I've Had a Bad Day...

I had to have oral surgery to remove all 4 of my wisdom teeth today. I actually felt pretty good. I'm on pain pills, but I felt pretty good.

Until 3:30. Erick just came home from buying me some soup from Leatherby's for lunch. I was light headed and leaning against him... The next thing I knew, Erick was standing over me "Jess.. Are you okay? You just passed out!"

I told him I was fine, but my head hurt a lot. He put his hand under me to provide a pillow when he realized I was bleeding.

So, a 3 hour ER visit resulted in 4 stitches in the back of my head.

I'm fine, but I was pretty embarrassed. Hopefully I won't have any more ER visits while I'm re cooping from my wisdom teeth. And now I'll have a super cool scar on my head.

Holiday Wreath

My class made these SUPER cute holiday wreaths. It was very easy to make, so I thought I would share it with all of you.

Supplies:

1 wire hanger

1 box sandwich baggies (fold down, not zipploc)

sequins/glue

ribbon

Bend the hanger into a circle. Tie the baggies around the circle you created (only need to do half-knots). Squish baggies together to create puffed look. Glue sequins directly onto the plastic baggies. Tie the ribbon onto the hook of the hanger.

This is a great fine motor skills activity. That is an area where a majority of my kids struggle. Some of my kids had a melt-down, but after they figured it out it was great.

Out of the Mouth of Babes...

Kids say the darndest things. Here are some of the funny things I've heard recently:

"It's okay Ms. Jess. It's only a legend and it only happens at sunrise."

"It's loosing it's wet!" (Talking about a clorox wipe becoming dry)

Vocabulary card with "which" - "Witch... EW! I don't like those things!"

"Come see my Jelly Fishing dance."

"It looks like a hurricane is going to happen." (I said, "Hurricanes don't happen in Utah because the hurricane can only start in an ocean and we don't live by an ocean.) "Oh! No wonder I've never seen one!"

"I can count by 15's. Wanna hear?" (And he did!)

We talked about different areas like mountains, deserts, etc. "Hey! I'm in Kobe's habitat!"

We went to see Ballet West's Nutcracker. "The boy who took the nutcracker from Clara is a BIG BULLLLLLY!"

A Day in the Life of a Paraprofessional

I love my job. I love my kids and I love the teacher I work with. I am entertained everyday.

We have a school-wide behavior plan. If the kids are having a good day, we call it a "green day." If they're being a little naughty, it's called a "yellow day." If they have having a completely rotten day, its a "red day."

Yesterday, 5 boys in my class were on red. They were talking and talking and WOULD NOT stop no matter what we said or did. In our class, when you are on red you don't have any priveledges (ie. adult takes you to the bathroom, you don't get drink priveledges during class, etc.) The boys didn't care.

So, I got to teach those 5 boys how to clean a bathroom. It was hillarious. The best part was cleaning the girls' bathroom. The boys' bathrooms are so much yuckier than the girls', but just gong into the girl's bathroom was a problem. haha Eight year old boys are funny.

They did a good job cleaning. And they all had a better day today. No toilet cleaning.

Turkey Bowl

Every year (almost every year) we play football on Thansgiving morning. We had fun today! This is MY kind of football!
Jeff, Erick, Holly

Lorraine & Holly

Erick & Lorraine

Tom

Jeff & Erick

Reading

I've had the oppertunity to read a lot lately. It's been really nice not going to school this semester. I have read several series since August.

I started reading some mysteries by Iris Johansen. So far (and I am only on the second book of her series) I really like them. The books are companions, so you don't have to read them in order. Each book's main character is a kick-butt woman with an attitute. If you are into drama-mysteries and like to read about strong women, this is a series for you.

Social Thinking

This is a phrase I hear almost everyday, but that may be foreign to most.

Our culture is very social. There are social rules that make up our society. Part of having Austism is when that person's brain does not make the same social connections as a person who is "neurotypical".

This week I'm going to a Social Thinking conference. It is so weird to think of our culture in that way. Things like, "You have to start as a nobody to become a somebody" when teaching someone how to join a group that already as several members. She expounds upon this saying things like "You cannot join a group instantly talking, you have to look at the group and gradually focus your eyes to their faces. Then you have to wait for two people to talk before you can talk."

Who knew about these rules? Can you imagine having Autism, being thrown into a situation where you didn't know the social rules? Of course, most of us don't have that problem because our brain makes social connections easily. No wonder some of my kiddos don't know how to make friends.

I think it is amazing that our presenter, Michelle Garia Winner, can break down these "unspoken" social rules everyone is expected to understand in a way that we can teach them to our kids. Yay!