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Special Needs
What's your child's preschool daily notes like?
DS started a self contained preschool program in our school district. It's been about a week he started, but I haven't gotten any feedback from his notes or teacher. I know it is very early and the staff is trying to figure out each kids needs in the class. But I am trying to pry my son to talk about school and he doesn't talk. He cries every morning that he doesn't want to go to "new" school (he was in F/T day care before) I am just wondering if I should be asking more details. What is the proper etiquette here, can I email his teacher for more details, what notes do you get back on a daily basis? I also I noticed all my son's lunches are coming home as is and it makes me wonder they are expecting him to feed himself. My son's self care skills are not on par with his peers. Any thoughts?
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Re: What's your child's preschool daily notes like?
My son has some self help skills. He can feed himself yougurt, bread sandwich and gold fish. But he doesn't know how to eat pasta, rice or lunch entrees. I mentioned this to his teachers and in his IEP meeting. I also send daily notes mentioning that please help him feed his lunch. But, I get no response. Yesterday I got a single line note for the whole day saying "he didn't like applesauce". Great! One day I got a note back that belonged to another kid and I mentioned it and there was no response.
I will send an email to the teacher stating my concerns. His IEP goals do not have self help as goal, I even mentioned that he is very resistant to potty training and they said he would get help with training and that it does not need to be on IEP.
Our school does give a "daily" note, I put daily in quotations because I definitely don't get a note every single day. I'd say 3x per week is normal.
But its a pre-printed form that the teacher checks off boxes.
Overall today I followed directions, needed a little help following directions, needed a lot of help following directions
Today I ate all of my lunch, ate some of my lunch ate a little lunch
Today we worked on....gross motor, pretend, fine motor - with a blank line for the teacher to write in the unit they worked on.
Stuff like that.
There is a notes section at the bottom for additional notes but that is rarely filled in.
This is exactly what I get. This year I can see they are trying harder to send the notes daily- last year it was very sporadic, maybe once a week. Like you, I'm used to having detailed daily sheets from daycare. This isn't the case in public school. I do email once in awhile to check in, but I try to make it about something important. The teacher is usually emailing me back late at night, and I know she is busy during the day. But she does want to know what things are difficult, or if something has changed at home. DS went through a stage where he cried about going to public school. I let them know and they created a nice social story book for him.
Eating is a tough one too. I let DS eat hot lunch. When he was 3 I never heard about what he ate. I'd ask him and he'd refuse to tell me, or he'd just lie and say he had pizza- every day. This year is a bit better- he's 4 and is opening up a little. I've asked his teachers and they tell me he's the best eater of the group, so I try not to worry. I agree though, 100% self feeding will be necessary for kindy, so it'll be on our IEP this year.
I am having the EXACT same concern. Chris, like your LO, can feed himself yogurt, goldfish, sandwich but not some of the complex foods I saw on their menu. I mean he CAN but he needs someone there next to him, prompting him, especially in a completely new environment. I put a note in his notebook asking them to let me know when he didn't eat his lunch because I know sometimes he goes into "no" mode and there's no getting him out of it. I really doubt the school staff is going to engage in the kind of persuading I do at home to get him to eat sometimes. The only response I got was that he ate dry cereal, peach slices and apple juice - that's great, except that was breakfast. I specifically mentioned "lunch" in my question.
DH says I can't start doubting the school this early but I'm a little worried.
I totally understand how you feel. I understand preschool is not to teach kids how to eat. But I always wonder if my son is not eating then how can he concentrate and learn? He would spend his day hungry, tired and whining. That is a lose-lose situation for us and school district.
Also, I never went to elementary/high school here in US (though i got my masters in US but that is university) so, I don't what the underlying expectations of students are in the US schools.My views of school expectations are what I read from these forums and here-say.
PLUS we are East Indian vegetarian family with a completely different lunch menu which consists of rice dishes, soups and stews. We don't have the sandwich, wrap dishes on our menu. I want my son to eat what we eat at home and not bend over my back to make him a separate lunch to make it easier at school. He used to eat all these foods at day care with some prompting. I am just concerned about his calorie intake and also that he may lose the food variety which took forever to develop in him
I suppose I will watch his food intake for one more week and like Auntie suggested, I suppose I will send foods which he can eat and give him a big dinner at night. It's always a trade off with special needs kids I think.
At ds's school last year we had a folder with notebook paper in it that we could send notes back and forth, I would get notes if ds didn't eat, if he said a new word, needed more diapers, etc. We didn't get notes every day, it was only if there was something to report.
This year I pick up/drop off ds at his classroom so if there is something to discuss his teacher will tell me in the morning or afternoon.
If you have concerns I would definitely call the teacher or send an email.
We get next to no info. I plan on checking in at least monthly.
I would have his IEP adjusted to include more self help skills. In terms of lunch, my son doesn't receive OT services and is actually right now in a community preschool but I looked very carefully at lunchboxes he could open himself and pack only things I know he can eat himself in a relatively clean and timely manner. I.e. I don't send hot food or foods that are too complex. The most complicated I've gone is a yogurt tube. The teachers say they will help and even heat things up, but I figure with 10+ kids to help, the more he can do himself, the better. I also practiced with him a few days before school started so he was used to it and had some practice opening it up "all by himself!"
It might not be what you really want him eating, but if you make it a focus area of development, you might be able to start off with simple foods he can self feed and make it more complex as the year goes on, eventually getting him onto more of a typical diet and self feeding.
I highly recommend planet lunchbox containers - they are fantastic!
This is what we get daily as well. There is also a section where the teacher checks off services received (OT, ST, etc) as well as any special activities such as Science Lab, etc.
At my school (DD attends the SNPre there), all teachers are required to do a "Glance at the Week Ahead" blog post each Friday so that gives me an idea about what books, songs, crafts, etc. they are going to do since LA is not at the point where she can effectively verbalize her day.
Thanks Auntie for your insight! Definitely being an expat living in the US is a HUGE challenge in itself without having a special needs child. But add to the mix a special needs child with special diet and restrictions owing to our culture, it really makes it harder for the goals we set for ourselves as a family. I am always open to other cultures and foods and his lunch menu is not just complicated Indian fare, his pasta/pizza and sandwiches come back home untouched too,which breaks my heart.
Oh, I didn't meant to sound arrogant or selfish. May be English being my second language, sometimes what I think comes out differently when I type it down. I actually wrote an email to the teacher yesterday mentioning how thankful we are that DS is in a good program and mentioned my concerns to her. She wrote a nice big email with all the feedback, which I really appreciate. And she actually mentioned that DS eats all his snacks and lunch by himself without any help!! Which is HUGE for us.
I could be having more expectations of preschool coming from a day care setting, I cannot rule that out. But I am willing to adjust and do what it takes to get my son where he needs to be. All I really want for my DS is to have energy to go through the long day at preschool. My heart breaks when all he gets for lunch is apple sauce and the lunch I send comes back untouched. And I am not just sending complicated Indian fare, the pasta, pizza also came back untouched along with bananas and other snacks I sent. And unfortunately, the school does not have a microwave which makes things difficult for DS. Definitely, It is an adjustment for him/us and the school too. In the process of getting him ready for mainstream, we as a family do not want to lose sight of his culture/background too. That is very important for us as an expat family living in the US and I hope we don't have to undermine the work we put into it so far. Very delicate balance for sure.