer bottoms to be placed. When he saw the nail gun, Saúl asked, “WHO BUY?” YES! A perfect question!

Saúl showed me this saw. He wanted to know why the piece was missing. ME too…
Saúl managed to use the sander and learned to get the edges as well as the center. Finally four drawers were completed and Saúl
returned to classroom work without crying, pouting or complaining. Amazing growth in behaviour in just a few months!

March 19, 2013

Saúl asked Rebekah at lunch today, “YOU BORN JOELLA?”

After getting an affirmative response, he then asked or told about other birth mothers. When asked about his own mother, “HOW-MANY BORN YOUR MOM?”

He replied, “MY MOTHER, WALKIRIA, BORN GABY, KIONEY, ME SAúL BORN THREE.”

He also was tactful in not asking single females about how many children they had had.

May 1, 2013

This month in calendar, we are writing questions to each other. I write questions for Saúl and he writes questions for me. He wrote this on Friday May 3. Very wonderful grasp of the concepts needed though the meaning was elusive until he signed it for me.